Unplugging everything from my motherboard.

So I bought a new case fan and when I went to install it fucking wires were like weeds in my computer. I had a buddy of mine build me this rig a few years ago now and it is just a fucking mess inside. I'm just wondering what the level of difficulty is for removing all wires from a motherboard and making them somewhat neat before putting them back into place. I have never built a computer before so I don't know what goes where. My main concern is plugging something into somewhere it shouldn't be and bad stuff happening.

I figure I will need my mobo manual (obtainable online) but am not sure if I need anything else. Any help would be greatly appreciated, thanks!

They will be mostly fan plugs and sata for the drives. just make a note of what goes where before unplugging, there are usually small labels written directly on the board itself.

I've just replaced my PC case today so had to do a similar thing. Just unplug everything and use the mobo manual to tell you where to plug them back in, it shouldn't be too complex. All that plugs into the mobo really are some fans , the CPU power and the main board power. If your graphics needs power from the PSU remember to plug that back in, along with the power to hard disks or DVD drives.

It's pretty hard to plug in something the wrong way in modern computers. Power connectors, fan connectors, SATA cables are all keyed to each other and only go in one way. The one exception are the header wires from the front of the case to the motherboard. These are for things like the power button and power LED, and its possible to plug them in the wrong way and not work. The positive and negative wires are usually labelled but in low light in a cramped case the labels can somethings be hard to make out.

In addition to the motherboard manual, I would watch some YouTube videos of people building machines. Whisky Media did a video a couple of years ago when Will and Norm built Jeff's computer, and there are some more recent build videos from Tested that would be good to watch. These will give you a good idea on how the components connect to each other and show you what wires do what and go where.

...can't...resist...posting...this...again... (it is the most helpful how-to ever!)

Most of the stuff will only plug in where is is possible to plug it in.

I wouldn't pull the small wires on the bottom that go to your front panel, those can be annoying to figure out if you don't build computers very often.

...can't...resist...posting...this...again... (it is the most helpful how-to ever!)

Oh man, I totally forgot this existed. Thanks for reminding me.

That is fantastic I forgot that as well, its amazing how comprehensive they get with only 3mins!

That is fantastic I forgot that as well, its amazing how comprehensive they get with only 3mins!

It's not hard, but take a photo just as a precaution. It's easy to miss stuff like the 12V ATX Power Connector because it's small. But the computer won't boot if you don't connect it. Graphics cards use 12V connectors as well, so you might think every component have unique cables, but that's not the case.

Avoid unplugging the small cables that controls the buttons and LEDs on the front panel. It's certainly not impossible to get them back in the right place, but it's a bit of a hassle and not getting it right will result in you not being able to power up your computer at all.

And just a general advice, when you're done with the wiring, boot up the computer first and check that everything looks OK before you tie the cables together.

It's fairly easy. If you're worried, try taking some pictures of the board from a few different angles, so you can look back on them when putting the wires back if you get lost.