Project C.T.O.A.N

[davido_labido]

Hey folks! So, my personal PC has been somewhat boring for a while. It is quite a high spec, but meh, I'm bored of it. I thought I would have a rummage through my boxes of bits and see what I could chuck together.

Project C.T.O.A.N is going to be made from things I have been sent for other projects that have now been finished, won from modding competitions and also sent from Nvidia last year, so it is going to be rather nice I feel.

This is the spec so far, but things could change.

Case: In Win H-Frame 2.0
Motherboard: ASUS ROG RAMPAGE V EDITION 10
Processor: Intel 5960x
GPU's: 2 x Nvidia 1080s
Ram: 32gb HyperX Fury DDR4
SSDS: A few HyperX SAVAGE as well as a Predator m.2 drive probably.
Liquid Cooling: EKWB
Coolant: Mayhems

This isn't going to be a particularly fast build. I have lots of other things to work on at the same time for bit-tech and that obviously takes priority. If I don't start the build though, I never will.

First of all, I would just like to thank Nvidia for giving me 2 GTX 1080s last year! The GEFORCE GARAGE sponsored the Mod in Taiwan competition and they were happy to support me after. It also meant I got this rather nice T-shirt.

And these awesome case badges. I REALLY don't want to ever run out of these haha.

Another prize from the competition was any In Win case that I wanted from their signature series. I was going to be working with one of these before I won the competition anyway, so I thought I would take the H-Frame 2.0. I love this thing <3

Outside of the box the beauty would be apparent.... If I could take pictures of reflective cases, seriously, how do people do it!?

I just added this picture because of the fly tbh. Also, I have ideas about that orange acrylic.

Inside the case there is plenty of space to work with, but I might have to get rid of one or two things and add a little something something too.

As good of an idea these are, I won't need HDD bays and these are taking up a lot of room. I will be doing something else here for certain.

It will be a shame to lose them though, they are very well done.

So, as always, let's start with the actual modding... First, lets strip the case.

Oh, and also, that Orange acrylic? That has gone now.

That is where I am going to leave it for now, I am still working on a few things and don't want to go down one path with the pictures and change my mind.

 

[Minibiker]

Great idea bud... got a feeling this will be a nice build!! That case is different, I like the shelves (bays) inside

 

[FloppyPoppy]

Love your builds Dave! can't wait to watch this one come to life .

 

[Dan103]

watching this ! looking good

 

[davido_labido]

awwww, thanks guys! I will be working on this today Huurah!

 

[bagleyboy]

That case is rather unique looking tbf, any idea if you're replacing the orange with a different colour?

 

[ADmodz]

Looking forward to see this.subbed

 

[davido_labido]

Cheers guys!

That case is rather unique looking tbf, any idea if you're replacing the orange with a different colour?

Yes! Clear

Looking forward to see this.subbed

Thanks!

So, I had an idea, il come clean, I did this bit a while back, in fact, I have even taken it to an event with this mod. I didn't post it anywhere though and now In Win have sent me their new lighting kits and fans I want to change it all. I thought I would show the original first though.

Drawing a rough copy of what I need to cut out of some new acrylic

It was raining outside, so all cutting had to be done inside... this is why I need a workshop =(

It is taking a while, but it is getting there!

Finally, the rain stopped and it dried up outside, at least I could file and sand it down outside.

once it was all filed down, it is a perfect match

Now it was time to sand the edges with increasingly fine sandpaper. This took hours.

Again, THIS is why I need a workshop. My girlfriend is never happy when I am modding

It was worth it though, I can have any colour I want now!!!

The downside to normal RGB. White just isn't white! This is the colour I use the most too, but oh well. These will all soon be swapped out again to the new fan and lighting kits from In Win, I have them here already

Nom Nom Nom.

It will be a while until my next update probably (unless I just show some hardware or something)

Computex is soon and although I won't be attending, no doubt I will be busy here.

 

[FloppyPoppy]

It will be a while until my next update probably (unless I just show some hardware or something)

Your on a hardware enthusiasts forum... glamour shots are fine by us

 

[davido_labido]

Your on a hardware enthusiasts forum... glamour shots are fine by us

That will have to be the next post... I took everything apart again lol....

Well, I spent the day doing more work on the blades.... They are now finished!! Yayz!

In Win sent me some of these bad boys.... these should be available to purchase soon! Basically, in these packs you get 3 fans, a remote control, a control box and some LED strips. I have no idea how they will be packaged or shipped once they are for sale, but I imagine it would be similar to what we have here.

I have been asked how these come apart on the book of faces, so thought I would show you whilst I did it... Basically, there are a load of tiny little pain in the back side screws... Remove all of them

Usually, it isn't as messy inside and the strips are usually just nice thin 3mm LEDs, these are my LEDs and the residue from the nasty double sided tape I used

The In Win LED strips look rather like this.... they have double sided tape on the back and connectors at each end. The connectors are too wide for what I want to do so we need to do a little messing about

I chopped off the outer coating to expose the solder

Then took a picture of me trying to desolder..... then actually did it properly without the camera in my hand... it is rather hard to solder with one hand =(

I soldered the two LED strips together, then just used a hot glue gun to ensure the exposed wire was insulated against the metal of the blade. I had to force the strips in and used a little bit of trickery to ensure they went around the corners.

Next I wanted to change the way it was all held together, at first some tiny screws held the 2 parts of the blade together and although they look almost invisible when In Win do them, I want to be able to access them more often and I didn't want to risk damaging the screws. For this I needed 6!!!!! drill bits.

That is how small the hole starts... it is about 2mm, and some of the holes are right next to edge of the acrylic I had cut, so I figured I would go up in drill sizes in .5(ish) mm increments.

I drilled the metal to 3 mm but went to 5.5mm in the acrylic... you can see how close to the edge I had to drill! going up in small increments paid off

The idea was to use these 5mm 3M female to female standoffs.... when I dropped them in the 5mm acrylic, one way or another, measurements were wrong... -.-

Drill + standoffs + file = smaller standoffs.

Spot on.

All I now need to do to put them all back together is screw everything in! I cut down some screws so the threads were 2.3 mm long... this meant they would tighten completely


The next job was to get the lighting to work together, the LEDs are meant to connect to the ends of each other and run in series... I wanted them to run in parrallel.

I used one of the connectors I desoldered earlier....

Then spliced it onto another wire. I did test this with some spare strips and a constant power supply before I plugged it in to the In Win stuff.... I really didn't want this to go **** up.

It worked!!! Now I can control the LEDs with the In Win remote control, I can also use the In Win fans and everything will work together.... very nice!

Here is a video of it in action:

if embedding isn't working, here is a link : https://youtu.be/EbPh1zZ5WJ8


That's it for now... next update will be hardware pron most likely.

 

[ADmodz]

Looking sweet dude

 

[davido_labido]

Cheers I will add some hardware pron tonight! I keep forgetting to take the pictures though!!