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the lighting is very over-exaggerated in the pictures - since the fans are running at 7V, it's really suddle. and when the HTPC is off, you cannot tell what it is!xonik said:
roachm said:
basically i wanted to make sure no one just pokes at one of the buttons on the thing and reboots it. so i made it so you have to hold down 2 buttons at the same time to reset the HTPC. just wired the two switches in sequence - if either one of these is closed, nothing happens; reset happens only when both switches are closed.MATTRESS said:
dremel and drill is your friend. i used 1mm black anodized aluminium left over from a side panel to my Lian-Li. you can use any sheet metal, although AL is easiest to work with. i made cardboard templates and made sure it all fit, then just cut out pieces of AL to size and drilled them. the brackets were bent in one place - i just used two pairs of pliers to hold one end and fold the other. go slow and don't over-bend - AL will break if you do.MATTRESS said:
i'm using Matrix Orbital 20x2 VFD and LCDC (www.lcdc.cc) to drive it. that VFD has 5 headers on it that you can connect switches to and let your software handle it. basically i just connected the original switches that were on the face of the device to the VFD's headers, and use LCDC to open/close DVD drive tray, volume up/down/mute, switch screen on the VFD, etc. you can program it to do anything, pretty much, on any key press.MATTRESS said:
took the drive apart, snapped old LED off, soldered new LED on. you can find how-to's if you google, or even search within these blessed forums.MATTRESS said:
i bought my extensive collection of LEDs from all over the place. v3leds.com (now defunct), www.mcmaster.com, www.eled.com, www.hosfelt.com, www.superbrightleds.com, and many others. take a look at For Sale/Trade forums here as well, there are people selling LEDs in bulk. of course, there is always www.ebay.com - you can find all kinds of LEDs individually or in bulk.MATTRESS said:
if you're replacing the LED in a CD drive, you don't have to use a resistor - it already has the right voltage (ok, most likely) for it. but if you just want to drive some LEDs off of a standard 5V or 12V lead, you have to use resistors. you can use bit-tech.net's led calculator or the same by linear1; again, you can find LEDs or resistors at radioshack or some other electronics places.MATTRESS said:
nope, no tutorial. find a USB pin-out (google is your friend), and then look at the USB pin-out of your motherboard USB header. match them up and do a little soldering.MATTRESS said:
no, no painting. i did paint the face of the DVD drive and the buttons. i used black vynil (or is it vinyl?) dye - you can find it in your local automitive store, like AutoZone. painting the entire case is a whole matter altogether, and there are lots of tutorials done on that. i painted a case once (http://codeflux.com/mods/athena/), and was a MAJOR paint (i mean, pain) in the ass.MATTRESS said: