7 Other Parts

The other major parts of your PC are the motherboard, case, power supply, and cooling solution.

Motherboard

The motherboard is what everything in your system will eventually attach to, and serves as the “skeleton” of the system. This is a very important job, which begs the question, why didn’t I include the motherboard in the four “vital components’? The reason is that motherboard choice has almost no impact on performance. In fact, the motherboard should be one of the last components choose! When choosing a motherboard, the most important aspect is the CPU socket. Having already chosen a CPU, pick a motherboard compatible with it. This is a fairly simple process of determining your CPU’s socket type, and pairing it with a board that matches. For example, my Ryzen 3600 has an AM4 socket, so when browsing motherboards I should only consider those with AM4 sockets (Daisy, 2020). Beyond this, little else matters outside of personal preference. Things like built in WiFi capability and ports for RGB lights to connect are important to some, but not all users. It is far too easy to spend too much on a motherboard, when for the vast majority of users one under $100 will be perfectly fine.

Case

Don’t buy this first! Far too many PC builders buy an expensive case first, using up funds that could have been better spend elsewhere. Like the motherboard, case has very little control over a system’s performance. It simply exists to keep the system contained and protected from things like dust and static electricity. The only real caveat here is to buy a case with adequate airflow. To do this, just looking for cases with lots of “breathing holes”. Cases with glass front panels are usually best avoided, in favor of mesh or screen front panels. Size is the other major deciding factor, which luckily come down to user preference. A smaller case will take up less desk space and often have a cleaner look, but big cases are much easier to work in and are generally easier to upgrade later. For most uses, a case can be found for less than $130. Cases above this price point become less functional and more design oriented. If on a tight budget, brand new perfectly functional cases can be found for less than $40. These cases will get the job done, but will be generally less attractive and harder to work in than more premium cases.

Power Supply

The power supply (again) is a component that has almost no impact on system performance. However, it could be the difference between a working PC and a bomb sitting on your desk! The guide for buying a power supply is this: buy a good one that has enough power. The power supply or PSU does just that, supplies power to the system. They measure their output in watts, and the only real “necessity” to choosing one is to buy one that can supply enough power to your system (Hale, 2021). There are a number of tools online to estimate your wattage requirements, such as PCPartPicker and Newegg.com’s Power Supply Calculator. Once you have this estimate, I always recommend adding about 100 watts, to accommodate any upgrades you may want to make after assembly. Finally, buy a good quality power supply. These can be found for around $75-100, and investing here will give you peace of mind for years afterwards. It’s easy to find power supplies for less than $30, but these are poorly made downright dangerous options. Shop around, read reviews and buy a quality PSU from a well-respected manufacturer like EVGA, Corsair or Seasonic.

Cooling Solution

And finally, we have to choose a cooling solution. There are two broad categories; air and water cooling. For the purposes of this guide, we will focus only on air cooling, as water cooling (especially custom water cooling) is a complicated, labor intensive task. Many CPUs come bundled with air coolers, meaning those on a budget don’t have to purchase a separate CPU cooler. Additionally, many cases come with case fans preinstalled, further cutting costs and making installation easier. The main reason people upgrade their cooling solutions (outside of overclocking, another subject we won’t touch here) is acoustics. The fans that come bundled with CPUs and cases are often low-quality, and spin at top speed all the time. While this keeps the system cool, a computer constantly revving with fan noise can become a nuisance very quickly. To get around this, higher quality fans and CPU coolers can be purchased that allow their speed to be automatically adjusted by the operating system. With this feature, less demanding tasks see the fans slow down, or even stop entirely to reduce noise. Finally, for those that prefer RGB lighting, a plethora of fans exist in any number of colors and lighting options. The only liming factor here is budget and personal preference.