When building a new computer: How do you do it?

[R3dF41c0n]

I build my own. I've been building computers since 2002 and I work in IT. I'm usually the guy friends go to for computer help.

 

[Belaam]

36 male

The first one, I called up a friend who had built their own before and had them walk me through the process and then had another friend with an IT job look it over to ensure we hadn't forgotten anything.

Frys and newegg, all the way.

I'm now on my 4th or 5th that I've put together myself and I don't see myself ever buying a pre-made box again. Excluding laptops. ;p

Oh, and if you're tracking backgrounds, I am an English teacher with zero background in electrical engineering, IT work, or anything along those lines.

As almost everyone else has said, motherboard and CPU, then build around that.

 

[Nuke_em_05]

I buy the parts off of newegg, wait for them to arrive, then assemble it myself.

I had a friend over the last time, but he was more interested in the end result (a "Crysis Box" back when that meant something).

 

[WarDialler]

And for safety's sake you may want to invest in a grounding wristband, to avoid frying any parts with static electricity.

Most experienced PC enthusiasts (where's my head? that nearly came out as Euthaniasiaists :/) Don't bother with a wristband, providing the PSU is in the case and plugged into the mains (plug OFF) the thing is grounded, any time you touch the case any static charge you may have accrued from moving will be safely discharged.

I object to the implication that I am not an experienced PC enthusiast!

I do usually use a wristband though, it means I don't have to touch the case (or similarly grounded object) every time I want to handle a sensitive component. Also, there are plenty of plastic cases out there, and ones that will have a coat of non-conductive paint all over. In such cases touching the case will not do anything to discharge static.

So, as I said to OP, if he wants to be on the safe side, he may want to use a wristband, although one can get away without doing so.

Male, 24 by the way. Building PCs since I was 14.

Apologies, CB, I didnt meant to imply you werent a techie, I've just never found one necessary.

Also OP; male 26, built first PC when I was 10. It was an AMD 486 DX66. It ran Doom 2 like a boss.

 

[NEREVAR117]

Simple and straight forward: I figure my budget, look for the best parts that I can afford, order them, and build it by myself. I built my current PC about two months ago (GTX 570, 2500K, 8GB RAM) and helped my cousin build his a few weeks ago. It feels great when it all comes together and you see that boot screen.

 

[thenumberthirteen]

I build it myself. Usually I start by picking out a form factor, then CPU and GPU. The rest come naturally from there.