Power Supply

My original intent was to buy a case and power supply and begin assembly of my self assembled system. I received the case, but the power supply is backordered.

The supply that I ordered was a Corsair 850w HX. This supply is highly rated, which is why it's in short supply, I guess.

So now I in a holding pattern. The plus side is that my budget doesn't take as quick a hit and I'll be able to move on to phase two as soon as I get the power supply and install it.

My daughter and son-in-law generously donated a copy of Windows 7 Professional for the system.

My computer adventure has begun. My first purchase is a Thermaltake Armor Plus case (steel). I got it at Amazon, so I could take six months to pay it off.

I chose the Armor Plus for several reasons

• It is a full tower case, which allows for good air circulation and good cooling. I didn't want to get into liquid cooling at this time, but this case will allow me to go that route in the future
• On the top front, there are headphone and mic jacks, eSATA, Firewire, and four USB ports.
• There is room for six 5.25" front loading drives, one 3.5" front loading drive, and seven hidden 3.5" drives
• The motherboard is removable for easy assembly and there is a cable management system

The down side is the weight, which is 37 pounds. The aluminum case is 22 pounds, but costs about $50 more.

Stay tuned for further adventures in my computer assembly project.

RIP DELL

My computer died. No suddenly, like a heart attack, but slowly, in incremental pieces, like cancer.

It was a Dell. Now it is a Dead Dell.

First the hard drive gave out. It was a Maxtor. Dell replaced it free of charge, but I lost a lot of data. After that I was diligent at backing up. For about two months.

A year later the replacement drive failed. It was no longer under warranty, so I replace it with a Western Digital. I rescued some of the data with Handy Recovery.

Next the LCD monitor became unstable and the picture rolled and shook. I replaced it with the old CRT monitor from my Gateway 2000.

The sound card died and then I had memory problems. Then it stopped completely.

RIP DELL.

I've decided to assemble my own PC. I want it to be able to edit video and audio material that I generate, so it has to be fast.

I may reuse the DVD burner from the Dell, until it dies. I have a Blu-Ray burner that I got as part of a package deal from Videoguys.

I also have two WD hard drives that I have been using as external drives with a WD docking station.

I need to do this piecemeal, due to budget restraints. I'll keep you posted on this blog.

Hello, again!

This my annual post. At least, that is how it turned out. Actually, I forgot that I had set up this blog. I'll try to be more diligent and post more often in the future.