19/08/2026
🩺💻 PC Upgrade + Whole Home Wi-Fi – One Job Turns Into Two! 📡🔧
This PC job wasn't actually planned at the beginning! 😄
The customer originally contacted me because they needed help setting up a home network to provide reliable Wi-Fi coverage throughout the whole house — from the basement all the way up to the loft 📡🏠
Of course, that's something I can help with. Whether it's a Mesh system or a more traditional network setup, the first step is always checking the property and working out what will provide the best coverage.
And this wasn't exactly a simple house to work with... 😅
It's an old Victorian-style property, almost 200 years old 🏠😳 — so getting a good wireless signal through all those floors and walls required some proper planning.
But while I was checking everything...
👀 I spotted a PC!
And of course, I couldn't just ignore it. 😂
It belonged to the customer's son and had been built around 4 years ago. Luckily, it was built before the worldwide RAM price madness 💸😂, so it already had a very nice 64GB of DDR5.
But I immediately spotted a few things that needed attention:
⚠️ AIO water cooler mounted on the side and not in the ideal configuration
⚠️ Only one 120mm fan at the top of the case, working as an intake
⚠️ No GPU support bracket
⚠️ Overall case airflow could be much better
After discussing everything with the customer and getting confirmation from his son, the PC job was added to the list! 😎🔧
🩺 Full PC Inspection
Once I started taking everything apart, I found even more things that needed correcting.
The AIO was mounted on the side because the existing case simply wasn't large enough to properly accommodate the 360mm radiator at the top.
I also discovered:
🔍 No CPU anti-bend/contact frame
🔍 Protective plastic film still attached to the thermal pad on the storage heatsink 😬
🔍 GPU support was missing
The PC had originally been built by a friend of the customer's son.
There's absolutely nothing wrong with building your own PC — I always encourage people to learn and have a go themselves! 👍
But... make sure you know what you're doing before putting everything together. 😅🔧
🔧 The Solution
After inspection, I recommended replacing the case rather than trying to work around all the limitations of the existing one.
So I got to work! 💪
🧹 Full cleaning of all components
🧠 Installed a CPU anti-bend/contact frame
❄️ Replaced CPU thermal paste with Thermal Grizzly Aeronaut
🛡️ Added a proper GPU support bracket
🔍 Checked and removed the remaining protective films
🔄 Transferred all components into a brand-new MSI MAG PANO 130R PZ Mid-Tower Tempered Glass Black PC Gaming Case
The new case came with 4 fans — 3 side-mounted fans, including reverse airflow fans — giving the whole system a much cleaner appearance and, more importantly, significantly improved airflow 🌪️❄️
The result?
The same hardware, but a much better home! 😎💻🏠
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📡 And Now... Back To The Home Network!
For the original job, I installed an AX3000 Whole Home Mesh Wi-Fi 6 system connected to the customer's Virgin Super Hub 5 with their 1Gbps broadband connection 🚀📡
The Mesh system was positioned across three levels:
📍 One Deco in the basement
📍 Main Deco connected directly to the Virgin Super Hub 5
📍 Third Deco on the first floor
With the positioning chosen carefully, the system should provide reliable coverage throughout the house — including the back garden 🌳📶
So what started as a simple home network installation turned into:
📡 Whole-home Wi-Fi upgrade
➕
💻 Full PC maintenance
➕
🔧 PC case replacement
➕
❄️ Cooling and airflow improvements
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🛡️ Hardware corrections
That's what I like about this job — you never quite know what is going to walk through the door... or what you're going to find when you visit a customer's house! 😂🩺💻
Customers are really happy with the final result 😄👍✨
Another happy customer! 🥳💻📡
