How do you know so much about computers?

Gaming Teen

New Member
I know probably some of you guys when to college on computers or read a book and I would love to know? I'm fascinated by technology and science and would definitely would like to know a lot more.
 

C4C

Well-Known Member
I was first interested when I started to game and wondered why I couldn't hit max settings on Runescape (it was 2005, okay :D)....

I found online it was the GPU... Didn't bother me much being in 3rd grade...

Time progressed and 3 years ago I started to wander about these forums (I've had 2 accounts), and really I learned by reading what others have to say and doing my own research online. I have no idea what texels or FLOPS do but I still have a pretty decent understanding of how things work... :)
 

strollin

Well-Known Member
Like voyager99 said, hands on experience. In my case, I started fooling around with mini-computers in college in 1976. Got my first PC in 1984. Built my first PC in 1985. I've been making a living off some part of the computer industry since 1975.
 

Darren

Moderator
Staff member
Going to college for Computer Engineering right now, but that just started this year. Most if not all of my knowledge about computers so far is from the internet. This forum primarily as well as reading a few others and lots of YouTube videos. I've built several machines for friends and family and a lot of my advice stems directly from experience.
 

beers

Moderator
Staff member
As above, all hands-on experience. Hanging around forums and things advances your knowledge a lot, although a lot of it falls along the lines of problem solving and experiencing technologies first hand.

It may be different for other people but I didn't really learn much from going to college.
 

Darren

Moderator
Staff member
As above, all hands-on experience. Hanging around forums and things advances your knowledge a lot, although a lot of it falls along the lines of problem solving and experiencing technologies first hand.

It may be different for other people but I didn't really learn much from going to college.

Where did you go?

College, from what I've been told, is better for teaching you how to problem solve, how to deal with stress and pressure, and how to deal with different people. Basically teaching you a work ethic. Yeah you'll use some of what you learn in college (hopefully) but most of it will teach you how to be a good worker as much as anything else. Of course this all depends on what you went to school for as well as what you end up doing.

Also, when helping people with issues on here I frequently just Google their problem and figure out what I could suggest that might be helpful. Knowing how to search for answers to your questions is a huge part of it.
 

tylerjrb

Member
My brother built a PC 6-8 or so years ago. We used to play track mania together me on my old 1.2ghz laptop him on his at the time super computer. I wondered at the time why mine was so slow and looked rubbish. Yet his was so much better. He explained everything to me so I could understand. Haven't really thought about them since about 3 years ago when I got fed up of my Xbox and built a PC. Since then learned a lot, also great fun learning how these things work.
 

ninjabubbles3

Active Member
Mostly through websites like MaximumPC, Toms Hardware, and YouTube channels like LinusTechTips, as Pauls Hardware, Awesome sauce network, NeweggTV, etc.

And this forum for sure! Member on here have probably taught me 3/4s of what I know.

Also, I barely know a fraction of what others on this forum know, but I'm sure it'll come with tim
 

spirit

Moderator
Staff member
I've lived my whole life around computers. I've always had an interest. I've had a lot of hands-on experience with lots of different machines in different scenarios. I do a lot of IT management at school and I've picked a lot up from this forum over the past 3 or 4 years. :)
 

storp

Member
Like others have said, hands on goes a long ways.

Just doing a first build, the way you like it, can be more valuable than a whole lot of pages being read. A lot of people think they cannot accomplish it when they actually can.

A resource like Computer Forum can help when you run into uncertainties or operating issues. And right up there -- what components might be best suited for your purposes based on the pros and cons of other builders feedback.

You need a serious resource to refer to.
 

z3r0

New Member
The old adage, "practice makes perfect."

As it has already been mentioned, experience is the best teacher and nothing else can be considered a viable substitute for genuine "hands-on" work.

Personally, my specialty is in program functionality and not necessarily computers as a whole. I've only tore down and rebuilt two desktops (and one notebook which I managed to break during assembly) in my twenty years of playing around with computers so I'm not up-to-date on all of the latest and greatest hardware or build methods. \

But that's why I'm here. Hopefully to gain some insight from IT professionals who have much more experience in this arena than I do. Eventually, I will ask for help in building a dedicated graphics and animation system that can adequately handle modeling and animation work as my D620 is seriously lacking in its ability to handle Blender's rendering process. :)
 

voyagerfan99

Master of Turning Things Off and Back On Again
Staff member
If you had gotten a D620 or D630 with an nVidia Quadro card it may have performed better. But even still, those machines are dated and it probably still would have struggled; just not as bad as the Intel chipset.
 

z3r0

New Member
If you had gotten a D620 or D630 with an nVidia Quadro card it may have performed better. But even still, those machines are dated and it probably still would have struggled; just not as bad as the Intel chipset.

I've read many reviews on the nVidia Quadro card that came with those systems and Intel admitted that they were all destined to keel-over. Anybody that I have ever spoken to about the Latitude-D series said that the Intel chipset sucks but it is still better than the Quadro. They could be wrong and I could be wrong entirely. All I know is that I love how Dell made the Latitude series so modular. Disassembly and upgrades seem to be pretty snappy from the videos I've been watching. :)
 
I've learned pretty much everything that I know personally from hands on experience. One time my computer was infected with a trojan, I was able to get rid of it after a few days; but that got me into playing around with the files themselves and what they can and can't do. How the infection takes place and where to look. Now, I only use Windows Defender and Malwarebytes Anti-malware.
As for the 'techie' aspect of the hardware, I learned that it was better in the long run to just buy the parts seperate and put the computer together myself. Internet and youtube has helped a little too.
 

voyagerfan99

Master of Turning Things Off and Back On Again
Staff member
I've read many reviews on the nVidia Quadro card that came with those systems and Intel admitted that they were all destined to keel-over. Anybody that I have ever spoken to about the Latitude-D series said that the Intel chipset sucks but it is still better than the Quadro. They could be wrong and I could be wrong entirely. All I know is that I love how Dell made the Latitude series so modular. Disassembly and upgrades seem to be pretty snappy from the videos I've been watching. :)

I've sold literally hundreds of them and I've only seen one or two have an issue with the nVidia card.
 

vacuoushalftime

New Member
I know probably some of you guys when to college on computers or read a book and I would love to know? I'm fascinated by technology and science and would definitely would like to know a lot more.

I say hands-on experience. I joined this forum not because I'm an expert :rolleyes: I joined because I want to learn more from the experts here ;)
 

Agent Smith

Well-Known Member
Reading a ton of stuff on the Internet. I'm a member of no less than ten forums. I have NEVER had to reinstall an OS with a probelm, I have always fixed it myself. The nuke option is a cop out.

I have a blog, forum, FTP server and Teamspeak server and thinking about adding a gaming server. I have learned a lot about security regarding all of that in the last couple of months just off the Internet alone.
 
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