what do yo find most annoying when building your computer?

when you do a perfect install and for one reason or another it takes 6 hours to get it to work / doesnt work.

building my last pc has really put me off doing it again. its currently sitting here not working, and only works randomly with no hardware changes, and wont POST.
 
meh, i think on last computer it took about 12 mins or so to install xp, another 3-4 to put drivers on. download them onto diff partition before reinstalling windows, you don't have to do a chipset driver, then reboot, then sound driver and reboot, then lan and reboot. somehow i've never once had an issue doing it all in one go :o

the installing generally only a couple of the latest games i've been playing. built computer to playing first game can be sub 25 mins quite easily on XP now, i do remember installing it on a 1.4tbird, with 512mb mem and a slow hdd though, not quite so fast ;) raid 0 seriously seriously helps with install times though.


i dunno, i never ever connect front panels as if i must i have one usb extension cable from the back that i hide round back of monitor for when i need it. errm, generally the only thing i find irritating is poorly design hdd mounting, and hdd's sticking out over mobo only to upgrade gfx card and find you have to move a hdd or two around so a gfx card can slide into its slot between drives at the end of the card.

antec 900, great case mainly, too short for multidrives + 8800gtx though, and its hard drive mounting is truly the worst i've ever seen. why they can make a sonata(trays you screw drives to outside case, with rubber grommets, with sliding click in trays that take seconds to install. to the crappy bays on the 900 case i do not know.
 
i dont really have anything that annoys me on a new build, but when transferring to a new case there is always that one stand-off/screw that refuses to let the case be parted from the motherboard
 
A new one, dual booting xp and vista then restarting and then finding vista has found disk errors on your hard drive and proceeds to "fix it" causing only vista to boot again. Bloody annoying trying to configure the mbr again to post to a OS selection screen.
 
Probabilly installing the CPU cooler especially if it needs a backing plate and also installing Windows.

Havning to update then restart, then update, then restart.
 
Installing my arctic cooling CPU cooler is secondary to all the little bits of software I run for film compression and other things like that. Plus all my plugins for all my apps, bookmarks on firefox and all the other little bits and pieces. Complete nightmare :(

Richdog said:
When it doesn't boot. There's nothing more soul-destroying.
Click to expand...

Yes I agree. Scratch what I said before about installing apps. THIS is the worst by far. Atleast when installing apps the computer is atleast inside windows. Also finding out that your USB mouse is making the computer not boot up is even more frustrating after spending 4+ hours trawling through the BIOS looking for the problem and reseating RAM, removing drives etc.to get it to boot.

And THEN finally getting to windows and find that you cannot connect to the Internet and then spend another few days messing about with routers and stuff and eventually discovering the cause of the problem is that they supplied you with the wrong LAN drivers :mad: Yes this is my Shuttle and yes it is a comlete bitch to maintain :(
 
Last edited:
Spending AGES getting cabling really neat and tidy only to find out you forgot to plug in one component, that's right at the bottom.
 
semi-pro waster said:
I'm surprised no one has mentioned the front panel connectors, they are always annoying.
Click to expand...

Quoted for great justice.

Some Socket A coolers were a female dog to install/reinstall. Pliers, a butter knife and a screwdriver - pressure towards the oh so fragile traces, and then it slips.... $±!+

Occasionally lining up the ports with the back panel can be a pain when it decides to hook into a USB port.

Or when you drop a screw.... only never for it to appear again...

For me the ultimate annoyance was getting the floppy drive to work. The cable was always wrong twice. Haven't used one for years... completely skipped SATA boot drives till most chipsets allowed native booting / slipstreamed XP.
 
My last build spec in sig, I got the T'Take Armour case, which is huge, but trying to fit that Tagen 900W PSu in there was an absolute git of a job. This build though after that went without a hitch, no blood spilled at all, and when put together started up first time. I even wired up the front panel connectors correctly at first time of asking (thats a first for me).
 
CPU, front panel connectors, worrying if you've got the cpu paste on right, the motherboard rear port plate stabbing you as you take the flapping bits of metal off.

I hate building computers :D My 2 favourite parts are having all the boxes to open and when you realise your computer is working without problems.
 
Agree with the front panel posts.

Also like to throw in when components blocks the use of another components.
 
I wouldn't say annoying but definitely stressful - changing the processor on your motherboard. For example, if your upgrading.

In the past I've never need to worry about the heat paste/pads because they came pre-attached.
 
Applying CPU paste and cooler, was very daunting first time, took me quite a few attempts to get right.... I swear my stock C2D cooler isn't in properly still but I can't do any better than it is now, and one of the clips is stuck making it hard to remove.
 
the only thing i found tricky this time was installing the the fans onto my noctua, those damn spring clips lol. You have nothing to hold onto and they require a fair bit of force to get them into the fan screw holes. It's one of those funny things where the strength you need isn't really that much but because it's awkward and you don't want to be heavy handed you end up sweating and straining.
I ended up using a pair of pliers to pull the clips into place and it was a million times easier ;)
 
semi-pro waster said:
I'm surprised no one has mentioned the front panel connectors, they are always annoying.
Click to expand...

Yup usb and audio are a pain in the arse, i connected the front usb up before, pc was working fine with devices plugged into it. Plluged in a hub to connect a joypad and the motherboard croaked. :mad:
 
comp builder said:
as in title, i find installing the CPU cooler to be the most annoying thing ever when building a computer, what about you?
Click to expand...

Nothing.

I've had a lot of problems with faulty parts (I've been unlucky :(). That's the worst bit.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom