The installation of the new CPU is done, and the system is up and running; posting this entry from it, as a matter of fact.

It's been a while since I've done a PC build. The last was actually a hand-me-down (thanks!) dual-core AMD. That machine is still running swell. In the end, it ended up being the same PC as my pal had before he handed it down, except in my case, with my PSU and hard drive and DVD, and the 8GB I put in instead of the 2GB he had and couldn't re-use.

The local super-store is having a sale, including $50 off the CPU and $40 off compatible motherboards. That and a previous deal I'd gotten for a groovy (and what turns out to be giant) mesh-fronted case, gave me the want-to to throw a new PC together. I have a pretty decent, last-generation, 1GB Nvidia video card, a couple sticks of 1GB RAM, and the case. I figured I just need a mobo, CPU, PSU, and hard disk to make the deal done. If push-came-to-shove, I've got a couple of dusty, dying PCs I'm not using that I could pull some of this from...but, as always, I've got things in mind for those...

The deal I'd actually considered was a quad-core that came with a free motherboard. As is often the case with those deals, the motherboard is an adequate one, but not a great one. A little hemming and hawing and I decided to jump up to the six-core and take advantage of the package deal for a better motherboard. Since I have some DDR2 RAM sitting around, and since jumping to DDR3 requires purchasing more, and also a much more expensive motherboard, I decided to go with a fair 4-slot Gigabyte AM2+ board.

In the end, the bill came to $100 extra for the six-core over quad-core, and $10 extra for the better motherboard. I could have gone for the quad-core and the better motherboard and just been $10 over, so that's a bit of a wash (and I've got a stack of quarters in the spare-change jar that says that $10 doesn't matter...). I was going to get another 500GB hard drive, but they had another deal for the same drive, but in 1TB size, for the same money, so I went that route instead (and may go back for another...don't know why). I got a good-enough 500W power-supply, to go with it all. I've decided to forgo a DVD in this one, installing instead from thumb-drive, knowing I can put one in later, or pull one from the other machines (one has two such drives).

Of course, I put an Ubuntu on there. I'd debated giving another distro a whirl, but in the end it came down to getting done what I usually do, but faster, and throwing in some room for virtualization. I quickly made a bootable USB thumbdrive, and after a careful couple hours of putting the things in the case, I fired it up. It booted on the first try. All of the fans kicked in (it's got three giant fans on the case, plus the CPU and GPU fans), the BIOS screens flew by, and Ubuntu greeted me from the thumb. So happy! I ran the "try me" off the thumb and it was fast. So fast. All six cores showed up, and I was even happier. I started an install, ran through the updates, and in no time, the machine is up and running.

One day spent doing this and taking care of the dogs and puttering around the house. Days like that I like. I also spent much of my morning clearing space in the neglected office (too much time with a laptop in the living room), forcing myself to treat the machine build as a reward for a desk-well-cleaned. The build took only about an hour, maybe an hour and a half. No "oopses" and no bloody knuckles.

Out of pocket, $360, and there's another $10 coming back for a rebate on the motherboard (making it truly a wash over the free one). Over my original plan, $100 and change for tax extra for the bigger CPU. Oh, and if you must, toss in the $30 for the case deal. Less than $400 in, using a "recycled" GPU and pair of GB RAM sticks, and I've got a pretty solid machine.

I'm torn over pulling some of the 8GB from the other machine to this one, or just swapping the 8GB to this (and maybe getting another pair of 1GB to make 4 in the dual-core...the 1GB sticks are on sale for less than $20 each). If this machine is going to be used for virtualization, it'll need a lot more than 2GB, and probably a lot more than 4GB (should I have chosen to throw a pair of 1GB sticks in). I might just bide some time and grab four 4GB sticks when I see that they're reasonably priced.

These details can wait. Dinner's here (pizza--it's raining or it would have been chicken on the grill), and the game's about to start!