It really didn't occur to me until this week
I've swapped parts, I've diagnosed problems, and I've made recommendations.
I even have, technically, put entire PCs together, but this usually involved cannibalizing a few dead PCs into one working one. A case from this one, motherboard from that one, RAM and HDDs from yet another one, a used CPU from eBay, etc., and a whole working PC resulted. Franken-systems, if you will.
Also, I've helped friends make part selections, installed SOME of the parts, etc.
But building a new one from the ground up? Actually, never in the entire 23 years that I've been dealing with PCs. Generally when I was looking, Dell would throw some insane sale and I'd be stuck with the "I can't put one together with the same parts for that little money" situation.
Now it's different, though. There were no great deals like that to sabotage me, and, when I asked my son (age 13) if he'd be interested in the two of us building one for him, he was enthused.
So, the parts are ordered up. We're doing a mid-range system, and this is the parts list. Some parts have so far arrived, and some have not. And, there's been a hiccup or two.
Then I'll finally be able to say "Yes, I actually have put together a complete, new system."
I've swapped parts, I've diagnosed problems, and I've made recommendations.
I even have, technically, put entire PCs together, but this usually involved cannibalizing a few dead PCs into one working one. A case from this one, motherboard from that one, RAM and HDDs from yet another one, a used CPU from eBay, etc., and a whole working PC resulted. Franken-systems, if you will.
Also, I've helped friends make part selections, installed SOME of the parts, etc.
But building a new one from the ground up? Actually, never in the entire 23 years that I've been dealing with PCs. Generally when I was looking, Dell would throw some insane sale and I'd be stuck with the "I can't put one together with the same parts for that little money" situation.
Now it's different, though. There were no great deals like that to sabotage me, and, when I asked my son (age 13) if he'd be interested in the two of us building one for him, he was enthused.
So, the parts are ordered up. We're doing a mid-range system, and this is the parts list. Some parts have so far arrived, and some have not. And, there's been a hiccup or two.
- The case was the toughest choice. I had to do the most work searching for that - I've NEVER bought a case before! I was thinking to go without clear panels, and just a no-nonsense case that looked reasonably good, quiet, and with good cooling. Naturally, almost everything that seemed reasonable also had clear panels.
- On the plus side, my son thinks it looks awesome, and apparently the idea of the LED fans appeals to him.
- I was originally planning on getting the same CPU, but the ASRock B450M Pro, but their discount deal dropped from $30 off to $20 off, making it no longer worth making the drive out there, because the deal showed up for the same CPU on Amazon, and the same motherboard was $20 less from NewEgg.
- Naturally, that motherboard ran out of stock literally before I could make the clicks to purchase it, thus the Steel Legend instead. Only $10 more, and the reinforced PCIe x 16 slot seems like a good move.
- As mentioned in the case of the PC's case, the LEDs thing seems to be a positive rather than a negative for my son.
- Looking up RAM from the QVL list is less than fun, and there are so many part numbers that even PC Part Picker are like "What, did you find that at a street vendor in Calcutta?" I went to Corsair's website and looked it up by MB brand and model. I hope they are right about this.
- I went with the Ryzen 5 1600 rather than the 2600 because the 1600 comes with the Wraith Spire instead of the Wraith Stealth, and the performance advantage the 2600 has over the 1600 couldn't justify a 35% higher price.
- Of course this led to the biggest (in my eyes) hiccup - it arrived, new in box, but was packed with a Wraith Stealth rather than a Wraith Spire. The Amazon website's UI seemed to only offer the possibility of a refund, but I just want an exchange, so I had to call (shocking, they actually have a phone number where you can talk to a person), and Amazon sent emails to the vendor (and to me), so hopefully this gets straightened out.
- The case, PSU, Intel SSD and a Synology NAS (not technically part of this build, but something I'd been planning on getting anyway) were in one order. For whatever reason, the case was shipped separately, and arrived quickly. The rest of it is coming to New Jersey from . . Ontario, Canada? And, until today, it was stuck in the Departure Scan status since the 3rd of this month.
- However, today that status updated to: "Recent weather has caused delivery delays. Recovery efforts are under way to deliver your package as soon as possible." Fun times.
- My son's mother's in the school system, so she may be able to get a legitimate Education version license key for Windows 10 for $14.99
Then I'll finally be able to say "Yes, I actually have put together a complete, new system."
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