BFR Build-It-Yourself Guide

All the information you need to build your own PC.

Why build your PC instead of buying it?

Well, the biggest and most obvious reason is price. Building a PC on your own is usually hundreds of dollars cheaper than buying one. Another reason is that you are free to choose any parts that you want, whereas you are forced to use certain parts when you buy a PC. In addition, building your PC guarantees that it is upgradeable, and that it will not contain any proprietary parts that PC venders will charge you an arm and a leg for if you need a replacement.

I don’t know how a computer works… how can I hope to build one?

You might expect that building a PC would be a complicated process, since computers are so complex, but in reality, the process is very simple, and anyone who can use a screwdriver can put a PC together. With the aid of a guide like this one and the documentation that comes with your PC parts, the building process should be nice and painless.

What about the warranty that a PC vender offers?

You may be thinking that one of the biggest arguments for buying a PC rather than building one is that PC venders offer warranties on their products, and will fix them if things go wrong early on in the product life span. What you may not realize is that all of the parts you buy for your PC have warranties. So instead of just sending in a broken PC and waiting for it to be fixed or replaced, you send in the broken part of the PC to its manufacturer to get your repair, replacement, or refund. Also, most manufacturer part warranties are almost always longer than the 1 year offered by a PC vender, and they come at no additional cost.