Handling the Load of Your CPU: Understanding Case and Motherboard Compatibility

When it comes to handling the load of your CPU, your case and motherboard compatibility play a crucial role. While other components like RAM and CPU Coolers are important, they have defined sets of specs that determine their compatibility with each other. However, the relationship between your RAM and CPU Cooler isn't as straightforward. This comes down to a matter of physical clearance based on the height of your CPU Cooler and its potential to interfere with your air or liquid cooler.

A larger air cooler with wide heat sinks can often block access to your DIMM slots, leaving no room for installing your memory modules. To avoid this, you can find an air cooler with high RAM compatibility or choose a low-profile memory kit. This will greatly reduce the chance of interference. It's also essential to research your model of CPU Cooler online to see if it has caused clearance issues for fellow builders.

Liquid coolers can pose similar clearance problems with their radiators or radiator fans, particularly when mounting them at the top of your case where they could potentially hang down too low and clash with your DIMMs. To avoid this, you can use a low-profile memory kit or choose a case that features either a top radiator mount with ample spacing away from your motherboard or radiator support on different sides of the chassis.

Selecting a Proper Power Supply for Your GPU

When it comes to selecting a power supply for your graphics card and entire system, there are several factors to consider. Assuming you've taken into account case and motherboard compatibility, you'll need to ensure that your power supply can handle the load of your CPU. The video card manufacturer's website should list in plain view the minimum recommended power supply wattage required to drive the entire system safely.

For peace of mind, it's best to opt for a unit that's about 100 Watts greater than this recommendation and 150 watts greater if you plan on overclocking your CPU and video card. If you want to find out exactly how much power your system will draw, add all of your parts to a list on PC part picker, and the site will spit out a fair estimate of your PC's total power consumption before overclocking.

PCI Express Connectors

Sufficient wattage is only half the battle when it comes to selecting a power supply for your GPU. Your power supply also needs to have the appropriate PCI Express connectors to power the card. Unless you're dealing with a low-power GPU that doesn't require any PCI connectors, most cards will have a number of them in six-pin or eight-pin varieties.

Check to see that your PSU has a sufficient number of the correctly sized plugs or you'll be stuck with an overpriced paperweight. Keep in mind that many power supplies feature six plus two pin PCI connectors, which can be used for either a single six-pin or eight-pin plug on your graphics card.

Power Supply Interference

In rare instances, your CPU Cooler can interfere with your power supply. This is usually only a concern in small form factor cases where the power supply is mounted directly above the CPU. In these situations, you'll need to find a liquid cooler that supports it or a low-profile air cooler that's shorter than your case's maximum CPU Cooler height limit.

Storage and SATA Connections

Finally, let's talk about storage. While we've covered various aspects of compatibility, there are still some key factors to consider when it comes to storing your data. SSDs and hard drives require a SATA connection to your motherboard for data transfer. However, these drives also require a second SATA plug to receive power. As such, your power supply needs at least one SATA plug for every one of your hard drives.

Don't forget to account for any other elements like fan controllers or LEDs that require SATA ports as well. With this information in mind, we've covered nearly every aspect of compatibility when it comes to building a PC. By understanding these key factors and taking the time to research and choose compatible components, you'll be well on your way to building a powerful and reliable system.

Compatibility Tips

I know that this was a lot of thick information to run through, guys, and there's a fair chance that I overlooked a few things myself. So, if you're watching this video as a seasoned PC Builder, please share any compatibility tips that I might have missed in the comments below. Your rookie tech friends will appreciate it.

Also, don't forget to toss me a like on this video if you enjoyed it. And feel free to check the description below for my new bios flasher shirt which is flying off the shelves like an GTX 980 TI at a yard sale. While you're down there, please stop being a turd and bookmark my Amazon affiliate link. It helps me a lot as always, I'm Cow with awesome sauce Network.

Thank you guys for watching. Subscribe to the channel if you haven't already, and I'll see y'all in the next video.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: ena wild advertisement appeared if any of you guys need a legit website for your Tech YouTube channel blog or whatever the te Squad is offering $5. Tech domains until April 8th with the code awesom sauce this is a new initiative so many domain names haven't been taken yet that's why I was able to score awesome sauce. Tech before any of you guys could snag it first and try selling it to me later trolls go check it out I put a link in the description okay bye what's up guys today I'm dealing with a topic that might not require much explaining to you DIY veterans out there but for the novice or first-time PC Builder choosing the parts for a PC and ensuring they're all compatible with each other can be a daunting task so to make life a little easier for the young PC Master race I've decided to throw together the ultimate PC Hardware compatibility guide the first step is to make a list of parts on pcpartpicker.com and see if you pass the s's compatibility check if it checks out you're done guys thanks for watching I hope you learned a lot from this video wait hold on let's back up decided to throw together the ultimate PC Hardware compatibility guide now while a PC list making site like PC part picker already offers a built-in compatibility Checker after doing some research I found that such automated systems aren't always 100% accurate especially when it comes to gauging specific clearance parameters or taking specialized situations into account so hopefully by the end of this video you'll have a greater understanding of how various PC parts relate to each other and thus a higher chance of choosing all the right Hardware that being said I use PC part picker all the time personally it's a fantastic site that I'd recommend using to part out your build I'm just giving you the necessary information in this video that a universal algorithm can't always provide so in order to thoroughly explain the vast network of PC part Association I've been working with a team of highly intelligent field mice to develop the Octagon of compatibility these are the eight main parts you'll most likely need to build your next PC for the record I've omitted Optical drives here because one they're not nearly as relevant these days and two there was no more room in the Octagon looking at the chart you can think of each of these parts as a puzzle piece that needs to fit with certain other parts in the group to make a working computer here's what all the compatibility lines for every part looks like and we'll be going over each of these today now I can tell most of you are already like this I'm out of here but don't settle up just yet because I'm going to break it down for you all nice and simple so that even a child or Donald Trump supporter can understand rather than trying to tackle all these lines at once let's start by talking about the computer case and work our way around the Octagon so for starters the relationship between cases and motherboards is pretty simple motherboards come in a number of sizes or form factors but the most common ones from smallest to largest are miniitx microatx ATX and extended ATX or eatx for short once you know what kind of board you're dealing with you can look on a case's product page to see what types of boards it supports some cases support more than one type of board but I would advise against putting a small board inside a larger case if you want to use your system to its fullest additionally your motherboard should have the necessary headers for plugging in your case's front panel connectors this includes the elements at the front of your case like USB ports to avoid a lifetime of pain and sorrow take a look at exactly what external connectors your case is rocking then check for the corresponding headers on your motherboard as a quick Pro tip a single USB 3 header on your motherboard can support up to two USB ports on your case and the same goes for a USB 2 header your GPU or video card also needs to fit comfortably inside your chassis first check to see how many PCI slots your video card has then verify that your case has the same number of expansion slots or more these days most cards are only two slots wide and most cases have at least two expansion slots so this really isn't a big concern if anything you're more likely to run into clearance issues with the length of your GPU again check the manufactur website this time making sure that the length of your video card is shorter than the case's maximum supported graphics card length the height and thickness of the cards cooler can also pose clearance issues but usually that's only if you're Building inside of a toaster the CPU Cooler has similar relationship with your case as the GPU if you're going with a non-liquid air cooler the main thing to look out for here is the height of the cooler versus the case's maximum supported CPU Cooler height for all-in-one liquid coolers pay attention to its radiator size which is usually either 120 240 280 or 360 mm long then check to see if the case in question supports radiators of that particular size to guarantee a case's compatibility with a power supply there are three factors to consider here the first one being form factor like motherboards power supplies come in a variety of sizes too but the two main types are ATX and sfx sfx is typically only used in small form factor cases so unless you're building a super portable PC chances are you'll be dealing with an ATX power supply this is kind of confusing since as we just discussed ATX is also a motherboard form factor but since they signify different specifications it's probably best to ignore the similarity at any rate check both product pages to make sure the form factor of your power supply is supported by your case secondly you'll want to ensure that the length of the unit meets the requirements for your cas's power supply clearance when building in smaller cases I like to stay well under this limit if I can just to give some extra room for cable management thirdly you'll want to look out for any fan controllers or LEDs built into your case that require juice from your power supply these are usually driven by a SATA or Molex connector so make sure your power supply has the right kind and number of plugs the last part to consider for our case here is storage whether they be mechanical drives or ssds most drives that mount directly to your case are of the 2 and 1/2 in or 3 and 1/2 in variety count up how many drives you plan to use in your build and make sure your case has enough Drive mounts to accommodate them be aware that many cases have Drive mounts that support both 2 and 1/2 in and 3 and 1/2 in drives but not concurrently unless otherwise specified now let's move on to the motherboard since this component functions as kind of a central Hub it's no surprise that it requires compatibility with every other part on our list of course we already discussed its association with cases so no need to revisit that when it comes to the motherboard and CPU the most important factor to allow compatibility is the socket type common Intel sockets of today include socket LGA 1150 1151 and 2011- V3 these socket types need to match exactly for there to be a Working Connection no exceptions AMD on the other hand is a bit more flexible in this Regard in that its fm2 plus and am3 plus motherboards are backwards compatible with older fm2 and am3 CPUs just not the other way around still it's generally recommended to use an AMD CPU and motherboard of the same socket type if you're set on buying a kcq Intel CPU for overclocking you'll also need to check that your motherboard chipset supports it at the moment the popular chipsets that support overclocking include z97 z170 and x99 AMD users don't have to worry as much here since overclocking is supported on pretty much all the main chipsets apart from processors your motherboard also needs to support the correct standard capacity and speed of your RAM or system memory most boards nowadays support either 240 pin DDR3 or 288 pin ddr4 so you'll need to buy a ram kit supporting the same type of memory if you're choosing a kit with more than two dims make sure the board has at least that many dim slots to house them motherboards also have a cap on how much RAM capacity they can support So if you're opting for a 64 gig kit for example make sure you're not buying a board that only supports 32 gigs finally you want to make sure your motherboard supports the rated speed in megahertz of your memory in order for it to operate at a full potential an OC acronym that's listed next to a specific speed indicates that you'll need to manually overclock your memory usually in the Bios in order to hit that specific frequency moving on to motherboards and graphics cards most boards you'll find have PCI Express slots that can accommodate any modern GPU but for good measure you'll want to make sure both parts are supporting the same generation of pcie the current gen as of filming this video is pcie Gen 3 if you happen to be installing multiple gpus make sure you choose a board that supports the same number of cards with either SLI for NVIDIA gpus or Crossfire for AMD now compatibility between the CPU Cooler and the motherboard is very much like the affair between the board and CPU as long as your cooler supports the same Intel or AMD socket as your motherboard you're in the clear luckily most air in liquid coolers support the vast majority of popular sockets but still be sure to double check before pulling the trigger like everything else in the PC the motherboard gets powered by the power supply but not every power supply has the right connectors to power any board the first of two main plugs to consider here is your EPS CPU connector this will either be a four pin or more commonly an 8 Pin plug on your motherboard either way I'd recommend a power supply with an 8 Pin EPS plug which is usually split into two four pin connectors so it can work for either scenario the second plug to watch out for is the larger ATX motherboard connector which usually has 20 or 24 pins as such your power supply should have a 20 plus 4 pin connector in order to power your board now listen up carefully here because compatibility between a motherboard and your storage configuration can be a bit tricky for new Builders to start with the basics most ssds and hard drives connect to the motherboard via a SATA data cable in order to transfer data most motherboards have a number of SATA ports on board for exactly this purpose as for now the two common speeds of this connection are SATA 2 which features transfer speeds of 3 gbits per second and sata 3 with faster speeds of 6 gbits per second while the average hard drive sees virtually no performance difference from either connection newer ssds from the last couple of years should always be pluged into the faster Port when possible as an example if you picked out four ssds and two hard drives find a motherboard with at least six SATA ports four of which should be SATA 6 gbit per second the new kit on the Block when it comes to storage is m.2 rather than plugging into a SATA port an m.2 Drive mounts into an m.2 slot that's built directly into some motherboards the form factor of m.2 drives is expressed with a key letter like M and A four-digit number indicating its Dimensions so be sure to check the drive specs and motherboard page to find out which keys and links are supported but wait there's more not all m.2 drives use the same data transfer protocol the two main ones being SATA and the newer and faster nvme pcie now because the world hates you some motherboards only support one or the other and some boards support both when in doubt check the manufacturer's website to see what's what if you're considering an m.2 drive for your build I'd highly recommend watching Paul's video on m.2 before buying your parts now believe it or not with the case and motherboard behind us we've already churned through the majority of compatibility lines here that brings us to the CPU which really only needs to play nicely with three other components one of which we've just discussed if you remember how to pair a motherboard with a CPU and you found a CPU Cooler that supports your motherboard by the transitive property your CPU and CPU Cooler should also see no physical incompatibilities since all three components support the same socket type however there's one more characteristic that should be paid close attention to and that's the cpu's thermal design power or TDP which refers to the amount of heat that needs to be dissipated for Effective operation track down the TDP of your CPU then look to see if your CPU Cooler is well cool enough to meet that requirement if you plan on overclocking your CPU I'd highly recommend a cooler with a cooling capacity that exceeds the on the-box TDP of your chip the TDP of a CPU also gives us a general idea of how much power it'll draw while your power supply needs to be able to handle the load of your CPU your video card is usually the biggest power hog in a PC and thus gives us a better estimate of what wattage or power supp supp should be in order to drive the whole system so we'll Circle back to this later when we touch on the video card as we've already gone over your memory and motherboard have a defined set of specs that determines their compatibility but the relationship between your RAM and CPU Cooler isn't so cut and dry this comes down to a matter of physical clearance based on the height of your dims and its potential to interfere with your air liquid cooler larger air coolers with wide heat sinks are multiple fans can often block access to your dim slots leaving no room for installing your memory modules a couple ways to to avoid this tragedy include finding an air cooler with high Ram compatibility or choosing a lowprofile memory kit which will greatly reduce your chance of interference to be on the safe side you should also research your model of CPU Cooler online to see if it's caused any clearance issues for fellow Builders all in when liquid coolers can pose similar clearance problems with their radiators or radiator fans this is particularly a concern if you plan on mounting your radiator at the top of your case where it could potentially hang down too low and clash with your dims again a lowprofile memory kit can do wonders here but equally effective is choosing a case that features either a top radiator mount with ample spacing away from your motherboard or radiator support on different sides of the chassis next up we have the video card and assuming you were listening when we talked about case and motherboard compatibility that leaves us with how to select a proper power supply for our GPU and our whole system for that matter on the graphics card manufacturer's website it should list in plain view the minimum recommended power supply wattage required to drive the entire system safely for peace of mind I typically opt for unit that's about 100 Watts greater than this recommendation and 150 watts greater if I plan on overclocking my CPU and video card if you want to find out exactly how much power your system will draw add all of your parts to a list on PC part picker and the site will spit out a fair estimate of your PC's total power consumption before overclocking now getting back to the GPU for a minute sufficient wattage is only half the battle as your power supply also needs to have the appropriate PCI Express connectors to power the card unless you're dealing with a low power GPU with no PCI connectors most cards will have a number of them in six pin or 8 Pin varieties check to see that your PSU has a sufficient number of the correctly sized plugs or you'll be stuck with an overpriced paper weight keep in mind that many power supplies feature six plus two pin PCI connectors which can be used for either a single six pin or 8 Pin plug on your graphics card at this point we've talked about nearly every part associated with the CPU Cooler but there are some rare instances where your cooler can interfere with your power supply this is usually only a concern in small form factor cases where the power supply is mounted directly above the CPU in order to save space in this situation you'll need to find a liquid cooler if your Cas supports it or a lowprofile air cooler that's shorter than your case's maximum CPU Cooler height limit as you guys can see there's really not much left to say about our power supply either other than its requirements for storage earlier we talked about how ssds and hard drives require a SATA connection to your motherboard for data transfer but these drives still require a second SATA connection to receive power as such your power supply needs to at least one SATA plug for every one of your hard drives and don't forget to account for any other elements like fan controllers or LEDs that require SATA ports as well finally that leaves us to storage but by now we've exhausted all of its various part associations thus concluding today's lesson on the Octagon of compatibility I know this was a lot of thick information to run through guys and there's a fair chance that I overlooked a few things myself so if you're watching this video as a seasoned PC Builder please share any compatibility tips that I might have missed in the comments below which which I'm sure our rookie Tech friends will appreciate before you guys go don't forget to toss me a like on this video If you enjoyed it and also feel free to check the description below for my new bios flasher shirt which is flying off the shelves like gtx980 TI at a yard sale while you're down there feel free to stop being a turd and bookmark my Amazon affiliate link and use it when you buy stuff it helps me a lot as always I'm cow with awesome sauce Network thank you guys for watching subscribe to the channel if you haven't already and I'll see y'all in the next video this was a long ass video holya wild advertisement appeared if any of you guys need a legit website for your Tech YouTube channel blog or whatever the te Squad is offering $5. Tech domains until April 8th with the code awesom sauce this is a new initiative so many domain names haven't been taken yet that's why I was able to score awesome sauce. Tech before any of you guys could snag it first and try selling it to me later trolls go check it out I put a link in the description okay bye what's up guys today I'm dealing with a topic that might not require much explaining to you DIY veterans out there but for the novice or first-time PC Builder choosing the parts for a PC and ensuring they're all compatible with each other can be a daunting task so to make life a little easier for the young PC Master race I've decided to throw together the ultimate PC Hardware compatibility guide the first step is to make a list of parts on pcpartpicker.com and see if you pass the s's compatibility check if it checks out you're done guys thanks for watching I hope you learned a lot from this video wait hold on let's back up decided to throw together the ultimate PC Hardware compatibility guide now while a PC list making site like PC part picker already offers a built-in compatibility Checker after doing some research I found that such automated systems aren't always 100% accurate especially when it comes to gauging specific clearance parameters or taking specialized situations into account so hopefully by the end of this video you'll have a greater understanding of how various PC parts relate to each other and thus a higher chance of choosing all the right Hardware that being said I use PC part picker all the time personally it's a fantastic site that I'd recommend using to part out your build I'm just giving you the necessary information in this video that a universal algorithm can't always provide so in order to thoroughly explain the vast network of PC part Association I've been working with a team of highly intelligent field mice to develop the Octagon of compatibility these are the eight main parts you'll most likely need to build your next PC for the record I've omitted Optical drives here because one they're not nearly as relevant these days and two there was no more room in the Octagon looking at the chart you can think of each of these parts as a puzzle piece that needs to fit with certain other parts in the group to make a working computer here's what all the compatibility lines for every part looks like and we'll be going over each of these today now I can tell most of you are already like this I'm out of here but don't settle up just yet because I'm going to break it down for you all nice and simple so that even a child or Donald Trump supporter can understand rather than trying to tackle all these lines at once let's start by talking about the computer case and work our way around the Octagon so for starters the relationship between cases and motherboards is pretty simple motherboards come in a number of sizes or form factors but the most common ones from smallest to largest are miniitx microatx ATX and extended ATX or eatx for short once you know what kind of board you're dealing with you can look on a case's product page to see what types of boards it supports some cases support more than one type of board but I would advise against putting a small board inside a larger case if you want to use your system to its fullest additionally your motherboard should have the necessary headers for plugging in your case's front panel connectors this includes the elements at the front of your case like USB ports to avoid a lifetime of pain and sorrow take a look at exactly what external connectors your case is rocking then check for the corresponding headers on your motherboard as a quick Pro tip a single USB 3 header on your motherboard can support up to two USB ports on your case and the same goes for a USB 2 header your GPU or video card also needs to fit comfortably inside your chassis first check to see how many PCI slots your video card has then verify that your case has the same number of expansion slots or more these days most cards are only two slots wide and most cases have at least two expansion slots so this really isn't a big concern if anything you're more likely to run into clearance issues with the length of your GPU again check the manufactur website this time making sure that the length of your video card is shorter than the case's maximum supported graphics card length the height and thickness of the cards cooler can also pose clearance issues but usually that's only if you're Building inside of a toaster the CPU Cooler has similar relationship with your case as the GPU if you're going with a non-liquid air cooler the main thing to look out for here is the height of the cooler versus the case's maximum supported CPU Cooler height for all-in-one liquid coolers pay attention to its radiator size which is usually either 120 240 280 or 360 mm long then check to see if the case in question supports radiators of that particular size to guarantee a case's compatibility with a power supply there are three factors to consider here the first one being form factor like motherboards power supplies come in a variety of sizes too but the two main types are ATX and sfx sfx is typically only used in small form factor cases so unless you're building a super portable PC chances are you'll be dealing with an ATX power supply this is kind of confusing since as we just discussed ATX is also a motherboard form factor but since they signify different specifications it's probably best to ignore the similarity at any rate check both product pages to make sure the form factor of your power supply is supported by your case secondly you'll want to ensure that the length of the unit meets the requirements for your cas's power supply clearance when building in smaller cases I like to stay well under this limit if I can just to give some extra room for cable management thirdly you'll want to look out for any fan controllers or LEDs built into your case that require juice from your power supply these are usually driven by a SATA or Molex connector so make sure your power supply has the right kind and number of plugs the last part to consider for our case here is storage whether they be mechanical drives or ssds most drives that mount directly to your case are of the 2 and 1/2 in or 3 and 1/2 in variety count up how many drives you plan to use in your build and make sure your case has enough Drive mounts to accommodate them be aware that many cases have Drive mounts that support both 2 and 1/2 in and 3 and 1/2 in drives but not concurrently unless otherwise specified now let's move on to the motherboard since this component functions as kind of a central Hub it's no surprise that it requires compatibility with every other part on our list of course we already discussed its association with cases so no need to revisit that when it comes to the motherboard and CPU the most important factor to allow compatibility is the socket type common Intel sockets of today include socket LGA 1150 1151 and 2011- V3 these socket types need to match exactly for there to be a Working Connection no exceptions AMD on the other hand is a bit more flexible in this Regard in that its fm2 plus and am3 plus motherboards are backwards compatible with older fm2 and am3 CPUs just not the other way around still it's generally recommended to use an AMD CPU and motherboard of the same socket type if you're set on buying a kcq Intel CPU for overclocking you'll also need to check that your motherboard chipset supports it at the moment the popular chipsets that support overclocking include z97 z170 and x99 AMD users don't have to worry as much here since overclocking is supported on pretty much all the main chipsets apart from processors your motherboard also needs to support the correct standard capacity and speed of your RAM or system memory most boards nowadays support either 240 pin DDR3 or 288 pin ddr4 so you'll need to buy a ram kit supporting the same type of memory if you're choosing a kit with more than two dims make sure the board has at least that many dim slots to house them motherboards also have a cap on how much RAM capacity they can support So if you're opting for a 64 gig kit for example make sure you're not buying a board that only supports 32 gigs finally you want to make sure your motherboard supports the rated speed in megahertz of your memory in order for it to operate at a full potential an OC acronym that's listed next to a specific speed indicates that you'll need to manually overclock your memory usually in the Bios in order to hit that specific frequency moving on to motherboards and graphics cards most boards you'll find have PCI Express slots that can accommodate any modern GPU but for good measure you'll want to make sure both parts are supporting the same generation of pcie the current gen as of filming this video is pcie Gen 3 if you happen to be installing multiple gpus make sure you choose a board that supports the same number of cards with either SLI for NVIDIA gpus or Crossfire for AMD now compatibility between the CPU Cooler and the motherboard is very much like the affair between the board and CPU as long as your cooler supports the same Intel or AMD socket as your motherboard you're in the clear luckily most air in liquid coolers support the vast majority of popular sockets but still be sure to double check before pulling the trigger like everything else in the PC the motherboard gets powered by the power supply but not every power supply has the right connectors to power any board the first of two main plugs to consider here is your EPS CPU connector this will either be a four pin or more commonly an 8 Pin plug on your motherboard either way I'd recommend a power supply with an 8 Pin EPS plug which is usually split into two four pin connectors so it can work for either scenario the second plug to watch out for is the larger ATX motherboard connector which usually has 20 or 24 pins as such your power supply should have a 20 plus 4 pin connector in order to power your board now listen up carefully here because compatibility between a motherboard and your storage configuration can be a bit tricky for new Builders to start with the basics most ssds and hard drives connect to the motherboard via a SATA data cable in order to transfer data most motherboards have a number of SATA ports on board for exactly this purpose as for now the two common speeds of this connection are SATA 2 which features transfer speeds of 3 gbits per second and sata 3 with faster speeds of 6 gbits per second while the average hard drive sees virtually no performance difference from either connection newer ssds from the last couple of years should always be pluged into the faster Port when possible as an example if you picked out four ssds and two hard drives find a motherboard with at least six SATA ports four of which should be SATA 6 gbit per second the new kit on the Block when it comes to storage is m.2 rather than plugging into a SATA port an m.2 Drive mounts into an m.2 slot that's built directly into some motherboards the form factor of m.2 drives is expressed with a key letter like M and A four-digit number indicating its Dimensions so be sure to check the drive specs and motherboard page to find out which keys and links are supported but wait there's more not all m.2 drives use the same data transfer protocol the two main ones being SATA and the newer and faster nvme pcie now because the world hates you some motherboards only support one or the other and some boards support both when in doubt check the manufacturer's website to see what's what if you're considering an m.2 drive for your build I'd highly recommend watching Paul's video on m.2 before buying your parts now believe it or not with the case and motherboard behind us we've already churned through the majority of compatibility lines here that brings us to the CPU which really only needs to play nicely with three other components one of which we've just discussed if you remember how to pair a motherboard with a CPU and you found a CPU Cooler that supports your motherboard by the transitive property your CPU and CPU Cooler should also see no physical incompatibilities since all three components support the same socket type however there's one more characteristic that should be paid close attention to and that's the cpu's thermal design power or TDP which refers to the amount of heat that needs to be dissipated for Effective operation track down the TDP of your CPU then look to see if your CPU Cooler is well cool enough to meet that requirement if you plan on overclocking your CPU I'd highly recommend a cooler with a cooling capacity that exceeds the on the-box TDP of your chip the TDP of a CPU also gives us a general idea of how much power it'll draw while your power supply needs to be able to handle the load of your CPU your video card is usually the biggest power hog in a PC and thus gives us a better estimate of what wattage or power supp supp should be in order to drive the whole system so we'll Circle back to this later when we touch on the video card as we've already gone over your memory and motherboard have a defined set of specs that determines their compatibility but the relationship between your RAM and CPU Cooler isn't so cut and dry this comes down to a matter of physical clearance based on the height of your dims and its potential to interfere with your air liquid cooler larger air coolers with wide heat sinks are multiple fans can often block access to your dim slots leaving no room for installing your memory modules a couple ways to to avoid this tragedy include finding an air cooler with high Ram compatibility or choosing a lowprofile memory kit which will greatly reduce your chance of interference to be on the safe side you should also research your model of CPU Cooler online to see if it's caused any clearance issues for fellow Builders all in when liquid coolers can pose similar clearance problems with their radiators or radiator fans this is particularly a concern if you plan on mounting your radiator at the top of your case where it could potentially hang down too low and clash with your dims again a lowprofile memory kit can do wonders here but equally effective is choosing a case that features either a top radiator mount with ample spacing away from your motherboard or radiator support on different sides of the chassis next up we have the video card and assuming you were listening when we talked about case and motherboard compatibility that leaves us with how to select a proper power supply for our GPU and our whole system for that matter on the graphics card manufacturer's website it should list in plain view the minimum recommended power supply wattage required to drive the entire system safely for peace of mind I typically opt for unit that's about 100 Watts greater than this recommendation and 150 watts greater if I plan on overclocking my CPU and video card if you want to find out exactly how much power your system will draw add all of your parts to a list on PC part picker and the site will spit out a fair estimate of your PC's total power consumption before overclocking now getting back to the GPU for a minute sufficient wattage is only half the battle as your power supply also needs to have the appropriate PCI Express connectors to power the card unless you're dealing with a low power GPU with no PCI connectors most cards will have a number of them in six pin or 8 Pin varieties check to see that your PSU has a sufficient number of the correctly sized plugs or you'll be stuck with an overpriced paper weight keep in mind that many power supplies feature six plus two pin PCI connectors which can be used for either a single six pin or 8 Pin plug on your graphics card at this point we've talked about nearly every part associated with the CPU Cooler but there are some rare instances where your cooler can interfere with your power supply this is usually only a concern in small form factor cases where the power supply is mounted directly above the CPU in order to save space in this situation you'll need to find a liquid cooler if your Cas supports it or a lowprofile air cooler that's shorter than your case's maximum CPU Cooler height limit as you guys can see there's really not much left to say about our power supply either other than its requirements for storage earlier we talked about how ssds and hard drives require a SATA connection to your motherboard for data transfer but these drives still require a second SATA connection to receive power as such your power supply needs to at least one SATA plug for every one of your hard drives and don't forget to account for any other elements like fan controllers or LEDs that require SATA ports as well finally that leaves us to storage but by now we've exhausted all of its various part associations thus concluding today's lesson on the Octagon of compatibility I know this was a lot of thick information to run through guys and there's a fair chance that I overlooked a few things myself so if you're watching this video as a seasoned PC Builder please share any compatibility tips that I might have missed in the comments below which which I'm sure our rookie Tech friends will appreciate before you guys go don't forget to toss me a like on this video If you enjoyed it and also feel free to check the description below for my new bios flasher shirt which is flying off the shelves like gtx980 TI at a yard sale while you're down there feel free to stop being a turd and bookmark my Amazon affiliate link and use it when you buy stuff it helps me a lot as always I'm cow with awesome sauce Network thank you guys for watching subscribe to the channel if you haven't already and I'll see y'all in the next video this was a long ass video holy\n"