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Tech-Daddy · Rated R

Well... my little 'puter is my pride and joy!
There are a lot of funny stories behind it's construction, but I am very happy with it's end result.

I call this my "Braveheart" picture... Wink

Innards are the following:
A8N-SLI-Deluxe
Athlon FX-53
1GB (2x512) OCZ EL PC3200, 2-3-2
Leadtek 6600GT
Gigabyte 3D Rocket Pro Cooler with Artic Silver
ULTRA 500w X-Connect modular power supply
Pioneer Slot load DS-106 DVD player
HP CD Burner (older than dirt...) Laughing

The trick bits:
1) Flames... and lots of them! I've always liked classic harloquin flames like on custome cycles and hot rods... this was my tribute to them! I cut the inverse flame on the top window, backed it with a sanded piece of lexan, then lit each end with a 3 LED array, blue at the base of hte flam, and green at the top of the flame. The fade works nicely. The Side window was lovingly cut and sanded and filed into submission to put the flames on the window! Ran into a problem shortly after creating my *magiccal* effect, in that my case color did not lend itself to displaying the flames very well in a dimly lit LAN environment. So I cam up with the 2nd layer of sanded UV blue acrylic that is lit with UV CCFL's! Add into that the other colors that are present in the acrylic (to be explained in a second) and I got my flames lit up enough to be seen at a LAN party! Wink

2) The flames actually flicker. I built a controller for all of the series LED's that is based off of hard drive LED activity. When the drive is at rest (off) certain LED's stay lit. When there is activity, then the other LED's light up and the first set goes off. So there is this constant play between the colors in the flames that makes the flames not only light up... but flicker and dance as well!

3) 92mm exhaust fan. Was a regular UV green fan, but I tapped 3 holes into the frame and aimed UV LED's in a triangle pattern. I tied them into the same plug used by the fan off of the motherboard, and then sleeved the connection in black so that it would not show up.

4) Custom Power cabling - I bought some UV reactive wire and some corresponding black molexes and the male or female pins needed to fil each location, and then built my own cable system. The Ultra cables are nice, but too bulky for how small my case actually was. So I gathered inspiration from another modder on another forum and redid the work in my flavor! The cable spacers are UV Green acrylic that have been tapped, drilled and added into the cable array. Kinda tricky to plan out how many cables you need, how many molexes will be used, where the spacers are going to be put in, etc... but I like the results!

5) Crushed Velvet in the bottom to give it that "pimp's couch" feel, as well as add in an areas for me to cover cables and connections! I plan on redeux'ing this later on, but for now... I like how this all lays out.

6) Bulgin Vandal switch on the front for power

7) Front intake for 80mm front fan with active LED show in the middle of it!

I have a complete work log up elsewhere if you would be interested in reading all of the blood, sweat, and tears that went into this mod, then I'll gladly post up the link.

PS: Also very excited about this, but I found out this last week that I wil be the MaxPC "Rig of the Month" for June! So, keep you eyes open! I, myself, won't believe it until I see it in print... but I'm still REALLY excited! Wink

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