Growing up, the only PC I had access to was an old Dell my dad used for work and softball schedule management, and it really could only (barely) run The Sims 2. My parents were sportsmen and there was no way anyone could afford to shell out thousands of dollars for a computer, so I never got to test a powerful, impressive, shiny gaming PC until I started my career in games journalism, and even then I only owned one for a few months at most. PC gaming is growing faster than console gamingI decided I would evolve into a PC gamer (although I’ll probably stick with a controller since my little hands struggle with mouse and keyboard input) and my journey has been a rocky one.
There are two main types of gaming PCs: pre-built and custom-built. A pre-built is exactly what the label says: a fully assembled PC tower with everything you need to enjoy gaming, and it’s basically ready to go – just plug it in and go. A custom build requires you to source all of the major internal components yourself, from the graphics card to the processor to the cooling system. It allows for a lot more tweaking and customization than a pre-built, but it inherently requires a level of technical skill that’s much more difficult.
read more: Video Card Installation: Kotaku Review
During my time at GamesRadar, I PC loaned from iBUYPOWER That worked for me very well — it was a pre-build that I used to play Warzone and Overwatch and occasionally stream on Twitch, and it required very little from me in terms of setup other than removing some cushioning and plugging in towers — but it’s been almost two years since I bought a gaming PC, and trying to get things back in sync has been incredibly frustrating.
The trials and tribulations of PC gaming
months ago, Buying Power I was sent a pre-assembled PC to test/review, but I needed to install a graphics card into it ( GeForce RTX 4070)I followed the instructions, lying face down on my apartment floor and loosening the brackets holding it in place, desperately trying to keep the cat away from the tiny screws and delicate components. I watched a YouTube tutorial before attempting this process, nervous that my clumsy fingers would break the delicate (and important) plastic tabs. I placed the graphics card into the tower, heard the distinctive click as it plugged into the PCie (Peripheral Component Interconnect Express) port, connected the internal power cable, put everything back together, connected all the peripherals and HDMI cables, and shoved the monster under my desk.
But when I turned it on, the monitor said it had no signal. I tried other cables. I uninstalled and reinstalled the GPU. Nothing. Thinking it might be the monitor I’d left lying around for nearly a year, I took it out to the living room to see if it would show up on my Xbox Series S. It did, so I took it back to the bedroom and tried again. No luck.
The iBUYPOWER guys were nice and responsive and did their best to send me my old PC back and send me a new one, but it took me months to sort everything out and meanwhile the space I had set aside for my gaming PC gathered dust. I assumed the problem was user error, but it was a reminder of my total incompetence in the world of PC gaming. I had the same problem with my second PC. Determined to solve the problem, I asked for help on social media and dozens of PC gamers helped me out. One of them walked me through all the steps to reinstall the card. I sent videos and pictures to confirm that I installed it correctly.
Then, when it still didn’t work, the support guy told me that this particular rig had a Hyte riser cable connector, which was just cosmetically there to allow the graphics card to be mounted vertically. They suggested I remove the Hyte riser cable and insert the GPU sideways into another PCie port to see if it was the cable that was causing the GPU installation issues. So I opened the rig up again and got to work, my hands shaking as I tried to make sure I didn’t break anything in the process. After successfully removing the riser cable, I discovered that the “low profile” layout of the case meant the graphics card wouldn’t fit in the other slots. Dejected, defeated and covered in sweat, I packed up the PC, thanked iBUYPOWER for their time and effort, and prepared to give up on my PC gamer dreams and send it back again.

A breakthrough in PC gaming
A friendly internet friend who lives nearby saw me tweeting about my PC woes and offered to let me borrow his old tower, and told me all I had to do was download Windows when I came to pick it up. As I stood sweating on the sidewalk, I realized the new problem I’d created: to download Windows onto my wiped PC, I had to get the OS version onto a USB drive and plug it into my tower. And the only working computer at home was a MacBook Air with no USB port.
Still, I carried the tower back to my apartment, sat on the floor thinking about it for about 30 minutes, and then it hit me: with the iBUYPOWER motherboard display port, I could at least use my PC to download Windows onto a flash drive. So I once again unboxed the tower, scolded the cat who quickly jumped into the box, and set it up in my living room. After a few hours and a few questions for my PC builder friend (where do I download Windows, what is Rufus, what boot device do I select?), I had Windows running on my friend’s PC.
And after all the work, all the sweat and frustration, NZXT sent me a pre-built PC built in-house with the graphics card already installed (I’d told them about the pain of the install and that I’d given up on trying to do custom work), and it looks absolutely beautiful (Player: Three Prime(which costs $3,700 and looks like a gorgeous techno fish tank when powered on) started up without any issues.
It took me less than 20 minutes to get this giant machine out of the shipping box and set everything up. After that I collapsed into bed and let out a manic laugh that a horror movie villain would let out. After hours of struggling and months of waiting this beautiful machine turned on like a light switch. For me it’s pre-built or nothing.
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