Crimson Blog

Behold my blog. Isn’t it grand in its pre-packaged little blue and white color scheme? Hmmm… I suppose I should talk about something that is mostly without application to other readers. Well in local news I have recently bought all the components needed to build a new computer. This is my first time owning a windows machine, much less building it from the ground up. Ambitious? Perhaps, but I have a team of highly trained, windows loving electrical engineers as roommates. They refused to let me buy the thing until they had stared at the components for four days. They explained to me that it was a very important ritual, an experience that I was missing out on by not staring myself.

To my roommates buying a computer is a bit like a religious practice. One must first pray to the demigods of Intel, Acer, and Nvidia. The prayer must include a single night of circular navigation through at least four websites, making careful note of price and power differences between components. This first night must be full of user supplied information on each part, which one priest will tell you to listen to them carefully, and the other will tell you to disregard completely. The position and opinions of the two priests is critical. One must have faith in one brand, and the other must have faith in another. Only by watching them battle can one find the inner peace of making a decision for himself.

The second day is one of second guessing. Again the two priests must battle, each one looking at your list of parts and then finding minute deals on other sites that will be incredibly more powerful than what you need, or incredibly cheap and not fulfilling those needs. They will make their offerings to you, but you must not stray from your path. For $260 more than what your paying… you could make your motherboard twice as awesome… but your not building the worlds greatest computer, and look at all those nasty reviews.. it doesn’t even come with a CPU fan! Behold, a bare bones model thats half the price of your computer now! Stay strong, you plan to replace more than half of the components immediately, and that power supply is going to crap out on you in a few weeks. With that in mind your paying the same amount.. and you don’t get the cool case you wanted anyways.

Day three. Day three is useful because now mistakes are caught and real deals are found. Double your HD space for $10, which is good because I found out it wasn’t SATA, oh and by the way, your case is going to be missing a fan. Now that your priests are desperate to help you to their side, they will show you the more practical options and the real flaws with your system. On this day you can reveal to your fellow belivers your plans for a new computer. View their reactions carefully. Look for the approving nod, look for the words “Good” and “Cool”. Be especially mindful of “Man I wish I had one of those.” Conversely also be aware of sudden intakes of breath and the breaking of eye contact, hidden sniggers, and outright laughter as they may alert you to bad decisions that your priests have made. If your priests are as valuable as mine are, you will get very few of the latter.

Day four, the purchasing day. This day is the second most frantic after the first. Your two priests will be joined by an army of clergy now that you have spread the word you are building a computer. You must be careful to listen to each one with a grain of salt. As you loom this close to the seperation of you and your money, you may feel inclined to listen to some of the more outrageous extremist ideas. Why don’t you just buy an Xbox360 if your just using it to play games. Are you sure you need a new computer? Wait a few weeks, I can get you a great deal! So your putting linux on it right? Remain calm. You have made it to day 3 without drastic changes, day four is no different. Before pulling out your credit card, and several times after, look over the components once more yourself and with your trusted priests. Only after you are sure that the parts will work together as a whole, make the purchase.