Here's what things look like after I installed the video card. This does what you think it would... handles anything related to video for your computer. Mine is an XFX Radeon HD 4870 1GB. Most likely, you don't need a video card like this in your computer. It's made specifically for gaming and handling the graphics that come with it. I have a full GB of ram on the card dedicated solely to graphics, and it has a 256 bit graphics processor. As of right now that should be able to handle any graphics heavy game on it's highest graphics settings without any problems. I'm looking forward to seeing how that goes.
This one's after I attached all the wires where they need to be in
the case. It looks a little less clean than it did before, but it'll actually do something now so I'm ok with that. All that's left at this point is putting the case back on and powering up the computer to install the operating system.
This last picture is of the side of the case once I put the side back on. I have clear panels on the side of the case so that in the event that I feel like looking at my parts while the computer is running I can do so. On the more practical side, you can see a fan in the side of the case. Most don't have extra fans like this... just an exhaust fan in the back. To help with all the extra heat some of my parts put out my case has an extra fan on the side, space for another one below it, and a fan that pulls air in through the lower front part of the case as well. To keep these from being too practical, they do glow blue while running.
At this point in the build, it was about 2 AM and I was pretty tired. So I went to bed to come back in the morning to deal with turning it on and installing the operating system in the morning.
Turning it on went well. Everything did what it was supposed to and the computer came on. This meant that all the wires went where they were supposed to in spite of it being 2 in the morning while I was plugging everything in. Thus far everything is shiny. The not so shiny part... when I started installing Windows 7 I got a fun blue screen telling me there was an error of some sort. Many blue screens later I talked to a friend who does IT stuff. He suggested that this was probably a RAM problem and that I should run a memory test. At the moment I've run the test with some fun results. For those of you who know what such things mean I'll share.
4 sticks of ram in: Computer freezes at 5% into first test
3 sticks of ram in: Computer freezes at 7% into first test (I have tried every configuration placing ram in different slots)
2 sticks of ram in: Computer retstarts at roughly 50% through first test (again I've tried every configuration of ram in different stots)
1 stick of ram in: Every stick passed with no errors, and every slot has passed with no errors
3 sticks of ram in: Computer freezes at 7% into first test (I have tried every configuration placing ram in different slots)
2 sticks of ram in: Computer retstarts at roughly 50% through first test (again I've tried every configuration of ram in different stots)
1 stick of ram in: Every stick passed with no errors, and every slot has passed with no errors
I'm not really sure what the results mean. It seems like it says that all my RAM is good. My thoughts are that this could be a problem with either the motherboard or Bios, but I'm not entirely sure on that. I'm waiting for my friend to get back with me so I can share the results. I'll try to post more on what happens with this once i get the problem figured out and the whole computer is shiny. Perhaps I'll get Cori to post on her thoughts through the whole thing... most of them probably not quite as interested in the details as mine.
To everyone who contributed... Thank you very much! I'm sure that I'll have the kinks worked out shortly and have a computer that will make other video game nerds drool. I couldn't have done it without your help!
- Adam
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