Neon Licence plate window???

[smokeslikeapoet]

I had what might be a great idea. I have an old neon license plate frame. I was thinking of making a plexi window slightly smaller than the frame, so when you look inside all you see is the glow, not the neon itself. I have a couple of questions. First, has anyone tried this? Second, If my memory serves me correctly the frame runs a the standard 10-12v that most car accessories due, can I use the 300w power supply that my Athlon 1.2 Ghz uses, or should I look for an alternate power source. One other thing, does anyone know how much heat those things put off. If it ends up raising my case temp 10 deg. C then I probably won't even try it.

[IFMU]

Well I havent actually done the mods with the car accessories... But from what I have read it should run off the 12v as well and should be able to get it to run off the psu no probs... Now as far as the heat... I think that neon doesnt create much heat. I cant remember exactly what or where I read that but Im pretty sure that I did... So heat from it shouldnt be a problem either...

[typhoonmike]

Well the neons that you can buy from the auto stores that connect to the cigarette lighter run off of 12v. All you have to do is snip the wires and hook up a molex to it. Probably the same with this getup but don't quote me on it. As far as heat goes, they get a little warm but doubtful it would be enough to bring your system down.

[Kingslayer]

There is little heat in a neon. And as far as power consumption, they use less power than a hard drive.

[smokeslikeapoet]

This may be a dumb question, but what do you mean by Molex? I know it is some kind of wire connector, but can you be more specific about what kind of connector and where I can get it? Thanks.

[foxmulder]

Molex is the connector that your power supply uses for 5V,7Vor12V depending on which two of the wires are used. Your CD ROM drive HD, Case fans etc. all use this connector.
Black and Yellow=12V
Black and Red = 5V
Red and Yellow=7V

[typhoonmike]

Yeah those really annoying white plastic do-hickies that are on the end of the wires coming from your power supply. The things that once you stick together hate to come apart.

Thanx for the description of what wires do what voltage. I'm electrically challenged and that was some good info to know. I'll have to write that stuff down.

[CrystalMethod]

i thought about doing the license plate neon window mod a while ago. But, I'm not really into window and noen mods, so it kinda died there. The best place I found (hypothetically speaking, as I've never put in a window), for the neon license plate light would have been on the top of the case.
...just don't get cheezy and put that plastic "chain" around the window afterwards...

[Oni]

But you need the chain, because you've got to remember that pimpin' aint easy! :)

[Smizack]

Originally posted by Oni
But you need the chain, because you've got to remember that pimpin' aint easy! :)

LMAO!

It's at least better than one that says "I love to shop at Wal-Mart"!

[Über~PhLuBB]

Y'know what I think would look better than putting the neon license plate frame around the inside of a window mod, would be to somehow mount it on your video card!

If you have a huge card, like a GeForce3, or a Voodoo5 5500, you could mount it so that the neon bulb follows the edges of the vidcard.

You'd need a window mod (As big as possible) to see it, and with another neon light in the bottom or mounted to the rear, that'd be a pretty sweet-ass mod indeed!

Another idea would be to just mount the neon license plate frame to the bottom middle of the case. It would be just like a neon light mod, but with thrice the tube length!