SENTRY: Console-sized gaming PC case project

Could these be used internally rather than externally? As the picture on the website shows them being used externally, but it would look much neater if they were used on the inside of the case rather than the outside.
I wouldn't even bother with filters if I have to take the case apart. At that point I would just leave them off and use canned air to clean the parts.
 
Dust filters sounded like a good idea at first but from what backers are showing it seems to restrict the passive airflow quite a bit, which is a shame.
 
Just for info.
The package from the penultimate party was sent on August 9 from Poland, and on August 22 it was received in Russia ).
We ordered a 2-pack with a friend, and now I'm waiting for my half.
I always considered Russian mail rather slow, but looking at the speed of delivery to other countries it was very fast ).
Thanks! )
 
Does anyone know what backpack is in this picture?
http://zaber.com.pl/sentry/FullP5/DSC_0957.JPG

This is from the Sentry product page on Zaber's site.
Still trying to find a backpack will fit the Sentry in it. I have an incase backpack made for a 15" Macbook pro, and the sentry can almost fit in the main compartment but it's a bit too wide.
I was looking at a few 18.4" laptop backpacks on Amazon but I can't find any that show exact internal dimensions of the "laptop" area.
 
Does anyone know what backpack is in this picture?
http://zaber.com.pl/sentry/FullP5/DSC_0957.JPG

This is from the Sentry product page on Zaber's site.
Still trying to find a backpack will fit the Sentry in it. I have an incase backpack made for a 15" Macbook pro, and the sentry can almost fit in the main compartment but it's a bit too wide.
I was looking at a few 18.4" laptop backpacks on Amazon but I can't find any that show exact internal dimensions of the "laptop" area.

17in laptop compatible bags should be mostly compatible or at least I remember that being stated a while back. I think 17in is slightly more common than 18in. Maybe try searching for that. You could also consider a briefcase style laptop bag. They may have larger or more well defined dimensions. I had a leather briefcase that would definitely work for Sentry. Unfortunately I gave it to my dad as I have little use for a fancy briefcase.
 
Does anyone know what backpack is in this picture?
http://zaber.com.pl/sentry/FullP5/DSC_0957.JPG

This is from the Sentry product page on Zaber's site.
Still trying to find a backpack will fit the Sentry in it. I have an incase backpack made for a 15" Macbook pro, and the sentry can almost fit in the main compartment but it's a bit too wide.
I was looking at a few 18.4" laptop backpacks on Amazon but I can't find any that show exact internal dimensions of the "laptop" area.
Swiss Gear Pegasus will house it, pretty sure.
 
Does anyone know what backpack is in this picture?
http://zaber.com.pl/sentry/FullP5/DSC_0957.JPG

This is from the Sentry product page on Zaber's site.
Still trying to find a backpack will fit the Sentry in it. I have an incase backpack made for a 15" Macbook pro, and the sentry can almost fit in the main compartment but it's a bit too wide.
I was looking at a few 18.4" laptop backpacks on Amazon but I can't find any that show exact internal dimensions of the "laptop" area.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01N5C932M/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
This 17'' backpack works well. My sentry fits in it perfectly with a little bit of wiggle room left and also with enough room for a tablet sized monitor and my 60% keyboard along with cables. The bag doesn't even seem that big compared to my regular backpack. Plus the price is nice.
 
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https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01N5C932M/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
This 17'' backpack works well. My sentry fits in it perfectly with a little bit of wiggle room left and also with enough room for a tablet sized monitor and my 60% keyboard along with cables. The bag doesn't even seem that big compared to my regular backpack. Plus the price is nice.

I was actually looking at the 18.4" version of that backpack, good to know the sentry fits. Thanks!
 
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I've almost wrapped up my Sentry build. I've got a few thoughts to share.

I bought an open-air cooled EVGA 1070 without a backplate or blower. I wish I'd picked up one with a backplate because it looks way cleaner. I'm also curious to see if I could have fit a bigger card in there. It looks like there is room. I'm impressed someone got an Asus Strix to fit.

The hottest thing in my Sentry seems to the m.2 card on the back of the motherboard. I'd like to try attaching thermal tape to it like someone else did here.

I also picked up a Silverstone SFX-L powersupply. The fan sits too close to the side panel and is noisier when the cover is on. I imagine this is similar to what SaberPL described for Cryorig C7.

Assembling all this has been fun. Thanks Zombie & SaperPL.
 
Thank you from Russia for the wonderful case, guys!
MSI Z270I Gaming Pro Carbon AC
Corsair 450W Gold
I7-7700K (undervolt, and clock like simlpe 7700)
MSI 1080Ti FE
16GB DDR4 2133
SSD 960 Pro (512) + SSD 850 Evo (500)
 

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That looks awesome man! How was the build process? Did you find heating an issue? Really like the look.
 
That looks awesome man! How was the build process? Did you find heating an issue? Really like the look.

I do not have any problems with heating (but it should be noted that I'm talking about real heavy applications and heavy games, unfortunately in normal life I do not play extreme synthetic tests)

I had many mini-itx cases, and each had its own nuances and complexities, but there was nothing extraordinary in this case, and the assembly in it could even be even simpler than in other small systems that actually have even larger internal volume

I can confidently say that my ps4 pro in games is working louder than this system )
 

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Anyone with the Asus Strix z270i and SF600 in the Sentry order custom cables and mind sharing the lengths they ordered? I'm trying to order in advance before my Sentry arrives.
 
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Sentry manufacturing process - weekly update


Last transport Sentry cases are fully assembled, packaged into printed carton boxes and sealed with thermo-shrinkable foil. Next two weeks we will spend on filling customs documents and on packaging everything into external transport boxes. As it is the biggest shipping from which we had, it takes a little bit longer, but we predict that in 2 weeks we will start sending tracking numbers for those packages.


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During the whole shipping process we were/are gathering all the information we are receiving from your feedback that can make this product better. At the start we had only several external testers. Now we have hundreds of them/of you, so if you have some thoughts about the current design which could make Sentry better, please let us know. We are receiving hundreds of question about the start of the future retail sales, but we do not want to be like other companies and just start sales because the product is popular, while we know there are fields which could be improved. We will decide "how and when" we will start the distribution after we will be sure that we did everything to give you the best product. We want everyone to be happy with their Sentry and because of that the feedback we already received (and which we will receive) is so important for us. If you will have some time, please join one of our forums and share with us your thoughts about Sentry. It may help to move forward the whole project and maybe you will show us some spots which could be made better but we never even thought about them. Thank you!

This week we won't show bonus photos (received from our backers) with computers built in Sentry cases, because we are receiving them through many channels (email, twitter, imgur, reddit, etc.) and we simply didn't have time to properly check all of them. We will add another pack of those great builds to one of the next updates. It means, if you want to share photos of your RIG with other backers, you still have time to send them to us. We will pick the best ones and they will show up in the weekly update.
 
uk8c4ozip4dckyy4jhle.png


Sentry manufacturing process - weekly update


Last transport Sentry cases are fully assembled, packaged into printed carton boxes and sealed with thermo-shrinkable foil. Next two weeks we will spend on filling customs documents and on packaging everything into external transport boxes. As it is the biggest shipping from which we had, it takes a little bit longer, but we predict that in 2 weeks we will start sending tracking numbers for those packages.


v2lwtkwtfzumxqco8yyg.jpg


t1muhnshasjjkuuuct1h.jpg


During the whole shipping process we were/are gathering all the information we are receiving from your feedback that can make this product better. At the start we had only several external testers. Now we have hundreds of them/of you, so if you have some thoughts about the current design which could make Sentry better, please let us know. We are receiving hundreds of question about the start of the future retail sales, but we do not want to be like other companies and just start sales because the product is popular, while we know there are fields which could be improved. We will decide "how and when" we will start the distribution after we will be sure that we did everything to give you the best product. We want everyone to be happy with their Sentry and because of that the feedback we already received (and which we will receive) is so important for us. If you will have some time, please join one of our forums and share with us your thoughts about Sentry. It may help to move forward the whole project and maybe you will show us some spots which could be made better but we never even thought about them. Thank you!

This week we won't show bonus photos (received from our backers) with computers built in Sentry cases, because we are receiving them through many channels (email, twitter, imgur, reddit, etc.) and we simply didn't have time to properly check all of them. We will add another pack of those great builds to one of the next updates. It means, if you want to share photos of your RIG with other backers, you still have time to send them to us. We will pick the best ones and they will show up in the weekly update.

Just make sure that everyone knows about the imgur album:

http://imgur.com/a/NPkty
 
Anyone using Ryzen 5 or 7 in sentry? And how about temp?
My 2 black sentry has been arrived.. I'm using skylake i7 and gtx 1080.. And my brother confusing between Ryzen or Kabylake.. For Ryzen we worried about the temp.. And Biostar B350GTN is the only one AM4 available in our town..
Any advice or suggestions.. Thanks
 
Anyone using Ryzen 5 or 7 in sentry? And how about temp?
My 2 black sentry has been arrived.. I'm using skylake i7 and gtx 1080.. And my brother confusing between Ryzen or Kabylake.. For Ryzen we worried about the temp.. And Biostar B350GTN is the only one AM4 available in our town..
Any advice or suggestions.. Thanks

I'm running Ryzen 7 1700 - both Dynatron T318 and NH-L9i work okay on it, without overclocking though. One thing that is noticeable about the temps is that it's heating up quickly on single threaded turbo boost and synthetic loads, but on real life scenarios - gaming & rendering it doesn't look far hotter than my previous E3-1231v3.

Second note - make sure to buy proper memory for the board.
 
SaperPL if you're looking for suggestions for improvements you can make on the Sentry, I've got one for you. Right now, there are 2 rectangular gaps (under the riser slot) between the CPU side and GPU side. It would be nice to have something that could restrict airflow between the 2 sides to allow for people to use open air GPU and not have to worry about heat going over to the CPU side. The separators could have a small cut-out for power cables between the GPU and PSU, but that's it.

I've made my own separator covering one of the gaps, but it would be nice to have something more official and sturdy to use instead.
 
Also it would be difficult to design functionally and aesthetically but a removable tray or backplate behind the motherboard would be great. It would be easier to access the cooler mounting and nvme drives for those that have them on the back of the motherboard.

Also several people have had issues with rear i/o shield not lining up or preventing their motherboard mounting holes from lining up. My motherboard lined up perfectly without the i/o shield, but with the i/o shield it was impossible. I had to cut the i/o shield on one side for the motherboard to line up with the mounting holes. Not sure why this is. It should be relatively standard due to the itx standard being, well, standard. Maybe it's something that could be looked into for version 1.2? Or 2.0 :D
 
SaperPL if you're looking for suggestions for improvements you can make on the Sentry, I've got one for you. Right now, there are 2 rectangular gaps (under the riser slot) between the CPU side and GPU side. It would be nice to have something that could restrict airflow between the 2 sides to allow for people to use open air GPU and not have to worry about heat going over to the CPU side. The separators could have a small cut-out for power cables between the GPU and PSU, but that's it.

I've made my own separator covering one of the gaps, but it would be nice to have something more official and sturdy to use instead.

You might want to test your temps without the shielding and then with the shielding first to see if it makes a noticeable difference. I doubt that it would make any difference at all. I transferred my components(cput, gpu, cooler, ram) from my nzxt mid tower into the sentry and the temps are the exact same as before(under load and idle).
 
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Also on that note, 4th Shipment White. Sent July 4th from Poland as well. Mine just arrived at customs in Montreal and is being processed. Final destinations is Alberta, Canada. I have not seen anyone from Canada post shipping updates about their Sentry yet so thought I should inform some if they are not aware.

Package has been delivered and received today August 28, 4th shipment shipped from Poland on July 4 to Calgary, AB, Canada. No apparent major damage to the packaging only a small denture as seen on the picture. No apparent punctures or signs of depression on the box itself. I can't open the box at the moment as I'm at work but will finally be able to start building my new workstation! Thank you SaperPL & ZombiPL for your hard work and transparency to us backers, and to those who have helped this project along the way!

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So I made up a shroud for the NH-L9i out of some 30x5mm foam and did a couple of tests.

i5-6600k @ 4GHz, Prime95 v26.6 small FFTs 5min, 30°C ambient.
Without shroud: 70°C 2420rpm
With shroud: 68°C 2180rpm

Note: There was no GPU because it died.
KIMG0542.JPG
 
So I made up a shroud for the NH-L9i out of some 30x5mm foam and did a couple of tests.

i5-6600k @ 4GHz, Prime95 v26.6 small FFTs 5min, 30°C ambient.
Without shroud: 70°C 2420rpm
With shroud: 68°C 2180rpm

Note: There was no GPU because it died.
View attachment 34823

Alright, I'm biting. Did you buy the foam, or were you able to use something you just found laying around? I'm getting the same Cooler and this looks like a great idea. Thanks!
 
Alright, I'm biting. Did you buy the foam, or were you able to use something you just found laying around? I'm getting the same Cooler and this looks like a great idea. Thanks!
I bought the foam and stuck it together with contact glue. There is a small notch for the fan cable and I cut one side down to sit on top of the ram.
KIMG0541.JPG
 
I bought the foam and stuck it together with contact glue. There is a small notch for the fan cable and I cut one side down to sit on top of the ram.
View attachment 35070

So in my experience when the foam is sealed right up against the fan it can make a bit extra noise. I've found it works best to adhere a strip of foam to the perimeter of the fan going out horizontal from the fan and then have a foam square adhered to the lid of the case come down around the perimeter of the foam sticking out from the fan. Basically using a foam strip around the fan to increase its diameter and then seal that larger diameter to the case. Anything is better than nothing, I've just found this is slightly quieter, probably makes a negligible difference in performance. My Sentry computer is at home in Texas so I can't take a picture at the moment.
 
So in my experience when the foam is sealed right up against the fan it can make a bit extra noise. I've found it works best to adhere a strip of foam to the perimeter of the fan going out horizontal from the fan and then have a foam square adhered to the lid of the case come down around the perimeter of the foam sticking out from the fan. Basically using a foam strip around the fan to increase its diameter and then seal that larger diameter to the case. Anything is better than nothing, I've just found this is slightly quieter, probably makes a negligible difference in performance. My Sentry computer is at home in Texas so I can't take a picture at the moment.
I read your post several pages back. The reason I went this way was simplicity and I didn't want to use adhesive foam. Ideally I'd like to make a plastic shroud that extends toward the pcie riser and rear I/O, but that can wait.
 
After almost 3 months, it finally arrived! :confused: I'm glad but will definitely think twice before buying anything sea shipped in the future.
The outer box was poked through, but the inner box is perfectly fine. Very nice packaging!
IMG_20170901_152113366.jpg
OMG I spent 2 hrs + to build it. Violence was certainly involved since the stock corsair psu cables are so damn tough!

And I had to give up on the front usb. The ssd is totally in the way. I don't need them anyway;)
IMG_20170901_175949417.jpg

I've never imagined I'd ever need those fancy custom cables. But now it seems I have to get some.
Even the tough steel panels are slightly warped by those stupid cables.

There's some small tolerance issues there. My IO shield does nor line up to the motherboard perfectly. Again, fixed with violence. :p
But I think overall the case is very nice. Sleek and tiny. (y) Have to do further test on thermals with the vega:rage:64 in it.
 
I read your post several pages back. The reason I went this way was simplicity and I didn't want to use adhesive foam. Ideally I'd like to make a plastic shroud that extends toward the pcie riser and rear I/O, but that can wait.

Yeah I'm working on designing a proper shroud in FreeCAD for when ever I get a 3d printer in the future haha I keep trying to come up with ways to justify it.
 
Where do you get these fancy custom cable's from? Seems like I should get some before my sentry is shipped off.
 
Where do you get these fancy custom cable's from? Seems like I should get some before my sentry is shipped off.

There is cablemod which is good, reliable, large selection of colors and such but expensive.

Someone recently recommended a small business, Avaentum, which seems pretty good and less expensive. Though I think it's a single guy working from home so it may take longer. Haven't tried his services yet, so I can't personally speak from experience.

The trickier part is getting the right lengths. If you post your hardware you plan to use for Sentry some people with similar hardware may be able to provide recommendations.
 
Finally yesterday assembled the two black sentry's I had received on 20-06-2017 (see my post from 27-06-2017).

Specs:
- AMD Ryzen 1700 3.0GHz
- Noctua NH-L9i + NM-AM4-L9aL9i
- ASRock Fatal1ty Gaming x370 Gaming-ITX/ac
- G.Skill Flare X 16-GB DDR4-3200 (F4-3200C14D-16GFX)
- Samsung NVMe SSD M.2 960 EVO 250GB (backside motherboard)
- Nvidia GeForce GTX 1060 FE from Nvidia
- Corsair SF 450W (grill removed)
- Full custom black/red cable set from CableMod

I am really happy how the cable management works out and everything fits so nicely inside the Sentry :)
 

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Anyone from Australia get their Sentry Yet? I'm still waiting for mine to arrive.

I received my shipping details on the 2 July but so far nothing.
 
After almost 3 months, it finally arrived! :confused: I'm glad but will definitely think twice before buying anything sea shipped in the future.
The outer box was poked through, but the inner box is perfectly fine. Very nice packaging!
View attachment 35119
OMG I spent 2 hrs + to build it. Violence was certainly involved since the stock corsair psu cables are so damn tough!

And I had to give up on the front usb. The ssd is totally in the way. I don't need them anyway;)
View attachment 35120

I've never imagined I'd ever need those fancy custom cables. But now it seems I have to get some.
Even the tough steel panels are slightly warped by those stupid cables.

There's some small tolerance issues there. My IO shield does nor line up to the motherboard perfectly. Again, fixed with violence. :p
But I think overall the case is very nice. Sleek and tiny. (y) Have to do further test on thermals with the vega:rage:64 in it.
Wow 3 months. That sucks. What country?
 
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Sentry manufacturing process - weekly update

This week everything went according to the plan. All cases were packed into transport boxes and currently we are preparing them for sending (stretch foil wrapping and customs/shipping paperwork).

The packaging process didn't change much through those 7 shipments, and nothing exploded or was made differently, so another photo of towers made with identicaly looking boxes won't be so "exciting"... but let's just pretend :)


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Like we promised in our last update, we gathered some photos which our backers published in many different places (forums, online galleries, twitter, articles, sent via emails, etc.) in the last 3 weeks, and we are posting them below. There will be probably one more, last update where we will insert photos from our supporters, so you still have a chance to show everybody how well you organized your PC inside your Sentry. We are also thinking about adding to our website an online gallery which will be made only with photos made by our backers. Not tomorrow or next week, but in a near future.


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