After many years of resisting, I finally gave in and bought a new computer! Being the elite computer guy that I am, you may think I'm always up to date with the latest tech, but in reality I try to upgrade as infrequently as possible. In fact, this new computer is only the sixth PC I've owned in my life, not counting the laptop that Alix gave me. My old computer was still working, technically, but it was never good enough to edit HD video (which I am now shooting a lot of with my 5D Mark II), and its performance had somehow degraded to the point where I couldn't even watch full screen videos on it anymore.

Nostalgia time! Here are the computers I have owned so far:

• 1991 - Intel 386 SX - Purchased as a complete system used for $200 cash from a sketchy computer shop in downtown Ottawa.
• 1993 - IBM 486 SLC2 - Purchased as a complete system for $999.99 at a one day sale at Future Shop. I had to line up outside the store and got the second last one.
• 1995 - Intel Pentium Pro - Purchased as a complete system from some random computer shop.
• 2000 - AMD Duron - Purchased as a complete system. I actually don't recall where I got this one, but it was probably a gift to myself for almost graduating university.
• 2005 - AMD Athlon 64 X2 - Purchased as a custom built complete system from Systemax through TigerDirect.ca.
• 2012 - Intel Core i7 3770 - Purchased all the parts individually from Canada Computers for about $1250 and built it myself.

This is the first computer system that I have built completely from scratch. Of course, I have taken apart and rebuilt many computer systems at work, so I know my way around the guts of a computer, but it still felt great to do a complete build from start to finish. During the course of my research, I found a great site that can help you organize your parts list if you are planning to build a computer. I highly recommend it. Here is the list of parts that I bought:

• CPU: Intel Core i7-3770 3.4GHz Quad-Core Processor
• Motherboard: Asus P8H77-V ATX LGA1155 Motherboard
• Memory: Corsair Vengeance 32GB (4 x 8GB) DDR3-1600 Memory
• Video Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 650 Ti 2GB Video Card
• Case: Corsair 500R Black ATX Mid Tower Case
• Power Supply: Corsair Builder 750W 80 PLUS Bronze Certified ATX12V / EPS12V Power Supply
• Optical Drive: Asus BW-12B1ST/BLK/G/AS Blu-Ray/DVD/CD Writer
• Other: Internal USB 3.0 Card Reader
• Other: 3.5" to 5.25" Drive Bay Adapter

Also, thanks to my generous contacts at Microsoft and Adobe, I now have the computer up and running with Windows 7 Ultimate, Adobe Premiere CS6 and Adobe Photoshop CS6. I am really looking forward to editing some of my HD videos in the near future. Also, if editing this photo was any indication, processing images in Photoshop is going to be a LOT faster on this new system.

Technical details: This photo was taken with my 5D Mark II + Tamron 28-75 at 53mm, ISO 100, f/8.0 for 30 seconds.

Comments

Wow, you have almost no cable clutter.

Nice! I'm glad I'm not the only one that tends to hold onto their technology
until it's almost completely useless. I find that it makes buying new stuff all
the more exciting. :)

Modern cases are great when it comes to routing cables.  In this case, all the
cables are routed back behind the motherboard instead of in front.  It is so
much cleaner than the old days, although if you are constantly swapping
different types of components in and out, it could get to be a pain.  I don't
plan on changing anything in here for a few years except perhaps for upgrading
the hard drives.