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Well, I finally changed the front power and HDD activity LED's on my HAF 932 from the annoyingly bright blue to a much lighter red and I thought I would help others out with a little write up on how I did it.
Please do this at your own risk as I assume no responsibility of any damage that you cause to your rig. I will skip some of the easier stuff that all owners should already know how to do.
Equipment Needed:
- Phillips Head Screwdriver
- Soldering Iron
- Wire Cutters
- Needle Nose Pliers
- Soldering Flux
- Solder
- De-soldering Wick
- Red LED's
1. Go to your local Radio Shack or equivalent and purchase some Red LED's. Here are the ones the I picked up:
2. Remove top panel that houses the power and hdd activity LED's.
3. Locate circuit board on the inside that has case plugs and LED's in it (only one there).
4. Carefully remove hot glue that is holding plugs into circuit board connectors.
5. Carefully remove plugs from circuit board and unscrew 3 screws the hold circuit board to front panel and remove circuit board.
6. Using soldering iron and de-soldering wick, remove solder from these 4 points to remove LED housing.
7. Once LED housing is removed, clean off remaining solder using de-soldering wick (be careful not to use too much heat as it can cause connecting rings on circuit board to fall off).
8. Clean de-soldered area using flux and a lint-free cloth to prep for resoldering.
9. Remove black little cap at bottom of LED housing by pulling straight down off of the LED leads (might need small flat head screwdriver to pop loose).
10. Using needle nose pliers, gently pull on LED's to slide them out from housing (I found that prying the leads straight out first made this a lot easier).
11. Slide in new red LED's in the same fashion and orientation that the blue ones were (Make sure that you get positive and negative right. The Radio Shack ones I purchased said that the shorter lead was negative. The circuit board is labeled positive and negative, but if not, the hole on the board closest to the headphone jack is positive on both *Thanks go to BioHzrd for this info!*).
12. Trim LED leads so that they are equal in length.
13. Insert LED leads through holes on circuit board.
14. Using minimal solder, re-solder LED leads from the bottom back on to circuit board. Trim excess leads from the bottom with wire cutters if necessary.
15. Plug all connectors back into circuit board. Do not screw circuit board in as you will want to test it first.
16. Turn on power and make sure everything works like it should.
17. If everything is working like normal, shut down computer and reinstall everything in the reverse order of how you took it out.
18. ENJOY YOUR NEW RED LED'S!!
Please do this at your own risk as I assume no responsibility of any damage that you cause to your rig. I will skip some of the easier stuff that all owners should already know how to do.
Equipment Needed:
- Phillips Head Screwdriver
- Soldering Iron
- Wire Cutters
- Needle Nose Pliers
- Soldering Flux
- Solder
- De-soldering Wick
- Red LED's
1. Go to your local Radio Shack or equivalent and purchase some Red LED's. Here are the ones the I picked up:
2. Remove top panel that houses the power and hdd activity LED's.
3. Locate circuit board on the inside that has case plugs and LED's in it (only one there).
4. Carefully remove hot glue that is holding plugs into circuit board connectors.
5. Carefully remove plugs from circuit board and unscrew 3 screws the hold circuit board to front panel and remove circuit board.
6. Using soldering iron and de-soldering wick, remove solder from these 4 points to remove LED housing.
7. Once LED housing is removed, clean off remaining solder using de-soldering wick (be careful not to use too much heat as it can cause connecting rings on circuit board to fall off).
8. Clean de-soldered area using flux and a lint-free cloth to prep for resoldering.
9. Remove black little cap at bottom of LED housing by pulling straight down off of the LED leads (might need small flat head screwdriver to pop loose).
10. Using needle nose pliers, gently pull on LED's to slide them out from housing (I found that prying the leads straight out first made this a lot easier).
11. Slide in new red LED's in the same fashion and orientation that the blue ones were (Make sure that you get positive and negative right. The Radio Shack ones I purchased said that the shorter lead was negative. The circuit board is labeled positive and negative, but if not, the hole on the board closest to the headphone jack is positive on both *Thanks go to BioHzrd for this info!*).
12. Trim LED leads so that they are equal in length.
13. Insert LED leads through holes on circuit board.
14. Using minimal solder, re-solder LED leads from the bottom back on to circuit board. Trim excess leads from the bottom with wire cutters if necessary.
15. Plug all connectors back into circuit board. Do not screw circuit board in as you will want to test it first.
16. Turn on power and make sure everything works like it should.
17. If everything is working like normal, shut down computer and reinstall everything in the reverse order of how you took it out.
18. ENJOY YOUR NEW RED LED'S!!

