A to Z in Computers

How to build your own computer            Page2

After you've gathered all the hardware you need to build your computer, the next step is to prepare your case. First remove the left and right side panels, then lay the case down on its side to so you can see the bottom plate where your motherboard will mount. You will notice there are holes in the plate where the motherboard is mounted. You must screw in what are called stand-offs usually brass in color. These stand-offs come with your case, and sometimes there are plastic ones also. They keep the motherboard from touching the case. This is a common mistake we see, believe or not, people mount there motherboard directly to the case. You must use these stand-offs between the case and motherboard or you will short out the motherboard.

P4 socket 478

P4 Socket 775T

Memory Dimm Slots

AMD Socket A

AMD 64 Socket

Look at the position of the holes on your motherboard, and this being your first time, you may want to hold the motherboard over the plate so you can see what holes the stand-offs go in to line up with your motherboard holes. The next thing to do is to install the processor and memory on your motherboard. We like to do that before installing the board in the case. You'll put less stress on the motherboard by installing the cpu and memory first. We'll be using retail box processor's which already included heat paste or tape on the fan heat sinks. When looking at the motherboard cpu socket, you see a brown lever ( the picture to the left )or sometimes a medal lever. Intel and AMD are very similar with locking devices except for the P4 775T which we discuss later. The AMD 64 will also be discussed later in this article. Unlock and raise the lever up. You should also notice when looking at the pin holes that one end isn't square ( Pentium 4 ) on the (AMD socket A) 2 ends are not square. Now look at the bottom of the cpu and you'll find the same thing in the pin configuration. Just line up the pins and plug in the cpu, then lock the lever back down in place. Place the fan on top (on a P4 cpu), and the plastic bracket ( one on each side ) is slid over the notched holes on the bracket located on the motherboard. There are to levers on top of each bracket which are pushed in opposite directions to lock the fan down onto the cpu. The 775T P4 socket is a little different. First unhook the lever and swing it up, then remove the plastic protective shield. Lift and rotate the metal plate over to one side. Note that you'll see two notches, one on each side of the socket and on each side of the cpu. Line the notches of the cpu up with the socket and set the cpu in place. Do not push on the cpu. Rotate the plate back over the cpu resting on the cpu. Use the lock down lever to seat the cpu, and lock it in place. There are four holes in the motherboard, one on each corner of the cpu socket. The heat sink has four spring loaded post, one on each corner. Place the fan and heat sink assembly over the cpu socket and line up the four post with the holes in the motherboard. Push two posts down at one time on each opposite corner ( not the same side), and you will hear a clicking sound which means its locked in place. Then push and lock the other two posts down. On the AMD ( socket A ) you'll notice three notches on both sides of the socket. First look at the bottom of the fan heat sink and line it up with the shape of the cpu socket. It is possible to put this fan on backwards, and you need to insure your putting it on in the correct direction. If put on backwards you will burn up your AMD cpu. Now slide the medal bracket around the notches (in the picture to the left would be the top notches). Then using a screw driver slide the opposite bracket over the bottom notches. ( some fans use one notch and some use all three. When installing an AMD Sempron 754, AMD 64 754 or AMD 64 939 socket cpu, they all use the same type of heat sink bracket on the motherboard. On one side of the heat sink fan is a lock down lever that locks into place on the cpu bracket. Place the clips on each side of the heat sink over the notches on the heat sink bracket, and lock the lever down into place. When installing the memory you'll notice a notch in the memory and a notch in the memory dimm slot on the motherboard. First push the white clips out away from the dimm slot, then slide the dimm into place. When seated correctly the white clips will lock into place around the end of the memory dimm. We do all the above first to insure proper seating of the processor, processor fan, and memory. Now you can proceed to mount the motherboard to the stand-offs in your case and secure with the screws provided.

Next you want to install your cd-rom drive, hard drive, and floppy drive. Pop out the drive bay covers for the cd-rom drive and floppy drive by pushing from inside your case from the back of the covers. Slide your drives in and line them up with the side brackets, then use screws that were provided with your drives to secure the drives to the case. Slide the hard drive in the lower 3.5 bay inside your case, leaving the side with the power and Ide connector facing where the motherboard is mounted. Line up the holes and use the screws supplied with your case to secure the hard drive in place. There are data cables that will need to be connected, but we will wait until later to attach the cables to the drives and motherboard.

8X Agp Slot

Pci Express Slot

Okay, now for the fun part or did we already do the fun part? We need to plug in the video card, and modem or whatever else you choose for your dream machine, and we also need to plug in the power connectors. Plugging in the video card, modem, etc, is pretty easy. Just side the video card into the Agp slot ( the medium brown color slot shown in the picture on your top left ) or into the pci express slot ( the black color slot shown in the picture on your bottom left ) with the monitor connector facing out of the case. The new SLI pci express ( not shown) is just two pci express slots on the motherboard. The difference is there will be a short card connector link that connects both cards together at the top of the video card. ( When purchasing a SLI motherboard, if you want to just to install one SLI video card, insure the motherboard supports only one card. Some motherboards require both SLI video cards be plugged in to work. Other's supply a dummy card to go into the second pci express slot, so you may only run one video card, then add a second one later ). Most of all the motherboards now days have a snap lock, to lock the video card in place at the end of the Agp or pci express slot. High end video cards will also have a 4 pin or 6 pin molex connector for power that must be plugged in for the video card to work correctly. Plug your modem and any other cards you choose to install and secure them with a screw at the end plate onto the case. Most all new motherboards have sound and networking built into them so you won't have to worry about those cards. Next plug in the power connectors.

You'll see on the right we show 2 power connectors. The top connector is standard on all atx motherboard and power supplies. If you are installing a pentium 4 motherboard the second connector( bottem left ) must also be plugged in. Also most the AMD 64 motherboards have and require this four pin connector. This supplies power to the processor. Also now some of the higher end AMD (socket A) motherboards have these connectors also. You must plug these in or the computer will not post and display anything on your monitor. If you are doing an upgrade on a system, and do not have this connector on your power supply, you will need to purchase pentium 4 compliant power supply which also works on an AMD system also. The picture shown is a 20 pin ATX connector. The Pci express motherboards will use a 24 pin ATX connector. It looks the same, but just has 4 more pins for power.

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