Is It Hard To Build Your Own Computer?

Answer 1

Only if you're not trained in knowing how to do the process. Take a technical class and learn how. YOu'll learn and once you know how it'll be easy if you have all the parts.

Answer 2

It greatly depends on your experiance with computers. If you have done modifications to computers before like installing graphics cards and hard drives, its really not much more difficult. Most motherboards come with instructions as well as far as what plugs in where. The biggest key is making sure you buy the right parts for the board, you dont want to spend a couple hundred dollars on a PCI-E graphics card to find that your board only supports AGP. Same goes for ram, processors and hard drives. If your going for a high end machine and want to fine tune the BIOS so that it works well or you want to overclock, it starts to get tricky. If you have never done this before, take a class and learn how, its alot of fun to build your own machine. Also, if your building a high end machine it will save you alot of money over buying a prebuilt one. Mine cost about a third of what a similar one would be through Dell or Alien. I bought all my parts through www.newegg.com they ship fast and have great service.

If your just wanting one to surf the web or do basic word processing or something a cheap one from Dell, Gateway or E-machines is the way to go. You wont really save too much building it yourself, and its easyer.

Answer 3

Your own knowledge is one of the most important things to consider. The first time I built a computer I didn't have any problems, but it took me awhile to figure out how the power connected to the motherboard and that you have to pull the lever back on the socket to insert the CPU. While I can't go over all these little bits, I will go over the basics of assembling a computer.

Difficulty Level:

I won't say it's easy, but it's definitely a lot easier than most would think. All it really involves is putting cards in slots and connecting a few cables to the proper connectors. There isn't any real wiring or anything required.

Recommendations:

Start with the basics. Only connect your motherboard, CPU, video card, hard drive, and memory in the case. Wait to add other components like sound cards, CD-ROM drives, and modems until later. You can actually start up without the hard drive connected, but it won't do much. Before purchasing items, make sure that they will all work together okay and are compatible with the system you are building.
I'll go over the basic procedures, but there may be more required than this. I'm trying to keep it simple.
First, open your case, there will be a plate that the motherboard will go on. Use screws or the plastic anchors to connect the motherboard solidly to the plate. Insert the plate back into the case (if it was a removable one). For CPUs, if you are using a Pentium II, you need to make sure the CPU bracket is in place on the motherboard before putting the motherboard on the plate. After the motherboard is in the case, slide the CPU into the slot or if you have a socket CPU, lift the lever on the socket all the way up and place the CPU into the socket. Then push the lever back down. Put the CPU heatsink/fan on top of the CPU (if it doesn't already have one), preferably using thermal paste to create a good seal, and connect a power supply connector to the heatsink/fan.
Before you go on, make sure you have the jumpers set correctly for the CPU's voltage, bus speed, and multiplier. Also, make your power supply connections on the motherboard. For an AT case, make sure that P9 is above P8 (P9 closer to the back of the case or the top of the case). Most motherboards are now ATX and only have one power connector to worry about. You can also connect the wires to the jumpers on the motherboard for the power LED, hard drive LED, speaker, keylock, etc., but they aren't that important and you may want to wait until you have everything else working okay.
Now secure the hard drive into a bay in the case. Connect a powersupply connector to the hard drive and connect the hard drive to its cable and the other end to your IDE controller on the motherboard or your SCSI controller.
Secure the floppy drive in a bay in the case and connect a power supply connector to it. Then connect the data cable to the floppy drive and connect the other end to the motherboard's floppy connector.
Put your memory into the proper DIMM, RIMM, or SIMM slot(s). Push down until they snap into place. If they are fully seated, the clasps at the ends should fit over your memory.
Place your video card into any PCI slot or the AGP slot if it is an AGP video card (most current ones are). Connect your monitor to the back of the video card.
If it's an AT motherboard, connect the COM ports, serial ports, and parallel port connectors to the motherboard and secure the other ends in the case's slots. Connect your printer, mouse, etc. to these, and connect the keyboard to the keyboard connector.
You've got the basics done, now try starting up your computer. Now would be a good time to fdisk and format your hard drive if it is a new hard drive or has no important data on it (both programs should be on the disk that came with your hard drive or perhaps on the windows startup disk). From the floppy disk, run "fdisk" to setup partitions on your hard drive. The easiest thing to do would be to make 1 partition and make it active. Run "format" to format the hard drive (erases all data on the disk).
You can now add your CD-ROM drive which you will probably need to have to access to your Windows 95 or 98 installation CD. Once this is in, boot with a Windows 98 or newer startup disk which should give you access to your CD-ROM drive. Now you can go ahead and install your operating system. You should be able to go to your CD-ROM drives drive letter (type "D:" then enter, assuming your CD-ROM drive is D). Then type setup.exe to begin setting up windows. Or, you could wait and install your sound card, modem, etc. before installing the operating system.
Insert the modem, sound card, network card, and/or whatever other hardware you may have into the other PCI or ISA slots. Add any other hard drives, removable drives, scanners, speakers, etc. after your operating system is functioning correctly.
For more information on formatting, fdisk, etc. read through the How-Tos tutorials

Answer 4

Buy a A+ certified tech book and go to http://www.newegg.com and get your parst. I didn't know ANYTHING about computer and this is what I did. Cost me $200 and now my friends are having me build them one!!! It's NOT that hard if you follow the book and research a bit. Don't let people discourage you..they just want you to come to them and pay them like triple what you could build it for yourself.

Answer 5

No, is easy to build one. First, you have to know what you need to buy. Then, start to build it. I built one that is for video games. It is working better than other.

Answer 6

No it is not been building my own for years STATIC KILLS EVERY THING MAKE SURE YOU ARE GROUNDED OUT AND NOT ON CARPET should not take more than a couple of hours take your time and have good tools a Phillips screwdriver

Answer 7

YEEEEEEEESSSSSSSS. Its is so freaking hard. I tried that once. it was a waste of $800. YOU R better off buying a computer

Answer 8

If you have the know how, its not hard at all. My computer is home built.

Answer 9

no, it's something easy to learn. Here in Argentina, you can make a course about it, I imagine you'll find something like this in your country...
Please, don't try to do it before you learn how to...
Good Luck, Hope this Helps

Answer 10

it's easier to buy one. A new one is only about 300 dollars. If you buy one, you're not sure if it's going to work and someties its not even complete so you have to spend more to make it complete.