H.I.M.E. An ongoing Contruction

[Valk]

[Introduction]

I built some pc's for my sisters a few months back. They were meant to be reliable box's that could run for a long time without service. I experimented with them, using a new motherboard from msi, the rs480im and a foxconn micro atx case that was on sale.

We replaced the psu's, since the stock foxconn psu's were less than quiet.
The cases however, I liked. They came with a neat little rail system and lots of fan mounts and were just generally quite pleasant to deal with compared to a lot of full atx cases i deal with at work.

So in the last few months, i basicly made up my mind that i wanted one of them. I wanted a pc that was compact and quiet, since it would be in the bedroom after we moved. I wanted it to be everything my previous pc was but smaller and trouble free.

Some have seen my lanboy. it is somewhat... not trouble free. Modifying it to watercooling took a lot of its support out to make room for a decent rad.
With a full atx midtower, i was limited to having only two hard drives and a DVD rom.

What i am going to do is modify a cheap, available foxconn micro atx case into a powerful media pc. This pc has to be quiet and capable of storing upwards of a TB of stuff in a small space.

I hope my efforts to create this pc are of interest to some. =)

[The case: Foxconn TW-1]

http://ev0one.net/ocforums/hime/worklog/casefront.jpg

http://ev0one.net/ocforums/hime/worklog/caseinside.jpg

Case is made of light steel. Comes with 2 usb ports on the front and audio in/out. 2x 5 1/4" drive bays, 2x 3 1/2" drive bays. Only a single railed hard drive bay.
Neat peculiarities for this case are its spring loaded drive retention mechanism *the black thing on the drive cage* also, it comes with a rear 92 mm fan and a front 80 mm fan. These were included and foxconn branded. The rear fanmount can accept 80 and 92 mm fans where the front is limited to a 80 mm fan. there is however room for a 120mm fan with modification since the case only has provision for one hard drive.
The usb and audio cables are detachable, so any you dont use can be saved for a later date when you might use them. the case side has lots of ventilation for the pci cards and a duct for cpu coolers.

I decided to name this pc after my main use of the pc, Anime watching. Anyone who has seen Mai Hime might understand the reference ^^

[Valk]

[Parts list]

I will be using some of the parts from my old pc as well as a number of new ones to put this box together.
Among the parts being rescued; My cpu. Ill be using my winchester cpu for a while untill i can afford a denmark. My corsair memory. This is actully promised to a friend as i wanted to update to a 2gb kit. This is somthing in the works, but for now, 1 gb of ram is all i have.
My hard drives are all going to migrate to this beast as well, but ill be replacing my pata drives with sata ones this year. I will use a enclosure for my 200 gb in the mean time.

Among the new parts are a new psu to replace my aging powerstream. Some may remember my modded ocz since i cut off a lot of cables and made my own quick connects. I liked them, but this machine has to be compact and clean. it also needs to... work completly. Without a atx 24 pin, pci express 6 pin and limited to only 4 molex connectors, I replaced it.

http://ev0one.net/ocforums/hime/worklog/psu.jpg

http://ev0one.net/ocforums/hime/worklog/psurail.jpg

My friend got this psu to replace his dead Antec and has had nothing but good things to say about it. It keepts his overclocked SD3700 happy with very stable rails and its quiet as can be. a steal at $50 cdn.

By going with a micro atx case, of course i needed a suitable motherboard. The geforce 6150 is currently the best offering in this field, and a lot of the 6150 boards are capable overclockers.
The foxconn 6150 board has the best overclock functions, but this msi board was regarded as being nearly problem free. The asus board is nearly identical, but has glaring issues with the onboard DVI. I need the freedom to use the onboard graphics for quadhead sometime down the road when i can get another monitor or two ^^.

I decided on the MSI K8NGM2-FID. This incudes the 6150/nf430 combo with 8usb 2.0, nvraid with 4 sata 2 channels, nvlan and firewire. It also has a Onboard DVI-D which can be used by itself, or with the dsub as well. the onboard graphics supports dual head, making it one of the only integrated graphics boards that does. Unlike the rs480.

http://ev0one.net/ocforums/hime/worklog/motherboard.jpg

http://ev0one.net/ocforums/hime/worklog/motherboard2.jpg
Clear cmos switch and easy to access battery removal everything is colorcoded, typical of msi boards.

http://ev0one.net/ocforums/hime/worklog/motherboard3.jpg
cheap backplate, but its a cheap board.

http://ev0one.net/ocforums/hime/worklog/motherboard4.jpg
Onboard VGA and DVI-D

The board also came with all the usual stuff. but also: hdtv and svideo tv out brackets and 8 channel audio outputs. If you put all the brackets in, you would use up all your pci slots =O!

[Valk]

[The Psu Mod]

I figured i would start this project with the easiest "although one of the more time consuming" projects, the psu sleeving.
Since the case is small, i wanted to make the cableing as clean as possible. The case has only one opening side, since the back side and the top are one peice, rivited to the main chassis.
So my plans to stuff all the unused wires on the backside of the tray are pretty much sunk, unless i remove all the rivets "there are 34 in total" to take a good 90% of the case appart.

I might cross this bridge at a later date. I am toying with the idea of painting on the backside of my case, which i will remove it for. but for now, i sleeved the powersupply for daily use while i make up my mind.

For those who are looking to do their first psu sleeving job, consider this primer.

I used a paperclip to work on the molex leads. I always suggest doing these first since they are easy and give you a good feel for the process of insert, twist, remove.
For those who havent done this mod before, you simply insert this in the space between the pin and the plastic connector. There are two small tabs you have to bend down to remove the pin from the connector.

If you look at the pin, there is a slit in it. if you look at it as if the slit is the North facing side, you will find the tabs on the east and west side. simply stick the paperclip between the pin and the plastic and bend them in. the pin should slip out from the connector easily enough if done right.
Be careful not to apply too much pressure because you dont want to crush the pin

http://ev0one.net/ocforums/hime/worklog/tool1.jpg


http://ev0one.net/ocforums/hime/worklog/molex.jpg

Here is a view of what the pins look like removed from the connector. it also shows what the tabs look like. when you remove the pin, they will be depressed. when you go to insert them again, you want to bend them outward slightly so the pin locks when reinserted. I did this by using my xacto knife edge and sticking it in the small slit space and levered the tab outward with a little pressure.
These are soft, it doesnt take a lot of pressure at all.

What is really important here is to lable these wires cleanly and carefully, A trick i have learned though by doing this a few times is to simply associate the numbers on the connector.
If you look at it, you will see some numbers on it, and those numbers represent the wire color or voltage wire.
Yellow is +12v and nubmer 1, the first black next to that is -12v and is number 2. beside that is -5v or number 3 and finally, red is nubmer 4 or +5 volt.

You can lable these anyway thats convenient for you. at first i labeled them 1-4, but the more you do, you get used to the fact that yellow is always 1 and red is always 4. I label only one of the black ones. usually number 2, or -12 v.

another way to keep track is to tape the yellow and its adjacent black together, and the red and its adjacent black together to make two leads. 12v and 5v.

it doesnt matter how, as long as 1-4 go back into their correct holes.

the atx pins are a little trickier to remove since they are square. there is also a lot more of them to remove.
On a typical psu, you have a atx 20/24 connector, p4 12 volt connector with 4 pins and a pci express 6 pin connector.

You will want to label these 1-24 1-4 1-6 according to the order in which you remove them. Most of these also dont have the same wire color as another psu, so you will have to identify a pin #1 on the connector. I usually do this with a jiffy marker triangle heh.


http://ev0one.net/ocforums/hime/worklog/tool2.jpg

The square pins are exactly the same as the round ones. they have 2 tabs on two sides that need to be depressed to be removed from the connector.
I used two pins. make sure you insert them all the way into the connector sides to depress the tabs. this will be difficult on psu's with opaque connector colors.
when you cant push these pins in any further, find some way to keep the pressure on these pins " i held them in there by pushing the connector against a arm of my couch, where i did this mod heh" and pull the wire out.

There are tools to remove both of these types of pins, but they are expensive. I wasnt willing to pay $29 for a one use tool that is just a peice of metal you jam in and twist.
Make sure you label these pins very clearly. inserting the wrong pin into the wrong place probably wouldnt be very friendly to your motherboard.


http://ev0one.net/ocforums/hime/worklog/bigmess.jpg

what you will end up with ;)


http://ev0one.net/ocforums/hime/worklog/sleeving.jpg

I like to use the smallest sleeving possible. im using 3/4" for the atx though since it is good to have a little big of give. The sleeving expands when you compress it end to end,a nd this is how you will get it over your pins and down over your wires. I taped all my pins together to do this so the resistance was as little as possible. It also allowed me to use smaller heatsink which looks best imo.


http://ev0one.net/ocforums/hime/worklog/heatshrink.jpg

http://ev0one.net/ocforums/hime/worklog/sleeving2.jpg

what clean heatshink looks like. You can make out some of the sleeving pattern in the heatshrink.

I always suggest using a heatgun. its kind of expensive for the firsttimer, but a worthwhile investment. You can also use a lighter, or if your really strapped, the heating element on your stove. just be careful not to let the flame get too close to the sleeving. it will melt and leave burn holes.

you should keep a lighter around though. a cheap bic one beacuse you want to melt the ends of the sleeving after you cut it. If you dont, the weaves from the sleeving wont stick to eachother and will be able to get caught and unwind.
even after heatshrinking, a weave can get caught on a peice of electronics and be pulled out of the heatshrink. if you melt the ends, you minimize the chance of this.

when all is said and done, you end up with this


http://ev0one.net/ocforums/hime/worklog/results.jpg

much better.

[Valk]

A hint for what comes next

http://ev0one.net/ocforums/hime/worklog/caseback.jpg

[twoeyes]

nice dude, keep the pics comin :)

[goodgod]

nice sleeving, i did the same on my seasonic s-12 600w and it took me 10 hours and a couple of cuts :)

[Flip-Mode]

Nice job.
Those are BIP micros right?

[sicloan]

I bought that same case for my sister, its a great little case for the price. Looking great so far, keep it up!

[Valk]

Im not sure how ill go about the watercooling though. Im still trying to figure out if i can use a front mounted heatercore, but if i do that, then i have nowhere to put the pump. There are times that i wish i still had my csystem =\
also, i tested a water run in this case using only one of the rads and wasnt too impressed
my copper 1u sink seems to outperform that. Hopefully the two of them will be suitable heh but i have to figure out some more airflow specifics since i put acustic foam on the side panel. so the holes are covered.Im getting tempted to just leave this thing air cooled for now.

[flamerail]

Nice!! I love ur sleeving job!

[Prodigious]

Awsome sleeving. Much better than mine was when I first attempted it.

And, I swear to God, before I even entered this thread the first thought in my mind was "another anime fan?" :D

[Valk]

Thanks for the comments guys. I took my time on this sleeving and im quite happy with it. i only wish i had sleeved some more worthy fans heh. i got it all tucked away nice and neat too, which ill take a picture of later when i have a little more time to think about it.

Liquid cooling is my main focus and i have to make up my mind on hot much modding i want to do. My desire to have more internal hard drives is slowly waning as im not using much of my 250 gb right now.
I have a 120 and 250 in there right now, and im not running raid. so if i were to only use one drive i could fit a pretty good size heatercore in there.

http://ev0one.net/ocforums/hime/worklog/rads.jpg

These are the rads i have to choose from. i have 2 of the swiftech ones. the nicer looking one is in a test loop that failed my test for single rad performence heh.
I dont think that even two of them will match even that chevette core for single fan performence. The largest rad there was of course the most ideal, i only used 1 fan on it and got 33ºC full load with my gpu in the loop too.

for size reference, the chevette core will fit without modification. it will just have to be shoved in tightly. the biggest rad on the right would fit if i remove the bottom two cages of the case. i would however have to get rid of the locking mechanism, which may or may not work well. the two switech rads would fit in the back, with a modded backside, but that goes against everything i have learned about watercooling.
I dont want to use hot case air. might as well just get a tower heatsink if i did that.

ill take a picture of the acustic foam later ^^.

[Flip-Mode]

The single core is your best bet IMO.

[WejRepus]

yea, go with the single chevette core. it is really not worth it to put in the two swiftech rads

[Electron Chaser]

Nice!! I love ur sleeving job!

QFE!!! One of the best I have seen very nicely done right down to the heatshrink.

[Valk]

he he. my trusty chevette core has seen a lot of action since i started using it in like... 2004... maybe ill jack the barbs off the one beside it and clean it up a bit. maybe give it a painjob he he.

Ill have to take my rig appart tonight and test fit it though. The problem with using a front rad at all is there is front usb and the power switch bracket. they are detachable peices, but still get in the way a bit.

and thank you SO much for your comments on the sleeving. This is the first one I have done where i tried to remove all the atx connectors as well to do the mod. I have to say, the charcol color is quite nice. simple and matches well with the case.

more pics soon.

[Valk]

http://ev0one.net/ocforums/hime/worklog/fans.jpg

Choices choices.....;)

[SniperXX]

Very nice. I wish I had the patience to sleve my power connectors. :S

Keep it up, and yeah that 80mm (?) swiftec one is too small for a current system.

[azu]

kinda random.. but as i remember it..

hime meant princess in japanese. lol.

i wonder what it implies XD

[Valk]

Indeed it does. I watch more Anime these days than actual tv... i mean... there is stargate, BSG and like.. friends... most of our tv just isnt that interesting right now.

I dont know what I wanted to go with that theme this time though. I am thinking of painting a picture of Natsuki Kuga on the side though. I havent drawn in a while and docgigs really inspired me with his bleach theme.

[azu]

lol picture of natsuki.. in her tight outfit + bike? cuz thats all i remember her as...

snap.. did you watch mai zhime? or "otome" as they eventually called it in english? she has that huge GUN

[Valk]

there are two mai hime series. the first.. actully mai hime, which wasnt too bad, and mai otome which was complete crap.. i only managed to sit through like the first episode of otome.. just couldnt get into the alternate universe thing.

Niether were particularly excellent series but the art in mai hime was pretty attractive.

[azu]

ehh i skipped through most of otome.. the end battles were pretty interesting. thats all xD

[Valk]

Figured i would add some pics since everyone loves pics. that and my camera is going to India for 5 months with my sister.

First of all, some pics of the case with sound insulation in place. it was pretty easy to install this stuff. Dont know if it made a big difference in the acustics of my case or not but it sure looks nicer than bare metal.

http://ev0one.net/ocforums/hime/worklog/topinsulated.jpg

http://ev0one.net/ocforums/hime/worklog/bottominsulated.jpg

http://ev0one.net/ocforums/hime/worklog/sideinsulated.jpg

http://ev0one.net/ocforums/hime/worklog/frontpanel.jpg

in this lat one, I can show off how much space there is for front airflow. the front bezel stands quite a distance above the sheetmetal. i can cut some large vents in the side plastic to get some more inlet vollume.

http://ev0one.net/ocforums/hime/worklog/rads2.jpg

http://ev0one.net/ocforums/hime/worklog/rads3.jpg

but it looks like that alone wont give me a front mounted rad. Some modification will be required up front to make suitable room for even my smallest heatercore. That is a 120mm delta TFB1212GHE for size reference.

Havent done a lot of the modding as of yet. Working on it though. you know what they say, measure twice cut once.

[Valk]

And just for more cleanliness, how my pc looks right now, premodded without drives.

http://ev0one.net/ocforums/hime/worklog/results2.jpg

http://ev0one.net/ocforums/hime/worklog/results3.jpg

Some cleaver stuffing and you get a clean wiring job. the two unused cables, pci express and second molex line are tucked cleanly above and beside the psu.

When i go for watercooling, i will try to string the sata cables under the motherboard too.

[Holy Diver]

Wow, that's very clean for such a small case, can't wait to see water running through it. I might have missed it but roughly how much time did it take you to sleeve the Power Supply?

[Valk]

It took several hours to sleeve that thing and sacrificed my included serial ata heh.
I have to use adaptors untill i feel like making my own. Ive made a lot of my own wiring in previous pcs, so all i need to do is rape two old sata converters to make a split on ;)

I think next time i feel like it, ill sleeve the sata cables i have too. The orange doesnt match and i dont feel like ordering new ones. these ones are nice and long and will string under the mobo all nice and neat though.

[Rysjimmy1994]

Looking good so far!

[t1mex]

I saw your thread in the the classifieds, and saw you were undecided on whether you were continuing the watercooling part of this, so I figured I would come in here and ask. Still going strong on this plan?

[autolex84]

Great so far, keep the pics posting!

[thegreek]

wow, that's turning out really nice

[Valk]

well. I want to watercool this but at the same time i dont. watercooling adds safety since the summer is coming, but to make room for it, i sacrifice a great deal. To make any of my cores fit im faced with eliminating expandability in storage, at least easily.
I am however still looking at the possibility of doing the mod, since i have some case sides from two aluminum cases i can cut up to make the required hardware. I have in mind a 2 peice shroud/mount idea in my head i could make pretty easily out of that aluminum.
so at this point its just a matter of buying the tools to accomlish the dream.
Other issues are simply... space.. there isnt any. many users may know what im talking about with the size of the d5. I just sold my Csystems to a friend so i only have the one pump, and to have the heatercore in there with a shrouded fan, really dont have a lot of space to have it in there.
The other concern is if watercooling only my cpu is worthwhile. I get 39♠C full load on this with the copper 1u sink right now. which is really quite good.
Overclockability is in question, since the board doesnt have vcore functions, although i can give 3.0 vdimm.

my winchester didnt overclock well with 1.7 volts, i know it wont with stock voltage heh.
But, It would really be a shame to give up on this. My bigger core is quite a beast and i did a nice job soldering to it. If i could get my hands on some cheap tools to do this mod and not botch the shyte out of it, ill go for it.
I have issues with patience, and knowing my own technical limits. My cookie sheet mount is a good example of where inexperience with a dremel and general metal fab gets you hehe.
My mutilated lanboy too.

If i continue this as a watercooling project, I willl still have to devise someway to store hard drives. Given the placement of the cpu socket, im tempted to see if i can make a exaust fan cage for them that would use the rear fan and the psu fan to cool them. Then i could probably store at least 3 without incident. Another option is to say fack the dvd rom and get a firewire or usb2.0 enclosure for it. Im not sure if you can install games and the os from this though, which is really all i need the thing for.

If anyone has suggestions, shoot em up here. i wanna know what you are thinking. Thinking about watercooling this little box is a pretty exciting prospect.. and surely, if somone can watercool a shuttle, i can do this. hell, everyone told me my lanboy was too small too.

[flamerail]

Where can i get ur bad ass sleeving!! BTW I LOVE THAT NOISE PADDING... WHERE CAN I GET THAT TO?!!? AND COULD YOU PLEASE STOP POSTING SHOTS!! IM DROOLING ALL OVER :D

[Benvanz]

I'm expecting this at my door when your done :D ... i wish

[Soichiro]

A quick suggestion: Put both RAM sticks in the blue slots for dual channel to work.
Another suggestion: Paint the side of my comp for me, because I am t3h suck at art. :p

That is some awesome sleeving. Great job so far, keep it up.
Btw, I didn't really like Mai Otome (but I loved Mai Hime). Even though a large part of it was lesbianism (sure Mai Hime had that one thing with Natsuki and ****uru, but that didn't take away from the plot), that's not something that's good for an anime, so I stopped watching after about 6 episodes...

Edit: WTF? It censored ****uru's name... ROFL!! These forums are... messed up... LMFAO

[Valk]

Memory is in dual channel mode. most msi boards use the first two memory slots as dual channel one and the next two dual channel 2. doing what you suggest would give me single channel unfortunatly.

as for painting. I am teh sux0r too. i used to do quite a bit of artwork, but I havent drawn in over a year.

http://ev0one.net/media/marlesig.jpg

I dont know if i posted this or not, but this is what i was orginally going to airbrush on one of my case sides. I wanted to incorperate it in with a window somehow. I have no no idea what i might paint now though.

As for the sleeving, I got it locally at a electronic supply store. I got three sizes of sleeving and heatshrink that all came to about $22. I can get some and ship it if you cant find it online. Its charcol color. which is just a blacky grey with some interwoven clear. looks really sharp ^^.

the padding is akasa padding. it ships with enough for two side panels and top/bottom. I still have some left tha tim hoping i can find a use for. probably use it to cover up my heatercore/shroud and make it look like a speaker box or somthing heh.

you guys are awsome. your comments have really made me want to produce this little box further. one thing i have to decide on though is hard drive placement. Im thinking of making a 4 drive antec style cage for the top and giving up an internal dvd. external should do the job fine.

[neonblingbling]

What if you painted the figure on the window? Regular rectangle window, clear background, painted figure.

[flamerail]

http://ev0one.net/ocforums/hime/worklog/fans.jpg

Choices choices.....;)
Go with the aluminum one!! :D

[BWR]

That is some amazing artwork...

[Flip-Mode]

you guys are awsome. your comments have really made me want to produce this little box further. one thing i have to decide on though is hard drive placement. Im thinking of making a 4 drive antec style cage for the top and giving up an internal dvd. external should do the job fine.
Calling you a wuss did the trick didn't it? Keep the good work man.

[Valk]

mmm who knows. I am a wuss in the fact that i dont have a lot of money, and even the cheap tools are quite expensive. Of course, you get what you pay for, but im not about to spend $90 on a dremel just so i can use it once heh. I dont do a lot of projects like this he he.
Case painting is a long way off. I have never picked up an airbrush before so I have to learn that before i try to paint on it heh. I could use somthing like acrylic paint but i doubt it.
It wont be untill after I move that ill be able to work more on this sadly. but thanks to everyone who is interested ^^.

[azu]

what a pity.. the pic wont be painted :(

edward and eric would be displease. loll..

[shard]

You could build an exterior box for the heater core.

[Valk]

that would be counter productive. I want everything to be integrated into the one box so i can move it easily. Although, im going to enjoy weighing this thing when done. there will be aabout a litre of fluid in it as well as more copper parts. so i expect this tiny box to weigh in to about 20 kilo's

I might still paint the pic i have on it, bu ti want to keep the case mostly black. it matches my lcds then. Ill get to it. i have to draw more though. i couldnt redraw that pic if i wanted to right now. Im really out of practice.

[Etacovda]

my 18$US dremel has lasted me a few years and a few mods (not to mention a few car rust removal jobs, too), dont get too uptight about cheaper brands. Mines a dynalink, 39NZD; fits dremel gear, comes with lots of accessories, a stand, and the flexible shaft.


Seriously, all they are is an electric motor with a shaft, theres not a lot to them...

[hitokiri_808]

That's a nice sleeving job you did.

What about engraving or etching the picture on a side panel?

[neonblingbling]

that would be counter productive. I want everything to be integrated into the one box so i can move it easily. Although, im going to enjoy weighing this thing when done. there will be aabout a litre of fluid in it as well as more copper parts. so i expect this tiny box to weigh in to about 20 kilo's

20 kilos (~45lbs) is alot to expect from a case this small IMO.

I'd put my money about 5 kilos/10lbs less.

[turkey4550]

Looks great, I think you would be well suited to stick with air in this case as small as it is. I just don't see sufficient air flow, to keep the ambient case temps down, and to properly cool the radiator. Not only that, where will it all go? External? You would have better performance in a RAID than you will gain from watercooling (with the right HSF). Just put one of the HD in a floppy bay. You did an outstanding job on the PSU. Keep the pics coming that is one clean job so far.

[Valk]

Raid isnt really worth it for me. My computer is by no means slow and unless i were to run raid 5, there is no redundancy to my data. although stuff like music and movies arent important, my artwork and my partners artwork *i always keep a copy in case hers dies* are priceless.
I know i can have a raid + storage, thats a viable option but the overall performence increase of it is pretty minimal in a desktop pc, and especially where i leave the programs running for weeks on end.

the watercooling IS worth it for me. it allows me to keep high end hardware happy in a small space. I recently found a site that has a s939 pinmod i can do to get more volts into my winchester. In a few months im also going to spring for a denmark, so its much better for me to spend like $20 on a tool to make a mount for my radiator than it is to drop $50-$75 into a decent tower sink.
Airflow is suprisingly open in this case. just you wait.

I probably wont worry too much about storage in this box. I have usb ports coming out my ass and a bunch of gigabit network cards. I plan to build a server sometime soon, since i have been without one for a while.
i can put like 2 tb of storage in there.

[turkey4550]

cool

[Valk]

incidently, Sorry for the lack of updates. I wont be able to do a lot of modding untill im done moving and all that jazz.
Once everything is settled ill start cutting stuff up. I have two aluminum side panels to use for material, so hopefully it will be enough.

[Valk]

Just thought i would get a critique on my wire managment and some suggestions
on how i might clean the top up some more. it seems the wires around the drives are the messiest, of course this will change when i splice my own serial ata cabling in the near future.

http://ev0one.net/ocforums/hime/worklog/wireman.jpg

im putting in an offer on a bip2 im gonna use. it will require the removal of all my bays except the last top one. its ok though. presently all my water stuff is for sale. im gonna start from a fresh slate on this box with a BIP2, Dtek mp-05 and mp-01. I managed to overclock this video card quite successfully too after making an ass out of myself over in the 3dmark forum heh.

I got a little too excited on that one.. but i take pleasure, i beat the top unmodded score ;)

http://ev0one.net/ocforums/7600gs/3d05003.jpg

Im getting to it. when i get the rad, ill start hacking up and ill share that process as well.

[pik4chu]

hehe, woot and welcome back! I also must commend you on your sleeving, it sure can be beautiful if one puts some good effort into it, and I must say it certainly shows on yours. So does the foam really help that much at all?

[luk3]

So does the foam really help that much at all?

would like to know the result also :) it looks nicer than the bare metal. but if it doesnt help kill the sound im not gonna get it. need to shut my pc up somehow:beer:

[Valk]

Denser neoprene foam would be a lot better for the noise insulation than this akasa stuff. this is just a synthetic carpet like material that is more for a soft matt show i think.
It does look a lot better than bare metal. Im not sure if it made a big difference since the side of the case that faces me doesnt have any, but its damn quiet with 2 7volted case fans.
Once my watercooling kit sells, im gonna start buying some parts. ill start with the rad and the pump since they require some hard mounting mods. I figure ill mount a GTS240 in the front either dual pass or xflow and stick a DDC in that slot where I can put an x1 card. ill make a little pci bracket sled for it.
Im planning to stick the hard drives in the bottom, rested on motherboard risers and rubber washers.. think this will work?

[JakeKlem]

lookin good man, keep up the good work

[Valk]

again with the wires heh. my buddy wanted his 120gb back so i had to format onto my 250 and did some wire adjustments. used a ribbon cable for the dvd this time. I need to get some more padding for the back of my motherboard tray, then the sleeved wireing would blend right in.

http://ev0one.net/ocforums/hime/worklog/wireman2.jpg

the feet are my sister's. of course she gives me a weird look whenever i take pics of my pc.

[Valk]

Got down to the watercooling today. I went out to pick up a cheapy dremel knock off this morning and came back with that and a drillbit.
I also finally got the radiator i baught here on on oc, cleaned it and preped my parts for use.

http://i48.photobucket.com/albums/f211/Valk1317/workarea.jpg

My work table for this mission. cheap dremel in hand, i started punching holes in my case and snipping off excess metal.

I didnt make a template for the fan, i simply removed the core from one of my evercools and traced with a pencil heh. i would have used a jiffy but i was feeling a bit too lazy to go buy one heh. only two of my dilled holes alligned right, but it worked out in the end =D. Some snip and grind and i have this

http://i48.photobucket.com/albums/f211/Valk1317/cleanfront2.jpg

I also tried to figure out how i was going to mount my pump and sure enough, figured out an alignment for it.

http://i48.photobucket.com/albums/f211/Valk1317/pumpmount.jpg

http://i48.photobucket.com/albums/f211/Valk1317/pumpscrews.jpg

With the clean rad install, and front bezel, it still looks pretty stealthy to me

http://i48.photobucket.com/albums/f211/Valk1317/cleanfront.jpg

Ran the pluming too. this clearflex 60 is really nice for the little space. tubing sticks out a little but is tucked nicely in when you put the side on, without collapsing tubes.

http://i48.photobucket.com/albums/f211/Valk1317/preloop.jpg

Bleeding/leak testing right now. ill post temps if my computer still works in the morning =)

[Valk]

http://ev0one.net/ocforums/hime/worklog/inside.jpg

Full load temp for cpu/gpu 40C/45C. for a single 120mm rad, not bad =D

[Skeith]

Is there any realavence in the fact that 'hime' translates from japanese as 'princess'? Or was it an acronym you decided on and this is just a complete coincidance?

Mod seems awsome so far, keep it comin.

[Rysjimmy1994]

H.I.M.E - Highly Integrated Multitasking Environment

[Valk]

Well. hime does mean princess in japanese. the acronym is just incidental and gives me a project name.

second rad and chipset block should be at my door anyday. whenever my friend feels like showing up with em heh. you know its bad when you cant even bribe your friends with money heh.
trying out linux too, temps are 35degrees now, not bad.