Knitelife

I purchased 2 Sunbeam UFO Acrylic cased about a month back in order to get ideas on how to go about building a 4 in 1 case for a mega folding rig. I put one together with an air cooled system and to say the least, I was a bit dissappointed. The case did come with everything you needed for assembly, but it was not designed at all for a full sized HSF like the Tuniq Tower or the Ultra 120 Extreme. The HSF was about 2 inchs too tall for what the case would allow, so putting the top on was out of the question.



I did not bother building the second case and ran it like this for about a month. So yesterday I was itching for something to do, so I decided to attempt my first ever mod and change the case so that it was tall enough to put the lid on. I went to the hardware store and purchased a few sheets of acrylic and was ready to give it a go. At some point between the store and home I got the idea that if I was going to make the case taller, might as well, make a second level for another motherboard and CPU. So heres how the progression went.

I knew that I needed an extra 2 inchs to fit the HSF and another 2 inches above that for some room to move things around in the case. I used the existing panels from the second UFO case that I had not assembled as my guide.



Using a marker, I traces the first layer and then moved up and duplicated the top half of the case one more time. Here you see the back panel after tracing. The blue plastic covering on the acrylic made it very easy to mark on since it was going to be peeled off anyway.



Here you see the side panels and the back panel after cutting. Notice I chose to go with 2 per side per motherboard instead of 1 like the original UFO case.




I made a point to match all the holes that the original case had so I could use the existing hardware that came with the cases for the assembly.



Although a bit difficult to see since I had removed the blue covering, here you see the new side panel next to the original side panel for comparison.


Once all the sides were cut, I started assembling. I used the bottem, drive tray, motherboard trays, top, back plates, and all the screws from the original 2 cases.

Here you see the backplates mounted to the back panel.


Actual assembly of the starting.


Motherboards being mounted.


Back view with motherboard mounted.



Another view.



Fast forward past installing fans and grills since my camera shots were way to blurry.

After getting 2 power supplies placed in the bottom, installing the video cards, and connecting up the power, I was ready to get my system back up and running. I did not like the fact that 2 of my folding rigs had been down for a good 8 hours by this point.

Connecting the KVM.



Power Up Time. Amazingly it came up the first time without a single problem. I had already prepaired myself to have to tear the entire thing apart to find a problem, but everthing worked without a hickup.



Its back up and folding again and I am very happy with my first mod.

The two computers before:



Combined into one 2 X Quad Core folding rig:



The 4 X Quad Core system will come in July!!!

I do have to thank Cyberdruid and his CRUNCH mod for the great ideas on moding folding rigs!!!

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[8GPU GX2 Folding Rigs]
[Does Folding Actually Make A Difference?]
[My Folding Stats] : [Double Decker Quad Core Mod] :[Q6600 - 4.5Ghz] : [E6600 - 4.64Ghz] : [11.047 SuperPI 1M]

l V l

WOW SEXY!!! omg!!!

Kopi

REP+ that looks awesome. I jsut got one from Sunbeam for review, mind if I ask you a few questions?

Are the stock fans 3 pin or molex?

Can you measure the height from the base of the UFO to the top, the depth of the top layer?

Thanks a ton.

Your creation is awesome, incredible work!

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Delphi

zomg sexy rep+ also geeze i gotta fold my other older rigs now...

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lavieinjuste

Ok, you know what would be pretty cool. Put a KVM switch inside of the case and have the switches on the front, unless you use them both at the same time, in which case that would be a dumb idea...

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Knitelife

The stock fans are 3 pin and they come with an adapter to molex.

The height of the 11 1/4 inches. Adding in the thickness of the motherboard tray, you end up with about 6 inches on the bottom half, and 5 inches for the top.

The bottom section is the height of a standard PSU turned on its side.

With the feet and top on, it comes in just over 11 1/2 inches tall.

When I build the 4X4 in July, the plan is to give more room around the motherboard area to keep the cables internal and mount the KVM on the inside. I also plan to have a top where you can place a LCD and mini keyboard. It will take a bit more robust acrylic than comes with the UFO to handle the weight, but that is the plan.

__________________
[8GPU GX2 Folding Rigs]
[Does Folding Actually Make A Difference?]
[My Folding Stats] : [Double Decker Quad Core Mod] :[Q6600 - 4.5Ghz] : [E6600 - 4.64Ghz] : [11.047 SuperPI 1M]

Kopi

Thank you very much sir!

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pjlietz

Very nice work!

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CyberDruid

I am very impressed--that is a folding CONDO. And it looks wonderfull--what a great use of those SunBeams...The sky is the limit--you could just keep stacking and stacking--I love it--a great space saver for us wacko Folders with too many rigs everywhere.

Congrats on a very clean and attractive Folding Farm!

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Current Project: CalligaCab: TV stand/bookshelf/PC-case

Syrillian

How in the worls could I have missed this?

That is some fine work there!

Sweeeeet.....!

+

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WIP: Scarab
Custom Cases:
Silentium, Halcyon, Indigo, Gemini, Prometheus, Anvil
Case Mods:
Liquid Chameleon, VF1000 LAN box

Semper Fidelis