Tortuga - Part 1 (Lots of Pictures!)

[Krazed]

Ok picture update!

Finally got my drive cage installed the way I want it to be. Useful, and still somewhat removable with the little hardware pouch on the side. (see pictures)

Hope this satisfies you guys for now! More to come as I progress.



closeup of the drive cage

 

[d94]

thats looks very skeeet ^^
but do you still have room for a fan in the lower part of the rad?

 

[ziggo0]

Thats a sweet tower man. Does that only have 2 hdd bays though? I'm thinking about buying one...but I'll need like 4.

 

[Krazed]

If you look at the pictures, there are TWO Cages for the hard drives. One at the top, one at the bottom. Top holds 2, bottom holds 4. All have rubber mounts.



and as for the fans/rad placement. Fans go on the outside, and blow air inward.

 

[nkcd]

^ Why don't you put the core outside and the fan inside sucking in. That way, you can cool you HDD and give the internal more airflow as well? You'll be using 120x25mm I assume since there aren't that much space between the front and the cover?

 

[Tyreal]

im not sure if it will fit on the front. You will have to cut the front panel if you wantto and even then you will have a heatercore sticking out with fans and all that.

 

[Krazed]

I've got it all figured out already. With the heatercore shoved as far into the case right now as is, and the fan shroud.. plus the 120mm fan, if you close the front cover on the case it all fits. The cover adds another 1/2-3/4 inch and makes a world of difference.

I'll show you what i'm doing when I get that far along

 

[Krazed]

Well here it is, in its nearly finished form. Just need to do a few little things, but this is how I have it mounted now. (Runs great by the way!)

Not bad for a first time huh?

 

[batboy]

Maybe you already have this all worked out, but normally the rear and top case fans are exhaust, however you have the rad fans in front running as exhaust if I read that right. Looks like you either need to have the rear/top fans turned to be intakes or you need several intakes in the side cover to make up the difference.

 

[JackNSally]

The last post before this one with pics it shows the fans on the rad blowing in.

 

[batboy]

Ok, I see that now. Guess I'm used to rad fans blowing out. Not sure I'd want hot air off the rad blowing into my case.

 

[Krazed]

Mostly, because I'm adding another fan into the case at some point to blow air in. I'd rather have warm air coming off the heatercore then warm air going into it. Lesser of two evils right now.

 

[noxqzs]

If I could make a suggestion. For less than $10 you could get some HVAC duct tape, and some zip ties and clean the bottom area up a little. Specifically between the psu and HDs. Also get rid of the masking tape and use the duct tape. Its basically sticky aluminum foil. works really well. everything else looks great.

 

[Krazed]

Yeah I'm going to be doing that, and then painting the radiator and shroud black as well. It's not finalized, I just wanted to get it running to make sure I didnt have to tear it all apart again.

As for zip ties, I have those too! Getting it finalized this weekend I hope, but we'll see.

Already overclocked a bit (Athlon XP 3200+ 2.2GHz @ 2.5GHz, ran a 8 hour Stress test on the CPU, and at max load, I got 37c. Not bad considering the fans werent on high and its fairly quiet! GPU hovers around 39c at max load as well. (x800Pro OC'd to 580/1100)

 

[nkcd]

wow, now that's interesting?

You running heater with Low CFM fan?? What kind of fan you were using and how many CFM does it push?

THose temps are very good... <40 at full load?

 

[BeerHunter]

Ok, I see that now. Guess I'm used to rad fans blowing out. Not sure I'd want hot air off the rad blowing into my case.

Yea dude I dunno why guys do it the other way.. (with hot arse air blowing in case, on mobo, from the radiator)

Last time I tried that following what I thought was the "right" way my memory got so hot on mobo it crashed at 200Mhz default speeds!!! Now I can run 240Mhz same timings with cool air coming over mobo then going into rad then out case.

 

[nkcd]

Congrat, so what kinda of fan did you use and what is their spec?

and your load is under 40C?

 

[Krazed]

Sorry I havent posted in a while, been busy with school and work!

Anyway, the case fans are 120mm Antec fans. I took the ones that were on the back/top of the case out and used those as Rad fans. They have a 3 way switch built in as well, and can be adjusted easily. The exhaust fans now are 120mm Antec fans, also with 3 way switches but are lighted. I bought those at CompUSA the same time I bought myself the case.

The difference between my case, and others I assume... is I have backround noise. (A 60 gallon aquarium with filter and pump running) Mind you, it's not loud.. but it trickles and drowns out what very little noise there is of the computer fans. So.. to my ears, its silent! The computer use to drown out the trickle.

 

[Janus67]

are you able to close the door on the front of the case?

 

[majesty]

is it possible you could post pictures of the front of your heatercore so i could see the fans. i plan on using this case as well next month when i go watercooled. thanks.