How to Build Your Own PC - Save A Buck And Learn A Lot  9  Chapter 8: Testing the System and Completing Assembly

Chapter 8: Testing the System and Completing Assembly 1 Preparing to Test the System

Many builders suggest assembling and testing your basic system before installing unnecessary expansion cards. For example, you might just install the sound card and test the system at this point. Then, open it up later and add your video production and other PCI cards. The idea here is that you want to test the basic system first to be sure it works. You don’t want to introduce any conflicts created by an extra add-on card.

Then, if you add cards and find something doesn’t work, you’re more certain that the problem was introduced by the newly-added card, because your system worked fine before adding the card. This is a general rule of trouble shooting. If you want to know the source of a problem and you change several things at once, you can’t easily know which change made a difference. If you change only one thing and the problem disappears, it’s likely the problem was due to the thing you changed.

Sometimes you don’t really know or care what creates a problem. You just want the problem to go away. For example, while working one day, your system unexpectedly crashes. You reboot the system and continue working as if nothing happened. You don’t know or care to know what caused the unexpected crash.

Chapter 8: Testing the System and Completing Assembly 1 Preparing to Test the System