Plan a Computer Build: Part 1

No, I'm not planning another build. It's just that it's an often asked question during our "Computer Club" meetings with the students. Each new group goes through this, so I figured it's a good time to get it down somewhere instead of reinventing the wheel each time!

These are high school students, so 99% of the time, they want to build a gaming PC. So, the first and most important question is typically answered..... "what do you want to do with it". In todays suburbia, the vast majority of them already have a computer, although, it's almost always a laptop. AND.....it's typically some low end machine purchased from Wal-mart or Best Buy and plays games badly! Which is what leads them to join Computer Club to start with! It being 2016, they've all watch a bunch of videos on YouTube of guys building machines and are now well and truly confused, although they can say a few words in tech; like SSD, 4K, water-cooling and nVidia Titan.

Since we know that this will be a gaming build, then the actual graphics card will go last. Bear with me on this....

I usually start here. Let me explain my rationale:

• Most people know where this computer is going to live, both now and in the next few years.
• The location of the machine often dictates the physical size limitations (such as a dorm-room). They're not going to be in high school forever! Plus "computer club" type kids are typically college-bound.
• In today's world, you can build a decent gaming (or any) PC in any form-factor you want.
• If you're looking to buy a gaming laptop, you have too much money to be reading my blog!
• The price and performance of cases rarely if ever change, although the models often do, so if you see something you like, you might want to grab it now before they stop making it!

Increasingly, I find people looking to do something in the Micro-ATX or Mini-ITX size. Guys like me who want or need to install 3, 4, 5 or more drives, plus optical drives are dinosaurs! So, it becomes a matter of size and budget, balancing asthetics. I'm going to focus on Mini-ITX here since Micro-ATX is mostly just smaller ATX cases.

Some of you might remember my son's gaming machine build in an Azza case. I'll call this type the "console replacement". They are slender, about as tall as they are deep, and can be oriented in both vertical and horizontal direction for placement. They're typically a quadrant inside with sections for, PSU, motherboard, drives, and GPU. They range from the rather garish look of this Azza CSAZ-103 that my teenager son loves, to very subtle Silverstones and Fractals. 

The other team is populated by the "box" style such as this Cooler Master Elite 110. They range from "bread-box" to "cube". These usually can house standard component (ATX PSU for instance), and typical have more drive placement options. The Fractal Node is well-know for it's ability to hold several drives and is a good candidate for a mini-server build.

While on that topic, there are a number of specialty cases designed specifically for "other" uses, such as this Silverstone DS380 for server and the above Corsair 380t which is obviously created for portability. Can you say "Lan Party"!?! So, figure out what you want, how you want it to look, and lets get started!

Next post; it'll be motherboard time.