Gadgetory

what's up guys it's ad from Texas and welcome to the build guide of butter on the $350 gaming PC for the month of February if you miss the gaming benchmarks video you can find a link to it in the description section down below if you want to build the best possible gaming PC for only 350 bucks then you came to the right place I'll be showing you step-by-step instructions on building the PC installing Windows downloading the drivers and even overclocking the CPU all the parts using this build will be linked down below as well as optional parts that include an SSD a CPU cooler and upgraded graphics cards if you want something with a little more power all you need to build this PC is a screwdriver now if you're standing on carpet just make sure to touch the PC case every now and then to ground yourself so that you don't build up static and end up damaging the components you can also buy anti-static wrist straps which you can find linked down below but it's not needed step one is to lay your PC case down and remove the motherboard from its box then take your CPU with the pins facing downwards and match the triangle on the socket to the gold triangle on your CPU once you figured out which direction is correct gently place the CPU down and do not apply any force and especially do not touch the surface if you do you will need to wipe off your fingerprint make sure to use 75% or greater isopropyl and a tissue or lint-free cloth like a coffee filter if you do use tissue or toilet paper just make sure to blow off the remaining length from the CPU if there are any if the CPU doesn't rest in place you may need to wiggle it around a bit for it to fall in place but I mentioned before do not apply pressure since the pins are very fragile after that lower the lever and lock it in place the plastic cover should pop right off so don't freak out next step is to install the RAM sticks release the locks off each slot that you're installing there is one on each side gently lower the RAM sticks evenly and apply firm pressure on both sides at the same time in order to snap them in place repeat the same process for all the RAM sticks if you installed it correctly the locks should be fully seated inside of the RAM now it's time to install the CPU cooler depending on what cooler you are installing make sure to follow the instructions listed on the manual if you decided to pick up the optional Evo 212 cooler that below they need to watch my build guide for the Z on PC since I go over the installation process there and you guys can find the link to the video down below if you're installing the stock cooler like in this video then just follow these steps first position the cooler and the orientation you want and what I usually do is I make sure to have the least cable slack as possible for a cleaner wiring job I was actually running on four hours of sleep when I built this PC so I didn't realize that the CPU fan header was actually near the top of the motherboard so instead of connecting the cable to the chassis span which is labeled C aka fan you need to hook it up to the CPU fan instead labeled CPU fan you can find that right above the RAM sticks anyway so installing the stock cooler is easy you don't need thermal paste since it already comes pre applied with some you will need to match the four holes on the motherboard with the four pins on the cooler so gently lower the CPU cooler down until it comes in contact with the motherboard then simply press down on the four tabs to snap it into place you can look at the back of the motherboard to double-check that the cooler has been fully seated by looking at the four pins sticking out once the cooler is fully seated connect the cable running from it to the CPU fan header on the motherboard which I stated before should be on the top of the motherboard near the RAM sticks you are not ready to install the i/o shield and the standoffs in the case some i/o shields come with these annoying pins that stick out and what I usually do is remove the big one since they interfere with installation but you can also fold them away as well a good way to determine if the i/o shield won't interfere with the motherboard is to place it on the motherboard itself and see if there are any pins that are in the way if they are just simply fold them and remove them once you already insert the i/o shield in the back of the case with the three circle cutouts located near the bottom make sure to apply some pressure on all four the corners to snap it in place now let's install the standoffs you will need six of these gold screws that came with the case and you need to install them in these exact locations once they are nicely tightened go ahead and gently lower the motherboard in and while avoiding bumping it into the case and trying to match the cutouts of the i/o shield with the motherboard ports you will then need six of these silver screws with a head and you can begin screwing in the motherboard as always I recommend a crisscross pattern while tightening the screws and please don't over tighten them only tighten them to a point where it's comfortable you can do this by using the screwdriver with your fingers and not your entire hand if that makes any sense next up we are going to install the hard drive make sure the exposed area is facing downwards but the connection ports facing outwards slide the hard drive in any one of the racks and make sure to line the holes with the tray then you will need to screw it in using these two silver screws if you're installing an SSD instead the process is the same next up it's time to install the power supply so lay down your case and insert the power supply with the fan facing downwards towards the cutout located at the top of your case you will need four of these to screw in the power supply you can use your other hand to push the PSU against the case in order to align the holes if you want to now let's connect the hard drive to the motherboard grab the black and white SATA cable that came with your motherboard and connect one end of it to the back of the hard drive and connect the other end to either of the yellow SATA ports on the motherboard that's located near the bottom now let's connect the rear fan grab the cable from the fan and hook it up to the chassis fan header which should be right next to the battery next let's go ahead and get these annoying cables out of the way let's start off with the HD audio cable you don't need the AC 97 so go ahead and ignore that locate the AAA PP pins on the bottom left of the motherboard and connect the HD audio to it make sure that the words HD audio are facing upwards next up is USB cable and this one connects to either one of the pins labeled USB which should be to the left of the yellow SATA cables this time make sure the words USB are faced downwards next up are the power LED wires and these connect to the yellow pins on the motherboard right above the SATA ports so the positive one goes in first on the top left and then the negative one goes to the right of that right next to it just like this next up we have the power switch and this one goes right next to the two power LEDs it doesn't really matter which way you insert this one in next up is the HDD LED and this one goes right under the power LEDs with the words facing downwards and finally the reset switch goes right neck so the HDD led and it doesn't matter which way you face this one as well here's a quick look at what the bottom part should look like again the reset switch can be facing downwards or upwards it doesn't matter now let's give some power to the hard drive so grab the SATA power cable from the power supply that looks something like this and connect it to the back of the hard drive right next to the SATA connection now we're going to connect the 24 pin motherboard cable and it looks something like this locate the 24 pin socket on the motherboard which is located to the right side of the RAM sticks and hook them up make sure the clip from the 24 pin cable is fully seated and that there are no gaps the next cable we're going to connect is for the front fan so grab the female molex connector from the front case fan and grab a male molex connector from the power supply and connect the two together the last cable you're connecting is for the CPU grab the cable that has two four pin connectors labelled CPU and connect only one of them to the socket on the motherboard located right above the CPU fan make sure you hear it snap in place so we are done with connecting all the cables the final piece to this build is the graphics card but before we can install it we need to remove the two PCIe plates in the back just use your screwdriver or flathead and push them out then you can grab it from the other end and pull them off you may need to wiggle a little bit for them to get loose first before you insert your graphics card in there make sure to peel off any stickers that are still on it face the GPU so that the fan is facing downwards and hook it up to the very first PCI slot on the motherboard for optimal performance while holding up the GPU use one of the same screws that you use for the power supply and tighten it up so you're basically done assembling your PC if you did everything correctly your PC should look something like this basically a Fender were to vomit in your case take this time to do some cable management of elico straps and zip ties that great what I did was wrap everything together and store all the cables on the top right also make sure all the cables are connected and fully seated to avoid budda problems now we are ready to install a fresh copy of Windows 8.1 and you guys can upgrade to Windows 10 for free later on if you're putting in your old SSD or hard drive that already has windows on it then you don't need this step for everyone else this is what you do grab I strive with at least 8 gigabytes of space and plug it into a different computer this is the Microsoft website and download the installation media I did leave a link to it down below click on the create media button so downloads it on your PC go ahead and install and run the program make sure to select the language Edition and architecture of your PC everything should match with my screen unless you're using a different language and windows Edition click Next and select the USB flash drive option and click Next again to choose your USB Drive that you have connected to your PC once you click on next for a final time a message will appear stating that the files will be deleted on the USB Drive so make sure that you don't have anything important on them click on OK to proceed this should take some time to download depending on your internet speed but once it's done it will stay that your USB Drive is ready you will need a legit Windows CD key to continue if you don't want to pay full price for them you can find them for around 25 bucks on the reddit CD key swapper which is where I get all my CD keys from I'll going to drop a link to this page in the description section if anyone is interested but wherever you guys get your CD key from make sure it's for Windows 8.1 pro Edition and not a standard edition once you get your CD key we are ready to install windows so go ahead and insert the USB drive into the PC you just built and boot it up it should automatically detect the USB Drive and take you straight to the activation screen if it doesn't restart the PC and hit the f8 key for the boot menu and select the USB flash drive option if the USB Drive doesn't come up then you connected the USB cables incorrectly on the motherboard make sure to go back and watch that part again once you get to the activation window go ahead and type in the CD key and select next accept the terms and conditions and then once you get to the screen select the custom option and select the drive you want to install windows on if you have only one like me then select the primary partition which is usually labeled number 2 and then go ahead and hit next let windows do its thing and install usually when it's complete it will tell you to remove the USB drive and click on OK to restart the PC but in my case it didn't so if you see the PC restarting on its own quickly remove the USB Drive so it doesn't boot from it again windows will continue to install the files and set everything up for you once you get to the personalize screen follow the instructions and all of the boxes until you reach the home screen now it's time to install the drivers since the PC doesn't come with a built-in Wi-Fi adapter you can buy one of these things that cost around $10 and plug it into a USB port and voila you have Wi-Fi I'll drop a link to it down below if anyone is interested but if you're going to connect your PC via ethernet cable then you don't need it so first we are going to install the motherboard drivers so go to the Asus website and search for your motherboard I let the link to it down below so it's easier for you guys to find it once you're at the screen select the support tab then navigate through drivers and tools once you're over here you have to select your windows operating system which should be 8.1 and they need to download the following the chipset software Realtek audio drivers real Techland drivers and as an optional download that I recommend the Asus AI suite 3 program once you downloaded those four files make sure to extract them and install them on your PC then you are ready to install the graphics card driver since we have a gtx card visit the GeForce website once again I'll leave a link to it down below once you are here download the automatic Driver updates since it will always detect your GPU and keep your drivers updated once it's downloaded and installed on your PC you are done with all of the drivers finally it's time to do the overclocking if you don't want to overclock your cpu you can skip this step and you are done but if you want increased performance then follow these steps turn on the PC or restart it and hit the Delete key on the keyboard to get into the BIOS once you are here click on the Advanced Mode tab on the bottom or just simply hit f7 and navigate to the AI Tweaker tab once you are here make sure that the settings on your BIOS match with everything on my screen the CPU core ratio should be set to sync all cores and the ratio limit should be set to 43 to achieve the 4.3 gigahertz clock speed scroll down to the CPU core voltage section and set that to manual mode and then proceed to override the voltage to one point three four five once you do that hit f10 to save your settings and then it will reboot your PC once you get to the desktop screen you can open up CPU Z which is a free program and check your overclock speeds as you can see it's showing four point two nine nine now I did stress test the PC for ten hours using prime95 so these settings are stable please keep in mind that not all CPUs are the same and if you experience crashes then you need to lower your clock speed adding a CPU cooler that I link below can definitely help prolong the life of your CPU and get you even higher clock speeds so that's it for the video of this helped you out or if you enjoy my build guides make sure to leave a like as it does help me out a ton and if you have any questions feel free to find me on Twitter then guys so much for watching and I'll see you in the next video