My First Ever Custom PC

[jiyeon]

 

 

Welcome to my custom PC build log!

This is my first ever custom PC, built between the 4th & 5th of June, 2018.

 

Specs as of 05/06/18

Intel Core i5-8600K

Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO

Asus Prime Z370-P

Corsair Vengeance LPX DDR4-2400

Asus Dual GeForce GTX 1060 OC 3GB

Samsung 850 EVO 250GB SSD

NZXT S340

3x Corsair SP120 RGB

Corsair CX450M

 

 

 

My case of choice is the NZXT S340 in white, it's a beautiful case that I had never seen in person before this, it's even better in person than in the pictures! I chose the S340 because of its simplistic styling and minimal design. I also have had previous experience building inside this case with PC Building Simulator on Steam, it's an irresistable case.

 

My first step is to remove front and side panels, the thumbscrews were hard on so I had to twist them free using a screwdriver, once they were loose enough, I was able to use my hands, because they don't call them thumbscrews for nothing. It's also very nice and convenient that they're captive and hold onto the panel.

 

I then took off the stock NZXT case fans to make way for my three Corsair SP120 case fans later in the build. I safely placed my NZXT case fans back inside the box, making sure to disconnect them from the back cables safely before stowing them away.

 

 

 

 

Next up is the motherboard, which is the Asus Prime Z370-P. I chose this board for the overclocking abilities and also for its styling, its black and grey color scheme fits nicely with my S340 and my graphics card. I had never seen a full ATX motherboard before this, so this appeared much bigger than expected (that's what she said) to me.

 

 

My CPU of choice is the Intel Core i5-8600K, I chose this CPU after many LTT forum users suggested I get an unlocked CPU, as originally I was going for a locked 8600. Sure enough, I shelled out for an unlocked 8600 and it fit nicely into the motherboard socket, making sure the arrows lined up. Thanks YouTube for all the CPU installation tutorials.

 

 

My memory modules are next, which are a 2x4GB kit of Corsair Vengeance LPX DDR4-2400 memory. They beautifully blended in with the motherboard and contrasted the S340's whites. I made sure to slot my modules in DIMMs B2 and A2, per motherboard manual's instructions. I also later found out the B2 DIMM was not seated correctly, as you can probably tell by the photo. The fixed clip on one side of the Asus motherboard DIMM tripped me up minorly here.

 

 

 

 

Next is my CPU cooler, the Cooler Master Hyper 212. My original cooler was the Cryorig H7 Quad Lumi but funds and shipping times held me back this time around, so this component is arguably the least powerful in the entire system.

I had major hiccups during the installation of this cooler, especially the backpate and washers. I even video-called my friend whom had experience with Hyper 212s to help me out, and sure enough, we got my Hyper 212 securely fitted. This ate up at least half an hour of the entire build process.

 

I also managed to fit my Samsung 850 EVO 250GB SSD into the far-left drive bay of my S340 case.

 

In addition to it all, I also fit my new Asus GeForce GTX 1060 OC 3GB into my PC, the graphics card was much bigger than I anticipated, and I finally got to see real-life GPU sag in person. I already knew from PC Building Simulator that I had to remove the second and third PCI-e brackets from the S340 in order to fit my case, so that was no problem.

 

 

After this major climb, I managed to hook up my PSU, the Corsair CXM 450W Semi-Modular PSU, and connect up all the necessary cables, including the front panel connectors, again per motherboard manual's instructions.

 

 

 

 

 

I'll first address why the lower front fan isn't attached, and that's because I ran out of chassis fan headers. There are only two chassis fan headers on this motherboard and so I was unable to use my third case fan at the time of the build.

 

With everything all set up, I hooked up my PSU cable to the wall, flipped the switch, and hooray, my system is functional! LEDs are on, case fans are spinning, It's a glorious day! it was at this point I sat in front of my half-assembled PC for ten minutes to grasp in the realisation that I had just built my first ever custom PC by myself. It was a magnificent evening.

 

 

I then brought my new system up to my room, and had to use my TV as my display since my monitor refused to pick up any signal. (LTT tech support will know all about this incident)

It was amazing to read my system on screen, new CPU, new memory, and a Samsung 850 Evo.

I happened to notice my BIOS only recognised 4GB of RAM so I knew I had to reseat one of them, and so I did. Voila, 8GB of memory.

 

 

Interestingly, I managed to get my third case fan on through using the vacant AIO pump header on my motherboard and setting aforementioned fan to DC mode so it doesn't spin at a constant 1500RPM. I am not certain this is safe but it works in the mean time and I'm happy I got my third case fan in.

 

 

The next day (or morning, as I slept at 6am because of this build) I woke up to this beautiful sight. My very own working PC. I had the side panel off for a good few minutes just staring at my RGB fans as if it was a campfire, it was relaxing.

I made sure to check my BIOS for my CPU cooler settings, set my RAM correctly to 2400MHz, and ensure my GPU was working, and then my build was finalised. I call her Sia.  

 

With my build done, I would like to take this time to share my thoughts and experience of building my very first PC.

 

It's a scary experience, but after a dozen "How to Build a PC" YouTube walkthroughts, I came in confident that I could end the night (or morning) with a working PC. As soon as I gathered up all the parts, I was filled with confidence and adrenaline in building. I probably completed the installation of the CPU and RAM in merely five minutes.

The CPU cooler was for sure the most difficult part, considering the Hyper 212 was not even my original cooler of choice. The included instructions were actually quite hard for me to follow that I needed a human to help. It really set my mood back a lot. It was my fault for not researching the cooler beforehand. I guess this is one of the points of building a PC where there's a steep learning curve, and I sure crashed into it.

I really enjoyed building my first PC, just even putting on the fans, I could feel my individuality inside this PC, because I was the one who chose these and have assembled my own system.

But of course, the best part was knowing the system works, and the sight of this PC showing its first 'ASUS' boot screen is an always will be an unforgettable moment.

 

 

Spoiler

 

Hi guys! I return with a July update, where I've cleaned up the aesthetics and also welcomed the addition of the Arctic Freezer 33 eSports One, a much nicer cooler than the Cooler Master Hyper 212.

 

I bought my 33 eSports on the July 18th and also bought a fourth Corsair SP120 fan along with it for maximum chassis cooling. Now my build looks dropdead gorgeous with all the purple illumination and especially the new CPU cooler which I fell in love with right from the moment I unboxed it.

 

Updates are sure to come in future, I'm thinking some RGB memory modules such as white Corsair Vengeance RGBs should work a treat!

 

 

Updated Specs

Intel Core i5-8600K

Arctic Freezer 33 eSports One (formerly Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO)

Asus Prime Z370-P

8GB Corsair Vengeance LPX DDR4-2800 (formerly 2400MHz)

Asus Dual GeForce GTX 1060 OC 3GB

Samsung 850 EVO 250GB SSD

NZXT S340

4x Corsair SP120 RGB (formerly 3x)

Corsair CX450M

Asus PCE-N15 Wi-Fi Card

 

 

 

 

 

Spoiler

 

I've pretty much officially completed my first ever custom build, I now have 16GB of RAM in a 4x4GB configuration, and to top it off, I now have some custom white cables! Also, I'm now blue-themed!

 

Updated Specs

Intel Core i5-8600K

Arctic Freezer 33 eSports One

Asus Prime Z370-P

16GB Corsair Vengeance LPX DDR4-2800 (formerly 8GB)

Asus Dual GeForce GTX 1060 OC 3GB

Samsung 850 EVO 250GB SSD

NZXT S340

4x Corsair SP120 RGB

Corsair CX450M

Asus PCE-N15 Wi-Fi Card

 

 

 

 

 

Spoiler

 

My new 500GB Crucial P1 NVME M.2 SSD arrived! I decided to get this new drive after I ran out of space on my 850 evo. It took merely ten minutes to install, and after that was a case of getting Windows 10 on it. Super painless process.

 

Updated Specs

Intel Core i5-8600K

Arctic Freezer 33 eSports One

Asus Prime Z370-P

16GB Corsair Vengeance LPX DDR4-3000

Asus Dual GeForce GTX 1060 OC 3GB

Crucial P1 NVME M.2 500GB SSD + Samsung 850 EVO 250GB SSD

NZXT S340

4x Corsair SP120 RGB

Corsair CX450M

Asus PCE-N15 Wi-Fi Card

 

 

 

 

Spoiler

 

Hi guys! I return once again to show off some new hardware.

 

One of the new pieces is my new Gigabyte GC-WB1733D-I Wi-Fi card, it has 1733Mbps 802.11ac Wi-Fi supported speed and includes Bluetooth 5.0 support!

 

The second piece is my new Sound Blaster Audigy Fx sound card, it's to accompany my new Audio-Technica ATH-M50x headphones, I bought it to allow some EQ software.

 

Updated Specs

Intel Core i5-8600K

Arctic Freezer 33 eSports One

Asus Prime Z370-P

16GB Corsair Vengeance LPX DDR4-3000

Asus Dual GeForce GTX 1060 OC 3GB

Crucial P1 NVME M.2 500GB SSD + Samsung 850 EVO 250GB SSD

NZXT S340

4x Corsair SP120 RGB

Corsair CX450M

Gigabyte GC-WB1733D-I Wi-Fi Card

 

 

 

[Guest]

Congrats! It looks great.

Really like the aesthetics of your competent choices.

[jiyeon]

Thank you! The case fans and the white of the graphics card really make the whole PC pop, don't they?

[dizmo]

Looks nice! I like how the colors all go together, it's not that easy to get white to work well.

Very clean.

 

I had a hard time with my cooler on my recent build as well, when trying to mount it to an AMD motherboard. It went onto the Intel board with great ease.

I don't think I'll ever buy a cheaper cooler again because of it though. The mounting solutions are just too garb.

[jiyeon]

12 hours ago, dizmo said:

I had a hard time with my cooler on my recent build as well, when trying to mount it to an AMD motherboard. It went onto the Intel board with great ease.

I don't think I'll ever buy a cheaper cooler again because of it though. The mounting solutions are just too garb.

Absolutely, this Hyper 212 isn't what I intended for my build anyway, will upgrade to a Cryorig H7 Quad Lumi in the future, should have a much easier mounting mechanism.

[Guest]

13 hours ago, dizmo said:

Looks nice! I like how the colors all go together, it's not that easy to get white to work well.

Very clean.

 

I had a hard time with my cooler on my recent build as well, when trying to mount it to an AMD motherboard. It went onto the Intel board with great ease.

I don't think I'll ever buy a cheaper cooler again because of it though. The mounting solutions are just too garb.

For me I didn't read the instructions and flipped the mounting brackets, so the cooler kept popping off. My heart was not into that build. lol

 

[dizmo]

4 hours ago, MiNy said:

Absolutely, this Hyper 212 isn't what I intended for my build anyway, will upgrade to a Cryorig H7 Quad Lumi in the future, should have a much easier mounting mechanism.

The H7 is the cooler I have. Wait until they implement the new mounting hardware they showed off at Computex, the mounting system they use now is absolute trash.

3 hours ago, Densetsu said:

For me I didn't read the instructions and flipped the mounting brackets, so the cooler kept popping off. My heart was not into that build. lol

 

Haha, that's pretty bad! There's only two things I read the instructions for, cooler mounting and seeing where to stick the front IO pins. I'm surprised they haven't figured out an easier way to do that, like having it all combined into a single plug and getting motherboard manufacturers to make a standardized pin layout. *shakes head*

 

[jiyeon]

45 minutes ago, dizmo said:

The H7 is the cooler I have. Wait until they implement the new mounting hardware they showed off at Computex, the mounting system they use now is absolute trash.

Oh, I didn't even know they appeared at Computex, thank you for that info, I'll be on the lookout for the new mounting hardware!

[dizmo]

5 hours ago, MiNy said:

Oh, I didn't even know they appeared at Computex, thank you for that info, I'll be on the lookout for the new mounting hardware!

Yes yes! They're switching all of their coolers over to it, so they clearly knew how horrible their old style was.

 

[Ironwhale2009]

I really like the colour scheme.

it's exciting journey building your first machine,I'm looking forward to the future upgrade updates....I wonder whats next  

[jiyeon]

6 hours ago, Ironwhale2009 said:

I'm looking forward to the future upgrade updates....I wonder whats next

Realistically the most I can do is CPU, cooler, RAM, and GPU since I'm limited by my 450W PSU haha, but I'm glad you're excited!

[Nogghan]

@MiNy wow this is very weird.. i had the exact same motherboard , CPU , ram , and cooler when i first build my system, ive since traded in the motherboard for a better asrock gaming K6, because that prime-p board has terrible power delivery honestly i could clock past 5ghz no problem but it wouldn't do anything in benchmarks 5ghz -5.3ghz because the power is so bad, i also have a bigger CPU cooler now because the 212 was getting hot even on my delided 8600k now i can run it passively with the grand macho from thermalright 

[jiyeon]

6 hours ago, Nogghan said:

that prime-p board has terrible power delivery honestly i could clock past 5ghz no problem but it wouldn't do anything in benchmarks 5ghz -5.3ghz because the power is so bad

That's interesting, I'll remember that in case I ever need that power. For the most part, I'm running 4.4-4.7GHz anyway so it's probably not going to become an issue for me. (Minus of course, that one time I clocked 4.7GHz and my system crashed)
 

6 hours ago, Nogghan said:

i also have a bigger CPU cooler now because the 212 was getting hot even on my delided 8600k now i can run it passively with the grand macho from thermalright 

My 8600K and 212 are doing fine, idles at around 30C and full load 70C at max, and I'm 4.4GHz... Obviously I plan on getting a nicer cooler on the future, that's for sure!

[O9B0666]

On 6/13/2018 at 6:23 PM, MiNy said:

 

 

It's a scary experience

 

it shouldn't be, everything goes in one spot, like a color by number.
 

 

On 6/13/2018 at 6:23 PM, MiNy said:

I probably completed the installation of the CPU and RAM in merely five minutes.

 

i wouldnt even expext it to go any longer lol

least you had fun with your first build, first thing as im sure you know to upgrade asap, get more memory/another HDD. I like the white build too, i just did my build in white purple and black, i sleeved the cables myself rather then order em, and that's super easy to make sleeved extensions.

[jiyeon]

4 minutes ago, O9B0666 said:

it shouldn't be, everything goes in one spot, like a color by number.

Yeah, it was simple to remember where everything goes but knowing stuff could be damaged if put into the wrong place was the truly scary part!

 

5 minutes ago, O9B0666 said:

least you had fun with your first build, first thing as im sure you know to upgrade asap, get more memory/another HDD. I like the white build too, i just did my build in white purple and black, i sleeved the cables myself rather then order em, and that's super easy to make sleeved extensions.

Yeah, my next upgrade should be filling the remaining memory slots, the jump from 8 to 16 will be nice. I'm not so sure on more storage since I can barely use 150GB right now, but that may change in the future. As for cabling, I was heavily thinking of getting white cables but I wanted my build to work first before I go visually upgrading it haha

[Guest]

Congrats on the build. Never underestimate building a PC, a lot of folks don't even try it. So welcome to the elite league of system builders ?

[jiyeon]

Hi guys!  I'm back just to publish a comparison of how my PC looked back in June '18 to now, closing in on a year since my beautiful machine was built.

 

 

A list of everything that has changed, in no particular order:

• Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO
  • Arctic Freeser 33 eSports ONE
• 8GB-2400 Corsair Vengeance LPX (2x4GB)
  • 16GB-3000 Corsair Vengeance LPX (4x4GB)
• 250GB Samsung 850 EVO
  • 250GB Samsung 850 EVO + 500GB Crucial P1 NVME M.2
• 3x Corsair SP120 RGB fans
  • 4x Corsair SP120 RGB fans
• BitFenix Alchemy custom cables - 6-pin PCIE + 24-pin ATX
• Asus PCE-N15 Wi-Fi card
• Debug speaker
• And a whole lot of cable management improvements!

[Tacos4all]

You've inspired me! Your first build is drop-dead gorgeous! I have built a couple PC's in the past for myself and one for a friend but none of them were this good looking. The color coordination with the fan lights and the whie/black theme is awesome. My past two builds have been rather basic. Black chassis and blue LEDs for my first. My second build was a little more stylish with tempered glass side panels and a tinted acrylic front panel. RGB fans, GPU, RAM, and Mobo. So while I can change the colors around at will for everything but the chassis fans (non-software based proprietary fan controller from thermaltake (Highly don't recommend). it's kind of a mismatch as I can't quite sync up everything to match the chassis. I think on my next build I am definitely going for a White and Black build. The Fractal Design Meshify S2 has caught my eye, but the Corsair Carbide Series Spec-Omega is also real nice. I am leaning more towards the latter because I will be going full water cooling for CPU and GPU and already have Corsair RGB ram that I can carry over into the new system. I suppose having a Corsair ecosystem will help with light coordination.

 

Other than aesthetics, your choice of CPU makes me reminisce about my first build which had an i5-3570k. I too shelled out the extra dough to get the unlocked processor and it is defnitely worth it. Not only are the boost clocks higher, but it offers you the opportunity to manually overclock if you wanna squeeze a little more juice out of your rig. It can be the difference between a minimum of 59 fps and min of 60

[jiyeon]

8 hours ago, Tacos4all said:

You've inspired me! Your first build is drop-dead gorgeous! I have built a couple PC's in the past for myself and one for a friend but none of them were this good looking. The color coordination with the fan lights and the whie/black theme is awesome. My past two builds have been rather basic. Black chassis and blue LEDs for my first. My second build was a little more stylish with tempered glass side panels and a tinted acrylic front panel. RGB fans, GPU, RAM, and Mobo. So while I can change the colors around at will for everything but the chassis fans (non-software based proprietary fan controller from thermaltake (Highly don't recommend). it's kind of a mismatch as I can't quite sync up everything to match the chassis. I think on my next build I am definitely going for a White and Black build. The Fractal Design Meshify S2 has caught my eye, but the Corsair Carbide Series Spec-Omega is also real nice. I am leaning more towards the latter because I will be going full water cooling for CPU and GPU and already have Corsair RGB ram that I can carry over into the new system. I suppose having a Corsair ecosystem will help with light coordination.

Thank you so much for your kind words! I did graphical design in school so all the color harmony and contrast come natural to me.  Sounds great! You should totally add your build to Build Logs too once you've gotten into it, it's so interesting to see other's PC themes.

 

8 hours ago, Tacos4all said:

Other than aesthetics, your choice of CPU makes me reminisce about my first build which had an i5-3570k. I too shelled out the extra dough to get the unlocked processor and it is defnitely worth it. Not only are the boost clocks higher, but it offers you the opportunity to manually overclock if you wanna squeeze a little more juice out of your rig. It can be the difference between a minimum of 59 fps and min of 60

Yeah absolutely, I thought what's the point of getting a locked processor like the i5-8400 when I can get an i5-8600K and play around with overclocks, all the more fun! I actually one time did underclock my 8600K to 2.8GHz to match the i5-8400, as you could tell, the gaming experience was less than enjoyable when compared to my 4.7GHz overclock.

[jiyeon]

April 7th update photo. It's like getting your yearly high school yearbook photo taken!

 

[Kurupt]

Looks incredible.  LOVE IT!

[r2724r16]

On 4/7/2019 at 11:56 AM, seoz said:

 

Cable management is great! Any pics of cable management on the other side of the case?

 

My PC's cables look decent on the side with tempered glass, but not so great on the side with the solid panel.

[jiyeon]

24 minutes ago, r2724r16 said:

Cable management is great! Any pics of cable management on the other side of the case?

 

My PC's cables look decent on the side with tempered glass, but not so great on the side with the solid panel.

Thank you! Yep, I have a picture of the back, I put like an hour or two into sorting the rear.

 

Spoiler

 

[jiyeon]

Happy 1 year birthday to my build! Time flies so fast, and it's grown up just as quickly.

 

What started out as a budget-limited build with next to zero theme cohesion has become a machine that I am super proud of owning, and proud to call my own creation.

 

Over the past year, I have been developing the visuals of the build as well as adding some additional quality of life components such as my sound card and Wi-Fi card to make this build more personal and unique to myself.

 

Here's to another year of healthy overclocks, good health, and high performance gaming and desktop usage to my baby.

 

[CiBi]

Look really good