Project: Negative10

TheNoviceModder · 3 Feb 2022 at 13:34

Hey everyone, it's been a few years since I last posted anything to these forums as I've been out of the custom pc game due to money shortage but I'm making a comeback slowly now.

My new build has been inspired by the fact I moved into a house with my partner and the only room I can have my pc in is the cupboard under the stairs so having a tower is out of the question. Especially seeing as the case I was using for my system was the phanteks enthoo primo. As you can see, this was never going to work!

That lead me to look into a SFFPC and eventually wall mounted pc's as desktop space is minimal.

My goal is to make a wall mounted pc which is under 10cm thick. My project began with using my current system hardware to test how working with a wall mounted system would go. I used the motherboard tray and gpu bracket parts from my old haf932 case.

I assembled everything and mounted it to the wooden backboard...

Thanks to having small hands, I could only just about fit my hand under the psu while holding the mouse...

As this was going to be a slim build, as much as I love the performance of the noctua nh-d15, I had to swap it out for the Noctua nh-l9i chromax which fits in perfectly with this build...

With everything plugged in, it was like an octopus had found its way from the ocean to my pc! It was such a mess & the excess metal was getting in the way!...

To remedy that, I trimmed any unnecessary metal away and moved the psu up to the top out of the way of the mouse. I'd recently made a metal brake and using an unused metal ruler I made a couple of brackets to hold the psu up high...

I've been running this setup for a few months now & I'm happy with how it works. I've been slowly designing my creation on sketch up, this is how my idea looks so far (not finished)...

The main 'frame' of the case is made from 2mm thick steel. Using an angle grinder I cut a groove across the width of the steel where I wanted to bend it 90°. This was my first time bending such thick metal so I learned a few things and also my first time using an angle grinder. The bend wasn't perfect (a good few lumps with a hammer got that corner bend out) but I'll refine the bend another time but it's close enough for now and I'm happy with how it came out...

Also testing out sanding & polishing metal, I may or may not be aiming for a mirror finish. This is the effect I've got so far, slowly getting there but still needs lots more work...

I'm using an old motherboard for layout testing before any holes get drilled. The bent paper represents where I plan another couple of bends for the gpu to be mounted...

Progress pictures will be posted when more progress is made. Enjoy...!

TheNoviceModder · 4 Feb 2022 at 21:48

New parts arrived today! 50 leds, mounting hardware (M6 screws & M3 screws), and 4 aluminium threaded posts. Still waiting for the wall brackets and standoffs to arrive.

TheNoviceModder · 11 Feb 2022 at 12:38

Made some progress on mounting the motherboard yesterday. Managed to get the holes drilled & tapped, used the old motherboard as a guide on where to drill the holes & tested the strength, which was a success! Next job is to drill the holes for the posts which will hold the polycarbonate window up.

Wing-Man · 17 Feb 2022 at 20:08

love what your doing here, but it very compact space is having the system so close to the monitor i good idea with all the LED's

Wing-Man · 17 Feb 2022 at 20:12

in this photo you can see how little space for keyboard and mouse. i need my keyboard infront of monitor i cant offset it feel's odd so i would need the monitor slamed to the left wall

TheNoviceModder said:

TheNoviceModder · 19 Feb 2022 at 19:00

Wing-Man said:
love what your doing here, but it very compact space is having the system so close to the monitor i good idea with all the LED's

Do you mean with the reflections of all the LED's in the monitor? Or a different reason?

TheNoviceModder · 19 Feb 2022 at 19:07

Wing-Man said:
in this photo you can see how little space for keyboard and mouse. i need my keyboard infront of monitor i cant offset it feel's odd so i would need the monitor slamed to the left wall

The offset isn't a major issue for me tbh, I'm used to having the offset because I like to have the full keyboard visually centralised rather than the letters centralised. I know what you mean though, I can see the good & bad side to both setups

TheNoviceModder · 19 Feb 2022 at 19:18

Made a little more progress today. Managed to squeeze some time out of the evening to drill the final hole for the mATX board (still need to drill the final two holes for a full ATX board but I don't have a good ATX board to use so those holes can wait until I have one) and got the holes drilled for the window posts!

Next on the to do list is:

Drill the holes for the wall mounting hardware.
Cut a hole where the PSU will sit and drill the mounting holes to secure it in place.
Round off all sharp corners

Wing-Man · 19 Feb 2022 at 19:20

TheNoviceModder said:
Do you mean with the reflections of all the LED's in the monitor? Or a different reason?

yes the glare on the screen from them. It’s very bad for your eyes and also a massive put off

to be clear, I love the idea of what your doing

TheNoviceModder · 19 Feb 2022 at 19:39

Wing-Man said:
yes the glare on the screen from them. It’s very bad for your eyes and also a massive put off

to be clear, I love the idea of what your doing

If you're referring to the LED's pictured above, then they shouldn't be an issue as they won't be directly visible. I've got a clever idea planned for them, just gotta learn how to wire them up properly with a 9v battery & resistors etc. The LED's also won't be on all the time, mainly for photos lol. I've got a tiny bit of glare from the keyboard LED's but it's not a massive issue for me. The life I have means I don't get to go on the pc very often but I want to make using it an enjoyable experience when I get the time so this is my fun project

Thank you BTW, its nice to see some positive support on the thread now I really appreciate it!

TheNoviceModder · 21 Feb 2022 at 15:30

The motherboard standoffs finally arrived! Just need cutting down to size & then they can be used

TheNoviceModder · 3 Mar 2022 at 23:05

Little brightness test of the LED's tonight. Three 1.8mm white LED's in series with a 100 ohm 1 watt resistor controlled with a rocker switch powered by a 9v battery. Hopefully my breadboard arrives tomorrow so I can test how bright 20+ LED's are in parallel, I fear they'll be too bright & I'll have to add a dimmer dial into the circuit to have some control. I'm learning as I go with this build & this light setup has been the most challenging part so far, but I will not be beaten!

TheNoviceModder · 8 Mar 2022 at 08:08

So the breadboard arrived yesterday! Great fun to play around with & learn things. Issue I've got at the moment is the middle line of leds won't light up. They're not dead or the wrong way around, I've checked that. I'll figure it out, eventually. But 16 leds seems bright enough for what I need them for, so 24 may be overkill aha!

TheNoviceModder · 9 Mar 2022 at 11:17

Managed to get all 24 LED's lit up. Mind you, after a short test I can admit that they're enough to light up my garden at midnight. Do what you wish with that information :cry:

TheNoviceModder · 22 Mar 2022 at 19:51

Found some time to get it wall mounted! After a bit of research, I found out I can go up to 5 meters with hdmi and USB cables before they need to be powered. This meant I could mount the pc on the wall opposite the monitor, out of way! I plan to route the cables across to the corner, down to the skirting board & along the skirting board then up in the corner. Having the case up here means the brightness of the LED's won't be an issue!

Wing-Man · 22 Mar 2022 at 20:01

I run a 20m hdmi cable when I have my pc in a different room to my desk and have no problems at all

TheNoviceModder · 22 Mar 2022 at 22:09

Wing-Man said:
I run a 20m hdmi cable when I have my pc in a different room to my desk and have no problems at all

Ah, maybe it's 5 meters for usb then & 25 for hdmi. I think that's what I meant to put? I was cooking dinner while writing the post so wasn't fully concentrating lol. Anyway, it's just under 5 meters from where the pc will be to where the monitor & keyboard/mouse will be so I'm fine

Wing-Man · 22 Mar 2022 at 22:27

Don’t trust them numbers. Linus did a video using pcie risers to see how fair you can go before you have problems and he did about 5m but spec says 1m is max.
I think he did it with usb too when building a sleeper pc, and again it was a hell of a lot more then you think.

TheNoviceModder · 23 Mar 2022 at 10:53

Wing-Man said:
Don’t trust them numbers. Linus did a video using pcie risers to see how fair you can go before you have problems and he did about 5m but spec says 1m is max.
I think he did it with usb too when building a sleeper pc, and again it was a hell of a lot more then you think.

I should be fine for 5 meters then lol

TheNoviceModder · 18 Jun 2022 at 19:28

Been a while since I updated this thread and to be honest, it's been a while since I had the time to do anything to this build! Anyway I found a little bit of time this week.

Firstly, I worked on the psu mounting holes and plug/switch hole cutout. It came out perfectly, minus the fact I put the template on upside down which meant the PSU can only be mounted upside down this can be fixed on the final version though as this build log is mostly just a trial run and learning experience for me and anyone else interested enough.

With that little error out of the way, I moved onto the GPU mounting bracket. The holes for the cables aren't the neatest, but they're good enough for testing purposes. I'm currently using an SSD bracket to hold the GPU up but I'll make a proper support bracket eventually. The placeholder motherboard is an ATX board and the length gets in the way of the GPU riser cable which pushes the GPU forward, but the final board will be M-ATX which won't get in the way and the GPU will be able to sit further back

Now I've got the GPU and PSU basically in their positions, I'm able to get my custom PSU cables cut to length. I want the cables to follow an exact path, so each cable in theory is a different length to cut out any unnecessary ugly slack.