Project - FIRST BUILD

[DayTrader]

Nothing too fancy for my first build (i.e. no h2o, no case lighting, etc) but I did my best with routing my cables (for now) -- see my sig for component list.

Thanks to all the pic posters before me. I got a lot of ideas from you folks.
Mike R.

case and parts arrive

Case disassembled so the modifications can begin

Top and rear case fans were tied together to run on one power plug and to reduce wiring

Top fan guard wire holes were jagged so I lined them with a little epoxy to keep the sharp edges from stripping and shorting a fan wire.

Optical/Hard Drive bay shelves were removed, the tops cut down and had modified LianLi optical drive covers installed to in front of my 2 DVD drives (the top IDE optical drive has since been removed altogether and I've replaced the coiled red SATA cable with a longer clear one that's routed out of sight)
this was the brackets originally - modifications to the tops of the brackets can be seen if you look closely at the pic a couple down from here.

original LianLi bezels

modified bezels

--because of the LianLi bezels, I couldn't mount the optical drives in their through the bracket's standard holes. Luckily, the other pre-cut slots lined up just right.

Two thin "slots" were cut into back of case to allow cable routing behind mobo tray

--- I also cut similar holes in mobo tray to allow the power, usb, etc cables to run between the motherboard and the tray and "pop out" where they connect to the motherboard but forgot to take pics.

Case wiring was sleved and shrink-wrapped at the ends

I lapped the processor and the TRUE (but forgot to take pics of the processor or just can't find them) first with 80 grit all the way down to 1500 grit.

Reassembly begins
psu installed

test-fit of motherboard onto tray

the two IDE hard drives have since been replaced with SATA HDs

cuts in mobo tray visible here

face of motherboard - cables connected

graphics card installed

the finished product (cpu, TRUE and RAM not yet installed)

I've since removed the IDE optical drive and both IDE hard drives, added two SATA hard drives and replaced all the red SATA cables with clear/silver cables. Of course, the processor, heatsink and ram have been installed as well. I flashed the MOBO to run the 0308 Rampage Formula bios (for better overclocking) making it a "Maximus Rampage." I've got the cpu overclocked from it's stock 2.4GHz up to 3.6GHz (8*450 or 9*400 but haven't found the right bios settings to get either one 100% stable), am experimenting with overclocking the RAM and the graphics card but now that it's summer time and the ambient temp in my house will hover around the mid 70's, (vs the mid 60's Fahrenheit in the winter) I'm coming to the conclusion that water-cooling may be coming sooner than I expected IF I want to maintain my current overclock. Alternatively, I could try switching video cards because the current one vents all its hot air INTO the case (vs the cards with a rear-facing vent).

Thanks again fellas for all the help, advice and suggestions.

Mike

 

[engiNURD]

Nice! Take an updated shot when you get a chance. and thanks for the pics! Now I kinda wish I did that to my buddy's TJ07 (holes in mobo tray and case for cable management).

 

[DayTrader]

Will do that tonight........just for u!

Re. the mobo tray cuts....... I STILL had to pull every pin for from the motherboard power plug (all 24 of them or however many there are - major pain in the ass given I'd never done it before) because I didn't want to hack a MASSIVE hole in the tray to get the plug through.

 

[guitarslingerchris]

Nice and clean, man.

 

[DayTrader]

Thanks!

Here's the end result (so far, that is).

 

[engiNURD]

Nice setup you've got there! Wow, I would cut a bigger hole instead of pulling out those pins, lol. Yes, I'm lazy.