HOWTO: Computer Assembly For Beginners
So, you've posted the requisite 'critique my computer parts selection' thread and placed your order. One day a man arrives with some boxes. How the hell do you get all these boxes plugged together?
I'm writing this for a beginner. S/he knows how to use computers fairly well but hasn't made a computer solo yet. S/he probably has a good grasp of the components which make up a modern PC. I've made several pretty deep assumptions about the type of hardware being put together. On balance it's probably the most common types of hardware used in self-builds.
1: Identifying Your Parts
Here are our parts:
- A CPU
- Some RAM
- One or more harddisks
- A motherboard
- A case
- An optical drive, such as a CD-ROM, CD-RW, DVD-ROM or DVD±RW
- An AGP graphics card (optional)
1: CPU
This is a retail-boxed AMD AthlonXP 2800+. As it's a retail box, you get a very good heatsink/cooler included:
2: RAM
This is two 512 megabyte sticks of Hynix DDR RAM, which can run at 333MHz (which is equivelent 2,700MB/s and so is also known as "PC2700").
3: Hard Disks
This is a Western Digital 80GB disk which runs at 7,200RPM and has 8MB of cache. A good fast choice unless you need lots of storage.
4: Motherboard
This is an Asus A7N8X-VM. It has onboard graphics, sound, LAN and USB2. It's based around NVIDIA's nForce2 chipset which is extremely popular and performs well. The onboard video is equivalent to a Geforce 4MX which isn't too good for 3D games but fine for everything else.
Let's quickly look around the most important parts of the board:
The CPU socket. This is known as a zero insertion force (ZIF) socket, which basically means it's effortless to insert and remove the CPU. You can see the brown ZIF lever running along the bottom of the socket.
The expansion slots. At the top we have the AGP slot for graphics cards. Below we have three PCI slots for things like sound cards, network interface controllers (NICs), TV cards and so on.
The RAM slots and disk interfaces. The two black slots in the center are for DDR RAM. Along the bottom we have the IDE connectors (labeled PRI_IDE and SEC_IDE) and the floppy drive connector. Also note the CPU fan connector in the top right.
The ATX power connector.
Odds and ends which come with the motherboard. There's a bag with IDE and floppy drive cables, the cable and bracket for the onboard TV-out, the ATX back-plate and manual.
5: Case
This is the cheapest cast I could find. You hopefully bought a more expensive case because cheap cases are generally horrible to work with. This case comes with a cheap and nasty power supply preinstalled. Inside your case you'll find a bundle of bits which will vary with the case and locale. In this case we have a UK to IEC adaptor, a bag of screws, a spare ATX blanking plate and four plastic feet.
6: Optical Drive
This PC of mine isn't going to have a optical drive. On the other hand, you need one to easily install an operating system. I'll be installing this temporarily:
7: Graphics Card
It isn't going to have a seperate graphics card either. Here's a picture of a basic AGP graphics card so you can identify one:
Now we've identified and looked at the components, let's begin assembly!
2: Installing the CPU
This is arguably the most difficult part and it catches out a lot of beginners. It's fairly simple as long as you remember at only one point do you need to apply any force.Start by flipping the CPU over (hold by the edges only) and examining the pins. At two corners you'll notice a missing pin. If you now examine the socket on the motherboard you'll see the same pattern.
This establishes the orientation the CPU should be inserted.
First unclip the ZIF lever and swing it up till it's vertical.
Place the CPU into the socket. It should drop snugly into place. You should never need to press it down into the socket.
Now press the ZIF lever down until it clips into place parallel with the board.
Now examine the underside of the heatsink. The'll be a patch of goo (don't touch it) and one edge will be indented:
Line up this indentation with the raised portion of the ZIF socket.
Now examine the clip in the picture above. It clips onto the ZIF socket here:
Now see the other side of the heatsink. You should see something like this:
This is where you need to apply a little force. Carefully move the board to a completely flat, solid surface while retaining the thin foam which is under it in the box. I've got it on one side of the case here. A table is better.
Stick a flat-edged screwdriver into the clip and press downwards and outwards. The result should be that the clip should move over the tabs on the ZIF socket and snap into place. The amount of force necessary varies between heatsinks. Once the heatsink is fitted the clip should look like this:
Now fit the cable which is attached to the cooler. The socket should be close to the CPU socket.
All done!
3: Installing the RAM
This is fairly easy. Take your time and make sure you get the orientation correct.DDR RAM is keyed in a certain way so it can only be inserted in the correct orientation. The key is shown here:
On each end of the socket are white (or another colour perhaps) tabs. Swing them out like this:
Notice how in this picture the RAM is snugly in it's rails. Now place a thumb on each end of the RAM stick and firmly press downwards. The white tabs should flick back up and the RAM will click into place. The white tabs might need pushing in the last few millimeters - they should be in the nicks in the RAM.
Finished!
4: Preparing the Case
This is boring. You need to fit the ATX back plate which came with your motherboard and install the threaded spacers. First, let's look at the different hardware you get in the bag of screws which came in your case.
In this image you can see (from left to right) three types of screws, the aforementioned threaded spacers, an alternate type of threaded spacers and paper washers. My case, being a cheap piece of shit, uses both types of spacers.
The different types of screws you get is important.
- The top type has a fine thread and is used for fitting optical drives and floppy drives.
- The middle type is used for fitting PCI cards, some types of harddisk and (if you lose the originals) securing the side-panels. They have a coarse thread and distinctive hexagonal head and round collar.
- The bottom type are used for fitting the motherboard to the threaded spacers. The should fit perfectly into these:
Your motherboard tray will have many different holes for different sized ATX boards. Place your board into the case gently to determine which holes need spacers installing. Be wary of installing spacers where they aren't needed - this can cause real headaches or even destroy your motherboard!
Half the spacers installed.
All the spacers installed.
Now you need to consider the back-plate. Most need to be viciously destroyed to be removed. Mine is removed using two screws.
Once it's installed, you're ready to put in your motherboard. There's a gotcha here though. Some back-plates will have thin tabs which are meant to press against the top of the connector housings on the motherboard. Watch that they don't get pushed into the connectors! You might need to bend them upwards a little.
Once you have the motherboard installed properly you should see the connectors through the back-plate and the threaded spacers through the motherboard's mounting holes.
Now select the correct type of screw, place on a paper washer and screw in the motherboard.
Insert the motherboard power connector, and you're done!
5: Installing IDE Devices
Most motherboards will have two basic IDE channels - primary and secondary. You saw the connectors above - marked PRI_IDE and SEC_IDE. Each IDE channel can have two devices - one "master" and one "slave". If you only have one device on a channel it should be set to master. By device I mean an IDE harddisk, an IDE CD-ROM/CD-RW/DVD-ROM/DVD±RW/etc.These settings are made with combinations of "jumpers" on the back of the drives.
Here you see both the jumpers and the legend - you can see it's currently set on cable select. Most people dislike cable select. It's better to set master/slave explicitly instead of have it automatically assigned based on what order the drives are on the cable.
Jumper settings vary so much between drives and manufacturers it's impossible to cover here. The worst thing which can go wrong is that your drive won't be detected and you'll have to come back to it. Attach the cables to your drives and the motherboard (some cables are colour coded in which case you should connect Blue -> Motherboard, Grey -> Slave and Black -> Master). Connect the power connectors at this point, too. IDE and power connectors are all keyed so it's hard to get it inserted wrong :)
Insert the IDE drives into their respective positions. For CD/DVD drives you'll have to remove a bezel (and maybe the underlying blanking plate). Some cases have funky and very nice rail systems for drives (most antecs do for example). If not, you'll have to remove the other side panel to get access to the screws which secure the other side of the drives.
For my build I'm using caddies so I can swap between my two identical 80GB drives quickly. You probably won't need or want these. Here's what an IDE harddisk looks like installed in the case and installed in the caddy:
6: Installing a Graphics Card
No pictures for this section, sorry. However, installing an AGP graphics card is simple. If it's a new, cheap case, you'll have to knock a hole for the AGP card in the back-panel. Insert a cross-head screwdriver in the top of the blanked hole and tap downwards. Then twist the blank free and discard.Now place the AGP card into the slot and (like you did fitting the RAM) press firmly downwards with your thumbs. It's fully inserted when you can see none of the copper-coloured connector strip.
7: Go!
Wait!Before anything will happen, you need to do the fiddly job of connecting the case buttons and lights to your motherboard.
This is what the cables connected to your front-panel will look something like. Look in your motherboard manual to see where they should be plugged in. Don't worry about the orientation of these - LEDs aren't damaged by being reversed (although they won't work) and switches (perhaps obviously) work either way.
Now double check you plugged in the CPU fan.
Plug in the power cable, the monitor and keyboard. Press the power switch. With any luck, you'll get the POST screen. Done!
8: It doesn't work!
- Absolutely nothing happens.
- It beeps.
- THE FUCKER TALKS TO ME.
Good luck!
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