Designing the Perfect PC

PC Design 01100101 with Vito Cassisi. And yes, that is binary for 101.

Building a new PC cannot be any easier. It’s a matter of slotting components into their respective sockets, and plugs into their female counterparts. But where most people fail is in the designing process, choosing the perfect parts for the ultimate price vs quality vs performance ratio. But this will no longer be an issue once you’ve learnt the way of the computer enthusiast; how we research, review and rate a product, and only allow the finer quality components grace our glorious desktops. It’s time to be enlightened into the world of PC design...

Deciding the computer’s main role
It’s human nature to seek the best components our budgets can satisfy, but often the appropriateness of these decisions is not a reflection of the desired end result. Hence we need to define what this ‘end result’ will be. There are four main categories:

Media Centre PC/HTPC
Home/Office/Multimedia
Gaming /Graphics Rendering (which incorporates enthusiasts and overclockers)
Server

Computers come in many form factors including the popular mini-ATX, ATX, and E-ATX. These define the physical size of the computer where mini-ATX is best suited to portable/HTPCs, ATX for standard office work or gaming, and E-ATX for high performance enthusiast systems and servers. Choosing the appropriate size depends on the main role of your PC. Size dictates the components that will fit, so it’s best not to choose the smaller form factor if you don’t need the smaller size. If you’re not sure about what size to choose, bigger is better. More room to work, upgrade, and hack. Oh yes, bring on the water cooling system.

Allocating the budget
The budget is the maximum you’re comfortable spending on the PC. Once you have calculated this, stick to it. If you’re wealthy and have quite a bit of money to burn, this doesn’t mean you should buy the best of everything. There’s often a large price gap between budget, performance, and extreme; however the difference in actual performance is rarely as straight forward. The gap between budget and performance components is often quite large compared to the gap between performance and extreme. Extreme components may only be, for example, 10 per cent more efficient than the performance parts, yet the price 50 per cent higher in cost. Try to find the best ‘bang for buck’ unless you genuinely require the extra performance.

The required parts
A computer system consists of the following components; use this as a checklist:

CPU
RAM
Motherboard
Graphics card
HDD or SSD
Power Supply
APU (usually integrated into the motherboard)
Optical Drive
Case

Basic external peripherals include:

Monitor
Keyboard
Mouse
Speakers

All these components (plus an operating system) make up a standard system. Be sure to consider all these parts in your design.

Recycle and save
No, this is not about scavenging aluminium cans for the 5c rebate, but rather parts from your older machine. Peripherals such as the monitor, keyboard, and mouse can be reused if they still suit your current needs and desires. Generally, processing parts such as the graphics card (or GPU), CPU and RAM will be outdated, and should only be used if suitable. A previously used OS can also be installed provided they aren’t OEM or insufficient for modern use i.e. Windows ME (read: Burn it. Now). Vista 64-bit is recommended for new systems due to its modern CPU scheduler, enhanced security and ability to address stupid amounts of RAM.