Chapter 2 : Hardware Installation
Hardware Installation
Next we need to install the cooler. This is a heatsink and fan combined and is installed directly
on the CPU to keep it cool during operation. Before installing
the CPU cooler however, we first need to apply some thermal
compound paste. Although many stock coolers come with
thermal paste applied to the heat sink, many high-end or
enthusiast cooler designs require the thermal paste to be
manually applied. Place a small amount of paste in the center
of the CPU, this should spread out evenly once the pressure of
the cooler is applied.
Standard coolers bundled with the CPU are relatively simple to install if you follow the bundled
instruction booklet. If you are using a custom 3rd-party, rather than stock cooler, you should
carefully follow the manufacturer’s installation guide. Some advanced cooler solutions can be
taller and heavier and will often require you to use a mounting bracket under the board for
added stability. The most important thing is to ensure a solid
contact between the CPU and the flat surface of the cooler.
Also ensure that the cooler is tightly fitted to the board so that
it cannot come loose during transport etc. The final step when
installing the cooler is to connect the fan’s power cable to the
board. Most modern coolers use a four pin molex connector
which attaches to the ‘CPU Fan’ header on the motherboard,
usually situated close to the CPU socket. Video here
Finally, we can add our RAM or system memory to the board. This is a relatively simply
procedure where you insert the memory modules or DIMMs (dual in-line memory modules) to
the memory slots on the board. The memory modules will only fit into the slots in one
position, so you should find that the latches easily click into
place on either side when you apply pressure evenly on both
ends of the DIMM. Also, note that if the board has more than
two memory slots, they are likely to be color coded. This is to
help the user to apply dual or quad channel memory configurations. i.e. the modules must be used in matching pairs of two
(dual channel) or four (guad channel) sets to take advantage of
the motherboards high performance multi-channel memory
configuration. Video here
11
How to Build Your Own PC