Cleaning up case wires

[Lyrids]

I'm swapping my motherboard later tonight and I figured I would clean up my case while I was at it. What tactics to people use to keep their cases neat and tidy?

 

[renswic]

planing, lots and lots of planing, my last build took me 30 mins to get hte hardware in order and 2-3 hours on wireing, jsut remember the goal shouldnt be 100% hidden, hide some, blend some in with stuff, route wires neatly, if done right, you could have a rats nest of wires and it would look good

oh and zip ties, you can never have to many zip ties

 

[Frank4d]

As Renswic posted... look at your hardware and plan how you will route your wires. I would start with the PSU since that is usually a problem. Sort out how many Molex plugs you will need and where to stash the ones you don't need. The space above your PSU and unused drive bays are good for this. Then plan where the cables will run, one at a time.

This is what my last build ended up looking like:

I could have hidden wires under the MOBO too, but the MOBO tray and right side of my case are not removable.

And... make sure you have zip ties before you start.

 

[maverick777]

Zip ties and electrical tape. Those will get you started. And like others has said, planning will be crucial to get a nice clean look. Try to keep wires bundled together in a logicle order. Don't hang one wire over the other if u can help it. If you have a removeable mobo tray then you can tried and hide some back there also. It took me well over 4 hours to wire my case the first day. I've been tinkering with it as I added things - 2 CCFL tubes, USB bracket, Firewire bracket. It takes some creativity to really hide all the wires and keep them neat.

Route things behind the mobo tray if possible.

Stuff wires into drive bays but keep them bundled with zip ties.

Good luck.

 

[IntimidatorX]

Frank4d could have also put the HD the other way around, then you wouldnt be able to see the cables.

 

[indokyne]

zip ties ftw

 

[mETRo]

Planning. Time. Zipties. Electrical tape. Beer. that should be all you need. Overall, it's tedious but it turns out very nice. I just built this system last night. Putting the components in took about 30 minutes. Wire management took a couple hours to get everything the way it is, especially with 3 120mm fans and 1 80mm fan inside a mini-tower.