| Plan it Out / the OS |
| Plan by Function |
| Tweeking Speed |
| Salvaging Parts |
| Discount PC Parts |
| Key Considerations |
|
Primary Components
|
| Case and Power |
| CPU (Processor) |
| Motherboards |
| Buying RAM |
| Hard Drives |
|
Secondary Components
|
| Video Output |
| CD /DVD /Floppy |
| Sound Cards |
| Getting Online |
|
Peripherals
|
| Keyboard / Mouse |
| Printer / Scanner |
| Monitors / Displays |
| Computer Speakers |
| Getting Started >>> |
| Choosing and Installing Software >>> |
| Optimizing and Overclocking your PC >>> |
Before you jump onto the web and start spending lots of money on expensive computer parts, there are three important questions you should answer which will guide your purchases:
1. What will be the main function of the computer?
2. Will parts be available to use from your old computer--or do you want to reuse parts from your old computer?
3. How much can you afford to spend on the system?
Often, you will either want to hand your old computer down to someone else, in which case you must keep it functional, or it may be so old that you don't want to use any parts from it, because they will slow down your new machine too much.
What operating system are you going to use?
Before you buy components, be sure that they are supported by the operating system you plan to use. Almost all current, commonly available devices have drivers available for current versions of Windows (generally, anything 2000, XP or newer); if you want to run an alternative operating system, you'll have to do some research -- many alternatives have extensive 'Hardware Compatibility Lists'.
Windows hardware support lists
Windows XP supports most processors and motherboards based on the i386 or x86_64 architectures. Put simply, all available consumer processors (especially from AMD or Intel) will work with the Windows XP operating system. For other hardware, see Microsoft's compatibility list.
Linux hardware support lists
As one of the most popular free operating systems, Linux is a very good alternative. It has versions for many different architectures, including i386, x64 and PowerPC, though i386 versions are much more common. It will also support all kinds of processors, enabling it to be used on Palm PCs and even iPods. There are many different versions of Linux, produced by different companies these are 'distributions' or 'distros' for short. For a desktop PC, you should make sure to pick a desktop distro, one where the company / organization has desktop users in mind. e.g. Ubuntu, SimplyMEPIS, Mandriva. SUSE is also a good choice, but also has tools that make it easy to use as a server. Ubuntu has won many awards from PC magazines and is noted for being particularly easy to use (for basic tasks, i.e. Home/Office e.g. web, email, word processing) All this is important to bear in mind as different distros will support different hardware (generally more 'bleeding-edge' distro will support newer hardware - look at Fedora, SuSE, Ubuntu, but not Debian).
A good rule of thumb is to buy hardware that is 12 to 18 months old, as it most probably has Linux support with most distros, but won't be too old.
BSDs hardware support lists
DesktopBSD, see FreeBSD 5.4/i386 and FreeBSD 5.4/amd64
Dragonfly BSD
FreeBSD
NetBSD
OpenBSD
PC-BSD, see FreeBSD 6.0/i386
Microsoft
Windows XP Home Edition SP2B for System Builders with Vista Tech Guarantee
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