Casemodding
Given up on modding the colours for now. Will play with some layout ideas when I get the chance. I do like the ability to edit the raw HTML with blogger. Makes it so much easier to do kewl stuff.

I have a modded case. Here is how it happened...

A fair amount of time ago I decided to upgrade my PC. I got together all sorts of bits and pieces and built a fairly nice system based ariound an Atholn 2000+ (1667MHz), A Ge Force 4200 and a suitable range of peripherals. I stuck it into a desktop case that I had. Unfortunately I had heat problems with the case. The CPU was overheating. After much work I hacksawed a hole in the front and put in a 120mm fan. I then fdrilled neat holes in the facia and ran the whole thing. It ran pretty cool but very loud. I then started planning a new case. I was going to custom build it and spent a fair amount of time planning and designing. I budgeted $150 all up. This is the point where I saw an ad for a case with 5 80mm fans AND a 120mm fan. It had a pair of thermometers, and drivebays directly cooled. It was $150
"What the hell" I thought. I went and had a look. It had a window, with a fan in the middle. The two visible fans (Including the 120mm) were transparent! It had a perspex and silver front.
"Whoa! That is so ugly I MUST OWN IT!" and so I planted my 150 smackers down and took it home.

I put my PC into it. It ran better.

After a while I got bored with a darkened case. Time for my first wave of casemodding. I went out and bought some components and started work on wave one of the modding. $30 and several hours later I had the following:

• 4 Orange LEDs around the 120mm transparent fan, facing in. They make a nice ghostly glow.
  
• 4 orange LEDs around the 80mm fan in the window. See above , but more subtle.
  
• 8 orange LEDs stuck in a piece of perspex at the bottom of the case, shining up. These nicely highlight the solid orange fan on the CPU.
  
• A black switch on a front panel. When switched it drops all the fans (Except the CPU Fan which is temp controlled) down to 7v which makes them virtually silent. I can then monitor the result with the thermometers, and switch it to turbo if needed. I have had to do this twice, both on days that hit 40 degrees.
  

Wave one complete. Now I had a PC that glows orange in the dark. I may eventually upgrade the LEDs to a mixture of purple & UV LEDs and UV reactive cabling.

So I sit there, staring at the Silver & Perspex front with 2 Beige CD-ROM drives. And stare. Eventually I find out about Stealth Drives from [H]ard OCP. After some work I get another facia to replace the one I buggered up with my first wave of mods. I carefully trim, cut, file and generally mutilate two of the Silver and Perspex facias until they are flat panels. I then recess my two drives until they are in a bit. With the careful application of some double sided tape I have a case with no visible drives. However, press the corners of the facias and the drives slide out from underneath.

L33t! Wave two complete. (Yes, I am being sarcastic with the L3375P3@|<)

Finally I remove the floppy, replace it with a ZIP Drive I salvaged from a mac. (I am sure this is why it insisted that it was a SCSI device, despite being plugged into an ATAPI chain. That took some work to overcome) I also reseat the heatsink and slap on some decent thermal goop.

I now have a silent PC that runs cool, and looks... Well actually DAMN ugly. Oh well.

I like it. It suits my sense of Frankensteinian asthetics.

And here are some pictures...