Rmcgrath
12-11-2005, 11:20 PM
OK-first, some explanation.
I purposely bought my computer's guts individually and without a case, first because it was considerably cheaper and second because later on I planned to build my own case from scratch- I had hoped to be able to run my rig as a test bed for the time it took to build a case. However, my parents didn't like my beautiful electronics open for all to see all over their office desk. So they provided me with an ultimatum: get it in a case or suffer the consequences.
Me being a lazy person and all, thought I could save a lot of time and hassle if I threw together some crappy construction that would fall more or less within the definition of 'computer case'. And so, I present to you all the 15-minute lumberjack case, a sleek and stylish answer to the high fashions of the twenty-first century.
I took the measurements from the bigger components, went to my basement (which, coincidentally, doubles as a woodshop) and in some 15 minutes built this epitome of cool using some OSB, wood glue, jigsaw, drill, staple gun and axe. Thus; the lumberjack case.
The absolute best part about the lumberjack case, in addition to its having saved my digital life, is the 'ducting'. With only one wall, all of the hot components can vent with ease, and the entire room in which the computer is placed functions as a sort of gaseous heatsink.
For example, on a single AMD stock fan, I got a stable 2.6 Ghz overclock on my Sempron 2600+. The overclocking on my 1024 MB of crappy Samsung RAM made my BF2 very happy. CPU temperature topped out at about 37 C.
I had thought that dust would be a problem in a case without walls, but apart from a thin film near the fan there was very little. I actually found that there was less dust on the CPU HS/F than on my computers with real cases.
I'm sad that I couldn't get any pictures of the thing running, especially at night, (the power supply has a fancy blue LED. Yay.) but here be the beast itself. Yes, that is string holding up the video card. Yes. those wires hanging out the bottom are important. No, I didn't make this up.
The holes in the back of the one wall are the out-vents for the power supply.
And the wierd wire thing on the top is my power-on switch. I used to turn on my computer with a paperclip, but decided this could be dangerous if I connected the wrong pins, and so I made a power 'button'. You push down the top wire so it touches the bottom wire. Pretty state-of-the-art.
http://img220.imageshack.us/my.php?image=pb1300291pg.jpg
http://img530.imageshack.us/my.php?image=pb1300283uo.jpg
http://img475.imageshack.us/my.php?image=pb1300301sj.jpg
http://img475.imageshack.us/my.php?image=pb1300314tw.jpg
Yep. She's a beauty all right.
I purposely bought my computer's guts individually and without a case, first because it was considerably cheaper and second because later on I planned to build my own case from scratch- I had hoped to be able to run my rig as a test bed for the time it took to build a case. However, my parents didn't like my beautiful electronics open for all to see all over their office desk. So they provided me with an ultimatum: get it in a case or suffer the consequences.
Me being a lazy person and all, thought I could save a lot of time and hassle if I threw together some crappy construction that would fall more or less within the definition of 'computer case'. And so, I present to you all the 15-minute lumberjack case, a sleek and stylish answer to the high fashions of the twenty-first century.
I took the measurements from the bigger components, went to my basement (which, coincidentally, doubles as a woodshop) and in some 15 minutes built this epitome of cool using some OSB, wood glue, jigsaw, drill, staple gun and axe. Thus; the lumberjack case.
The absolute best part about the lumberjack case, in addition to its having saved my digital life, is the 'ducting'. With only one wall, all of the hot components can vent with ease, and the entire room in which the computer is placed functions as a sort of gaseous heatsink.
For example, on a single AMD stock fan, I got a stable 2.6 Ghz overclock on my Sempron 2600+. The overclocking on my 1024 MB of crappy Samsung RAM made my BF2 very happy. CPU temperature topped out at about 37 C.
I had thought that dust would be a problem in a case without walls, but apart from a thin film near the fan there was very little. I actually found that there was less dust on the CPU HS/F than on my computers with real cases.
I'm sad that I couldn't get any pictures of the thing running, especially at night, (the power supply has a fancy blue LED. Yay.) but here be the beast itself. Yes, that is string holding up the video card. Yes. those wires hanging out the bottom are important. No, I didn't make this up.
The holes in the back of the one wall are the out-vents for the power supply.
And the wierd wire thing on the top is my power-on switch. I used to turn on my computer with a paperclip, but decided this could be dangerous if I connected the wrong pins, and so I made a power 'button'. You push down the top wire so it touches the bottom wire. Pretty state-of-the-art.
http://img220.imageshack.us/my.php?image=pb1300291pg.jpg
http://img530.imageshack.us/my.php?image=pb1300283uo.jpg
http://img475.imageshack.us/my.php?image=pb1300301sj.jpg
http://img475.imageshack.us/my.php?image=pb1300314tw.jpg
Yep. She's a beauty all right.