It has been a couple of months that I've been struggling in keeping up with my slow computer because of the motherboard or "mobo" bracket's plastic parts broke making me result to more traditional ways like pasting the broken hinges using a "super glue", I hate mighty bond for failing to stick them all together. I doubled my efforts by using a glue stick (yup! the one that requires heat and melting). It has been over five to six months of keeping with that broken piece. So what if it is broken? The weight that is pinning down the processor to the mobo is loose making the microprocessor interacts and functions well together with the system resulting to frequent usual computer "hanging" and crashing.
Day 1 - Tuesday
Tuesday, upon knowing that the wight is firmly mounted down to the mobo, I thought that the problem was with the video card so I went to the mall to buy a NVidia GeForce FX 5500 for the price of Philipine Peso or Php 1, 700.00, I believe that's a reasonable price for a 256 mb video and 3d accelerator card (finally I can play those high end games). I went home, mounted it and crossed my fingers that I can finally upgrade my crappy Windows ME to Windows XP (I would want to upgarde because I have new hardwares that are not compatible Windows ME or lower like the Pen Tablet and Web Cam which I both acquired last and earlier this year). The installation went smoothly until the part wher it says "Installing Hardware Devices" then it stopped or hung up again. I repeated the time-consuming installation three times and the same darn thing happens. So I call it a night and decided to chill before I "Hulk Smash™" the whole cpu.
Day 2 - Wednesday
I tried to tidy up myself because I am going to meet up with a former highschool friend she requested that I should treat her, so "wholeheartedly" (with pun included) I agreed and promised to meet her up at around 3 in the afternoon. I went to SM Dasmariñas at around 2 pm to buy the bracket. I brought the microprocessor Intel Pentium (M) 1.86 GHz with me in a not-so safe enclosure, a plastic bag and a paper. So I did went into "S.O.S." or Save on Surplus to buy this bracket which I also remove from my motherboard which was also my first time to do so as well. I happily bought it and proceeded to meet up with my high school girl friend (not as in "girlfriend" the "girlfriend" but as girl friend) and treat her to the movies. We went to see the "Living Hell" movie which was fair enough (we thought it was a horror so we watched it, I like horror films). Later, we dine at a KFC (Halooo GMO chickens!) and decided to call it a day. I went home. Mount the bracket and as I was about to also mount the microprocessor to the microprocessor slot (geez! so many "microprocessor in this sentence"), I was a bit confuse to why didn't it fit the slot. I analyze the structure of the processor and saw that the tiny threads in it got misaligned. what I did was grab a tweezers and tried to aligned it but what happened next was more catastrophic. Some of the tiny threads broke off the processor and I am not stupid not to be aware of what happened (well, I am one for bringing it outside unprotected), it will not be functional anymore. So, again I slept with a heavy heart and guilt because it is again because of my negligence and decided to call it a day.
Day 3 - Thursday
The next day, early as early as 10:30 am I was already in SM Dasmariñas trying to find an Intel 4 1.86 GHz Microprocessor but the store only offered a higher version Intel Pentium 4 GHz for Php 2000.00, This time my doubtful instinct kicked in, what if I bought this and then it isn't compatible with my mobo? My Php 2000 will be useless, so I went out the store and decided to drop off an internet cafe in SM and browse if my Intel Pentium 4 2 GHz is compatible with an P4V845 Series Motherboard (which is a classic motherboard which dates back as long as 2003) and guess what I didn't even find a single site which shows what I was looking for. You may say I didn't try hard enough but I tried every Google and Yahoo search strategy I know which includes the use of quotations ("") and plus signs (+) to specify and narrow down the search but everything was put to waste. If only I brought my mobo. so hesitant but hopeful, I bought the new microprocessor and went straight home. I mount it (carefully) on the slot and fits perfectly now with the weights and the bracket. When I opened it a long beeping sound was produced by the pc. As far as I know there are certain meaning to these beeps as my dear good friend Dan told me once, I assume it has somehow related to the memory or the SD Ram. so what I did this time, to be sure was to bring my whole central processing unit to S.O.S. and let them do the diagnosing. I arrived there at around 2 pm and to my surprise it is not the 256 mb ram which is broken. The freaking motherboard is the one broken this time. I though, this is again my fault for not being careful in removing the bracket or maybe not grounding my hand earlier causing small electrical components to malfunction. So I resulted to finally buying a new motherboard (similar to my old ones using SD Ram for me to avoid buying new RAMS) at around Php 2,300 plus Php 300 for the tech guy's services. It run smoothly this time and the thorn in my heart was finally removed with a big hole in my wallet, (okay, so I don't have one...) a big hole in my pocket. I went home and brought the good news to dad and finally upgraded the pc to Windows XP and is now at top shape. Now ready for gaming and beyond! finally I can use Photoshop Adobe CS or Gimp without having to worry that my pc can't handle the graphics... and I lived happily ever after.... so far.
Moral lesson of the story:
- Don't act as all knowing, if you aren't sure of what you're doing, don't do it!
- Seek the help of reliable and trusted technical professionals to avoid expenses topping up based on speculations on what you think is broken
- Never bring a microprocessor unprotected and take care of it while it is outside.
- The saying that "regret comes last" is indeed true.
- There is a rainbow after the rain.
