I'm disassembling my desktop

[Kevin]

It's come to that time where my computer has crapped out on me. It's a screen problem. Anyway, I'm taking it apart in the hopes that when I buy a new desktop, I'll be able to use some of my old hardward. This is where I need help.

• Will I be able to use my old harddrive?
• What about my memory (RAM)?
• Should I keep the wires?
• How about the case?
• The motherboard, soundcard, etc?

Thank you in advance, and know that I know nothing about computers. This should be fun, however, because I used to take apart anything I put my hands on when I was a young one.

 

[Dave McFly]

as far as the harddrive goes, if the drive was a EIDE or a SATA drive or not. if you had a wide flat ribbon looking cable connecting the drive to the motherboard then you have EIDE. most NEW motherboards if you go that route may NOT have those connectors on them anymore. some have both some have just the SATA ones.

memory will depend on the board too, look in your manual to see what type it is and find a board that will take the same type.

wires you can usually keep if the board has the same types of hookups (EIDE or SATA) as the older board. when I rebuilt a machine i kept the ribbon EIDE cables, and the power supply and cables that came out of it just in case.

if your case came from a store bought machine like a dell or HP you MAY not be able to use it in the new board. but cases are pretty reasonable, i have seen them as low as 30 bucks on ebay or as high as as your imagination and cash will take ya.

if you keep your motherboard, then all of your cables and drives will be able to be salvaged in your setup. MOST motherboards that are new have built in audio but I prefer having a dedicated sound card the less ONBOARD stuff you use like built in sound or built in video will give you less slowdown from the system.

I hope this helps a little, and if you want to 'shop around' go to www.pricewatch.com they have all kinds of neat stuff from parts, to barebone kits (a PC case with a motherboard/cpu and a power supply and you supply the drives and extras) to full ready to plug in and turn on systems.

 

[Kevin]

This is pretty helpful. Another question/answer: This is the computer that crapped out on me http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/product?lc=en&dlc=en&cc=us&lang=en&product=311344&, so hopefully I'll be able to find all the info there. I've had this computer for a fews years now. My Aunt gave it to me after she had it for a few years. Anyway, so I may be able to use the harddrive? It has the wide flat ribbon looking cable thing.

 

[Dave McFly]

This is pretty helpful. Another question/answer: This is the computer that crapped out on me http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/product?lc=en&dlc=en&cc=us&lang=en&product=311344&, so hopefully I'll be able to find all the info there. I've had this computer for a fews years now. My Aunt gave it to me after she had it for a few years. Anyway, so I may be able to use the harddrive? It has the wide flat ribbon looking cable thing.

ah that one may be a problem my friend had a similar setup but his was more like a standard PC tower that sat on the floor. on those types of PCs they put a partition on the hard drive that contains a back up so if you have to format and re install the WINDOWS stuff is on that partition so you don't need a install CD. if yours came with a install CD then it may not have that partition. but since that PC is so old you may want to consider a bare bones kit from that pricewatch site.

Barebones PCs

all of those prices on that site INCLUDE shipping from the distributor of whatever you order from and each distributor has a website and a phone# you can call if you have any questions. another option is www.tigerdirect.com as well but I prefer Pricewatch .

the nice thing about barebone computers is you pick the parts you want to put in it. and you may pay more up front but you save money in the future because you can easily upgrade the parts to faster/powerful components much cheaper than you would in an older proprietary machine like that compaq. I have a barebones that i got from tigerdirect, and i kept my DVD rom and HD drives and sound card and ethernet card from the old machine.

 

[Kevin]

I'm liking these barebone computers. I think I may order one.

 

[Dave McFly]

they are fun and most of the hard work is done for you, like the motherboard is already fastened to the back panel and on some the CPU and fan are attached as well. the rest you just plug in the memory, video card/sound card, slide in the drives and hook up the wiring from the power supply to the drives. word of advice get one of those static work bands, you see them in places like radio shack. they are a wrist band that wraps around well your wrist and it has a cable that snaps onto it and on the other end has a alligator clip that you clip to the metal part of the case. this is so any static electricity will go into the metal of the case and not onto any components which if get zapped good will be 'toast'.

if you want to save some $$$ as i said MOST motherboards have built in audio, and ethernet jacks, some even have built in video. you can use them until you get a dedicated sound or video card. just make sure you disable the onboard audio/video in the BIOS when you turn on the PC or you will get confliction between the onboard sound/video and the sound/video cards. but this is easy to do and only takes a few seconds.

 

[Asteroid-Man]

To be honest I'll need to know exactly what happened. Saying "it crapped out" doesn't say anything. A number of things could have to be replaced...

 

[Kevin]

You know the part where you plug the monitor into the back or the tower? Well, it's messed up. Not the monitor or plug, but the part of the tower that's attached to the motherboard(I think?)

 

[Dave McFly]

it sounds as if the on board video on your Compaq gave you the old 'F U'. I had a similar thing happen with a Acer desktop i got back in 96. my friend who built from scratch PCs was building a new one and he gave me his old case/motherboard/cpu and some memory and i put a DVD rom and a HD and a floppy in it and used it for many years before i built the machine I am using now.