After my initial assembly of the computer as seen here, a lot has happened! I had detailed some of it in the modding forum with this post about the fan mod I was undertaking, and you all helped me with picking out designs in regards to that mod here with the fan tray, and here with the fan grill. I still have to get the fan grill cut/ordered as well as a couple of other things to help dress up the interior a bit more, but here is the progress thus far since phase 1.
CableMod custom cables came in today, as you can see here. I also moved the hard drives to the bottom as the fan tray at the top meant I had to eliminate the bracket that held the 1 TB HDD. I also 3D printed a back cover for that drive so that it matched more with the rest of the theme/decor and purchased 12" rounded SATA cables so that they would run behind things better and have less extra slack. Because I moved the bracket, the fan module also moved and is now secured to the back of the front panel with heavy duty Velcro.
Another shot of the interior, you can kind of see the fan tray in this pic
better shot of the fan tray. With the short video card, the air circulates really well to the CPU.
Cutout on the top with the two fans. I swear I did not arrange the fans that way for the picture, it just turned out that way lol. I have tabs printed to glue on to the grill so that it just pops in to place without any screw holes. I also picked up some AC filter material for a dust filter. It is a little over 2mm thick and was $2 at Lowe's for 15" x 24". Better price than anything else and should be effective enough.
And now a couple of pics buttoned up
You can see I used thumbscrews to close up the side. Don't know if I will keep them there permanently, but I have been opening the side a lot so they are there for now for convenience. Also, not that you can really tell, but did get a USB 3.0 header extender to move the cables behind the PSU and out of the way. Almost forgot to mention that. So, from the original list, here is what is left that I will/may still do:
CableMod custom cables came in today, as you can see here. I also moved the hard drives to the bottom as the fan tray at the top meant I had to eliminate the bracket that held the 1 TB HDD. I also 3D printed a back cover for that drive so that it matched more with the rest of the theme/decor and purchased 12" rounded SATA cables so that they would run behind things better and have less extra slack. Because I moved the bracket, the fan module also moved and is now secured to the back of the front panel with heavy duty Velcro.
Another shot of the interior, you can kind of see the fan tray in this pic
better shot of the fan tray. With the short video card, the air circulates really well to the CPU.
Cutout on the top with the two fans. I swear I did not arrange the fans that way for the picture, it just turned out that way lol. I have tabs printed to glue on to the grill so that it just pops in to place without any screw holes. I also picked up some AC filter material for a dust filter. It is a little over 2mm thick and was $2 at Lowe's for 15" x 24". Better price than anything else and should be effective enough.
And now a couple of pics buttoned up
You can see I used thumbscrews to close up the side. Don't know if I will keep them there permanently, but I have been opening the side a lot so they are there for now for convenience. Also, not that you can really tell, but did get a USB 3.0 header extender to move the cables behind the PSU and out of the way. Almost forgot to mention that. So, from the original list, here is what is left that I will/may still do:
- Fan Grill (obviously
) with a couple other things - A second RAM module (for 16GB total)
- aftermarket cooler (Open to suggestions, might go with Noctua NH-L12S, which would cover up red MOBO heatsinks)
- RGB LED lighting (I like it, I don't care )
- custom IO shield sticker or something to make it all black
- possibly eliminating red on the mobo heatsinks (if necessary)
- full window side (which would come last for obvious reasons)
