Build the best PC!

Jonni Bidwell hopes to build on his catalogue modelling career, but first he’s going to build a PC and set up the Linux install of your dreams.

The best hardware meets the best software. We build a killer Linuxpowered PC rig and configure it with the ideal filesystem.

“We’ll show you how to assemble the hardware and get a simple, flexible Linux install”

Building PCs is fun. Depending on your point of view, it might always have been fun, or it might not have been. Today, a reasonable rule of thumb is that if all the components you buy fit into the correct slots, ports, sockets, caddies or other receptacles, then you can be pretty sure they’ll all work together.

Back in day, there was a lot more to worry about. Certain chipsets wouldn’t like certain types of memory, which would have to be installed in the correct banks. Technically, if something went wrong your motherboard was supposed to communicate some helpful diagnostic information through the language of beep codes. But more often than not, pressing the power button would get you nothing more than a blank screen and a momentary whirr of fans, leaving you not a clue as to whether something awful had happened (the CPU being crushed because heatsinks back then required just a bit more force than anyone was comfortable administering) or something benign (like a cable not being seated correctly because connectors never fitted quite right in those days). Besides worrying about damaging your components, PC cases back then also afforded you ample opportunity to damage yourself, by way of their carefully sharpened internal edges.

You can still find tributes to this fashion in some cheaper cases today, but in general your build should proceed without blood being spilled. We’ll show you not only how to assemble the hardware (without ritual bloodletting), but how to get a simple, powerful, flexible Linux install that makes the most of it.