I Always Forget To Mention These PC Building Tips...

I Always Forget To Mention These PC Building Tips...
I make a lot of videos about PC building, but there are some things that I just tend to leave out. So to make amends for any misses, I present today a brief collection of stuff I probably should have mentioned during my many build videos -- PC building tips I might have left out -- and I hope this clears up any confusion.

► TIMESTAMPS
0:00 Intro - 5 Essential PC Building Tips I Always Forget to Mention
0:56 1. PCs Are Modular and Upgradeable
2:32 2. You Don’t Really Need a Windows License
5:02 3. Bits vs Bytes / Bitrates - know your data labels
9:02 4. Sometimes builds just go horribly wrong
10:50 5. Don’t Forget the Blood Sacrifice

My Windows 10 / Windows 11 Videos -

HSC Made Easy - Converting Between Bits and Bytes - "Ladder" Analogy - General Maths

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Paul's Hardware
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► Edited by Joe Aguilar - ShaostylePostProductions

Audio file(s) provided by Epidemic Sound

[jonsmith]

Never put the side on before 1st power up

[shakeypudding]

You sir are a god send and a fountain of information. I just finished my very first PC build at age 61. I used PC parts picker to sus out my parts and then used several of your videos to put it together. I installed Windows 10 Pro and used a grey site key. It is working flawlessly. And I too spilled blood during the installation 👍😃 PS- I’d love to see a video on doing the little tweaks to ensure your gaming PC is running smoothly. TY.

[nielderfp]

And PSU cables are not interchangeable between manufacturers, or sometimes between PSUs of the same manufacturer. Been there done that, destroyed the SSD, got the T-shirt.

[rickmaus]

One thing for a new builder to consider if buying a system from a place like microcenter is to pay a little extra to make sure your motherboard, cpu and memory posts before you leave the store. Especially if you live far away.

[icube]

I thought the tip was to never close the case panel until you have successfully performed the first POST, otherwise the PC God will smite you for your hubris

[Odb]

LAY THE CASE DOWN.
Too many youtuber's dont show that you need to be laying it down. They'll show cable management and everything else standing up, but don't focus on LAY THE PC DOWN to put the mobo in.
Now that crap goes through the backs of cases you have to keep flipping the stupid thing over. No one shows that.

[bbqribz]

I've bought probably 8-10 keys through Kinguin since that old video came out. All have worked without issue, it's literally saved me hundreds. Thanks Paul!

[bookbinder]

Build to the monitors you want to end up with

[Apeman_king_of_apes]

9:02
This is very, very true. Sometimes things just don't go right. Sometimes parts don't fit, or arrive damaged.

My latest example: I am a very seasoned builder. I've been building computers since about 2009. I've assembled probably close to 100 PCs at this point, just for myself and all my friends and family, and their friends and families. Over the summer I got stumped by a new build that would boot the first time then never power back on. Turns out I got 3 bad EVGA power supplies sent to me in a row, and they were taking out motherboards. One of them even burst into flames! Never had so many part failures from a (now no longer) reputable brand. Sometimes shit happens, and that's why I buy new parts with warranties and money back guarantees.

[aaldrich]

I always advise to route the EPS cable before installing the IO shield and platform. Sometimes the clearance for the EPS cable at the top of a case is limited. Get it through before the mobo lessens the clearance for the EPS connector to come through.

[rnsaopaulo]

Ah yes, the blood sacrifice. Discovered that one on my build last month as I attempted to use a finger to depress that PCIE clip on an installed graphics card. Aluminum cooler fins and knuckles participated in that sacred rite. It will be the wooden chopstick from now on though.

[DT]

I built my wife’s and my own PC in the last 12 months. My first ever PC builds after a lifetime of buying prebuilds.

Your videos not just helped me with the build process (one was intel and the other AMD so thank you for having guides both ways!), but you inspired me to even try building my own PC

You’re a gem and an asset to the tech community

[peterwstacey]

I always add a PC speaker to the front panel IO connectors, at least during the build. No need for expensive Debug displays (although I wish they were included), a simple beep code tells you if anything is faulty. You can always remove it after a successful POST

[MasonzeroDigitalWorks]

Grey market keys are hit or miss but all the ones I've used for my person computers have been fine. I also bought probably 30 or 40 from various sites for people I built PCs for and no one has ever complained that Windows became unactivated. However, I have heard stories of keys getting deactivated. And those OEM keys are tied to your motherboard, so if you upgrade your mobo it will need a new key.

[curtis.albrecht.]

I "ALWAYS" install a tiny little SPEAKER, when connecting the Power Button to the MB. That way, I can HEAR the POST beeps. Just last night in fact, I was building an OLD i7-4460 with 16GB (x2 x 8GB) of DDR3 1866Mhz RAM. Well, that's some really old hardware. And, I was HEARING that RAPID BEEPING, indicating that there wasn't any RAM installed. So, I broke out my trusty ERASER and CLEANED the gold contacts on the RAM. After some agressive ERASING, the contacts were clean enough that I got that Heavenly ONE/SINGLE beep, indicating that POST had indeed completed successfully. Speakers and erasers are ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY, when working with "old" hardware.

Also, the build above uses a Kingspec (MT-512) 512MB, mSATA drive on a PCIe x1 Adapter Card. PCIe x1 is rated 6Gbps, the same as all of the SATA 3 ports (in older hardware). So, if you manage to come across an old laptop, that HD can be repurposed into a desktop, with one of those Adapter Cards. They are VERY compact, and eliminate the need for SATA cables cluttering your build.

[JosSliv]

The "Blood Sacrifice" is an acceptable part of the building process unless you're taking a blood thinner and then bleed all over your new components. Been there, done that. Luckily after the clean up and transfusion 😄everything worked just fine.

[megabittech]

3:28. I would like to point out that there are ways to get windows keys legally for little or no money. As an example I purchased a copy of Windows 8 professional for 8 dollars in 2013 from my University. I've used that Windows 8 key to activate every PC Ive built since then.

[odahithedubious]

One thing I'm almost ashamed to admit, is that I sometimes do repeat my mistakes. For example, even though I checked, I didn't get my RAM fully seated. NO BUENO. It wouldn't POST. The second time I've committed this very basic blunder. Which leads to another life lesson. If nothing is going right, and you're absolutely stumped, it's usually because you have overlooked something really basic. Didn't check that RAM was fully seated. Forgot to plug in the power to the SATA hard drive. Didn't plug in the motherboard power. Forgot to turn on the power supply switch. Stuff like that.... I don't do it vary often any more, but still get caught sometimes. Usually due to getting distracted by some shiny object.

[futuza]

1) Expect to RMA something.

Expect to recieve at least one bad part, every build I've ever made has always required at least one RMA. This means you should not put yourself on a hard deadline until after you've ensured each part you've recieved is fully functional. It might be a bad stick of RAM, a motherboard with an outdated BIOS/UEFI instruction set that cannot be updated without another CPU, a broken capacitor or a CPU with bent pins, maybe your video card has fans that don't work, or your AIO cooler is missing the correct mounting bracket, or a case fan has a stripped screw socket. PC parts are delicate and shipping companies are never kind, and manufacturing processes are still very flawed when it comes to PC parts, chances are very high you'll recieve at least one dead part. Each part has probably a 1/10 chance of being dead on arrival. Thankfully most manufacturers are reasonable and willing to replace the bad part free of charge, but its going to take time l, so give your PC extra time for RMAing.

Keep all your receipts/boxes/packages for at least 30 days after you've built the pc, if something hasn't gone wrong/stopped working by that point you probably won't need them anymore - but make sure you keep a digital copy of your proof of purchase/receipt of purchase, in case you ever need to make a warranty claim. Feel free to recycle all of the boxes and packaging once you've done that, but be aware of the warranty terms, as some stupid companies will require idiotic things (eg: to provide the original packaging) to make a valid claim. There are some manufacturers that are just plain worth avoiding because of how difficult they make it to make a claim. (And these companies should probably be class action lawsuited out of business.)


2) Test Each Component
Thoroughly test each component (individually as possible). Try to elliminate variables if it does not behave as expected, for example if your new monitor isn't working try using it with another known working PC to discover what the real issue is, eg: it might be the cable, GPU, drivers, or BIOS settings that is the root cause, rather than the monitor itself. There's a million things that can go wrong and it is best to test after you have eliminated as many variables as possible that could be influencing the results. Before completely assembling the PC test components, for example plug your Powersupply, RAM, CPU, and cooler into your MB and make sure you can POST outside of the case. If everything works, then proceed to put it in your case. Save things like cable management and cleanup for later, until you can test that it all works. After you get your PC up and running, benchmark and test components to make sure they're behaving as expected (eg: if your ssd is supposed to have 7000Mbps read/write speed, but is getting 2000, then you need to do more testing or consider an RMA if you didn't just do something dumb like forget to update a driver).

3) Document your PC
Document information about your PC build (sites like pcpartpicker are great for this kind of thing), and record your benchmarks, date of assembly, costs, and take pictures of the PC, etc. This will be extremely helpful to yourself if you ever need to refer back to that information or if you want to resell it or recommend things to others.

4) Document Problems
Documemt unusual/difficult issues you encounter and fix in a public forum (not a walled garden that requires a sign in). Did you have a really weird error with your RAM that took two weeks to figure out? Write down how you fixed it and post your solution, because someone else might have the same problem - they will be very grateful you were willing to share and help, and it's just the right thing to do.

5) Setup Backups
Once everything is working/updated/setup etc, make sure you figure out how to back your data up and have a disaster plan in place. Consider what will happen to your data in the event of several scenarios including: power surge, hardware failure, malware, cloud company data breach, flooding, tornado/fire/war and figure out how to mitigate around these issues while staying within your means. Some data is not worth backing up (game installs, applications, etc) others are critical to preserve (passwords/sign in information), and deserve more care. Once you've figured it out, make sure it actually gets backed up!

[petes]

Gotta say Pauls Hardware was one of the first to come up with the little things missed when building a PC. YEARS AGO. Ive been building PC's for Family & friends for years & you have always been the best help for problems missed by others. Cheers Mate