I'm building my computer today - help me out!!

P

panther05

New Member
Ok in this thread, i'll be posting question as I build my first computer. I put this thread in this forum since I have a feeling I'll have most trouble with connecting cables to and from the PSU.

here's the exact Mobo i have
p5gd1_l.jpg


and I have a Antec NeoPower PSU

crap this is soo confusing!!!

could someone, on paint, draw little circles of where to plug the things....I have the main MOBO power supply plugged into the PSU, but that's it.

here's what I have so far:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v290/vmg2003/DSC01240.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v290/vmg2003/DSC01239.jpg

I know i didn't provide much info, feel free to ask.
 
from what i can remember, thats pretty much it for pluggin the PSU into the MOBO, everything else from the PSU goes into the cd/dvd/hdd/floppy drives
 
what about the cables that connect from the drives to the mobo? I have one NEC DVD-RW and one hard drive

There's these three identical cables (came with the PSU) that are obviously to connect them to the drives (the sockets match to the drives - 4 holes) but these cables have like three different ends..

here's a picture of the three cables, with one of them strectched out to show you the end.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v290/vmg2003/DSC01243.jpg

here's the PCI-Express cable which I don't know where to put
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v290/vmg2003/DSC01242.jpg

and here's a cable called "FAN ONLY" which I also don't know where to put.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v290/vmg2003/DSC01241.jpg
 
k, well the first pic looks like molex adapters, these increase the amount of 4 pin molex cables you can have so you can add more hard drives and dvd drives at will. the other 2 pics are exactly the same, and ive never worked with pci-express so i would have no idea what to do.

as for the dvd to motherboard, these should come with the motherboard itself and not the PSU, they look like flat cables, usually with 3 cuboid bits on.
 
elmarcorulz said:
k, well the first pic looks like molex adapters, these increase the amount of 4 pin molex cables you can have so you can add more hard drives and dvd drives at will. the other 2 pics are exactly the same, and ive never worked with pci-express so i would have no idea what to do.

as for the dvd to motherboard, these should come with the motherboard itself and not the PSU, they look like flat cables, usually with 3 cuboid bits on.
Click to expand...

thanks.

Ok i have those flat cables indentified, but not sure where to put them..

mobo3.jpg


which one goes to where...



...oh and sorry for asking all these dumb questions....i'm really determined to build this PC...i just dont have any real life friends to help me :(
 
Looks to me like the blue one is the floppy connector (or the black one next to it), and if it's not it MIGHT be a standard IDE controller. I know on my old Asus mobo that it has 2 standard IDE controllers and one RAID controller. The primary RAID is just an IDE controller with RAID (which are advanced hard drive configurations, but you need more than one hard drive) capabilities, and the secondary is the same thing but just on the secondary channel. So in other words, the PRI RAID and SEC RAID are connectors for your hard drives, and the blue one is a standard IDE (hard drive) or floppy connector.
 
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ok i THINK i have everything connected...except these 5 little cables that come from the front of the case (where the power-on botton is). The cables were already attached to the case when I got it, so it seems like I just need to connect them somewhere on the mobo

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v290/vmg2003/DSC01245.jpg

i know it's blurry...here's what they say

"Power LED"
"Reset SW"
"HDD LED"
"SPEAKER"
"POWER SW"

could some one help me find where to connect these. They're small and have either 2-3 pins.
 
panther05 said:
thanks.

Ok i have those flat cables indentified, but not sure where to put them..

mobo3.jpg


which one goes to where...



...oh and sorry for asking all these dumb questions....i'm really determined to build this PC...i just dont have any real life friends to help me :(
Click to expand...
The RAID are fo CD Drives and HDd.

Your "WTF?" is an FDD (For Floppy drives) and the other one is for your Power Supply :)
 
NT61 said:
The RAID are fo CD Drives and HDd.

Your "WTF?" is an FDD (For Floppy drives) and the other one is for your Power Supply :)
Click to expand...

thanks.

but I took a second look at the manuel and it says the "WTF" one is "PRI_IDE1"

still not sure what it's for though.

The black one just to the bottom right of it is the floppy. At least according to this manual, which isnt being very useless :mad:
 
yeah, the sad thing is those are the smallest looking wires, and cheapest made, but the power switch is BY FAR the most important switch you'll hook up on your motherboard. You definitely need a manual from the mobo to figure out where to plug those in. Every motherboard is different, and there's a cluster of jumper connectors that is where all your case wires hook into. I can't really see it in the low-res pic up there, but I can tell you that most of the time that little cluster is near the bottom of the motherboard (when it's mounted).
 
Looks like I was right there, look at my older comment. The blue one you should hook up to your optical drives (CD and DVD drives), and the PRI RAID you should hook up your hard drive to. If you've got 2 of anything, remember to either set the jumpers on the back of them to slave and master or plug the master into the end connector and the slave into the middle connector, then the computer knows which one is slave and primary without jumpers.
 
NT61 said:
The RAID are fo CD Drives and HDd.

Your "WTF?" is an FDD (For Floppy drives) and the other one is for your Power Supply :)
Click to expand...


NO.. your blue "WTF" is for the IDE HDDs and also for your IDE CD/DVD Drives, it should be labeled "IDE0".
The shorter black one next to it is for the floppy drive. Remember to plug the connector after the twist into the floppy drive and the other end into the MB.
 
This is amusing. I can't imagine how difficult this build is! When I built my first computer, I bought a book that illustrated every step. I also referred heavily on the mobo diagram. For me, the jumper cables were a pain, as they never match 100%. I searched online to find the correct arrangement, but it wasn't easy.

I would think you are going to want to double check and triple check every connection. Wouldn't the power-supply connections come last?

The jumper pins on the back of the drives will be critical too. If they are not placed correctly, you will have all kinds of issues trying to figure out what's not working and why.

You should try to plan ahead before haphazzardly hooking everything up - you WILL miss something otherwise.

I followed the order as suggested in my book and it went relatively smoothly. It's way too easy to get everything mixed up.

good luck my friend
 
Yeah, everyone seems to have at least 1 problem building a computer, no matter how experienced they are. I know how to build them, but I have 3 possibly faulty components in my new system (possibly shorted motherboard, twisted case that doesn't let PCI cards fit exactly, and a bad power supply) and until I get that worked out it won't run. The worst part is hooking it all up and then going backwards to find the problem, so listen to Rars222, plan everything before you hook it up. Building the dang thing is the easiest part, but when the hardware doesn't want to work, that's when I get mad. I'm not saying it just gets harder from there on Panther, but just try not to get frustrated if things don't work right away, because chances are they won't. If you get it to boot though, in my opinion it gets easier from there, but I have a lot more experience with software problems so that's just my personal opinion.
 
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