PROJECT LOG CURV3D | By C4B

CURV3D | By C4B | Completed

Hello there!

Just registered today and want to show you a little project Im working on, its actually pretty finished, new motherboard and changing to only 2.5" disks will be the last thing. However, this all started as a side project to my other build Cold Winter, but turned out to be pretty fun and took a lot of time. Its a simple HTPC but with a special design.

This is a HTPC/NAS build. The specs of the hardware is:
Asus AT3IonT-I Deluxe
Intel X-25-V G2 40gb
4gb Corsair DDR3
Western Digital Green 2TB & 3TB

Sponsors:





I got the idea for this build when I was looking at some of the acrylic I had left from Cold Winter. Saw some nice shape coming. So I started cutting, and got these two acrylic pieces:









The next thing I did was to put some feet on it, havent decided yet if I should get some smaller ones. Then I put the two pieces together with two small hinges.





Glued the motherboard stand off screws into the acrylic.



And sleeve the power cables for the drives.



Some overview pictures.





Next up is the front and backplate:



Should I go for a powerswitch on the frontplate or hide it in the back? The cross is where Im thinking of putting it.





Put some paint on those! (Sorry for Instagram picture)





So this is how far Ive come. Dont have that much left to do.





I also got a nice powerswitch with a white LED ring.



So I installed the LCD and the powerswitch on the frontpanel and soldered the cables and sleeved everything white.





So this is how the front and backpanel looks like.







Here is some pictures of how I managed all the cables.









I took some small Fractal Design fans and soldered together and put on the side of the harddrives to cool them down a little.



Thats about it. After this I cleaned everything and took some final pictures of the build. Im soon gonna buy a better camera so I can take some better pictures and I will post them here later. But here is the final pictures Ive got right now.















I sanded down the edges and polished it. Looks a little bit better. Also made a 100mm hole under the motherboard, will put a slim 100mm fan there on low rpm too. With a little dustfilter.

The edges







100mm hole





I also did a little "mediabenchtest". Put on 10x 1080p movies in a playlist and the CPU and GPU never got over 65c. So Im satisfied. Now with a intake it will get even better.

I got the 100mm fan today. A slim version from Scythe. I wasnt going to make an air intake even though everyone wanted me too, I just want to clarify, I didnt really needed it and I had no idea how to install a fan without hiding it. But then I found this fan, its 12mm thick, and the acrylic is 8mm thick, so I made a 100mm hole and installed the fan with help of some glue. So it extends 4mm over the acrylic. Just waiting for a dustfilter to go over the fan.

The only thing Ive got left now is to take the whole system apart, clean everything and fix some edges on the white plates, then put everything together again.





I bought a Canon 400D from a friend a couple of weeks ago so now I got some better pictures, the final pictures. The last thing I did was to install a fan filter over the 100mm fan under the motherboard.

I have been using this build as my main computer for a while because Im working on another project. The temps are pretty good, uses it for movies, music and internet. No problemo!

Enought with that, here are the final pictures. Hope you enjoy them!

Left side





Right side





Backpanel



Frontpanel







Thank you and Ill see you soon again!

With kind regards
Johan Nyman
Minimalistic PC

Hi again!

I can never really finish a build, like many others I think. Anyway, I sold the harddrives I was using in this build, got a 1TB 2.5" instead and a Corsair Force SSD. Also a Asus E45M1-I Deluxe is coming. So some hardware upgrades is going on here.

When changing to only 2.5" disks I wanted to make a harddrive bay. Here it is!



I drew up some different designs but I went with this one, measured out and cut with a jigsaw. What about some white paint on these?





And this is how it looks in the case:



What do you think?

Johan Nyman

Looks good sofar, looking forward to the finished project!

Very cool looking build.

I like it, looks nice.

ssjwizard said:

Looks good sofar, looking forward to the finished project!

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Speedracer 64 said:

Very cool looking build.

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LoganG said:

I like it, looks nice.

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Thanks all!

Hmm what could this be???



My friend HCP thought I should make a harddrive bay in the same design as the case. So heres the result.



Which one of the harddrive bays do you like? I cant decide really.

I thought I commented on this before but sweet build

The first one is very nice, but I think the second one would look better with the case. The sharp and jagged edges may clash with the smooth rounded shapes.

cullam3n said:

I thought I commented on this before but sweet build

The first one is very nice, but I think the second one would look better with the case. The sharp and jagged edges may clash with the smooth rounded shapes.

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Thank you! Yes I think Ill go with the second one, just sand the edges straight and so on. New motherboard hopefully arrives before the weekend.

I'm kind of interested in seeing what in would look like with the actual hard drive bays clear with the sides white (similar to the outside case) but it's a little late for that now. Either way I'm sure it will look great.

Also what if you put a slight reflective tint on it? Not a lot because you still want to see through it obviously. I don't know, just thinking aloud. lol

cullam3n said:

I'm kind of interested in seeing what in would look like with the actual hard drive bays clear with the sides white (similar to the outside case) but it's a little late for that now. Either way I'm sure it will look great.

Also what if you put a slight reflective tint on it? Not a lot because you still want to see through it obviously. I don't know, just thinking aloud. lol

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Hmm I think Ill keep them white. What do you mean by a reflective tint?



Made new cutouts of the second design, this time for three harddrives. Sanded down the edges and ofcourse painted it white. I think Ill go with this design actually, I asked around what people thinks and its 50/50. But when the case has this round, smooth design it feels better with a similar harddrive bay instead of something with raw edges.

Second design rev 2:





In the case





It kinda looks like a smaller version of the case. Ill go with this one!

Tomorrow Ill start with the cables for this so everything is ready when the motherboard gets here.

Hope you like it!
Johan Nyman

I like it!

As far as the reflective tint, I was thinking of something along the lines of this project log but not as extreme. But I think it looks fine the way it is.

Yeah, that second design looks good in the case. Looks good man

cullam3n said:

I like it!

As far as the reflective tint, I was thinking of something along the lines of this project log but not as extreme. But I think it looks fine the way it is.

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Ah okey, Ill keep it like this though.

LoganG said:

Yeah, that second design looks good in the case. Looks good man

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Thanks!

That looks great! Good work!

Love it so far! Really clean, unique look

Aldakoopa said:

That looks great! Good work!

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Atomichearse said:

Love it so far! Really clean, unique look

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Thanks!

My new motherboard is here! Finally, without the i/o shield though so I had to get a new one from ebay. However, I installed the new mobo and this time I need to use a picopsu so some sleeving was done. Now you can see my harddrivebay in action!

Whats in here???





Open it up and tada!



Goodlooking cooler!



Im pretty satisfied with this harddrivebay.



I cant decide if Im going to go like this, with sleeved cables, or hide them all under the harddrivebay and motherboard so only the sata cables is showing. What do you think?

Cheers!
Johan Nyman

If you were going to hide the power cables, how would you do it? Is there room to run them underneath the hard drive cage?

cullam3n said:

If you were going to hide the power cables, how would you do it? Is there room to run them underneath the hard drive cage?

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Yes there is room for that, then just make a hole in the side to run them out and to the picopsu. The 4-pin I thought I could run under the mobo.

Hello!

Its time for a update, probably one of the last. This all started out as a sideproject but turned out to be my priority. So I have been putting time into every small detail and now its 100% finished. Last thing to do is to take some time to get some really nice final pictures (again).

Anyway, I read on another forum that a fabric called "Sarita" from Ikea works perfect as dustfilter. So I bought 1sqm = 5$. I havent found any fanfilter for 100mm fans so had to make my own. Made a frame in acrylic, painted it white and glued the fabric on it. The installed it over the fan under the case.







Another little detail I wanted to do was a little shroud for the back of the LCD. Just made it simple with acrylic again.









Took out everything, cleaned everything and assembled everything again. I think Ill go with the sleeved look. Gives it a little extra.










So thats it. Been a fun project and Ive got really good feedback on it. If I have time tomorrow Ill get the final pictures up. Going out in the sun/snow to take some pictures tomorrow.

Thanks
Johan Nyman

Looks awesome. Missed it until now... When you get the final pictures posted back here, I'll put it out on our Facebook. They love snazzy build pics of rigs like this.

The curved acrylic reminds me of project R unit or Resilience by Navig. It's a great look.