Most DVD drives need to be installed from the front, so that means taking the front panel off carefully and avoid pulling the wires for the power switch. It's also better to connect any cables now before it's slotted in, as things can get quite tight back th

Some cases have USB ports on the front, which need to be connected to the motherboard to be functional, the pins for which are situated next to the switch pins we just connected. If you're unlucky, you’ll have a bundle of 8 cables which must connected one by one to the matching jum

Structure-wise, don’t rely on the narrow bricks; instead, design your case to use the wider type of bricks, those with 2 x 3 or 2 x 4 pegs. Offering more support, these pieces are also more similar to real-life bricks. Flat, "plate"-style pieces should also be used in areas of the case where additional structural support is requi

For the CD-ROM, the diagram indicates that 2 is Slave setting. What does this mean? Well, looking at the back of the device, we have 3 pairs of pins. So, to make it a slave device, Pcbuildinsight.Com I place a jumper over the central (second) p

That's it from me. I hope you enjoyed this little visual build-log. If you'd like to try the same thing yourself, keep an eye on FreeCycle , or head down to the city dump and find old some old PCs to play with. Just tearing them apart fully, mixing a few components, and trying to make them work again is a fantastic learning experience. Comments are welcome, but I might not be able to answer any specific hardware related questions for your particular bu

Once you’ve discovered what is required, verify that your motherboard can accommodate the upgrade by opening up your desktop and inspecting it. This is an important step. Your motherboard may technically have eight SATA ports, but what if a large video card or cooling fan is blocking two of them? This is not something you’ll discover just by cracking open your desktop’s man

Whatever the operating system, be sure that the software or process you're trying to close isn't vital. Run a web search to check what it is for and establish if it has any relevance to system stability or your game. If it is irrelevant, proceed to close

The same practicalities exist in using your own materials for building a PC case as for using household items and standard cases. Airflow must be kept at an optimum for cooling purposes, which means being able to open the case is vital. Just as importantly, the interior components must be kept isolated from any metal in the case; the case should also be grounded if there is any conductive mater

Each USB port requires 4 cables, so the bundle of 8 can be split up into two sets of 4 cables. One USB port uses the top set of pins, one the bottom. The cables should be labelled with either a 1 or 2 , plus something similar to the follow

The difficult part is the jumper settings, which will vary according to your device. Basically, you're looking for something that mentions CS or Cable Select, as well as Master, and Slave. There will be a diagram somewhere. The digrams indicate which pins a jumper should connect. You should be able to remove a jumper with your finger nails, if not then use a pair of very small needle nose pliers and don't bend the p

Now, two of these cameras were obviously monitoring very quiet locations. However, the third webcam on the lower left was a college workshop where students kept walking in and out of the room. So I quickly configured the motion settings as described above, and then waited for one of the three cameras to trigger my alert. Sure enough, within about five minutes, I received my email al

Find the physical measurements of any hardware that you plan on installing and use a tape measure to make sure that you have room. Be sure to account for not only the width of new hardware but also its depth. Some cases have thin profiles that will only fit "half-height" PCI Express cards. Processor coolers are another common troublemaker, as the most effective air-cooled models tend to have extremely large heatsinks that are as tall as the typical mid-tower PC case is w

Since I only have a single IDE CD-ROM and single hard disk to show you today (as well as only a single physical IDE connector on my motherboard), I've opted to make the hard disk as Master and the CD-Drive as sl

Given that an old software box can house a small ITX motherboard, you should find that discarded stereos, DVD players, games consoles and even waste paper bins can all be used to house your motherboard, hard disk drive and PSU, along with any additional storage items you deem use

Internet Service Providers (ISPs) also throttle traffic from Steam and other providers. They do this to prioritize specific data types, such as online shopping and social networking over high bandwidth activities such as online gaming, downloading, and video stream

Let's look at some standard IDE cables and connectors. There are 3 identical looking connectors - one at either end and one in the middle. However, one of the gaps between the end connectors and the middle connector is longer - this is the end that plugs into your motherbo