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My life in PCs, from the start

How I started building PCs, and every one I built along the way.

Overwatch and a PC that never ran it

The Radeon R7 240, from the listing: where it all started
The Radeon R7 240, from the listing: where it all started

I started building PCs because I wanted to play Overwatch and my PC couldn't run it. Paying a technician wasn't an option.

My dad had bought me a PC with an AMD Radeon R7 240. It was what we could afford, but it wasn't enough for the game, so I decided to learn how to upgrade it myself.

Nine classes on YouTube

SupraPixel's PC building course, the one that taught me
SupraPixel's PC building course, the one that taught me

I found SupraPixel's PC building course on YouTube and watched the nine classes, from choosing parts to installing Windows.

After that I bought an RX 570, installed it myself, and Overwatch finally ran.

Then everyone else's

Then I built my dad's PC, my brother's and my cousin's.

The PC I built for my dad
The PC I built for my dad
The one for my cousin
The one for my cousin
One for a friend of my brother's
One for a friend of my brother's

My dad started recommending me to his friends and their kids, and my brother to his friends. At some point I was charging for it.

The one that got stolen

My RX 570 ended up in a build of my own: a Ryzen 3 2200G with an Aorus RX 570 I had barely managed to buy from a guy who used it for mining, 16 GB of DDR4 and an EVGA 500 W power supply.

The setup in between, with my uncle's gaming laptop
The setup in between, with my uncle's gaming laptop
Laptop sold, parts in: GTX 1660 Super, Ryzen 5, PRIME B450M-A
Laptop sold, parts in: GTX 1660 Super, Ryzen 5, PRIME B450M-A
The 2019 build, the day it was done
The 2019 build, the day it was done
My room in March 2023
My room in March 2023

Someone broke into my house and stole it.

The next day my uncle gave me a gaming laptop. I preferred a PC, so I sold the laptop and used the money for the next build: a GTX 1660 Super, a Ryzen 5 and an ASUS PRIME B450M-A. (Selling that laptop also started a side business, but that's another story.)

That PC lasted six years. This is my room in March 2023, with it on the desk, the Coradir monitor and a Blue Snowball on its arm.

My first big job

My first big job was for Corven. They had a real race car set up as a driving simulator: you sit in the cockpit and drive on a screen.

The Corven simulator, inside a real race car
The Corven simulator, inside a real race car
The PC behind the Corven simulator
The PC behind the Corven simulator

I built the PC that runs it.

Today

I ended up working in data, not hardware, but I still build PCs. The latest one is my own white build, the one where I ended up flashing a BIOS by hand.