CreepyPasta PC Version #2, The White Smoke Of Ignorance

It was a quiet Sunday afternoon, when 17-year-old Tom got his parts to build his very first computer. He had been considering an upgrade from his old computer, since he could no longer play his favorite games on decent settings. After months of thinking, researching and saving money he finally bought the parts. When the sound of the doorbell reached his ears, he was filled with emotions of excitement as well as fear, as this was his first build.

He ran to the door and opened it, wide open. There, a big pile of boxes awaited him with a delivery man. After signed the documents, which where handed to him, he slammed the door, as soon as he placed all the boxes inside his house. He, then moved them to his room, in order to have quiet during his building session.

He stood there, looking at them with some tears in his eyes, as if they were the Messiah that he was waiting to rescue him from the tyranny of his old, worthless computer. Then he started opening all the boxes, with his bear hands. He couldn't even think to get a knife, as this would cost him; time which he could spend with his new computer. However, he did not damage any of the boxes, as he wanted to keep them and display them as trophies.

After opening all the boxes, he started assembling the PC. He had watched countless build on YouTube. He had read countless forum posts on the Internet on how to build a computer. This felt like second nature to him. This is what he was born for. 

He took the motherboard, placed it on top of its box put all the necessary components on it and made sure it posted. His worst nightmare was that one of his parts would be DOA, but luckily this wasn't the case. 

He then put all the components inside the case, did some fairly good cable management for some new and he put the computer on his desk with the side panel window facing him, because he wanted to admire this excellent piece of work. He was so proud of this build, he was standing there for more than an hour; just admiring it. 

Finally he turned it on. The sounds it made, the air from the exhaust fans, all seemed heavenly to him. He was overwhelmed with joy.  He installed windows and downloaded all his favorite games. Thanks to his speedy Internet connection this didn't take long. After about two hours, he was able to play his games. He boot up battlefield. He went to check the recommended settings and his was floored with what he saw. Everything was on Ultra. This was his first time playing on that high settings. Filled with excitement he started desperately searching for a game. 

But, god, how much of a fool he was. Excited as he was, he did not notice that there was smoke coming out of his computer. White smoke, white like the fresh snow. 

After about ten minutes of playing the system crash. He was now terrified. He did not know what happened. And that's when he realized. There was smoke coming out of his computer. "What have I done wrong?" he asked himself. "My god", he said when he saw he tube with the thermal paste on his desk, untouched."I must have forgotten to put it on the CPU when my father told me to throw out the trash. But how did the computer survive for so long?". He opened the case, pulled the cooler off the CPU and he saw that there were some remnants from the thermal paste from the stock cooler.

Having realized the mistake he had made, he put on the thermal paste and tried to power on the computer, without any luck. He could only see error codes, which he knew that meant that his CPU was fried. It was now just a useless piece of junk.

With no money left, Tom had now to work hard again for almost one semester, just to get a new CPU for his system, leaving him with his old, rusty and slow computer.