What do all developers have in common? A PC (or Mac).
Having a powerful and reliable computer is critical to every developer's productivity and success. While there are several pre-built PCs on the market that claim to provide unbeatable performance, building your own PC has numerous advantages that can improve your developer experience.
Customizability
One of the primary benefits of assembling your own custom PC is the ability to customize and tune it to your specific requirements. Depending on the type of work they do, developers require a system which allocates its resources in the best possible way for the workload, and planning a custom PC allows you to select the perfect PC parts that are suitable for the job.
For example, if you work with graphics-intensive software like ML and AI (ChatGPT anyone?), you may need a powerful graphics card, whereas a developer working with databases or distributed caching like Redis may prioritize a fast CPU and large amounts of RAM.
Save money
Making your own PC can also be a cheaper solution. Because of the manufacturer's overhead costs, pre-built PCs frequently have hefty markups, but picking your own PC parts allows you to eliminate these additional costs.
You can also decide to upgrade your PC over time (double up RAM, upgrade your CPU or buy and additional disk), rather than having to buy a new computer every few years. With GPU prices skyrocketing lately, you can buy a processor with an integrated GPU and postpone the purchase of a dedicated VGA. This will save you a significant amount of money in the long run.
Improve your skills
Building a custom PC can also be a rewarding learning experience. Understanding behind the scenes the hardware on which your software runs might help you optimize your apps and troubleshoot issues more effectively as a developer.
Knowing how hardware works, you could also better understand for example the impact of branch prediction flaws which affected all modern CPUs, like Meltdown and Spectre.
Planning a PC from the ground up can teach you about all the PC parts, how they interact with each other, and how to solve any issues that may emerge.
Performance and future proofing
Whether you need more CPU cores, more RAM or an extra SSD, you have complete control over the hardware components when building your own PC and can choose the best parts for your requirements. This way, you can create a computer that offers exactly the performance and the PC parts you require for your work.
A future-proof custom PC allows for easy upgradability, so you can easily swap out components (Indiana Jones approved) as your needs change over time.
Sense of accomplishment
Creating your own PC might make you feel proud of your effort. You can build a machine that is uniquely tailored to your needs by investing the time to research and assemble it yourself. This might give you a sense of fulfillment that utilizing a pre-built computer you would not get.
Resources
There are plenty of resources that will guide you to the process of building a PC:
- PCPartPicker: online service used to help users build custom PCs by selecting compatible components, comparing prices, and creating a list of parts to purchase.
- Pangoly: free custom PC builder with compatibility checks, advanced search filtering options and performance comparisons.
- Reddit: The subreddits r/buildapc and r/buildapcforme offer advice and recommendations on building a PC.
- YouTube channels: GamersNexus and LinusTechTips are two of the most popular channels in the PC building scene.
If you have any building tips, or you would like to share how your custom PC has dramatically changed your work as a developer, please leave a comment.
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