Given that an old software box can house a small ITX motherboard, you should find that discarded stereos, DVD players, games consoles and even waste paper bins can all be used to house your motherboard, hard disk drive and PSU, along with any additional storage items you deem use

Computers have changed a lot over the last decade, but one thing remains the same – the need for cooling. Efficiency has pushed temperatures down but hasn’t eliminated heat as an issue. That’s particularly true for high-end workstations and gaming

We finally have a custom budget gaming desktop that was cheaper to build than to just buy an Alienware X51! I installed Ubuntu as it's the most common distribution of Linux and the most recommended distro of game developers like Steam. Of course, to make full use of the graphics card, I also installed AMD's proprietary graphics drivers (to learn how, read Installed Ubuntu on Your Laptop? 6 Tweaks You'll Nee

How hard is it to get a decent gaming PC without breaking the bank? If you go out and buy yourself a pre-assembled name-brand computer, chances are, it won't be powerful enough to be a viable gaming Hardware updates|https://pcbuildinsight.com/ computer, or you'll spend a lot more than you would prefer. Essentially, neither of these two possibilities are ideal, and it seems like you have no other options. Maybe if you put it in a little labor into building your own computer, you might be able to find a middle ground where you get decent gaming performance at the right pr

Everything inside a computer must connect to the motherboard for it to function. Most motherboards have a significant number of connectors for installing new hardware, but the number is finite, and can be filled to capacity more quickly than you’d th

Once you have a fan of the correct size you need to open your case and line up the fan with the mounting area. It will have four screw holes, as will the fan, so you just need to line up the screw holes on e

Slide the SSD into its bracket, lining up the screw holes in the SSD or the 3.5" adapter with the holes in the drive bay. Make sure to install the drive so that its SATA power and data connectors are facing the motherbo

This most commonly occurs because you’re using an older operating system or an unpopular one. Windows XP will work with most of today’s hardware despite its age, but you’re often going to be left with reduced functionality. Mac OS X is very finicky about the hardware it will work with. Linux is a little better, but only if you stick with popular, well-supported distributi

You may find your power supply doesn’t match up if your case is particularly old and you’re trying to use it with a newish motherboard. Older PSUs have only 20 pins, while newer ones have 24. You can see the difference in this ph

Rosewill Dual Fans MicroATX Mini Tower Computer Case FBM-01 : This case was chosen as more of an afterthought, as the case really doesn't matter as long as it can house the components you picked out. It's cheap, it's sturdy, and it's not terrible looking. It certainly doesn't scream "gaming", but if you're on such a tight budget, that doesn't quite matter. Cover it with cool stickers if you feel like

Structure-wise, don’t rely on the narrow bricks; instead, design your case to use the wider type of bricks, those with 2 x 3 or 2 x 4 pegs. Offering more support, these pieces are also more similar to real-life bricks. Flat, "plate"-style pieces should also be used in areas of the case where additional structural support is requi

Also, back up your data. This is a guide about installing a solid state hard drive. Even if nothing goes wrong, that new drive will be blank, and you’ll have to install a fresh version of your operating system on it or clone an existing drive to

Whether you’re looking at building a standard tower for media or gaming or an impressive server farm , Lego is a great choice of material! (note that for successful long-term use you will probably need to glue your bric

This is probably the hardest step of all. Before securing the motherboard to the case, I made sure to write down a quick diagram of the jumper pins for the case switches and LEDs as they're difficult to see once the motherboard is in place. These can be found on the bottom left, if you were looking down into the machine, and they look like t

Component prices on Amazon fluctuate depending on the vendor, but generally, the total should float around the $500 mark. According to today's prices, I exceeded my budget by about $4 but at the time of purchase, it only costed $

ASUS M5A78L-M LX PLUS AM3+ AMD 760G Micro ATX AMD Motherboard : I went with ASUS for the motherboard because I've never had any problems with their motherboards and they're pretty known for reliability (among others, but ASUS is a good choice). This motherboard has everything that I need -- AM3+ support for the latest processors, support for up to 8 GB of RAM, a PCI-Express slot, and multiple available SATA po