Gigabyte GOPC CA2: Good Things Come in Small Packages - Assembly and Installation of Parts
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The GOPC did not come with a processor, RAM, a hard drive or an optical drive, so the following were supplied to assemble the GOPC:
- Intel Pentium 4 'C' 800 MHz Hyperthreading 2.4 GHz CPU
- 512 MB (2x256 MB) Crucial DDR400 RAM
- Maxtor DiamondMax 9 80 GB hard drive with 8 MB cache
- Sony CRX225E 52x24x52 CD Burner
The GOPC arrived partially assembled, with the floppy drive already connected and the power to the motherboard already set. This makes it look like Gigabyte has assembled half of it. Stubbornness is not recommended when assembling this computer, and as a result, it has to be installed as their instructions say.
The instructions appeared to be sparse and light on detail. It does give enough detail so that things could be figured out with some trial and error, but since there is a prescribed way to make all the pieces fit, one should not have to feel like you're assembling a jigsaw puzzle to do it. Also, some will find when assembling this PC that if you make a mistake, you may not notice until much later, at which point a lot may have to be disassembled to correct the mistake.
For example, the heatsink's clips and the socket do not give any indication as to which way the clips should be inserted, nor do the instructions show which way the heat sink will face. It is easy to try every wrong combination of arranging the heatsink and clamping it down. It is also easy put in a hard drive backwards, since the instructions don't tell you that the cable provided is not long enough to handle the case where the hard drive's pins are on the other side.
To install an optical drive, a plate that fills the bay needs to be removed. While this step is standard for almost all computer cases, the GOPC has a screw that sits behind the card reader and is almost impossible to remove or replace. Those with standard screwdrivers will have a hard time removing it, and a suggestion would be to replace that screw with a thumbscrew so that the user would not have to force a Philips screwdriver in there.
Another thing I noticed was some bent pins inside the case. It's probable that they are due to the fact that the case is so small that the cables were pulling on the pins.
Also, in order to reach some parts of the GOPC, steady hands are a necessity. Installing the memory is harder because your hands have to approach the banks from outside the case. Also, the memory sits right next to the floppy connector and the primary IDE connector (the BIOS supports two, but only one connector exists), making it hard to put the cable in.
If you are thinking about installing a video card to take over for the integrated SiS video card, the card's size plays an important role. An ASUS Radeon 9600XT card barely fit within the slot, and all the cabling for the floppy drive and the card reader had to be pushed out of the way and into the heat sink and hard drive. Luckily, the heat sink on the video card is small, and it didn't need any more molex connectors to power it. The 220 W power supply only comes with enough molex connectors to power one hard drive, a floppy drive, an optical drive, and the motherboard. Expansion video cards that need a molex connector should be automatically skipped for this PC.
By far the hardest part of assembling the PC was the heatsink. This may be because I've been spoiled by the clips provided by the Vantec Aeroflow, which is one piece and extremely easy to install. I probably would not have cared on a bigger motherboard, but it is not easy to get it on without damaging the motherboard or the processor in the process.
Gigabyte should be given some credit though - they've designed all the cabling to only be able to fit to a particular set of pins. It's almost impossible to make a mistake wiring the components together. And somehow, everything fits. The arrangement may seem counter intuitive to some (the hard drive hangs off the bracket that holds the floppy, only rotated by 90 degrees).
When it's done, the GOPC will be very cramped, but usable.
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