A few IMPORTANT things to remember while and, after building a system.

[KPRage]

Hey guys,

Thought of writing this message to help you all out in figuring out few very important aspects when you are building a system and, what you need to do immediately after you get your components.

One more reason for writing this is to remind myself a few important things which I forget myself at times.. :P

DISCLAIMER

Please consider this to be a suggestion, which may help you make a better choice, rather than a guide! Everything mentioned below is from my learning so far. Some of the contents may have already been mentioned in other threads. Please excuse for any repetition. The components mentioned below may vary in future. Some of the topics are highly subjective. No offense meant to anyone living or dead..

The build

Power supply

When you are planning to buy a new system or, planning to upgrade your current system the one most important component you need to invest your money on would be the PSU, a.k.a. Power supply. A crappy power supply will destroy almost all your components!

When buying a power supply, one thing you need to keep in mind is, how much Watts is really required! Here are two links which I found to be up-to-date:
http://support.asus.com/powersupply.aspx
http://www.extreme.outervision.com/p...ulatorlite.jsp

Make sure you take into consideration the PSU's efficiency. Required PSU = Calculated watt + (25% of Calculated watt) for better future proofing.

MOBO/CPU

Here is the current status of the way CPUs and mobo's are coming out.. ALMOST EVERY YEAR! Yeah, it s!@#s.. But, here is a small thing I use for upgrading my system.. I want my system to run for at least three years! However, since the updation is happening almost every year, I would suggest to go for every alternate year.. E.g.: For those who bought SB, Haswell is the time for upgradation; For those who bought IB, go for the next processor family release (don't buy immediately. Buy after 6 months of release. For, the new ones may have bugs which may be fixed by then!).

RAM

RAM is probably as crucial in the build as a PSU.. Wondering why?

Memory is the single most likely cause for system errors or instability. Everything revolves around the memory with modern systems. The CPU is the location of the memory controller. So often what folks assume to be CPU instability is actually memory instability. Sleep problems, POST problems, VGA problems you name it memory is the bedrock that those issues rest on.

COURTESY HiVizMan

Choosing RAM is indeed more difficult than I had initially thought! Thanks to some of the masters, Zka17, Chino and, Viz, learnt an important aspect while choosing RAM:

Purpose!. You will be surprised that, each Benchmarks need different types of RAMs. Read http://rog.asus.com/forum/showthread...untry=&status= for better understanding.

Hard Disk/ Solid state drives A.K.A Storage

When buying storage, SSDs are a must due to their awesome performance compared to the traditional hard disk. However, they do come with a few cons.

- Cost. This may not be an important factor for some of you. It may be for some of us.

- Limited capacity.. SSDs with higher storage capacities do indeed exists. However, they cost a bomb! The common ones used by many of them goes to max 512 Gb. For some of us who store lot of movies, games, software etc, this will be a con.. For others, this isn't a con.

This makes the traditional HDD kind of a necessity.. This, I will leave for you to decide..

GPU/ Graphics card

From the time of the first processor, there has been a war between two Giants on who is the best! Current in the Green team (a.k.a nVidia) the 700 series and, titan are the champs.. In the Red team (a.k.a AMD) 7k series (8k under way?) are the champs.. This topic is highly subjective on whom to choose.. So, will leave this too, for you to decide! :P

Case and, Monitor

Another matter left for you to decide.

What next?

Now you have all the components and, you are very excited to put it together. Before you do that, read on.

NOTE: Please wear an anti-static wrist band or, make sure you touch a grounded metal object near-by (something other than your system :P) every now and, then. You won't believe that, static has been cause for system failures at times.

I know the excitement of putting the system together. However, here is where most of us make the mistake. Before you start putting everything together, a very important step to do is: TEST EACH COMPONENT INDIVIDUALLY.

I will try to include some of the ways to test each component. If I am unable to find a way, I request the ones who may be aware of it, to update here.

PSU

This may sound very stupid but, before you connect your system to the PSU, connect it to your power outlet and, switch it on. Leave it one for an hour or so and, check if there's no burnt smell. I do not know other ways of testing it. If someone knows any other way, please update. Another way as mentioned by Chino is to check each rail with a multimeter. This needs some electrical knowledge.

Motherboard

Before you place your motherboard into your case, keep it on top of the box it came in and, test it by connecting the above tested PSU's 24 pin connector. As soon as you switch on your PSU, for ROG motherboards, you should see the Start and, Reset button light up. This is a very basic test, nevertheless is very important. You can do this with or, without the CPU and, RAM installed.. This test continues once all the components are added. Please do not put the mobo into your case yet!

Update: "Inspect the CPU socket for bent or missing pins in Intel's case. Or inspect your CPU in AMD's case. Test the clipons for the RAM and PCIe slots just to make sure they snap into place and not too loose or broken. Then proceed to inspecting the motherboard chokes and capacitors if there are any leakage or not soldered on properly." Thanks Chino.

CPU

Not sure how to test this without adding RAM too. For now, I would say, this and, mobo testing go further after adding RAM and, other components.

RAM

Once you install RAM, connect your still-on-the-box-Mobo to a Monitor.. Fire it up and, press Del/F2 to enter BIOS..

If the system does not start when you push on the start button, check the QCode and, post back here immediately (via another system if you own one or, do so from your friend's system)

If your system starts and, if you see the CPU info and, RAM info on your BIOS then congrats! They work so far.

Start testing you RAMs following the this guide to the dot: http://rog.asus.com/127362012/overcl...-motherboards/

If you get any errors, post back here and, one of us will help you out in solving it. If you see your RAM running on lesser timings than specified, fear not, it might be because your RAM supports XMP mode and, its not enabled.

SSD/ HDD

Congrats! If you have made it till here without an issue you have a good mobo, RAM and, Chipset for now.. :P Connect your SSD/ HDD, see if this gets detected in the BIOS.

Once it does, connect a DVD ROM or, USB wherever you have the OS's installation image is and, install your OS.. Please note that, it will be good if all this is done while the Mobo is still not installed into your case.

If everything goes well, Congrats once again. You have a basic system. You can disconnect your DVD ROM and, USB for now.

GPU
Its now time to connect your GPU.

Note: Please make sure you switch off your system before you install any component. Also, make sure the power supply is not connected to the motherboard before you install any of the above components.

Make all necessary connections and, fire it up.. Go to BIOS and, check if your GPU is detected. If all is well, install the drivers and, check if the GPU works.

If you have multiple GPUs, connect one at a time in each of the PCIe sockets. This will also be a test of the mobo's PCIe sockets. Do this for all the GPUs and, test each of them.

Now, start combining 1 GPU at a time. Meaning, 1 is already in a PCIe slot, add 1 more GPU in SLI or, Crossfire and, make sure you enable it via your GPU driver and, test them..


Case

So, now that you have tested each component, its now time to put them all into your case. To those who made it so far without an issue, my friend, you have a nice working system.

Testing the stability..

Use our very own Noden's RealBench to test stability.

Other way of testing stability is by installing an anti-virus, running a full system scan, opening firefox with as many add-ons as possible/ necessary installed, open 15 tabs of ROG forum in it and, run a video.

Best testing will be daily usage!

A few useful tools you can install are:
- CPUz;
- GPUz;
- HWMonitor or, OCCT or, CoreTemp or, RealTemp;
- RealBench;
- MSI afterburn or, EVGA's PrecisionX for GPU overclocking/ fan control;
- 7 Zip for zipping or, unzipping;

If I have missed anything, please feel free to add on.. If you feel I have given a wrong info or, am wrong, please update immediately here.

Hope this helps you guys in some way. Have a safe and, nice experience in building a system. More importantly, have fun doing so.

Cheers,
KP

[HiVizMan]

Nice write up and share KP

I would like to add a very handy utility for new OS installs.

http://ninite.com/

What it does is allow you to select your programs you want to have installed - you select them by ticking boxes. Then you download a small link and once you have done your new OS install you simply press the install and let it do its thing. The app will download and install all your favourite application. Go have check it out.

[KPRage]

Thanks Viz.. Also, Wow.. That indeed is an awesome tool mate.. Checked it.. Its really simple.. Thanks for the info..

[Pratham]

Thanks for sharing KP...I remember when I was building my first build, I didn't look for any power supply guide..In the end I got ****ty 450w power supply and it died on me in just 2 months then I got replacement and it died again...actually I was using two XFX 8800gtx card and needed to beef up my power supply...rookie mistake...hehe..

[Zka17]

Good job, KPRage!

Regarding the SSD, you're right. Upgrading from a HDD, SSDs are giving the most speed-increse experience... - however, it's important to note that you can not fill up completely an SSD! You have to let 40-50% of it's capacity empty for maintained performance... That's the reason why people are using an SSD (for the OS and other applications) + an HDD (for data storage)

Also, when you're installing OS on an SSD, there are some things you may want to optimize... I'm using this guide for Win7: http://www.overclock.net/t/1156654/s...-for-ssds-hdds

[djdelirius]

Sticky this?

[KPRage]

Thanks Z.. Thanks for the share.. That is indeed an useful info.. It comes @ the right time too! My SSD is coming in next week.. Mostly mid of next week.. Will surely be looking into the link for installation instructions..

Cheers,
KP

[Detleg]

very nice KP thanks

[HiVizMan]

Sticky this?

Ask and ye shall receive so sayith the moderators.

[KPRage]

very nice KP thanks

Thanks mate..

Cheers,
KP