1) A MotherBoard - A motherboard is the brain of the computer and is what you build everything onto - the base of your mining rig. The main feature you are looking for in a motherboard is the number of GPU slots it has as this will determine how many graphics cards or GPU's it can fit - and in the end your total hashing power. 3 PCI Express slots will mean you can fit 3 x RX 580 with a hashrate of 20 MH/s each - or a total hashing power of 60 MH/s. A PCI Express slot is a connection port on the motherboard and looks like the picture below - they are often coloured white but can be different colors- you can get other types of slots but most GPU's work on a PCI express.We used the GA-Z97X-Gaming 3 which you can get here!

2) Graphics Card - Pick your GPUs! Some graphics cards cost a fortune but don't hash much whilst some are more reasonable but use more power. Ultimately its a balance between how powerful you want your rig to be and how much you want to spend - but a word to the wise - make sure you pick an efficient GPU. You can buy second hand GPU's from reputable providers such as GPU Shack - be careful though when you buy them off a street corner as often they have problems that you won't see until you get the card home and plugged in. I have a list of GPU's here that you can sort through and work out what fits your budget.

3) Hard Drive - You need a hard drive to store your operating system and your software for mining. A standard SSD drive will do (an SSD hard drive is just a storage device and is called solid state as there aren't moving bits which can break). The size will depend on what you are planning to do when mining. If you are planning to download the entire blockchain and mine as shown in this guide here - then you will need to take into account how big the blockchain will become and need to spend a little more. If you are just going to mine ethereum as part of a pool then you don't need to store the blockchain and can get a smaller SSD drive. We used the SSDNow V300 120GB. Buy it here.

4) RAM - or Random Access Memory - this is a basic component in any computer is basically a scratchpad for jotting down calculations and recalling information quickly in a computer. 4GB should do the job.You can get some here.

5) A PSU or Power Supply Unit - Power supply units come in many sizes and this can trip some people up when they are looking at calculating what size they need. You need to sum up the power consumption of your GPU and all the other components and make sure your power supply has the capability to supply more! So if you have two GPU's that consumes 220 Watts and other components that need 250 Watts then you can get away with a 750 Watt power supply unit as the total power needed is only 690Watts.If you are building a "mega rig" which has 6 GPU's you might find it more cost effective to have two separate power supplies because at 750 Watts and $100 each rather than a 1500 W and $300 dollars!We got a Seasonic 1200 Watt which you can buy here.

6) A Case - Again this can be quite a difficult choice to make as it will depend on your GPU's and whether you are using GPU risers. You don't want components sitting on top of each other as there is a fire hazard potentially. You can leave the whole system open air or even build your own case to give it that personalised touch. You can buy off the shelf rigs from a couple of providers - for example SW mining here have their own set of rigs that take up to a week to ship. They do all the hard work for you.