Rock-solid rec...

[FarFromUrth]

Can anyone recommend a basic, but still dependable computer science text that can get me started.

Not studying it as a community-college subject or anything, but simply interested in gaining a deeper knowledge of my PC, from a hobbyist point of view.

Any help would be much appreciated.

-JVM

[j-dawg]

If you're interested in computer technology and understanding how to operate, repair, and modify PCs, I'd recommend building a desktop PC. If you need a new PC, you might save some money. If not, you can just sell it afterwards. It's a great way to get a handle on what goes into a computer and how everything fits together; you'll spend a lot of time online trying to tweak and configure everything into shape, but when you're done you'll have a computer and a whole lot more understanding of how it works.

That was how I got started. With time, it just builds--something goes wrong, you fix it, you learn something new. Something could be shinier or prettier or faster, you change it, you learn something new.

Or, you know, you change it and break it. That happens too, but you still learn something.