Re-building a computer

Some weeks ago I got the sudden idea that since my girlfriend needs a computer (she’s finishing her university years and anyway who doesn’t need a computer nowadays?) and since I had a spare case lying around, a not so spare 40G hard drive sitting in my computer as a slave and a pending deal with a friend for an ATI All-In-Wonder for my old MiniDisc player I thought I’ll build her a cute little ‘puter.

Which I did. I checked the price lists at UltraPro Computers and after a little searching for reviews on the Internet and some talking with friends I decided to get an Epox EP-8RDA3I motherboard, a 1600MHz AMD Duron CPU and 256 megs of RAM for a smooth Windows XP experience. I decided for the Epox motherboard because I have another Epox and it worked absolutely flawlessly until now. But after buying the new motherboard and seeing the few cool new features the 8RDA3I had over mine (EP-8RDA) I decided for a switch. So I gutted my computer, took out my MB and put it back in the old case with the brand new 1600 MHz CPU on it. I put the new MB in my computer and put my more powerful CPU on it. Also did a cooler switch because the new cooler was, well, simply cooler. :-)

What I noticed was that my old cooler sometimes got stuck when I started the computer. Probably because of the dust that accumulated on it over the time. And if me as the computer nerd I am always noticed this looking at the boot screen I doubted my girlfriend would notice it and even if I set the emergency shut down temperature to a quite low value I wasn’t satisfied. So I called the guy I bought my MB, cooler and CPU from back last year and told him the situation. And he was nice enough to visit me and give me a new cooler in exchange for the old defective one. Wow. I’m now an officially satisfied customer and now Ioana has a cool little computer that’s working perfectly in my 4 year old case. And it’s also a TV!