OMG!! PC builbing is NOT easy!!! Or im just dumb!

The numbers of wires will vary depending on the case and/or mb....

But as an absolute minimum, you will need connected to your mb:

Main ATX 24 pin pwr to mb from power supply...

small 2 pin connector (sometimes individual wires) , usually labled "PWR" or "pwr sw" coming from case's front panel power on/off switch

"aux cpu", a small 4 pin connector on newer ATX12v power supplies, connects from PSU straight to mb; required now for a couple of years since advent of P4, and K7 or K8

CPU heatsink fan conector, usually 3 pins, connected to "CPU fan" on mb form heatsink fan...(many mainboards BIOS will require a fan be present and turning to protect your cpu)

(Ensure video card gets it's own external power input from a 4 pin molex from PSU; uses same type of connector as hard drive pwr input

This concludes the "must have/Essential " list...
----------------

The rest of the connections vary depending on mainboard and case, but will not prevent you from working, but typically includes the following...

Front panel USB connections (1 or more); connect from front panel to available USB headers. (Sometimes uses nice easy to use connectors, some use 3 individual wires for each USB port)

Front panel mic/headset audio (only applicable if your case has front panel audio connections)

Case speaker? some cases have these, but most modern mbs have dispensed with them, and use a tiny onboard speaker for beeps....

Your mb manual will map out exactly where all the connections are, most manuals have a nice map, and then detailed pinouts of each connector and header...

reset switch (nice to have, but won't stop you)

What Mdd said :-)

Mdd hit nearly everything. Just remember for the most part they have simplified everything for you connectors have been fashioned for all parts so that they mostly only work in one direction and can not even be plugged in unless correctly oriented.

The above statement does not always apply to the motherboard connectors for front panel USB, audio and firewire. Some cases/moterboards provide indiviual wires with a small pin connector that needs to go to the appropriate pin on the motherboard. Use your mobo and case manuals in conjunction with each other and they will tell you where they go.

no you're not dumb, PC builbing is hard. hell i dont even know anybody that knows how to builb!!!!

well joking aside, it's not really hard as you read the mobo manual really carefully and compare it with the case wires. the little wires do have labels for what their purpose is like HD LED for hd light and PWR for power.

I just did my first build last Friday. Just plugged every socket with something!  

It gets easier with experience.

One thing to be careful of is that you do not plug two power cables into SATA hard drives (some drives have SATA power and standard molex connectors), it's one of the few plugs that's actually possible to screw up and damage something. Other than that, just make sure that all the loose wires are plugged in where they fit or where the labels clearly mark they should go, and you should be fine.

If it doesn't boot, disconnect everything that's not essential and try again. Non-essential devices include PCI cards (not including video), all drives, all USB ports.

As an add to my earlier statement too:

The pin 1 that the case and mobo manuals reference are almost always marked on the motherboard right next to the pin1. This is important since it give you your starting point and dircection of travel for the rest of the pins. And for ribbon cables there is almost always a red (or other color) stripe on the side of the connector that contains pin 1 of the cable/connector.

Hope this helps!

Take an orgnaized approach. Trace one cable at a time and see where it come from and determine where you think it should be going.

Sometimes the cables for the FireWire (IEEE 1394) connection looks like a squid w/ lots of tiny tenticles. If need be, get a magnifying glass and use a needle-nose pliers, tweezers, or hemostats to hold them. Of course lots of light is always helpful. There should be some indication on each one, telling what it does. At first glance it may just look like serial numbers or marking for some technical reason... but don't forget, YOUR the technical person now. Look for markings like 1+, 1-, 2+, 2- in white letters on tiny black plastic blocks. These need to slip over the pins on the mother bords, inside blocks often labled J1, J2, ...

The hardest wires, IMHO, are the FPANEL connectors that are clustered together at the very bottom right of the motherboard. They normally read HDD LED, PWR SW, RESET, etc. You won't be able to read the markings from this pin header off the mobo (itty bitty letters to an older set of eyes), so they best thing to do is get the motherboard manual, and bookmark the page with the diagram for the FPANEL Pin Header. Then, yank the bundle of wires that are connected to the front of the TT Armor case and pull them out into the open so that you can read the little writing on the plastic connector heads of each wire. They should MOSTLY match up with the manual's descriptions, but POWER SW might be listed as just PWR or PWR SW, nothing too mentally taxing. Also be sure to look closely at the polarity of the pin headers listed in the manual AND the polarity on the plastic connectors, that's something you want to get right the first time around and they aren't always the same. Beyond that, all the other wires are going to be easier because they are large and mostly obvious, such as that if your HDD doesn't spin up, you probably forgot to plug it into the P/S. If you have any other issues, feel free to post again, I'll try to check back. And remember, it is your first build, so even if it takes two weeks to get going, it'll be your baby, so let her grow up slowly and she won't disappoint.

Corsair did a tutorial recently

Try folowing that through for starters....

http://sysbuild.corsairmemory.com/report.aspx?id=2

 

Hey Tatt,

Thanks for the link it is actually pretty good. Enough info for me to send friends there when they have questions.

Again thanks.

Welcome mate! That's EXACTLY what I've been doing! Was going to do a web site project to do what they've done, but THANKFULLY they've saved me having to dismantle my sweet running system.

PHEW!

Since you asked yourself....

In my point of view, building is pretty easy with thing easily connected with the help of common sense... So I guess that the second option apply.... :?

Its PAT,

Since you asked yourself....



Evidently the second option APPLIES (notice the S) to you as well!! I can see from your signature that you are a well meaning intelligent person. No really.

How'd your first build go? I'm sure it was flawless and you had no issues at all!

Okay i,ve completely finished my pc and its up and running! It runs fear at max settings very smoothely with a min of 45Fps! I do have a few minor problems though and was hoping you guys could help me out. Okay well first off; every time i boot the comp up it goes through the motherboard/BIOS setup and then starts windows! And also i keep getting a short beep at startup... Little help??

is it realy BIOS screen or simply POST screen? It is normal to have a short beep and POST screen to show up. Some BIOS allow to mask the POST screen with some sort of logo or picture..

Em.. its really hard to describe it. What i mean is it doesnt just start the windows load screen when i turn it on. I get all the different black load up screens that it went through when i started it up for the first time, so it adds like 2mins on to startup time!?

Oh yeah it also shows the Asus Logo.

yup..normal.. when you start the computer, it list the component found and do some test that you can see on the post screen..then when everything is ok, it boot the OS

There should be a quick boot option in the bios to help reduce bootup time.

Okay thanks guys.

Not to make you sound stupid or anything...

But did you go into the bios and set boot priority to cd rom and have the windows xp install disk in the drive?????

Go back and double check all your IDE/SATA connectors and your molex power connectors.