I’m a bit of a tech nerd, and I understand that not everyone reading this blog will feel the same way. Thus, building your own computer could entirely be out of the range of your abilities. Still, the process of finding the parts and spending the time laboring over the computer was immensely rewarding, and a great source of savings too.

 

The desire to build a computer initially came from the fact that I was attending college and using a school-issued (mine to own) laptop. The laptop wasn’t bad, in fact, for the task of doing schoolwork, it was quite fine. However, I’m a tech sort of person, a geek, a nerd, I wasn’t just going to be using my laptop for schoolwork. Among the many activities I enjoyed, some were more computer intensive than others, for instance: Photoshop and World of Warcraft. Beyond those two programs, I also found that I wanted to use Premiere and I was going to play Starcraft 2 when it came out, as well as Diablo 3.

Laptops are notoriously difficult to upgrade. Unlike a desktop computer, the parts in a laptop often require specific replacements or upgrades, and since they don’t have a ton of extra card slots (or even room for cards), your options for getting an additional graphics, sound, or other boost are fairly limited. Ultimately, I knew that my laptop wasn’t something I wanted going forward. It did its job well, but it wasn’t required to play games or run graphics intensive programs, to do that, I needed something more.

 

As a poor college student, though, I couldn’t really afford a $2,000 computer with all the bells and whistles. Heck, I couldn’t even really afford a $1,000 computer. To be honest, I couldn’t really afford much of anything, but that decision is another topic entirely. The story here is of how I managed to build a computer easily worth twice its cost price for $700. With the help of a friend I began to search for the individual computer parts on sites like NewEgg.com. I needed a power supply, a hard drive, a CD drive, a motherboard, a processor, memory and more.

I knew if I ordered a computer from someone else that they would have done all of those things for me, and not necessarily searched for the best price either. Lots of companies have arrangements with other companies, and strictly buy from them. However, so long as I was careful, I could buy my parts from whoever was offering me the best deal. It didn’t come without its risks though. Most individual parts don’t have impressive warranties, and certain parts, like hard drives or processors, are often “you get what you pay for” deals, if you go cheap, you run the risk of getting an unreliable product.

 

Eventually I got all the products, and they were mailed to me in various packages. It was sort of like a mini Christmas in the middle of the year. I was excited at the prospect of getting exactly what I wanted and felt I needed, I just had to build it first. It was with tense, but eager anticipation that I took apart the Tower and put the various parts in, hooking them up as directed. I was frightened, scared of the possibility that after putting the money into it, I would flick on the power switch and nothing would have happened. In a way, I imagine those people who built the first computer felt the same way. And for me, this was the first time that I was building a computer.

There were some minor difficulties, however, in the end, I flicked the power switch and saw text on the screen! Of course, it was more than that too. I put in the Windows disc to install the operating system and all of that worked exactly as it was supposed to. That feeling alone, having it all work, was well worth it. But, the fact that I saved at least $300, possibly as much as $700 on it? There really aren’t words to describe the “Wow!” factor that goes into that. Computers may not be your thing, but there are plenty of things that one can “do” themselves. I highly recommend it, not only to save money, but as a tool to feel good as well.