Computer Build - The Great Distracto Part I: Origins

*Tech speak is mostly eliminated or translated, except where used ironically, so please read ahead if you want to know what all the fuss is about, even if computers are not generally your thing.*

I have a yen to build another computer. Building custom PCs is one of my favorite activities, but it's an expensive hobby, so since I started in 2005, I've only done it four times, and two of those were for other people. The easiest way to keep costs down is to cannibalize another computer for parts.

The last one I built was a Christmas present two years ago from me to my husband and vice-versa. His part of the present was a gaming computer, and mine was getting to buy and build a new computer. We named it GAMEMURDER, which isn't terribly accurate, but we're not especially demanding since we play a lot of older games, and we're not trying to push 120+ fps to a 4K monitor. We're more like Skyrim from the couch using a game controller instead of keyboard/mouse kind of people. At present, my husband is playing Rome: Total War, released in 2004. But he's playing it 100% maxed out, dammit. Meanwhile here's the machine I'm looking to replace:

It's only ten years old and can barely keep up with Morrowind.

Oh, what's that you say about the monitor? You mean the television I'm using that isn't even full HD? You think I should replace that too? That it's just meant for watching videos and not to do work on, or - like - read words on? I'm not sure what you mean. Also, why do I have such a headache?

GAMEMURDER is coming up on two years old now. Since it was built, Intel has debuted their 7th generation Core processors (stay tuned for a DotD when the Core i7 7700k drops down near $300 again - maybe sometime around the release of Intel's newest processors which could be happening next month?). More than that, Nvidia has since released their 1000 series graphics cards using Pascal architecture. The Pascal cards are better in both performance and price than the 900 series cards before them, and our poor little GAMEMURDER wants one desperately.

The truth is that GAMEMURDER longs to live up to his name. Here's a pic:

For one, this case is a beast. I put a little Lego Duplo guy at the top for size comparison, but even if you don't know what computers usually look like inside, you can probably tell there's just a huge amount of empty space in there. I didn't realize just how big the case was when I bought it (a mistake I usually make thinking the case will be smaller than it is, but it won't happen again!) Once I had this guy put together, it was obvious this is a case that is designed for custom water cooling solutions.

Now, unsurprisingly, I don't have heat problems with GAMEMURDER because the case is enormous, and the parts, while high-end, are more mainstream high-end.

• For a processor, I went for an i5 6500, which is locked, and can't be overclocked (set to run faster than it does out of the box). It's more than we need for most purposes, but late-game turns in Civilization VI are very slow to load. (Our best guess is that an i7 would help with this because my understanding is that Civ6 can and does utilize hyperthreading, but y'all please correct me if I'm wrong before I lay down the cash for a new processor.) 

• The graphics card is an Nvidia GTX 970, which is a great card, but can't run all of the newer games we play completely maxed. 

• RAM is 8GB of fast DDR4 RAM, which I haven't generally seen as a bottleneck, but... but... RAM!

The processor is the big one. Since gaming isn't the focus of the new computer, I can limp along with the Intel HD Graphics 530 built into the processor until we can upgrade GAMEMURDER'S graphics card. (The graphics card will cost almost twice what the processor will.) And the RAM is likely to stay put where it is, as memory has gotten so expensive since the last time I bought it, so it's more cost effective for now to buy slower RAM for my new computer and double GAMEMURDER's memory later on. 

So this is what I have to work with for my new baby, lovingly named the great Distracto. Stay tuned for the next issue where I talk more about what new parts I'm looking at for her.