Thanksgiving Sales have started at Newegg, Tiger Direct and NCIX

Since the day after Halloween I have been getting sales flyers in my email for Black Friday.

The deals are too good to resist with cool computer parts up to 60% off. I’m already getting the custom build bug.

Since I was a child, I’ve been building things. Log cabins, Mechano sets, plastic and wooden models.

Heathkits

My favorite projects are electronics since you get something that is a radio, plays music or a computer. Steve Jobs told his biographer he learned to build things from Heathkit like I did.

Heathkit AA40 stereo amp - check out those transformers and wired components

Heathkit was from Benton Michigan and had electronic equipment kits for sale. I built my first decent stereo receiver from a Heathkit. It was still working 40 years later.

For years I saved each Heathkit catalog that came in the mail, dreaming about the ham radios or amplifiers I might build. Heathkit also had 8-bit computers you could build back in the 1960s before the computer craze started.

Heathkits were less expensive than factory built electronics. The projects were fun if you liked electronics. I learned how things worked as well, although more about the mechanical and soldering aspects than electronics theory. The components were first class and the equipment outlasted its owners in most cases.

Heathkit quit the kit business when the market was flooded by cheap Japanese electronics but they are back at it according to their website.

Custom and kit computers

Time has long passed them by since any one can build their own computer from a kit or parts from Newegg, Tiger Direct, NCIX, or Canada Computers. For the beginner, they package all-in-one kits that include everything you need.

For the more adventurous, you simply research the motherboard, CPU, hard drives, memory and other components and build the computer from scratch. Tom’s Hardware is the best source of technical reviews and used comments about components.

The kits are cheaper than buying a Dell. The full custom computers can cost 100% more than a Dell but are made of better components. I tried to add a new video card to a Dell i7 from three years ago. Dell desktops are cheap, small boxes not meant to be upgraded.

I got back into building computers two years ago after my son James took me to all the College Street computer stores in Toronto on a visit. These whole-in-the-wall stores have all the goodies.

Whizzer - i7-980X speed demon for video editing

That Christmas I built an i7-860 with an ASUS motherboard in an Antec P-183 case. We call it Katzass because it was for it’s time.

Katzass runs Sonar digital recording software. Project goals were speed, buss throughput and sub 25 dB noise level.

Katzass got an upgrade last year with 2 SSD drives. It also got a NVIDIA GTX 470 video card upgrade to cut the noise level even further and increase write-to-disk times.

With a custom built computer, upgrades are easier than some you buy at Future Shop or Dell. The cases have spaces and I already know how it works.

Last winter the government was allowing a 100% write off for new computers so I built another over the holidays. Whizzer, as we call it, has the 12 core i7-980 CPU, P58 motherboard in a gorgeous ANTEC game case.

Whizzer is my main computer for Photoshop and Adobe Premier video editing. The GTX570 video cards renders H-264 videos in seconds.  The blue fans make cool night lights.

Pass the Winter

Yesterday the cab driver asked me how I passed the winter.

It was an odd question since I have so many projects on the go I can’t complete them.

I might build another computer after Christmas, I told him.

But I had a better idea – why not build a robot?