Top Mistakes Every PC Builder Newbie Makes & The Classic NOOB Computer:
Read:(CONFESSION – All the mistakes I personally made – CONFESSION)
The classic noob computer has:
1. Watercooling. (They plan to overclock – which is ineffective BECAUSE dollar for dollar you get more real world performance elsewhere*).
*Unless you are trying to max everything out, and the industry does not have part offerings fast enough for your desires.
Myths: Water cooling is quieter and cooler. Room temperature matters and can change the whole dynamics. I made a sortable Spreadsheet of Frostytech.com’s benchmarks of their CPU coolers if you want to nerd it up and look at some data. Or go to the StopTheOverclockingMadness page to read more about cooling.
2. Full ATX Case.
Even though they only have 1 or 2 SATA device and 1 video cards. They are wicked huge and cumbersome and heavy. You can put 8-10 SATA devices in a mid tower, and it’s half the footprint with plenty of airflow. Legitimate Reasons for getting a full tower 1. you have 16 SATA devices. 2. You are a sucker and have complete watercooling hardware that needs the space. 3. You need it to protect your virginity. If it’s cool, silent and rock solid and does everything you want, wouldn’t you prefer something MicroITX sized or smaller?
3. Extra Case Fans (Bonus noob points: Fan controller)
Zero extra are needed. The ones that are in the case aren’t even needed. PC hot is not the same as people hot. PCs can run much hotter than people think. Go find a single post where overheating was the issue, causing shutdowns, and more case fans was the solution.
4. Sometimes seen: Too fast Ram, and RAM is not in pairs.
Go look at the real world benchmarks of whatever applications/games are important to you, see how little ram speed is compared to the cheaper 1333/1600 ram and you will see it’s not worth the premium. (or is it?) Certainly if you can get faster ram for only a tiny bit more than 1333 get it, but yeah. Most of the time you are not doing anything but burning money.
5. Sometimes seen: Color scheme / Window / Lights / Extra thermal paste
Fact: After week one or two, you’re not going to care about what the insides of your computer are going to look like. Newsflash: Girls aren’t impressed by your fabulous computer’s appearance, (quite the opposite). Get something elegant IMO.
Top Mistakes most PC builders make:
1. No UPS (Uninterrupted Power Supply – battery backup)
Nothing causes irreversible hardware damage like like brown outs, black outs, dirt power or power surges. Get a UPS.
How to buy a UPS: Look at the replacement battery cost. If the replacement batteries cost 90% of the unit, drop it. Find a UPS with common (therefore cheaper) replacement batteries. (watch out for fake proprietary model numbers that ALL UPS manufacture’s say is the only correct battery for their UPS. In reality there are common numbers that you are just going to have to google to figure out. Plan to replace them ever 3-4 years if you are lucky. When the power flickers and your computer stays on you can put on your smug face:
When the power goes off and you save your work and/or shut down elegantly, you will pat yourself on the back quiet hardily.
2. No RAID 1/5 to prevent downtime of critical non-cloudable data.
Automatically mirroring two identical hard drives in a RAID 1 (or 5) is not only about having a proper technical backup, It’s about downtime. (Raid is BETTER than a backup)
When (not if, but when) your HDD fails, this is what’s going to happen: You’re going to freak out a bit, but oh well, you’re going to have to take it out of the case, find another computer and check the warranty status and start the RMA process. Now you’re going to have to wait for the RMA to be approved, and or go through some hoops running diagnostic software to get some error codes before they’ll allow you to RMA it. You wait a few days and once they approve the RMA, you have to ship it back to them. Then you wait a few more days and they receive your drive, and wait another day or two, and they’ll ship you out a refurbished one. Wait a few more days for it to come, and now you have your hard drive back. Now you have to find your windows install CD/USB +key and install windows, start downloading all the updates, then you set it all up the way you like it, then you install all your apps, then you download then reinstall all of your games, then you set each of them up the way you like it, maybe you loose a lot of settings or saves games, oh well, then you restore anything form the external, then are all back up and running. Wasn’t that EXHAUSTING just reading it? That was a hell-of-a-lot-a downtime and hassle, don’t you think? SO, Now here is the question: was all that downtime and work WORTH the cost of another single identical hard drive to you? Now you can choose. If not, then it’s all good. But I think your time alone, even if you make minimum wage, is worth it, but you know best for your situation. In RAID 1 (mirror) when a HDD fails, you are just notified in windows that 1 HDD failed, you pop it out, send it back, and put in the replacement and it syncs up again. Zero downtime. And you never have to remember to backup to external, which, let’s be honest, you’ll forget to do that every day. And an internal HDD is less than an external.
And guess what happens when your hard drive fails? That’s right, smug face again:
SSD do throw a monkey wrench into this. They are up to several magnitudes more reliable. Put all the non media on the SSD. More FAQ about RAID 1/5
3. Not properly set up SSD/RamDrive
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