The Build from Hell: Part II: Assembly

Isn't it nice when things just work? You get in your car, turn the key, and the engine starts. You pick up the phone, push some buttons, and someone answers on the other end. You turn a knob on a faucet and water comes out.

This is the way computers should be and, until recently, the way they had been working for me. That all changed with The Build from Hell.

So, when we last met our intrepid hero, he had just ordered the components for the Ultimate HTPC of Ultimate destiny. He had also decided to refer to himself in the third person.

Order was placed on a Thursday. Parts arrived on Friday, except the case, which arrived the following Monday. Eager to put the thing together, I dove into the boxes, ripping them open. Everything was good and new and shiny and OH, DEAR GOD IN HEAVEN!

That's not "accidental" damage. This is not "oops, I set a heavy box on top of it" damage. That is deliberate, with malice aforethought. That is "hey, let's see what happens if we put this package in the elephant pens in the zoo!" damage. That is someone-backing-the-UPS-truck-over-the-package--repeatedly damage.

RMA'd that same Monday, replacement received Thursday. At least Newegg is fast.

So, with great anticipation, I set out on the task of actually putting the thing together. And there's not much to tell. It was pretty straightforward.

It booted up fine, I installed the OS. Everything was fine. Except...

For the majority of boots (I'd say about 60%-70%) it "forgets" the hard drive is plugged in. Interestingly, a similar problem occurs on my work computer, which uses a nearly identical motherboard (Asus P8H67-M LX and P8H67-M LE, respectively). I'd assumed in that case, it was the solid-state drive I was using as the primary hard drive, since I'd been forewarned that it might need a firmware update (which I did not apply out of laziness). But now, I'm wondering. Two different hard drives (an old 120 GB SATA and a new 120 GB SATA-III SSD; one plugged into a 3 Gb/s port, the other plugged into a 6 Gb/s port). A quick google turned up a couple people with the same problem, but no solutions. There comes a time when you realize the only common feature to different problems may be the cause. But I have no idea what to do about this problem. I mean, what can I do? Start buying MSI motherboards again? Because there are certain lines I'm just not willing to cross.

Right now, I'm just living with the issue. The only annoyance is that you just have to hit the reset button about four or five times when trying to start it up.