Secret log…
[ No Comments ] Posted on 02.04.08 under Classified at present
This is a secret project at the moment so I can’t give too much away!
Let’s just say it’s going to be a tribute to someone who I hold very highly in my
estime.
It’s a Thermaltake Soprano vb1000 in piano black.
This mod is more about performance and a nod of respect to ’said’ someone.
It will be a showcase in essence and the case is not to steal the spotlight if
you will.
This is also going to incorperate works from various other Case-Modders from the Uk and from America. A pool of talent is going into this project;)
What I can tell you is this…
The chassis is going to be powdercoated by coolercasesuk ( Thanks Paul for all the info… )
in a “Blood Red”.
The panels, externally will remain black but will be finished to a higher grade.
Sound proofing will infact come curtousy of the actual packaging my DD WaterBox came in
*Using my initiative there eh?*
The window…
It’s going to stay as is, but, It will have another sheet of “tinted” acrylic behind it Custom built and etched by Sn0wMan, a good friend of mine in the states..
Well thats it for now, here’s some pics of the setup as it is now…
My new studio…
I’ve already had some ‘goodies’ arrive and more are coming…
reFURb…
[ 1 Comment ] Posted on 02.04.08 under reFURb
My first Completed project.
This case was brought in by a customer after having major issues with system hangs, laggy performance and difficulties booting it. After looking at the case I knew there was a lot of hard graft ahead of me to get it back into shape again, Unfortunately I’ve lost the very first images I took but let’s say it was like a Jungle in there during monsoon season;)
It was decided eventually to put all-new hardware in there and for me to re-build the psu and respray the case. The etch was decided on later.
Some shots of me working on the psu and ‘Lapping’ the cpu copper mount for the Hsf followed by some before and after shots…
^Half way there.^
Me in my “studio” working…..
Coincidently, for anyone who thinks they know me and refur to me as ‘that’ bum, I got news for ya….
I now own This website, part own www.voidedwarranty.com , work as a Reviewer/Forum mod over at www.pcapex.com ,
work as a fulltime carer for my son and work every day building a specialist business from the ground up building custom pcs/gaming systems along with case-mods.
So please, the next time you see me and have that thought, RE-think! I’m doing pretty damn well for myself and Hell, I only just started!;)
Anyway, before and after……
Tribal Toshi…
[ No Comments ] Posted on 02.04.08 under Tribal Toshi
Well it’s time to let the cat outa’ the bag once again lol.
This is something i’ve just started on due to neccessity rather than anything else.
The doner laptop in question - Toshiba Satelite proA10
specs…….intel mobile celeron (R) @2.0ghz, 512mb ddr ram, intel graphics ( i’ll get the specs up on that later! )
Anyway I bought it from a college friend about two years ago because he was fed up with the issues he was having and well, I had a feeling i’ld be able to sort it out with some tlc!! The main issue and the reason for the hasty start to this project is there was no cpu cooler
installed whatsoever! and the temps were running dangerously high.
I also had to replace the ‘rattly and funny knocking noises’ hdd. - Quickly replaced with a 20gig hitachi drive stripped out of my bro-inlaws old advent notebook.
So i have been racking my brain as to how i could cool the cpu and make the laptop mobile again. Up until now I’ve basically been directing the airflow from my desktop fan over the lappy which i’ve had enough off!
Now take into consideration I have no money at the mo and i also have another 4 projects on the go……..
I found an old ‘cooljag’ 12v dc fan from an old athlon xp hsf i had kicking around so i decided i would use that.
Now to the tricky parts………
first of all I had to trim out about 2 thirds of the fans shroud to allow airflow to come through the vent ( you’ll see what i mean in the pics! )
then i had to power the thing… PROBLEM TIME!
If I can explain this simply…… the way the laptop’s original cooling system is set up is as follows - the fan kicks in when the thermal sensors detect the cpu raising above a certain temp and there is no way of disabling this function. I did some research but came up empty.
I wanted the fan to be ‘always-on’ and under my control, well this lead me to the idea of powering the fan from an external source, but this would render the laptop immobile again!
so then i toyed with the idea of a ‘portable fan controller’ yep. i was rofl aswell!! E
ventually i came up with the usb powered fan idea, although i would lose some performance
with usb1.0 only putting out 5v dc, i realized that when the laptop is ‘out’ with me this would be enough for just wordproccessing, internet browzing etc.
So I stripped a stock usb cable down to the +/- red/black wires and soldered them up to a female 3-pin connector ( the fan already has a male 3-pin connector on it. )
I have also cut a small channel in the outer shell for the fans cable to exit. I had to shave some of the original fans mounting chassis away in order to get the larger fan in - If any of you attempt this, be EXTREMELY CAREFULL! there is nowhere near as much space to work as there is in a normal pc case! NO ROOM FOR ERRORS! in one place where i had to dremmel out a mounting lug/standoff for the original fan i was literaly 1 to half a mil from the hdd. Just so you all know, if you get this wrong you could seriously fry your laptop permanently!
And it works just fine! I then did a clean xp essential2 install and installed speedfan etc
My laptop is performing better than it ever has since I bought it.
Here’s some progress pics and some screenshots of my temps at idle……
And installing Ubuntu 7.04 to a second ‘Boot’ partition….
Next up?
Case respray with a custom tribal design….
XGS…
[ No Comments ] Posted on 02.04.08 under XGS
On to my second “Packard Hell” case…..
This little gem was given to me by a neigbour when they got a new pc. This time I wanted to build a simple computer for my son but wanted it to look the part aswell. Daniel loves Superbikes and his favourite colour is green so thats what he’s going to get, A superbike inspired Case-mod.
I’m going to keep this one subtle yet bold with a striking green paintjob for the shell and a pearlescent white for the chassis, which I’ll probably get powdercoated again. Some of you may ask, Why go to the expense of powdercoating a pc case? - Simple, It will leave you with an outstanding finish along with having a robust paintjob that won’t get all scratched up the next time you install new drives etc!
Here’s the blank canvus……
Claw…
[ No Comments ] Posted on 02.04.08 under Claw
Claw was, is my first foreigh into Case modding. I saw a weird but wonderfull coffee maker made from an old pc when googling
‘Customized pc cases’ wondering if there was such a thing!
That google image led me to pcApex and from there the rest as they say is history……..
Started out as a stock Jeantech windowed case or as we in the proffession call a ‘Pre-mod’. This case co-incidently was my first attempt at a custom window-etch
I’ll let the images do the talking….
As you can tell from the next image, the case needs a re-spray!
Linux is your friend! Ubuntu…
And how things looked in my office before the new desk and parts came along…
Claw is not finished yet and is yet another of my backlogged projects, but it will soon see a new colour scheme, this time powdercoated by www.coolercases.co.uk
Signing out>…….
Hell Bell…
[ No Comments ] Posted on 02.04.08 under Hell Bell
This is the first of two packard bell cases on my modlist, given to me by my dad.
she’s about 6-7 years old and has been treated with the greatest love and care!!
until now that is…
I don’t know why but I HATE packard bell’s, I really do. But she does run ok for me,
Which would be my first pleasent experience, EVER, with a “Packard Hell”.
so ive decided to treat her as my dad has, but with some added crunk!
my design thus far……..
Hisui…
[ No Comments ] Posted on 02.04.08 under Hisui
yep, another worklog lol!
i wanted to do a ‘desktop mod’ at some point so here it is.
so far ive stripped it down, and etched what will be a small accent window,
i’m just kinda working out where everything is going to go right now, i want to have the psu mounted externally if i can.
so without further a do…………
to be continued….
Katana…
[ No Comments ] Posted on 02.04.08 under Katana
I’ve had this old Alienware case for some time now and I wanted to have at least one ‘oriental’ themed case-mod in my ever growing collection.
So far the work has involved designing the case and then taking it from paper to metal.
I wanted a simple window on this one so it won’t take away from the main design so I went for a rectangular shape - Nice clean straight edges.
I cut the window from just below where the psu is housed so the power supply is hidden from view. If however I wanted to put a second window up top It would be pretty straight forward to do so.
The front panel has been stripped down and the bottom part is what I have been working on.
Smoothed over all the dimples and then sanded it back, A little bit of filler work to the curve at the bottom and lastly a light skin of primer.
I still have a long way to go with Katana but I think I’ve made a promissing start.
I’ll let the images do the talking….
That’s all for now.
H20vers1…..
[ 1 Comment ] Posted on 01.12.08 under h20vers1
My first adventure into watercooling and acrylic casing.
This is the most recent project I have begun to work on. I still have some hardware and watercooling equipement to aquire but I’m making steady progress, which is a good thing as this will be a high performance benchmarking platform aswell as being a gaming rig.
Here’s where it’s at presently……
Hardware specs so far….
Danger Den WaterBox Plus
Vista Ultimate/XP essential II
Intel Q6600 Core2duo Quad ( hopefully next few weeks )
Asus P5N-E SLi Nforce650i sct 775
OCZ Reaper Enhanced Bandwidth Edition Dual Channel DDR2 4.0Gb
Western Digital 150gb caviar sata hdd
Samsung pata dvd writer
graphics unverified…
Hiper Type-M 630watt psu
CoolJag Falcon 92cu cpu cooler/Arctic Cooling Freezer Pro7.
Thermalright Northbridge cooler
Thermaltake 120mm high flow ?intake/exhaust?
2x Antec blue led TRICool 80mm 3 speed fans
Fan controller unverified…
logitech s510 wireless keyboard with mouse and remote
Everglide Titan Monster Gaming Mat
philips 190s 19″ lcd dual input display
V-Gear MobiDTV digi tv reciever
Green ”Spire” ccfl x1
^WaterCooling for the above system^
EK Evga 680i nb block.
Swifttech MC W60 gpu block.
DangerDen dual bay clear res.
DangerDen fillport.
Swifttech MC14 Ramsinks.