urbtree

so here is the finished artical read on if you wanna know more.
just to save you a bit of time flicking through i put them up here













I'll have to cut to the chase here a bit as i`m a bit late starting my work log. when i started this project ididnt even know there was a scene so didnt take many pics presant

so the story so far is... 10 month ago i was a complete n00b when it came to pcs of any description.

my girlfriend gave me an old beige box containing a A7N266 asus, an athlon xp 1800, psu, no RAM and i think the gpu was a fx5500 by innod.

the bug had bitten and i`ve never looked back since. i bough a gig of ram put the machine together with the help of the internet installed windows tracked down all the necessary drivers and taught myself all about the workings of a pc from scrach.
i was having to reformat once a week due to my constant tinkering but this is how i learnt and i couldn't have done any it with out google.

so i turned my hand to modding this ugly beige box.
i tidied up all the wires before i even knew that this was the done thing.
i started in the usual way with light up fans uv round IDE cables and cold cathodes but the only ones i could get hold of were rainbow.(my god they were hideous)
i fitted a tv card, as besides internet this was its primary use then went mad stripped all the parts out and bought a new case

finally the pictures start
while my case was on order i decided that this rig was going to be top notch so i also ordered an new hyper type r modular psu in blue, to match the blue theme i was goin for. in the end i had to settle for black chrome one as blue ones were rare as rocking horse ****.

all this time i was planning an athlon x2 rig as core2 was not out yet. i`d planned athlon right up untill the day i was ordering my mobo and i saw the fisrt reviews on core2.
i soon gave up my fanboyitus (only due to the fact that amd was all i`d everknow and fanboy mates told me amd was were the best.)

they laughed at me when i bought intel core2 even though every review said the beat athlons to death.
no matter they didnt laugh for long

so i fitted new parts with the old and she fired up first time, not bad for a n00b

those nasty fans came with the case but soon got binned

gonna leave it there fo now as its 4:30 i`ll catch up on the rest tommorow when photobucket desides its gonna play ball

urbtree

i then bought a new dvd drive and covered in ally checker plate.
i covered a bezel in sticky back stuff put in a couple of uv cold cathodes.




them fans have gotta go.
but i was still happy
by now i had ordered all my parts and they were winging there way to me
i don't have any pics of the build process cos i didn't realize then that ppl might like to see them but...

my new 32 lcd came first and i wasted no time in getting it mounted and connected.

i was so happy but i cant handle wires so i had to sort some other way



the reason i`d always planned the clear case was that i knew i was going to be spending thousands on this rig so i wanted to see it all.
never wanted to spunk 250 notes on a gpu then put it in a box till it breaks.

finally the rest of my parts arrived after a last min change of mind over what i was buying. i had originally planed on being AMD/ NVid but at the time core2 was out and against all the advice of fanboy mates i followed my bible custome pc magazine
http://www.custompc.co.uk/
i bought:-
Core2 E6600 top (spec at the time.)

Asus PN32 SLI (still believed in the sli myth then)
a terrible motherboard but soon to be rectified

2GB XMS 2 5400 (bad choice but ram used to confuse me)

7900GT golden sample
great card till they break........ and they will

god is any one still reading this

while i was fitting all the new bits i swapped out all the nasty fans, swapped the whole living room round to accommodate my new toy and upgraded to a TFT monitor






i had now discovered overclocking so changed the hsf for arctic cooling freezer and a zalman jobby on the gpu.
i found this site and was well on my way to overclocking haven when disaster struck.
turns ou the mobo i had bought for its sli capability's was in fact a load of toss. this board would not clock above 2.7 no matter what and this just would not do.

luckyly it soon died and when i RMA'd it they let me upgrade to the
Asus p5b deluxe wifi for no extra cost, easily good for 3.6 and more
by now the sli bubble had burst so ididnt need it any way

water cooling next and this is where it stalled for a bit as all moy money has been going into my g/f's new business.
how ever i have managed to squirrel some away and she has just got me a water block for xmas a nice little d-teck fuzion
i`ve also got a cool river deluxe veery cheap off ebay and intend to mod this to fit the d-tek then i can upgrade the parts as i get them. i`m going to remove the gpu and chipset cooler and use this on my cpu only


next i had to figure out a way to get my pc into the far corner of the rooom next to my couch as HDMI wires were about 70 pound a meter.
ended up costing nearly a £100 to move my pc 2 feet, but this was all part of the plan.
as ive said i wanted my pc insides to be highly visable so had turned my pc flat against the wall
i then added a modded monkey





so the other day i notice my temps were up having not touched it for months.
i got up early and decided to give it a clean. this turned into a strip down then into a full on modding seasion untill finally out came the dremil.
by the end of the night i had cut out the drive bays and turned them 90 degree and cut a hole in the side of the case for the dvd drive and power buttons as reaching round the front was doin my head in.
i then took apart an old drive and powered it up with an led on it so it can be sean spinning

how many pc's do you know with spinners eh?
i swaped all the fans and lightin round re wired the whole box. cut a hole in the back (now the left side for a 120 mm fan in prep for a rad later and this is where i am now.




well tbh her i am under a pile of crap




next up i need to recover my new dvd drive
get the water cooling done once the fittings for the d-tek arrives
i`ll take pics of the moddin of the coolriver kit to fit the d-tec.
i`m then goin to add to the w/c kit as and when i can an post the results plus a few more mods that i wont disclose just yet but i promise to take pics of the work this time and follow it up in my log
.
next up is a new rad. i would like a 240 but it needs to be up to the job of cooling my northbridge and future 8800G something or other, so i may have to go 360 but i would like to fit it in the space between my hard drives and disk drives so i can get a constant supply of cold air striaght through the case from what is now the front and rear.

hopefully me next post will be in some sort of order with pictures of the work not just rsults

ira-k

Hey its looking good.....You put a lot of work into it...You might need ot get another pump to when you get a rad those aren't very strong...

__________________
**Water Cooling Essential Threads** Overclock.net's Downloads Section** TEC Guide:Basic Principles of TEC's

**E8600 @ 5300Mhz **E7200 @ 4545 *9 **5000BE @ 3510*10**LE 1600 @ 3500*10**150 Opty @ 3242*12**

JerseyDubbin

nice work...little bright for my taste but definite props on all the work you put into it!

urbtree

o hell yeah.
eventually i`m hoping to run 2 swiftechs/d5's
i found this pic on here once and its exactly how i had mine planned in my head.
dont know whos it it but its stunning.



all in blue with blue or maybe bright green coolant as a contrast

its not actually bright as you would think. most of the lighting is uv black and they dont put out much at all
i have one blue catode in it but its more of an insepection light connected to a swich. i rarely have it on. the fan lights can be dimmed via speed fan. but the camera plays tricks and makes them look dead bright.
one thing they are is loud my god they wine till i turn em down

ChielScape

ive seen the original post with that one... german obviously.

__________________
Bigger = better, except for transistor size.
480GTX Club

ira-k

Yeah I like that, its nice and clean...I don't know who's that is either but its nice....


Yeah I like blue to.......This is the front of my last case...



click....

__________________
**Water Cooling Essential Threads** Overclock.net's Downloads Section** TEC Guide:Basic Principles of TEC's

**E8600 @ 5300Mhz **E7200 @ 4545 *9 **5000BE @ 3510*10**LE 1600 @ 3500*10**150 Opty @ 3242*12**

urbtree

wow that looks good. looks like you stole concords center console

the attention to detail in that rig is incredible. such as the plexy over the gpu lit by led
the fact that it looks like a switech cpu block but its had the ribs on the top buffed flat (never heard about anyone lapping that side before. and the pipework.... just stunning

ira-k

HaHa..........I have little PSU's for my rad fans and pumps and TEC stuff and I can turn some of them on and off there, the ones i don't have on re-lays...I have it all in a tech bench I made now, I just ran out of room using a case.....

EDIT: Yeah he put some serious time and effort into that rig...

__________________
**Water Cooling Essential Threads** Overclock.net's Downloads Section** TEC Guide:Basic Principles of TEC's

**E8600 @ 5300Mhz **E7200 @ 4545 *9 **5000BE @ 3510*10**LE 1600 @ 3500*10**150 Opty @ 3242*12**

urbtree

i'm guessing it works. i just saw your idle temps in your system.

bit off topic but i added my build log to my sig bout 4 hours ago and although i can see it in user cp its not showing in my posts. didnt wanna start another thread

can any one tell me if these radiator is any good i keep getting conflicting reports its only 80mm so it should fit nice between my drives

EDIT:
ok my sigs there now must have been because i hadnt posted since

__________________