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This is just a starting point, but the sky's the limit!

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Assembling a computer yourself is a good way to learn how they work.

If you've been beating yourself up about doing nothing productive during our never-ending pandemic, stop. Sometimes doing nothing is exactly what you need. Other times, it's nice to make something with your own hands. That's what this guide is about: how to build a PC from scratch.

It can be daunting for a lot of reasons-it's expensive, it's complex, it can get messy. But I want to be clear: If you can build an Ikea table, bookshelf, bed, or anything that comes in more than one of those deceivingly heavy flat packs, you can build a PC. The tricky part? I can't tell you how to build your PC. Not really. Not unless I know exactly which hardware you're using. I can, however, explain what each component does and what my recommendations are for each category.

Once you've built your shiny new PC, it might be time to check out some other stuff to further accessorize your new partner in crime. Be sure to have a look at our guides for the best gaming keyboards, best gaming mice, best gaming headsets, and best gaming controllers.

Updated April 2022: We've removed some picks that are hard to find, added a section on buying advice, and added more information to each product most affected by shortages.

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First, Let's Talk Shortages

For several years now we've been in the midst of a PC hardware shortage. First, cryptocurrency miners bought up all the GPUs to farm crypto, then we got hit by a worldwide silicon shortage, and then there was that whole pandemic thing. Point is, it's tough to get all the parts you need to build a PC, it has been for years, and it's likely to continue being tough for the foreseeable future. I can't fix a global logistics crisis, but I can give you some pointers on shopping during one.

When you're shopping for components, make sure you're buying from a reputable vendor. You may think you're buying from a large online store like Amazon, Walmart, or Newegg, but they allow third-party sellers to list products as well. There's usually a little notice that will tell you as much, right underneath the buy button.

If it's shipped and sold from someone who isn't Amazon, Walmart, or Newegg, you're probably going to pay more for the component than its retail price. For instance, our top motherboard pick retails for $130, but as of this writing its listed on Newegg for $205. It's shipped and sold from a third-party retailer, hence the markup. First-party sales (when the product is shipped and sold by the store whose site you're visiting) tend to have better prices that hew closer to the actual manufacturer suggested retail price (MSRP) of the item.

We've tried to stick to first-party sales, but sometimes components are just not available through anyone but a third party. In that case, my advice is don't spend more than 50 percent over the MSRP on any of these components. Give yourself a hard budget and please don't pay double or triple what any of these components are worth.

We've added buying advice to each category most affected by the shortage to speak more specifically to each component's scarcity, but in general just know that building a PC right now is probably going to cost you more than you'd expect.

What Do You Need?

In order to get a list of components together, no matter what your experience level is, you should use PCPartPicker. Not only does it have everything you need to buy, it also lets you build your PC piece by piece right on the website and makes sure all your hardware will play nicely together. It even has a few example builds you can tweak to your liking.

Regardless of what kind of PC you're building ( home office or gaming), the components you need are going to be the same. You'll need a motherboard, a central processing unit (CPU), storage, memory, a power supply, a case, and a monitor. The only thing you might not need if you're mostly using this PC for home-office tasks is a GPU (graphics processing unit), but it's necessary for photo or video editing and gaming. That's a lot of stuff! Here's a little breakdown of what each component does, along with some hardware recommendations.

Every other component plugs into this circuit board. It's the highway they use to communicate and collaborate. They come in different sizes and configurations, and each one looks a little different, but they all fill the same function. Make sure you know which processor you want before you buy a motherboard.

Motherboards come in a couple of flavors, but the most important thing to know is what kind of socket it has. There are basically two: LGA and AM. You'll always see them listed with a number after them, like "LGA1150" or "AM3." The exact numbers after the LGA and AM portions of these socket names will change over time, to indicate which generation of Intel or AMD chips they support, but the current standards as of 2022 (which will work with the latest chips from either maker) are LGA1200 for Intel and AM4 for AMD.

Motherboards also come in a couple of sizes, the most common being ATX (or "full size"). That's what I generally recommend, especially if this is your first build. Your PC case will list which size motherboard it supports, so make sure they match up.

Buying advice: Motherboards are less scarce than the other components on this list. We try to keep this list updated regularly with prices that aren't too much higher than MSRP, but if any of the prices here skyrockets between updates, shop around. Your chances of finding a reasonably priced motherboard are much better than your chances of finding a good price on a GPU.

This is the brain of your computer. It sockets directly into the motherboard, and it's the single most important component of your PC. That doesn't mean it has to be the most expensive (we'll get to that later). If the CPU doesn't mention including thermal paste, get some. Don't eat your CPU. I know it looks tasty, but it's not actually food.

Buying advice: You're going to see the highest markups on your CPU and GPU. But these prices will move around quite a bit, so keep checking back if you can't afford the component you want at the moment.

If you'll be playing games on this PC, you'll need a graphics processing unit (also called a graphics card). This is a specialized processor that's designed and optimized for handling visual data like the graphics in games. It's also used in video and photo editing and other graphics-intensive tasks.

Buying advice: These cards are tough to find in stock (or at a reasonable price) at the moment, so you may have to wait a while. Graphics cards are among the most in-demand PC components right now, and their prices are way higher than they should be. That's why the picks on this list are generally mid- to high-end. If you're going to pay through the nose for a graphics card, make sure it's a good one.

Radeon RX 6800 XT: If you're going all-out, the RX 6800 XT is my top choice right now. It's a beast of a GPU that can handle anything you throw at it. Even Cyberpunk 2077 at full 4K resolution.

This is your PC's walk-in closet. This is where you store all your files, your games, your movies, your documents, your photos, your everything. You can always add more storage later.

Western Digital Black 1TB PCIe Internal SSD: This lightning-fast NVMe drive is a good option for nearly any gaming system. It has incredible read and write speeds of up to 7,000 and 5,300 megabytes per second respectively, making it fast enough to not only store all of your games, but possibly your operating system as well. It's also available in M.2 varieties.

You'll see a lot of the same terms when you're looking at memory and storage, but they're very different. Memory is more like that one table you toss things on to deal with later. It's scratch paper; it's short-term. It's very important, though, because software uses memory to cache (temporarily store) data in a place where it can be retrieved quickly.

Your power supply unit is a little box that keeps the electricity running to every component. It determines how quick and powerful your PC can be. The faster it is, the more power it needs, and you always want to have a little more than you need, just in case. Just like GPUs, PSUs are also in and out of stock right now.

Your case is just what it sounds like. It's a metal box. It might be covered in glass panels and etched aluminum, but inside it's just a big metal box that holds everything together. Make sure you match it up with your motherboard size. For example, if you have an ATX motherboard, you need an ATX (or "full-size") case.

Corsair Obsidian Series ATX Full Tower: There are lots of kinds of cases. Some are super small, others are enormous. And your decision will ultimately come down to the design you like as much as anything else. If you're unsure what to get, this one is great for your first build. Other case manufacturers we like are NZXT, Fractal, Phanteks, Cooler Master, and Lian Li.

MSI Gungnir 100 ATX Mid-Tower Case: This budget-friendly case is a solid option for most people. Be aware that it'll be a tight fit-there's almost no wiggle room for bulky cables or hyperspecific configurations. It looks nicer than you'd think for the money, and the RGB button syncs up your lights with very little effort. The smokey tempered glass allows them to shine through without turning your office into an EDM show.

When you build a PC, you don't automatically have Windows included. You'll have to buy a license from Microsoft or another vendor and make a USB key to install it. Or you can check out the newly released Windows 11. Here's a little more information about what all you get out of the newest version of Windows.

Putting It All Together

The internal layout of every gaming PC is a little different, so we're not going to get too far into the weeds here. Your best bet for specific instructions for your hardware will be referencing your manuals and searching for your components on YouTube. It can be super helpful to actually see a person handle and install your exact hardware, especially when you're stuck and can't quite figure out what the hell your manual is talking about. But here are some general tips for putting all these components together.

First, prep yourself a clean workspace. This can be a dining room table, a cleared-off desk-just any surface big enough for your case to lay flat on its side, with ample room around it for the rest of your components. You'll also need a Phillips-head screwdriver that will fit the screws on your case. When you put these parts together, be sure to discharge any static buildup and work on a nonmetallic surface like a wooden table. Or you could just assemble the motherboard on top of the cardboard box it comes in.

Most of the components you bought are going to come with instruction manuals; keep them handy. We're going to start with the motherboard, so open up the instruction manual to the installation page. It can be pretty intimidating-there's a lot to look at-but think of all this as a big Lego set. Each piece fits into each other piece. For the motherboard, your first job is going to be seating your CPU.

Depending on what kind of CPU you purchased (Intel or AMD), the chip will have either little prongs on one side (don't touch them) or little golden contacts on one side (don't touch them). Seriously, don't touch that side of your chip. Oils from your fingertips can damage the contacts, or you might bend a pin. Do either one and your processor becomes nothing more than an expensive hunk of silicon.

Seating your processor is pretty easy. First, double-check your motherboard's instructions and make sure you've unlocked the processor socket. It'll be a big square with a bunch of little holes (or contacts), with a lever or button beside it. Your motherboard's instructions will say explicitly how to unlock the socket so you can put your processor in without any issues.

Once you've confirmed that it's unlocked and ready, just find which corner of your processor has a little golden triangle and line it up with the same symbol on your motherboard's processor socket. Gently lower the processor into the socket, then gently flip the latch or locking mechanism. You shouldn't have to fight it. If you have to press really hard, double-check that the processor is socketed correctly.

Next, you're going to need your thermal paste. That little tiny plastic syringe of silvery goo is very important for this next step. Now that your processor is seated, take a look at the shiny square of silicon in the center of it. That's where your heat sink is going to sit. Your processor came with a heat sink, and on one side of it, you'll see a copper circle. You're going to be putting the heat sink directly on top of the processor after we apply the thermal paste, with the silicone square and the copper circle lining up perfectly.

Go ahead and carefully squeeze a tiny ball (no bigger than a pea) of thermal paste onto the silicon square on your processor. You'll want it as close to the center as you can get.

Now line up your heat sink with the screws surrounding your processor, and gently lower it into place. You're gonna squish the thermal paste, and the goal here is to create a thin layer covering the back of your processor. It's OK if it oozes a little bit, but if it oozes out and over the edge of the processor, you used too much. Get some isopropyl alcohol, dab it on a lint-free wipe, and wipe the processor and heat sink. Wait till they're thoroughly dry and try again.

If it looks all right, screw your heat sink into place. Flip back to your motherboard instruction book and find the right place near the processor socket to plug in your heat sink's cooling fan. It should be very close to your processor socket. Once you've found it, plug it in-congratulations, you just installed a CPU. This was the hardest part, and it's over. Good job!

Installing Your Storage and Memory

Memory is maybe the easiest thing to install. See those vertical little sockets beside the CPU? Line up your sticks of RAM and slot them in, starting from the left-hand slot. They'll lock into place once you've seated them properly. If you have two sticks of RAM, make sure to skip a slot between them. Your motherboard manual should say which slots to use.

For your hard drive or solid-state drive (SSD), find an empty bay in the front-facing part of your case. Slide your drive in and screw it into place. If you have an M.2 drive (a tiny SSD about the size of a stick of gum), there should be a place on the motherboard where you slot it in directly. Check out your motherboard's manual to see where the M.2 slot is if you can't find it.

Installing Your Motherboard and Power Supply

The rest of this is formulaic. Start by putting your motherboard into your case. Consult your motherboard's instructions, line up the screw holes in the case with the ones on your motherboard, and get to work.

Next, you'll want to install your power supply. There should be a spot for it near the top or bottom of the case, a big square spot that will fit your supply perfectly. If you're having trouble finding it, look at the back of your case: There'll be a big empty square. That's where the power supply goes (and where you'll plug in your PC when you're all done). Once you've found its home, slot it in and screw it into place.

Make sure all the snaky cables coming out of the power supply will reach your motherboard with room to spare. Don't plug in anything yet; we're going to come back to the power supply in a bit.

Installing Your Graphics Card

Your GPU is going to be pretty big. Even a modestly powerful GPU like the GTX 1060 is large compared to your other components. That means how it fits into your case is important. Once you put your GPU in there, space is going to start getting tight.

Flip open your motherboard's instruction book again and look for a PCIe slot. It's going to be a horizontal slot with a little plastic latch beside it, near the middle or bottom of your motherboard. That's where the GPU plugs in. All you need to do is identify the back of your GPU (the side with the HDMI and DisplayPorts), line that up with the back of your case, and push the GPU into the horizontal slot. It should lock into place easily enough; if it doesn't, make sure you're inserting it correctly.

Find another one of those tiny little screws and fasten your GPU to the case. There's a little spot for that on the same piece of metal with the HDMI ports. It should be easy to find.

Now, take a look at the cables coming out of your power supply. There should be a few that look like they could fit into the square (or rectangular) socket on the side of your GPU. It should look like six or eight little holes in a rectangle shape. If you're having trouble, take a look at this video from hardware manufacturer Asus. Some of the specifics will be different, but it's a great look at how to install a GPU.

The motherboard needs to be hooked into all your devices. The power supply unit I used in this build is what's called fully modular, which means that you can select the cables you need and leave the rest off to eliminate clutter. Otherwise, power supplies have a ton of cables, and you'll have to deal with the unused power connections dangling inside your case. You'll need to connect the PSU to the SSD and the motherboard.

You also need to plug the motherboard into your case-the power buttons, audio plugs, and USB ports on the front of your case. There are special headers for each kind of plug scattered around the board, so you'll want to check your manual for the location and function of each grouping of pins. These tiny pins need to be plugged in a certain way, and they're unbelievably minuscule. There's also a hookup for the case's fan-in the case I used there was one header on the motherboard but three fans installed. Then there's the SATA cable for your SSD, which plugs into the motherboard.

This part of your build really depends on the hardware you purchased, so consult the manuals for each component to ensure you've correctly plugged it into your motherboard and the power supply.

Boot It Up and Install Windows

The final stage of your build is a simple one: Hit your power button. If the PC whirs to life, you probably put it together perfectly! If it doesn't, don't despair. There are a lot of potential problems that could cause a PC to fail to boot up for the first time. This video from Kingston goes over some pitfalls that might cause you some headaches, so if you're not able to boot your PC, give it a watch and retrace your steps.

There's also a chance you could have received faulty components. This video goes over some tips on how to check your parts. In general, if you're having trouble with a specific component, YouTube is your friend. There are tons of helpful PC-building tutorials.

If it started up just fine, the next step is super easy: Turn it off. Remember that Windows flash drive you made earlier? Plug it into the PC and boot it up again. If you set it up right, your computer should just do its thing and get started installing Windows. If not, you might need to open your BIOS (check your motherboard's manual for how to do that) and set the USB drive to be a "boot device" first. Here's a brief rundown of that process (start at step 3).

You Did It!

Congratulations on building your first PC. It's a bit of a pain, but it's a great way to spend an afternoon. Or a couple of days, depending on how many unforeseen headaches you run into. Seeing as the pandemic hasn't totally gone away, you can use your new PC to help you spend all those extra indoor hours productively (or just grinding out loot in Warframe).

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Assembling a computer yourself is a good way to learn how they work. If you've been beating yourself up about doing nothing productive during our never-ending pandemic, stop. Sometimes doing nothing is exactly what you need. Other times, it's nice to make something with your own hands.

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An Ethical Hacker exposes vulnerabilities in software to help business owners fix those security holes before a malicious hacker discovers them. In this free ethical hacking course, you learn all about Ethical hacking with loads of live hacking examples to make the subject matter clear.

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There are many ways you can try it without even installing it.

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The article What is a Linux user? by Anderson Silva made it clear that these days people are as likely to use Linux (in some way) as they are to use Windows, as long as your definition of "using Linux" is sufficiently broad. Still, if you don't have enough Linux in your life, now is a great time to try Linux in a way you've never tried before.

Here are 10 ways to get started with Linux. Try one or try them all.

1. Join a free shell

There are a lot of people running Linux with more Linux servers than they know what to do with (keep in mind that a "Linux server" can be anything from the latest supercomputer to a discarded 12-year-old laptop). To put excess computers to good use, many administrators open their spare boxes up for free shell accounts.

If you want to log time in a Linux terminal to learn commands, shell scripting, Python, and the basics of web development, a free shell account is an easy, no-cost way to get started. Here's a short list to try:

Freeshell.de is a public access Linux system that's been online since 2002. You get SSH access (to experiment in a Linux shell), IPv6, and OpenSSL, and you can request a MySQL database.

Blinkenshell provides a Linux shell to learn Unix, use IRC, host simple websites, and share files. It's been online since 2006.

SDF Public Access Unix System was established in 1987 to offer free NetBSD accounts. NetBSD isn't Linux, of course, but it's open source Unix, so it offers a similar experience. It also has several homebrewed applications, so it straddles the line between old-school BBS and plain-old free shell.

Free shell accounts are subject to a lot of abuse, so the more you demonstrate trustworthiness and willingness to participate in the goings-on of the collective, the better your experience. You can often gain access (through a special request or a small donation to demonstrate goodwill) to database engines, compilers, and advanced programming languages. You can also ask for additional software or libraries to be installed, subject to administrator approval.

How to use it

Public access shell accounts are a great way to try out a real Linux system. The fact that you don't get root access means you get to learn local software management without having to mow your own lawn or fix leaky faucets. You can do just enough real-life activities to make them viable for getting real work done, although they're not reliable enough to be mission critical.

2. Try Linux on Windows with WSL 2

Believe it or not, Microsoft started shipping Linux with Windows as of June 2019, meaning you can run Linux applications from Windows as the second iteration of the Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL 2). While it's primarily aimed at developers, Windows users will find WSL 2 to be a Linux environment from the comfort of a familiar desktop without any virtualization taking up extra resources. This is Linux running as a process on your Windows machine. At this time, it's still a new initiative and a work in progress, so it's subject to change. If you try to push it too far too soon, you're likely to encounter a bug or two, but if you're just looking to get started with Linux, learn some commands, and get a feel for getting serious work done in a text-based environment, WSL 2 may be exactly what you need.

How to use it

WSL doesn't yet have a clear pathway or purpose, but it provides a Linux environment on your Windows machine. You get root access and can run Linux distributions and applications, so it's an easy and seamless way to learn. However, even though WSL is Linux, it's not exactly a typical Linux experience. It's Linux provided by Windows, and that's not what you're likely to encounter in the real world. WSL is a development and educational tool, but if it's available to you, then you should use it.

3. Carry Linux on a bootable thumb drive

Carry Linux, installed to a USB thumb drive, everywhere you go, and boot any computer you encounter from that thumb drive. You get a personalized Linux desktop, and you don't have to worry about the data on the host computer you've booted from. The computer doesn't touch your Linux OS, and your Linux OS doesn't affect the computer. It's ideal for public computers at hotel business centers, libraries, schools, or just to give yourself an excuse to boot into Linux from time to time.

Unlike many other quick hacks to get to a Linux shell, this method offers you a full and robust Linux system, complete with a desktop, access to whatever software you need, and persistent data storage.

The system never changes. Any data you want to save is written into a compressed filesystem, which is then applied as an overlay to the system when you boot. This flexibility allows you to choose whether to boot in persistent mode, saving all data back to the thumb drive, or in an ephemeral mode, so everything you do disappears once you power down. In other words, you can use this as a secure kiosk on an untrusted computer or as your portable OS on computers you trust.

There are many thumb drive distributions you can try, some with minimal desktop environments for low-powered computers and others with a full desktop. I'm partial to Porteus Linux. I've carried it on my keychain every day for the past eight years, using it as my primary computing platform during business travel as well as a utility disk if computer problems strike at work or home. It's a reliable and stable operating system that's fun and easy to use.

On Mac or Windows, download the Fedora Media Writer to create a bootable thumb drive of whatever portable distribution you download.

How to use it

Booting a "live Linux" from a USB thumb drive provides a complete Linux distribution. While data storage is done a little differently from a system you install to a hard drive, everything else is as you'd expect from a Linux desktop. There's little you can't do on a portable Linux OS, so install one on your keychain to unlock the full potential of every computer you encounter.

4. Take an online tour

Somebody over at Ubuntu thought up the brilliant idea of hosting an Ubuntu GNOME desktop in the browser. To try it out for yourself, open a web browser and navigate to tour.ubuntu.com. You can select which activity you want demonstrated, or you can skip individual lessons and click the Show Yourself Around button.

Even if you're new to the Linux desktop, you might find showing yourself around is more familiar than you might expect. From the online tour, you can look around, see what applications are available, and view what a typical default Linux desktop is like. You can't adjust settings or launch another tour in Firefox (it was the first thing I tried, naturally), and while you can go through the motions of installing applications, you can't launch them. But if you've never used a Linux desktop before and you want to see what all the fuss is about, this is the whirlwind tour.

How to use it

An online tour is truly just a tour. If you've never seen a Linux desktop in action, this is an opportunity to get a glimpse of what it's like. Not intended for serious work, this is an attractive display to entice passers-by.

5. Run Linux in the browser with JavaScript

Not so long ago, virtualization used to be computationally expensive, limited to users with premium hardware. Now virtualization has been optimized to the point that it can be performed by a JavaScript engine, thanks to Fabrice Bellard, the creator of the excellent and open source QEMU machine emulator and virtualizer.

Bellard also started the JSLinux project, which allows you to run Linux and other operating systems in a browser, in his spare time for fun. It's still an experimental project, but it's a technical marvel. Open a web browser to the JSLinux page, and you can boot a text-based Linux shell or a minimal graphical Linux environment. You can upload and download files to your JSLinux host or (theoretically) send your files to a network backup location, because JSLinux has access to the internet through a VPN socket (although at capped speeds, dependent upon the VPN service).

How to use it

You won't be doing serious work on JSLinux anytime soon, and the environment is arguably too unusual to learn broad lessons about how Linux normally works. If, however, you're bored of running Linux on a plain old PC and would like to try Linux on a truly distinctive platform, JSLinux is in a class all its own.

6. Read about it

Not every Linux experience happens on the computer. Maybe you're the sort of person who likes to keep your distance, observe, and do your research before jumping into something new, or maybe you're just not clear yet on what "Linux" encompasses, or maybe you love full immersion. There's a wealth of information to read about how Linux works, what it's like to run Linux, and what's happening in the Linux world.

The more you get familiar with the world of open source, the easier it is to understand the common lingo and to separate urban myth from actual experience. We publish book lists from time to time, but one of my favorites is The Charm of Linux by Hazel Russman. It's a tour through Linux from many different angles, written by an independent author out of excitement over discovering Linux.

How to use it

Nothing beats kicking back with a good book. This is the least traditional method of experiencing Linux, but for people who love the printed word, it's both comforting and effective.

7. Get a Raspberry Pi

If you're using a Raspberry Pi, you're running Linux. It's that easy to get started with Linux and low-powered computing. The great thing about the Pi, aside from it costing well under $100, is that its website is designed for education. You can learn all about what the Pi does, and while you're at it, all about what Linux can do for you.

How to use it

The Pi is, by design, a low-powered computer. That means you can't do as much multitasking as you might be used to, but that's a convenient way to keep yourself from getting overwhelmed. The Raspberry Pi is a great way to learn Linux and all of the possibilities that come with it, and it's a fun way to discover the power of eco-friendly, small-form-factor, simplified computing. And be sure to stay tuned to Opensource.com-especially during Pi Week every March-for tips and tricks and fun activities.

8. Climb aboard the container craze

If you work near the back end of the mythical cloud, then you've heard about the container craze. While you can run Docker and Kubernetes on Windows, Azure, Mac, and Linux, you may not know that the containers themselves are Linux. Cloud computing apps and infrastructure are literally minimal Linux systems that run partly virtualized and partly on bare metal. If you launch a container, you are launching a miniature, hyper-specific Linux distribution.

Containers are different than virtual machines or physical servers. They're not intended to be used as a general-purpose operating system. However, if you are developing in a container, you might want to pause and have a look around. You'll get a glimpse of how a Linux system is structured, where important files are kept, and which commands are the most common. You can even try a container online, and you can read all about how they work in my article about going behind the scenes with Linux containers.

How to use it

Containers are, by design, specific to a single task, but they're Linux, so they're extremely flexible. You can use them as they're intended, or you can build a container out into a mostly complete system for your Linux experiments. It's not a desktop Linux experience, but it's a full Linux experience.

9. Install Linux as a VM

Virtualization is the easy way to try an operating system, and VirtualBox is a great open source way to virtualize. VirtualBox runs on Windows and Mac, so you can install Linux as a virtual machine (VM) and use it almost as if it were just another application. If you're not accustomed to installing an operating system, VirtualBox is also a very safe way to try Linux without accidentally installing it over your usual OS.

How to use it

Running Linux as a VM is convenient and easy, either as a trial run or an alternative to dual-booting or rebooting when you need a Linux environment. It's full-featured and, because it uses virtual hardware, the host operating system drives your peripherals. The only disadvantage to running Linux as a virtual machine is primarily psychological. If you intend to use Linux as your main OS, but end up defaulting to the host OS for all but the most Linux-specific tasks, then the VM has failed you. Otherwise, a VM is a triumph of modern technology, and using Linux in VirtualBox provides you with all the best features Linux has to offer.

10. Install it

When in doubt, there's always the traditional route. If you want to give Linux the attention it deserves, you can download Linux, burn the installer to a thumb drive (or a DVD, if you prefer optical media), and install it on your computer. Linux is open source, so it can be distributed by anyone who wants to take the time to bundle Linux-and all the bits and pieces that make it usable-into what is commonly called a distribution (or "distro") for short. Ask any Linux user, and you're bound to get a different answer for which distribution is "best" (mostly because the term "best" is often left undefined). Most people admit that you should use the Linux distribution that works for you, meaning that you should test a few popular distros and settle on the one that makes your computer behave as you expect it to behave. This is a pragmatic and functional approach. For example, should a distribution fail to recognize your webcam and you want your webcam to work, then use a distribution that recognizes your webcam.

If you've never installed an operating system before, you'll find most Linux distributions include a friendly and easy installer. Just download a distribution (they are delivered as ISO files), and download the Fedora Media Writer to create a bootable installation thumb drive.

How to use it

Installing Linux and using it as an operating system is a step toward becoming familiar and familial with it. There's no wrong way to use it. You might discover must-have features you never knew you needed, you might learn more about computers than you ever imagined you could, and you may shift in your worldview. Or you might use a Linux desktop because it was easy to download and install, or because you want to cut out the middleman of some corporate overlord, or because it helps you get your work done.

Whatever your reason, just give Linux a try with any (or all) of these options.

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The article What is a Linux user? by Anderson Silva made it clear that these days people are as likely to use Linux (in some way) as they are to use Windows, as long as your definition of "using Linux" is sufficiently broad.

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Start your online CV now.

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930 million+ members | Manage your professional identity. Build and engage with your professional network. Access knowledge, insights and opportunities.

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A Day in the Life of a Harvard Computer Science Student

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5 Years of Coding - Everything I've Learned

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Inside the mind of a master procrastinator

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Inside the mind of a master procrastinator

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Inspiration on better working

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Inside the Mind of a Master Procrastinator | Tim Urban | TED

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Cal Newport and Rich Roll are awesome!

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Digital Minimalism with Cal Newport | Rich Roll Podcast

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Deeper reading and history of cryptography and code breaking.

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A look at the political and moral implications of Big Data

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The Singularity is Near: When Humans Transcend Biology

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The Singularity is Near: When Humans Transcend Biology

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Predicting the future.

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Nine Algorithms That Changed the Future...

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Nine Algorithms That Changed the Future...

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Who knew that algorithms could be so interesting?

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The New Turing Omnibus: 66 Excursions in Computer Science

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The New Turing Omnibus: 66 Excursions in Computer Science

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A great primer when entering Computer Science at University.

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The Innovators: How a Group of Hackers, Geniuses...

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The Innovators: How a Group of Hackers, Geniuses...

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More history by the superb biographer, Walter Isaacson

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The Chip: How Two Americans Invented the Microchip...

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The Chip: How Two Americans Invented the Microchip...

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A nice history lesson.

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This is not a University reading list, but a brief introduction into some wider reading. If you're doing a computer science degree you'll be about to narrow your focus into specific areas, but it's good to also read more broadly.

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Wider reading on the implications of artificial intelligence and the future of humanity.

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Algorithms to Live By: The Computer Science of Human Decisions

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Algorithms to Live By: The Computer Science of Human Decisions

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Become more robot! How logical decision making helps in everyday life, not just computing.

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A Programmer's Guide to Computer Science...

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A Programmer's Guide to Computer Science...

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Excellent book to take your programming and understanding to the next level.

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So you've got your A Level in Computer Science - what can you do with it?

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Hello and welcome to the TSFA Computer Science transition site.
On this page you'll find useful resources that will help you move to the next stage of either University or the world of employment!