Project S-D

Hello Everyone! This is the first computer I built that I would consider a true case mod. This first post will be big, as it goes up through the first half of the project (I've been slacking on writing). Hopefully, I'll be smarter about the second half and break it up into more bite-sized bits. I will tell you now, although I have a definite set design, I'm going to try and keep it secret for as long as possible, so you can watch it transform over the next several posts. At the end of the project I'll tell you what the "S-D" stands for.

The history...
This entire adventure started... oh, I suppose around the time the video card had died in my Macintosh G5. I had been frustrated about the cost of Mac vs. PC components. I had been complaining to my friend/co-worker (ObviouslyTom) about it. A few weeks or so after getting the G5 squared away, I decided I would build a PC that could do Maya, Zpaint, and ultimately run AoC. ObviouslyTom was kind enough to donate this case to me (which he had aqcuired for free from my facist boss) and I went down to his place to pick it up. It had since been sitting around in my house for at least the last 2 or so months, while my design developed around this monstrosity of a case. You see, before the case was in my hands, I had no idea what I had planned on doing with it.



Aren't I a pretty case? Only the most sexy get held together via black duct tape...


This is the back of the monstrosity. It is pretty epically huge.

The first thing I noticed about the donated sacrificial case is how HUGE it is. I can say it here, but you just don't get it, until you see it. Plus it is made completely of thicker steel sheet than most cases you see today. It was an old Gateway server case, still with MoBo and processors. It took a good two hrs or so to strip it down to the base shell, and I tell you, I wasted no time getting right to it (who does not like to deconstruct old hardware?)



It is a very well-build case, not only do the sides come off, but the top as well, it is very easy to access the space in this case.



The old Motherboard, still in the case.


An even better picture of this old P3 Motherboard. It is fascinating to me. I still have it sitting on a shelf, not that I'll ever do anything with it...


This is one of the two old P3 processors. Yes, dual processors! woot. This thing must have cost a fortune back in the day... Also, let it be known that the way these things were attached to the MoBo, coupled with the absolutely ridiculously sharp aluminum heat sinks resulted in several small lacerations. I am very lucky I didn't cleanly slice a finger off. S H A R P


Even a nice capacity removable HDD shelf.


At this point, with the case stripped, (and weighing almost 20-25ish lbs, empty, iirc), I sat down and measured and remeasured and tripled measured all of the panels, the frame, and the locations of every mounting point. I then made views of each side, the top, and the face in Adobe Illustrator at 100% scale. Up until now, everything was straight forward and easy, now I actually needed to figure out what I was going to do with it.

Over the next, oh I would say 2 months, I designed, laid out, measured, re-laid out, remeasured, researched parts to fit, re-re-laid out and ultimately created what will be (I hope) an incredibly cool, and most certainly unique PC case. Knowing that there was no way I would ever get this beast of a case to feel delicate or compact, or light and airy, i took that into my design. Also, during this time, I laid out my budget, and researched exactly what kind of innards I wanted for my PC. (you'll get to see them by the end of this post). Amazingly, almost all of that took me right up to roughly last weekend, when the final computer parts arrived (to make it run), and I set about modifying the case to work around everything that I had purchased.


From Last Week until Present.
This brings me to the point where I get to use big, nasty power tools to cut up the case to fit certain components for my case. A Porter Cable jig-saw with a metal blade on it will cut through steel akin to a starving parahna next to a splashing kid in pool.

The first thing I needed to do was account for the air flow in the case. There are already places for (x2) 120mm fans, and a larger one up front (whatever might have been there was gone when I had gotten the case). This really made the placement of the fans I wanted to use a no-brainer. Unfortunately, the perf grill of the case was maybe 50% open, so not the best for allowing the case to breath. I decided to cut out the original perf (it was actually part of the stamped steel paneling), and replace it with a much more open hex mesh, that I had used on a previous computer.



Here i have cut out the front of the case to allow for my main intake fan, which is a 140mm AreoCool fan. I would have gone bigger, but the next size up was 200mm, and although it would have fit, I felt that it would have begun to interfere with other internal parts. The remains of the original perf that I removed is laying in front of the PC Case.


Here is the back of the case. In addition to removing the bumped out perf areas, I also had to cut out the old I/O port, since it was also part of the stamped back panel. That was a nervous cut, since I knew I would have to get it as dead-on as possible, so that the ports on the back of the new motherboard would line up with the supplied I/O panel. Again, the wreckage of the industrial jig-saw is seen in front of the case proper.


The circled area is where I would have had interference for the power on and reset switches. The switches I purchased are industrial vandal-proof switches, and will actually stick into the hole in the case a small bit.


Since I am completely redesigning this case, I had to come up with a new front that matched my design. The plastic front that came with the case was not only unacceptable to my design, but it was broken. Honestly, that is quite fine with me, as I would prefer to make a new front to make the case as much my own as possible. So, knowing how I would manufacture the front, I wanted to be able to bolt the front panel on from inside the case. This meant taking some of the metal out of the case around certain mounting points so that I could access the bolt, even if the case still had all of its internals inside.


Here are two locations (circled in red) where I had to remove metal to allow for the hardware (which, btw is a big meaty bolt with two standard washers and a lockwasher.)


Here is another place I needed to modify the case for a bolt. It is the top left corner of the case seen from behind. You can actually see it holding on part of the new front panel onto the case.

...which brings me to the new front of the case! (well at least a small part of it). Your actually not going to get that much from the next few pictures. I will tell you that I have made it out of 2 sheets of 1/2" thick acrylic - yes, solid acrylic. Yes it will weigh a lot. Yes, it machines very nicely.


This is the first layer of 1/2" acrylic. The acrylic is actually tapped to allow the bolts to thread right into it. I am using so many washers so that I can use a 3/4" long bolt and have the threads go right up to but not proud of the face of the first sheet of acrylic (1/2" long bolts were just too short, since I am biting into acrylic). As you can see, the DVD Burners have been placed along with the front fan, and the power / reset buttons. Additionally, you can see tons of drilled out holes. Most of them are there to straddle rivets, so that the acrylic piece sits flush to the case.


Here is the full 1" thick acrylic face, completely aligned, bolted up, tested, and straddling all of the components that interact with the face of the case. I wonder what those two large holes in the case about mid-way up could be for... Hmmmm.... The acrylic looks brown because of the protective paper that is on it from the factory. At this point, the acrylic face is just taped together. In the near future, I'll glue it up.

Now comes the time where I sand, grind, and sand some more, along with scraping off old stickers and adhesive gunk, and getting everything as polished as possible before I painted it. Sorry, no pictures of that part.


Time for the Finishing!
Wow. What an adventure. I wish I had been keeping track of hours spent, but I was more concerned with getting the case up and done... so, eh. At this point, I break out the solvents and wipe down the case to get all metal shavings, grease, grime, dirt, and last bits of sticker residue off the case, and all other parts I'll be painting.

First up, painting the case skeleton, the cut to size hex screens, all of the hardware, the HDD cage, and whatever else I needed for the internals installation.

Obviously, the first step is priming, so here are a bunch of pictures the case being primed...


I installed the I/O panel prior to priming and painting. You can see it in this picture. Yes, I did check to make sure it would line up, and guess what? It does! Yay me, I can use a ruler.


Lots of the misc sundry items in a state of primer.


The front of the case.


And now the back and side.

The nice thing about primer, it drys fast (I tend to get impatient about paint). Here comes the paint!


Here is the new and finished front of the case (that noone will ever see). It is rustoleum copper metallic spraypaint. I was surprised, it went on really nicely.


And here is the back...


The inside...


And now all of the misc doo-dads.


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So...let me tell you now that I can be impatient, especially when I work on a project that I am stupidly excited about. To me, waiting for paint to dry is about equal to having your fingernails sheered off by bamboo stakes. Somehow, with a forced shower, a forced nap, and forced eating, I managed to get through it to where the paint was cured enough to handle gently (there was no way I could wait 48hrs - sorry just no way in hell it would have happened. Ever. Well, unless you drove me to another state and pushed me out of the car to walk home)

Since we are waiting for the paint to dry, I'll show off the guts that will ultimately go into the computer. To preface this, I wanted a multi-processor computer that could handle stupid amounts of RAM so that I could run 3d computer animation programs as quickly as possible. I ultimately decided to build a machine that would use the Vista 64 bit OS. OK, on to the parts!


This is the heart of the machine. It has 4 processors, each rated at 2.4GHz, stock. The Q6600 is a stable, tried and true processor that has really good over-clocking abilities (which I will be taking advantage of).


If the heart cannot breathe, it dies. This is my CPU cooler. It is two pounds of copper (an incredible, if not expensive heat conductor) and a 110mm fan. This thing is about the size of a large grapefruit.


This is the motherboard. Short of the most horridly ridiculous box art, it is actually a really good motherboard with very nice over-clocking potential. You know, it makes me wonder who designs these and video card boxes, which almost always have really lame artwork on them. I think there is a job possibility there, right up there with the guy that writes fortune cookie fortunes.


Fortunately, the people at EVGA have much better taste in box art than Abit. Instead of screwing up and doing something horrible for the cover, they played it safe and just avoided the entire problem altogether. What can I say about the 8800GTX that has not already been said? It is a great budget video-card, even moreso now that the9800's are out.


This unassuming black lump is my 610w PC Power power supply. It is energy efficient, has the fan in the back (alot of them now-a-days have them on top, and I needed it on the back for my design).


Inside these shiny boxes is RAM. Lots of it. In fact, there is a whopping 8 GIG of RAM in there. This is the best company ever. G.Skill RAM - G.Skill - WHERE SPEED IS! You have to love that.

In addition to that, there are two DVD burners in the machine (just normal w/ lightscribe), and two hard-drives, one 160Gig, the other 500Gig. Sorry guys, no pictures of them (although the DVD burners (samsung) did get some play in earlier pics.


The Assembly!

Here is where I delicately assemble the entire computer, hook it up to a keyboard and monitor, and then cross my fingers...

I started off by installing the newly painted hex mesh and the fans, so that I would not need to manipulate them around other components. I had pre-located the mesh prior to painting and had cut out small sections whenever it fell over a screw location. All of the fans went on perfectly smoothly.


Here is the new front fan (140mm AreoCool) and hex mesh. I've removed the stickers on the front of my fan, since it didnt really go with the clean look I wanted.


And of course, we have the rear fans. Since the fans are black, it is very hard to see them. BTW, those fans are 120mm scythe fans, which i hear are really good. They should last forever, move alot of air, and are quiet. What more could you want?


Here is a picture of the rear fans from inside. If you look closely at the edge of the fans, you can see where the hex mesh is sandwiched in between the case and the fan. The mesh does not interfere with the fan at all. I did spend some time clipping the mesh so that it was only completed Hexagons in the pattern. Any little points or partial hexagons were removed so that I would not tear my fingers off later on their sharp little edges. Plus, it looks a lot cleaner that way.


The next step was installing the new feet onto the case. Right now the acrylic feet are not painted, but that will be resolved in the near future. While I was in this step, I also installed the risers for the motherboard inside the case. Unfortunately (or fortunately, as it would be relatively boring) I do not have a picture of this step.


Now comes the time where I install the processor and heatsink onto the motherboard. I didn't take any pictures of the processor itself, since you never know when a bolt of lightning will shoot from your camera and fry your helpless processor.


Here is a comparison of the stock steel and aluminum processor heatsink versus my huge copper one. Not only is my new one bigger for more heat distribution, but it is also about 1000x more heat conductive. Thermal paste is Arctic Silver 5.


Here is that heat sink installed onto the motherboard. You can just now start to see how HUGE that heatsink is.


In goes the Motherboard, the video card (also HUGE), and the power supply. You can see the hungry octopus of PSU wires creeping over the case side.


Ahh, thats a little more manageable. At this point, all of the components are hooked up to each other. I only have one stick of RAM in at this point, just to boot the machine and make sure everything runs. NOTE: although I don't have that many wires, I still want to do something in regards to wire management. I just came up with an idea this morning, so I'll look into it, and see about adding it to my next case mod steps.


Another view of the inside of the case, with a little more close-up of everything. You cannot miss how big that video card is.


The Moment of Truth

Time to cross your fingers, hook up the monitor, plug in a keyboard and mouse, and hope things are not too stupidly wrong or broken....

We hit the power button (currently, the only one I have access to is on the Motherboard)...

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and...

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SUCCESS!!! WE GOT THROUGH POST!

In all honesty, getting through POST was all the computer managed to do on Sunday night. No matter what I did, I could not get the computer to boot off an OS disc to do the OS install. I kept getting "NTLDR missing" errors. I spent hours monkeying with the hardware, swapping RAM sticks, trying different configurations, even pulling an old IDE HDD with XP and trying to boot from that. Nothing worked. I spent about 6 hours working on it with the help of another Tom (Tom M - thanks!), until at about 1:30am. After that, I just went to bed defeated.

The entire next day at work, I was milling over everything that I had tried, and by the end of the day, I had several plans to try, and multiple contingencies lined up. I had a bet that it would be memory, motherboard and then processor in that order from highest to lowest on likely problems. ObviouslyTom was set up to drive his rig to my house that night with his computer (he also has a 6600, and different RAM) and we would have test all of those components to see if I had received something DoA from the 'Egg.

Fortunately, my most promising hypothesis was correct, and within 5 minutes of getting home last night, I had the computer booting up from the Vista disc.

The problem? The RAM. It is rated at 1.8-1.9 volts, optimally. The Motherboard auto-detected the ram and set the voltage at 1.8, the bottom end of its functioning range. I upped it to 1.9, and everything blasted right up - the RAM was just not getting enough voltage to retain information!. Once I was up and running and updated, I ran Prime95 for a few hours last night, and it seems stable. Current core temps are 21-22°C idle and 39-40°C under full load. I didn't lap the processor, and the case is still just a frame w/o sides, so the airflow is not as direct as I would like it, plus the thermal compound had just been set, so hopefully with a little more time, those numbers will come down some.


Here we are, vista64 up and running, updated, and I am just reclining back listening to some music. (Next on the shopping list, a 24" LCD to get rid of that tank of a CRT)

Well, thats the first half of this journey. I have a running computer, and a fairly badass computer at that. Next will come at least two more updates, one will be for overclocking the processor, I'd like to hit 3.6GHz on it,but we'll see how it goes. The other post will be to finish the case, and show you the TRUE vision that I see for this PC. Fortunately, I was smart enough to make my design work around the now functioning computer, and I shouldn't have to pull any of the working bits out to complete it at this point.

With that said, I don't think you'll be disappointed. It will take a lot of work, though, so be patient!

Skully.

if you want to overclock your processor that much you might want to consider water cooling it. Also, very nice build so far. can't wait to see more updates

Thanks for the comments. This is just basically the armature of what I think will be an incredible case. There are literally hundreds of parts left to go into the case exterior.

I thought about water cooling it, Heck, the case is big enough. I could almost get an aquarium in there. But... at the end of the day, I'm too lazy to upkeep the water cooling. 3.6GHz would be the absolute top end that I would ever care or want to go. If I get there, rock on, if not, no problems either. In some ways, it is more of a curiousity thing just to see how far I could push it reliably.

See, short of my mac, my other PC is a totally frankenstein'ed 423 pin lol-Dell Dimension 8100 (sorta). I managed to get the processor up to 2.8GHz. The FSB on it is 100Mhz. Unfortunately, it doesn't matter how fast your kid is if he still takes the short bus to school...

So coming from that, this thing is astounding. Hope for the best and plan for the worst ^^.

thats awesome how u took an oldschool case and are updating it. i like! keep us updated.

this makes me wish i never threw out my inwin q500 full tower. anyone remember that bitch?

This is looking good so far. I love the color. Please don't place your brand new computer parts on a towel. You can end up killing them.

I think i know what s-d stands for but i dont think ill say as its rather dirty

I'm not personally a fan of the copper, but damn man, that's a slick paint job + acrylic setup you got going there!

I have been talking with Skullkyng about this project ever since I gave him the case (which is an old Gateway ALR 7200) and I am curious to see what the final outcome will look like.

You think thats huge.

I used to have the ALR8200.

Add another 5 inches of height, and another 6 of depth. O_O'

I traded it with a guy before I moved for a Chieftec Dragon case for my PC, as I wasnt taking that huge bastard with me.

(This was like 3-4 years ago)

Oo very nice.

A few things of note for today:

Yeah, I was not thinking when I put the towel down. I had done that for the paint. At the end of the day, everything worked, so thats the important part (that and it won't happen again).

BIG NEWS: I can now complete about 80% of the outside of the case!!!! All of the parts and pieces I've been machining from acrylic are now done. I'll post some pics tonight of my stash. Additionally, expect to see a couple of updates between now and the weekend.

Now I just need to make a huge order of materials from McMasterCarr.

Oh, here is a question. I need to wire my buttons to the motherboard. Can anyone post a link to the right kind of connector to hook to the pins on the MoBo?

Lots of work and sanding to do tonight.

More pics to come, either late tonight or tomorrow morning.

Are you sure those rear fans are 80mm? They sure do look like 120mm to me.

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Originally Posted by ClariorHincHonos

Are you sure those rear fans are 80mm? They sure do look like 120mm to me.

Your right, they certainly are120mm. I was really tired when I wrote this one up.

Life happened last night, so I won't get to do any updates until this evening. Sorry guys!

OK< finally an update.

This is the work that I completed yesterday after work. Yesterday I began the very long task of doing the prep-work for the finishing of the parts for the outside of my case. Most of it is machined acrylic. Unfortunately, on some of the thicker pieces (parts go from 1/8" thick up to 1" thick), the router left chatter marks on the sides. (BTW BIG MONDO PROPS to J.M. for doing the routing). So i had to sand the edges. I'm also using an orbital sander to scuff up the face and back so that the primer will stick better to the machined pieces. Additionally, my box of hardware arrived to mount the acrylic panels to the case. This is great because that means that when I am done with cleaning up the acrylic, I can do a dry-run on the case panels, and drill any holes that I may need. I'm really hopeful to get far on the case this weekend.

OK Now for pictures!

Since it is such a nice weekend, I will get to play outside. Here you can see me getting all of my stuff set up.


IN this box is my orbital sander. The tape will be used to hold the panels together when I get to the dry-run.


Drill and tap set. There will be several pieces of acrylic that I will need to add threads to, since the hardware cannot protrude of the back of certain panels, or in certain places.


This is probably the best acrylic adhesive in the world. It dries super fast and it drys super strong. You apply it with the syringe. (just make sure it works with the acrylic you are using. I am using a G-grade acrylic, NOT lexan.


It is Friday, and I'm chilling outside working on my new computer case. How can you not have something like this.


This is the box of hardware that will be used with the case. It is mostly pretty standard stuff. Washers, nuts, threaded rods, that sort of stuff. You'll see the exact stuff later this weekend, when I start opening up the boxes and bags.


This is MOST of the stack of acrylic I need to finish. As you can imagine, it is going to take me quite a few hours.

Getting to work!

Ok, so as you may recall, the face of my case was made of two pieces of 1/2" acrylic. The first thing I did yesterday was to sand the joining surfaces of the two pieces of acrylic. This does a few things, it gets rid of any dirt, and it allows the adhesive to capillary better.


Here are the two face pieces. I was laying them out to make sure I glued them up properly. Once that glue bonds the acrylic, that is pretty much it.


Once I was certain I had the alignment dead-on, I very carefully taped up the corners and some of the exposed sides to hold the pieces in perfect alignment. (this picture is actually of me removing the tape later, but you get the drift). Once you get the acrylic taped together, you fill your syringe with the adhesive (it is colorless, and looks like 'thinner" water - not as viscuss) with a turkey baster. I then ran the tip of the syringe (starting with the holes in the middle of the panel) around any seams where the two panels touched. The adhesive is so thin that the seam actually draws (via capillary action) the adhesive in, so you really do get decent coverage. You can also use thin strips of say piano wire to make a gap between the panels load up the adhesive, and then lower it down, but I feel that is too risky (at least for me). Once I did the insides, I then went around the edges, where there was not tape, then I started to remove the tape and finish the rest of the outside edging. The adhesive sets up very quickly, and is a very strong bond (kinda like superglue).

Once I was done gluing up the face, I set it off to dry (not that it was necessary) while I worked on some other parts. I chose to do my finishing by acrylic thickness this way I could eliminate a group, and ensure that all of the like pieces recieved the same style of finishing (for example, the 1/8" acrylic will not need the edges sanded, but the 1/2" stuff certainly will).


Here is a picture of a typical 1/2" piece of acrylic. I've just finished sanding the edges (with sandpaper, by hand), and then the face and back with orbital sanding. You can see the bag of acrylic parts in the back. I have a long way to go.


Two hours later, here are all of the 1/2" pieces, now finished! I used my orbital sander case to hold them as I finished them.

Now back to the face. At this point, the glue is more than set up. I use the orbital sanded to sand the four sides to make sure that the edge is perfect, then I sand both the face and the back of my now 1" acrylic face.


Here is the glued up piece. By this point, the edges are so smooth, that although you can see the light shift in the edges, it is completely smooth. Once done the edges and face, I had to hand-sand the inside of the large hole, which is ultimately where my 140mm fan sucks in air.

Thats it for now. After I finished the face, I called it a night, did clean-up, and then jammed on Rockband with some friends. As soon as I post this, I'll be going back outside to continue with sanding, and hopefully, the next update will be more exciting - maybe you'll start to get to see the design!

OK, well I just got done putting in a stupidly long day I started at about 9:30 this morning, and short of the break I took when ObviouslyTom stopped by this afternoon, I worked straight through until now (just shy of midnight). . You'll get to see the fruits of my labor below.

The first thing on my list of chores was to finish sanding up all of the acrylic parts that I still had left to do. I would say I only completed about 25-30% of all of it on Friday night.


Here you can see the piles of acrylic that still need to be sanded. The pile on the right is the 1/4" thick material. The pile on the left is the 1/8" material. I chose to go with the 1/4" material first.


The 1/4" material is done!! Excellent. I'm maybe 60% done with the sanding of acrylic now.


The intimidating pile of 1/8" acrylic. I've been putting this off as long as possible because these pieces actually needed the most clean-up, and since they are only 1/8" thick, are more prone to accidental damage or snapping during rough sanding. Not the best combination.


Here is a typical piece. You can see there is leftover material on the edges, and the holes are not completely drilled out. This is a pretty extreme example, but gives you an idea of some of what I was working to clean up.


Here is the same piece, all cleaned up, but prior to sanding the face and back. I did all of the edges first, then did the orbital sanding afterward, just to keep down the juggling of tools and parts.


As you can see, all of the acrylic is now finished! I didn't even manage to bust any of the 1/8" acrylic, much to my relief. There were some really frail pieces that were really flexing while I was sanding them. As you can also see, it is getting quite dark outside at this point as well.

I thought about calling it a day here, but then, I didn't stop working. So, now you get to see this!

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More stuff on the computer face!

If you remember from yesterday, I glued the two face panels together. Well, I ddecided to do a dry-run on the parts that are installed onto the face.


Here is the face with all of the secondary parts taped on. Everything fit just how it was supposed to, which is great news for me! Time to really start putting this together now for a test fit.


Here I am drilling and tapping holes for acorn nuts. The acorn nuts are on threaded rods that are then threaded into the newly tapped acrylic. The rods and acorn nuts will do the work of holding this thing together after I get done painting all the parts (which ultimately means that whatever I put together for the dry run, I'll have to take apart to paint, then completely reassemble again).

Well, here it is:


This is the face plate with about all of the acorn nuts I can safely tap. Most of the remaining acorn nuts will be glued down. I'll cut the rods down so that they fit into the holes of the acrylic of the secondary pieces, which will be held tight by glue.


Here is just another shot of the face panel.


And one more for good luck. Ultimately, when assembling this, I did find a small measuring error on my behalf that will require me to recut about a dozen pieces. I thought I had taken everything into account on my detail drawings, but it just goes to prove that you cannot catch everything on a detail drawing. Ultimately, not even a big deal or a set-back, just something to learn from in the future.

OK, thats it for tonight. Lots more work to do tomorrow. Catch everyone on the flip side.

WOW.... Thats absolutely amazing. Keep up the work man, I have high hopes for the outcome of this project.

This is looking better and better every time you post. Great work, nice nuts.