AtomicFire.net server case-in-progress!

[AtomicFire]

Just a work in progress for a server. Specs are:

Dual Athlon XP -> MP 1.9GHz
1Gig Infineon DDR
Quantum Atlas 10k 36gig u160 drive

I wanted a server that would stand out, as before I leave for college this will be a LAN party server for games and files and whatnot. I deided on a orange\black color scheme, with a silver\black front, black top, sides, and orange back and inner frame.

The origional case was this bland one from Newegg, it was on sale for $40 shipped with a 350watt power supply so I picked up two of them. One goes to my dad, i kept one for this server.

First out was the lack of paint. I painted the whole inner chassis bright neon orange, the kind on traffic safety cones. A can of "Krylon" paint from Wal-Mart - $4

Then the wire fan grills i had needed to be painted black to contrast the orange. A can of generic black paint from Wal-Mart - $1

What I had to do was cut out the restrictive front 2x80mm fan grilles and install the wire grills:

Then the rear 80mm with the restrictive fan grille was modified to fit a 92mm, as I frequently strip the Compaq's that our school throws out and they all have 92mm fans and nice shiny chrome wire grilles:

And heres a side view of the case:

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UPDATE April 24, 2004:

Did another layer of the Krylon paint and let that dry. Then installed the fans and black grills:

Doh! Yes I need about 3 80mm grills, I only have one!

I also painted 30 screws black by putting the threads into cardboard and spraying the heads. With the 5 drive array installed, it really looks mean:

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Its still a work-in-progress so i'll update this as I go along. Comments please? Send them all over to [email protected] or leave them here. I'll take positive and negative comments too =)

As this is my first major mod, I did'nt know that you had to sand down the metal to get a better finish on the paint and to make sure it sticks well, so I might have to sand all this off if it begins to flake off. Meh.

 

[theNoid]

Looks good so far, keep it up and post pics!!

 

[hardwired]

coming along nice. be careful when installing the parts, dont scratch it.

btw linking to images from other ppls sites is forbidden. plz respect newegg enough not to waste their bandwidth.

 

[AtomicFire]

Good point, edited to link to my server

 

[Walleye]

I think if i were building a serious mod, i would have started with a better case. dont get me wrong, the dynapower metis case works well for the low end, but there are better ones only slightly more expensive.

for the record, i own a dynapower metis case too.

 

[AtomicFire]

Heh I agree. The steel was really thin and its flimsy as hell, but it was $30 shipped from newegg so I really didn't care that much lol

 

[AtomicFire]

Updated

 

[Tanis143]

Well, when it comes to the inside of the case I wouldnt worry too much about getting an auto quality shine, too much of a hassle. Just make sure to sand down the case until the metel is smooth, then primer, wet sand, primer, wet sand, paint, wet sand, paint, then clear coat. That will get you a nice reflective paint job. And, IMO, a shiny outside with a contrasting not so shiny inside looks cool as hell

 

[AtomicFire]

heh good plan. I'm doing the outside panels now, just finished the second coat.