Whether it is for gaming, editing or some other application, building a high-performance PC is not much different from building a regular PC, except that it's going to cost you a lot more money and you need to pay special attention to what you're purchasing to know exactly what type of performance the PC components can deliver. Do your homework on computer parts and soon you'll have a system that is smoking fast and mega strong.
Instructions
Planning
1. Research what you want. When you build a high-performance PC you will need to be extra cautious and be willing to spend quite a bit of money. Go to the manufacturers' websites for every major piece of hardware and compare options and abilities. You should also go to websites that compare benchmarks such as tomshardware.com. You need to pick your components by choosing the best speed and performance for each component.
2. Set a budget. Even with a high-performance PC you need to set a budget, because unless you have unlimited resources you will need to know how much you have to spend on each piece of hardware to narrow your choices.
3. Determine your focus. Even If you just want to build the absolute best computer possible, you still need to determine what your primary focus is going to be in using the computer. If you want a gaming PC, then you will want to have high-performance video and extremely fast components. If you're building a workstation for video editing than you really want to focus on processing power and memory. When building any high performance system, you will want power and speed. Your focus may cause you to sacrifice a little of one to put more strength into another area.
4. Decide to customize or have it made. You can buy the pieces and build it yourself or you can have it made. To get exactly what you want you will probably need to build it yourself, but if you are not experienced at building computers, building a high-performance computer may be a little more work than you want. You can choose to customize a computer through a company like Alienware, though it will be at a hefty price and still not completely customized.
5. Keep it cool. One problem you will likely encounter is keeping your system cool. Because you will be pushing the edge of the current computer market's capabilities, your system is probably going to get hot and you will need a plan for dissipating the heat. Make sure that you buy quality heat sinks and fans and design your case so that air can flow easily out. It is also a good idea to consider a liquid cooling system. Liquid cooling systems can be bought as part of a kit or you can build them piece by piece.
Building
6. Buy your parts. After researching the parts and deciding on what you want, you can either buy them directly from the manufacturer's website or go to a computer parts website like Newegg.com and order your parts. You will not likely find high performance parts at a local electronics store because they have to stock the more commonly purchased and more inexpensive items.
7. Install the main components. Put the motherboard, CPU and RAM into the case. Be careful that everything is fully connected and that the motherboard is not hitting the case anywhere, but is only making contact with the pins that screw the motherboard onto the case. Install the CPU onto the CPU connector on the motherboard, this will likely be a square that has pin holes where the chip's tiny pins will match the configuration. The CPU will only fit one way. Next Install the CPU heat sink and fan assembly on top of the chip. There will be matching openings or connections on the motherboard around the chip area for the fan assembly to be connected.
8. Connect your drives. Install all of your hard drives, optical drives and a floppy drive if you are using one, in the drive bays in the front of the case. Open up both sides of the computer case and screw the drives in carefully so they don't move. Connect the power plugs and connector cables. In building a high performance PC you will most likely be using SATA drives and will not need to worry about master/slave relationships as with IDE drives. If you are using a Raid setup though you will need to go into the Bios when your done and select the appropriate RAID settings.
9. Insert the cards. Slowly and carefully connect all of your cards. This includes your video, sound and any other special cards. After seating the cards in their appropriate slots, there is a faceplate on each card that should have slid into an opening on the back of the computer, screw the faceplate on here securely.
10. Check all other connections. Connect the power supply to the motherboard and make sure every drive and fan is connected with its appropriate power connection. Connect all of the case connections to their correct pins. These include the power and reset switches, which turn on your computer. The motherboard's manual will show you where these are on the board. The connections from the case are very small cables with two holes at the top of a small black plastic rectangle that connect into small pins marked on the motherboard.
11. Plug in the peripherals. Plug in the mouse, keyboard, speakers and monitor into the back of the computer.
12. Start the computer. Start the computer and go into the BIOS by hitting the correct key, the screen will have instructions for which key to hit to enter the BIOS. Make any changes for Raid drives or disable any onboard devices that will not be used. Restart the computer and make sure everything works. Use a diagnostics CD to test all of the hardware.
13. Install the operating system. Put the operating system CD into the CD-ROM. Set your BIOS to boot from the CD-ROM and reboot. The BIOS will detect the CD and boot from it. The operating system will now guide you to make selections as it installs on your hard drive.
Tags: will need, high performance, operating system, what want, will likely, back computer