Project DEEP PURPLE (The Introduction)

[modding.fan]

So...today is Indian Independence Day, which means, much like in the U.S., everything shuts down. Yay for a day off in the middle of the week. Anyway, I was planning on a nice, boring, easy day off. However, the mailman came yesterday (Monday) and brought me a BIG box from the boys over at New Egg! HOORAY! It had (among lots of other things) the last part I needed before I could start my painting:

I love ordering OEM parts...for one it's way cheaper, and for two...well...pictures speak louder than words:

Yup...this is the badboy I've been waiting on, my Samsung DVD/RW with Lightscribe (lightscribe rocks...no more CD markers...EVER!):

Beyond that, my hard drives came in:

Twin Seagate Baracuda 200Gb, 3 Gb/s SATA's that will be hardware raided to keep my stuff running *nice* and fast.

A couple of Gb's of Patriot DDR3

OH! OH! I love unpacking big boxes...my sexy vid card came in. And I must say...even before I get to using the card, XFX wins one award in my book...not only is it a cool box design...

But it was one of the most difficult to open cardboard boxes I've ever laid hands on. LOL Anyway...here's what it looked like inside:

The card has an odd, but nice looking, metal facing screwed to the 'window' side for all to see, covers up all the unsightly capacators and such for those of us with windows. But...alas, it won't last long, it's going to be the first thing removed so I can fit my NV78 on it (if it ever gets here).

And the really cool looking, almost alien themed (green/black) {Oh...did I mention that one of my prime reasons for going with an XFX card was because it was built onto a black PCB?} card:

My PSU came in as well...and as much as XFX won the award for most interesting box, Rosewill gets the opposite, most subdued, basic box. But, to me, it's nice:

Opening up the box gave me a true feast for my eyes...this is a BEAUTIFULLY made PSU...the finish on it is amazing...I put my copper Zippo on top of it just to show how deep the reflection is:

One major failing, the sticker is on the 'window' side of the case...so...no one would ever be able to see the beautiful finish! But...since my case mounts the PSU vertically...it's not an issue anyway... Shame that no one will see any of this PSU besides the fan. (Which will be switched out in a later post to the purple ones I bought.)

Anyway, it's of course, a modular power supply, with a large amout of power options, all well labled:

The veritable octupus of included cables, all very nicley loomed (I wasn't expecting that, the photos on the site showed bare cables):

Even the ends of the looming are done very attractivley:

Well...that rounds out that box. Next post will be the 2nd phase of deconstruction...I love taking stuff apart!

Cheers,

MF

[modding.fan]

So, as I mentioned, my box of goodies came in yesterday. So instead of going out partying like any sane guy would when he's got the next day off, I finished the screw-and-pressure-tab deconstruction on the case. (In preparation for drilling out all the rivets tomorrow.) So, here we go:

With so many things left to do, I didn't know where to start...so I started with an easy fan removal from the radiator cage. I noticed that TT was even smart enough to put a small plastic gromit on the cage to protect the fan wires...I'm more and more impressed with TT as days go.

If you remember from a few posts back, the expansion ports are retained through spring pressure, these springs needed removal as well. Just thing copper things, removal was easy:

And there we have them:

I moved my attention to the front bezel, first popping out all of the filtered panel covers:

And taking them apart:

Next are the wings on the front bezel. Simply held on by a couple of little brackets on each wing:

After the wing was off, I noticed that they had put little stoppers on them, padding and all, to keep the case from being ding'd or scratched by the wings...awesome!

Now I looked at the power tray. I popped the plastic front off the metal housing and looked inside to figure out how to pull the buttons out:

A screw and a couple of pressure tabs later, and here we go:

That left the metal housing for the LED's, Power and Reset buttons. Lots of plastic pressure tabs later, and we have a metal box ready for black paint:

Case feet:

And a couple screws later:

The window also had to be removed, first step was popping out the door latches:

Yup, these latches:

The pressure locks all popped out really easily:

And voila! No more window:

One window, ready for...well...nothing that i can think of. LOL

And that leaves me at about 10:00 p.m., with a case ready for the drill bit, but that's not happening till tomorrow...I don't want my house filled with aluminum shavings and rivet bits...so I'll be doing that work outside.

Cheers!

MF

[modding.fan]

Okay...so I said I was done when it hit 10:00 last night and I had taken the case apart...but...now that I have so much stuff in, I just *had* to do something else...

So I looked around and thought, what can I actually *do*? Then it hit me, I've been doing so much deconstruction, maybe I should put something together.

The only real thing I had that I could put fully together, and have totally ready for installation, was my HardDrive waterblock. And this was an absolute nightmare...we'll start with some obvious problems...

First...on the dry-fit, I realized that DangerDen can't measure tygon tubing very well:

Yup, the piece they gave me was about 1 1/2 inches long, but, with a standard sized 3 1/2 hard drive in there...it requires a 2 1/4 inch piece of tubing...so i cut one from the big length I bought earlier. No problem.

Then, as I started screwing it together, and...the screws they gave me were all about 1/16 - 1/8 inch too long...they but up against the ends of the HD screw enclosures before they are tight...so...the whole thing was, um...floppy.

I had a look around the house for anything, and immediatley realized I needed to look in the toolbox for washers. And, well, I had none. So, what does a modder do when he can't find the exact right part...yup...make them. See, I've been doing wiring (car stereo's, computer power lines, etc) for years, so I've got a huge collection of different wire splices...and in my toolbox I saw these:

Yup, they look like washers to me, after a few clips. So, out of my supply of about a hundred...i grabbed 16 (figure 2x per screw for thickness), and went to snipping.

In the end, I had these:

They fit into the screw recesses like they were designed for it, and gave me just enough thickness so I could have the whole assembly nice and tight...if you look dead inside the recesses, you can just see my makeshift washers...but...since it's going to be inside the drive cages...no one will see anything!

So, here's view, complete with the proper length of tygon and the tygon tube-thingies to prevent leaks:

Just for fun, here's the piece of tubing they gave me laid i place...yup...just a *bit* short

Just to see...I decided to try and slide the whole assembly into the case and ran into *another* problem. The drive bays in the case are not designed to accept multi-bay-sized items. See, each bay has a support jutting out from it for the drives to rest in, so the weight of each device is not fully supported by the screws...however, this stops a multi-bay-sized device from fitting in.

So, tomorrow when I get it all taken apart, I'll be either cutting or bending one of the sets out so this can fit.

Cheers!

-MF

[modding.fan]

So...after all that, it hit me that there was still one thing I could do for prep before I went to bed. I had to drill holes where the pump would mount to.

I'm going to mount the pump to the same drive-bay that holds the power button...something like this:

So I marked, and quickly drilled, then sanded the top smooth:

It's always better to drill *before* you paint...glad I rememberd this part.

Also, because I hate looming loose floppy wires...I had to spin the power lines. Looks much more tidy, and makes it way easier to loom later.

[Kaky]

Man write something more it so torough i love it and the case man !!!!!!!

[modding.fan]

Quick sneak preview...it's now late wednesday evening...and I've got every piece that I've purchased put back togetehr and in the case. I'm in the process of editing pictures and i"ll be posting my lot entries probably from work tomorrow...if I dont' get to some of them tonight.

I really did intend to take breakes to do the log as I was doing work (drilling rivets, sanding, modding, painting, putting together, etc.)...but...I just got on a roll and couldnt' stop myself...

Anyway...since I have nothing more I can do to the case for now (just waiting on my NV78 to get here, and I gotta order my neons)...so I should be able to do an entry or two before I go to bed tonight.

Cheers

-MF

[brouhaha]

It's coming along nicely!

[modding.fan]

It's coming along nicely!

Thanks for that. I've finished editing all my photos for all the work i've done to date...but it's midnight and I have work in the early a.m.

I promise...on my first smoke break, I'll at least get one big entry done on the deconstruction.

Cheers!

MF

[modding.fan]

Welcome back to project DEEP PURPLE!

This installment will cover one of the most fun 3 hours I’ve spent outdoors in a long time…that is the rampant destruction of a pristine computer case. Yup, I’m moving this to an outdoor venue mainly because I don’t really feel like walking on aluminum shavings and rivet heads for the next 6 months. (I spend a lot of my in-house time barefoot).

Anyway, without further ado, I’ll start by saying that, overall having gone through the process of destroying this case I am absolutely impressed with TT’s build. There were so many cross-connected pieces adding to overall structural strength you’d think this was designed for some absolute abuse, not just a life sitting on a desk.

Not knowing where to start, I figured I’d work top-down, for some reason it made sense to me. So I drilled out every rivet I could find attaching the ‘roof’ of the case to the body (all in all, about 13 or 15 rivets):

And ended up with this:

Leaving me with a neat looking rectangle of metal:

Now, as I mentioned before, I’d been dying to figure out how to remove the top plastic fascia…and, there it was…lots of pressure tabs (again):

Which readily popped off leaving me *more* pieces for painting:

From here I just sort of went all over trying to figure out what to take apart next…this case is full of cross-connected pieces and stabilizer bars…that…I really didn’t know where to go…so here’s some pictures of the process…though 2 days later I’m not sure now exactly what they are from.

The main cross-bar:

And it’s rear connections:

It was at this point when I stopped to look at my drill bit (my first time doing any rivet work is now, either assembly or disassembly, so it’s a learning experience)…and had to think of a way to clean this up:

A bit of reverse spin, with some channel-locks and I was back in business.

First up with a clean bit was a small artifact left from the top of the case…the PSU mounting bracket (also used to hold the rear-mounted HD cage which I wont’ be using):

My next target were the drive bays (nope, I didn’t’ pull the main cross bar off…figured it gave some good stability for drill pressure). These things are home to more rivets than I cared to count:

Next was the little lateral cross brace that connected between the motherboard tray and the main cross support:

Another half dozen rivets later and I’ve got a free motherboard tray:

Leaving me a still very recognizable skeleton…and a few dozen more rivets to go:

At this point, I realized that there was a *lot* of new surface area that I’d been exposing, and that quite a bit of it would not need painted…so marking some of it would save me time (and paint).

The final drive-bay housing removed:

And I’ve got just four pieces to go (front, back, bottom, crossbar):

The front removed very easily, and was marked for paint/no paint:

Removal of the crossbar left me 2 little pieces. Now…before anyone thinks how easy this process must have been…I’m about 2:30 into work here, and it’s HOT outside. LOL I’d been sweating like a fiend…just drilling case parts.

And…all done:

What an adventure…it felt so nice to actually start doing some real work on my case. Next up...some actual (get ready for it) MODDING! YAY!

Cheers for now!

-MF

[meticoeus]

Purple and black are two my favorite colors and the armor is one of the only cases I like. GL with this project, it looking good so far. When I was considering getting it, I was curious about the drive mounting rack, but now my questions have been answered ;p.