Enigmachine
10-22-2006, 11:13 PM
I uploaded my case pictures to the gallery for the contest, but I thought I would start a thread anyway since I expect to keep modding the case till I feel it's perfect. :)
Here's a picture of the case as submitted for the contest:
http://www.bjorn3d.com/photo/data/519/FullyAssembled.jpg
Basically I was inspired by the name, Titan Atlas, a god that carries the world on his back. My original idea was to put a black and silver terrestrial globe on the top panel, with other silver spheres around it; the globe would have acted as a mouse and the spheres as mouse buttons, but I didn'ht have time to get around to it. Hopefully I will do it someday, it should look really cool.
Since this is my first mod, I decided to start with the least visible/damageable item on my list, and did a new cage for a 120 mm fan on the front of the case. That turned out to be pretty easy once I went out and bought tin snips. I guess it's true what they say though, measure twice, cut once! Lesson learned... But by this time I had spent 2 weeks looking for the parts for the rest of the mods and I only had a week left so more eyeballing seemed likely. :)
I tried a bunch of other things, like hanging a mobile in a front drive bay that would have turned thanks to the heat from UV lamps, but that required too much precision for my eyeballing ability. :)
I also did some modding of the power supply, but since I don't like windows in general, you can't see it. :D Silly me.
So 2 days ago I started on the most visible part of the design, I didn't think it would take so much time to do, but it did thanks to my never having worked with a rotary tool before and having a drill from 1957. I guess I should have splurged on more than tin snips. :)
The idea behind the side panel is to not only keep the "spheres" theme going, but also since it's in a round shape, I could stick a side fan on it and rotate it to cool down whatever part I like inside the machine. It seems like cases have their side fans located pretty much at random, with my design I could cool down my PCI cards (TV capture cards, for example, are a good candidate for this), my GPU or my CPU just by rotating the plate till the side fan was other the right part. I was planning to put a round aluminum plate over a big side window and have it stick out, but while I was assembling it I realized that it looked much cooler sticking INTO the machine with some mesh. Of course by that time the hole was already made and far from perfect, but that's part of going too fast I guess.
So now it's on the inside held by metal fasteners so it can rotate (not freely, you have to force it a bit, but that's a good thing) and you can make it blow wherever, even halfway towards the front of the case. The louver is a nice aluminum thingy with a mesh inside so keep the dust out. The side spheres are the same metal-looking "buttons" I wanted to put on top originally, with a ring of light around them (there's actually two UV tubes and UV-reactive candy packaging to throw some colors in there). In fact all the fans are green UV reactive fans.
The aluminum plate is the "pizza" thing I was referring to in an early post. :)
Things I didn't have time to do but might if I this mod isn't too embarassing are:
Do the "world" mouse on top, with metal-looking buttons.
Paint thin silver lines around the openings.
Engrave the right side panel with a picture of Atlas holding up the world (see the statue of Atlas from the hm... Rockfeller plaza in NY, I think?). Anyways, something Art Deco.
Finish modding the power supply.
Repair the amber EL wire I ripped out while closing the case one final time and give the case consitent colors for the glow.
I didn't have time to install the casters, which is a good thing because the machine would probably have rolled off my drawing table/workbench. :)
Anyways, that's about it. Hope somebody likes it. I know I'm glad I had a chance to try my hand at modding something and that nobody got hurt so far. :) Thanks Antec & Bjorn3d!
Here's a picture of the case as submitted for the contest:
http://www.bjorn3d.com/photo/data/519/FullyAssembled.jpg
Basically I was inspired by the name, Titan Atlas, a god that carries the world on his back. My original idea was to put a black and silver terrestrial globe on the top panel, with other silver spheres around it; the globe would have acted as a mouse and the spheres as mouse buttons, but I didn'ht have time to get around to it. Hopefully I will do it someday, it should look really cool.
Since this is my first mod, I decided to start with the least visible/damageable item on my list, and did a new cage for a 120 mm fan on the front of the case. That turned out to be pretty easy once I went out and bought tin snips. I guess it's true what they say though, measure twice, cut once! Lesson learned... But by this time I had spent 2 weeks looking for the parts for the rest of the mods and I only had a week left so more eyeballing seemed likely. :)
I tried a bunch of other things, like hanging a mobile in a front drive bay that would have turned thanks to the heat from UV lamps, but that required too much precision for my eyeballing ability. :)
I also did some modding of the power supply, but since I don't like windows in general, you can't see it. :D Silly me.
So 2 days ago I started on the most visible part of the design, I didn't think it would take so much time to do, but it did thanks to my never having worked with a rotary tool before and having a drill from 1957. I guess I should have splurged on more than tin snips. :)
The idea behind the side panel is to not only keep the "spheres" theme going, but also since it's in a round shape, I could stick a side fan on it and rotate it to cool down whatever part I like inside the machine. It seems like cases have their side fans located pretty much at random, with my design I could cool down my PCI cards (TV capture cards, for example, are a good candidate for this), my GPU or my CPU just by rotating the plate till the side fan was other the right part. I was planning to put a round aluminum plate over a big side window and have it stick out, but while I was assembling it I realized that it looked much cooler sticking INTO the machine with some mesh. Of course by that time the hole was already made and far from perfect, but that's part of going too fast I guess.
So now it's on the inside held by metal fasteners so it can rotate (not freely, you have to force it a bit, but that's a good thing) and you can make it blow wherever, even halfway towards the front of the case. The louver is a nice aluminum thingy with a mesh inside so keep the dust out. The side spheres are the same metal-looking "buttons" I wanted to put on top originally, with a ring of light around them (there's actually two UV tubes and UV-reactive candy packaging to throw some colors in there). In fact all the fans are green UV reactive fans.
The aluminum plate is the "pizza" thing I was referring to in an early post. :)
Things I didn't have time to do but might if I this mod isn't too embarassing are:
Do the "world" mouse on top, with metal-looking buttons.
Paint thin silver lines around the openings.
Engrave the right side panel with a picture of Atlas holding up the world (see the statue of Atlas from the hm... Rockfeller plaza in NY, I think?). Anyways, something Art Deco.
Finish modding the power supply.
Repair the amber EL wire I ripped out while closing the case one final time and give the case consitent colors for the glow.
I didn't have time to install the casters, which is a good thing because the machine would probably have rolled off my drawing table/workbench. :)
Anyways, that's about it. Hope somebody likes it. I know I'm glad I had a chance to try my hand at modding something and that nobody got hurt so far. :) Thanks Antec & Bjorn3d!