Case mod for school project

[Karbon Killa]

Well I have a requirement class called SSE (Senior Seminar Experience) Basically the overall goal of the class, is to think up an "essential question", make a product, go through a 15 minute speaking exhibition, and hope to god that you pass.
So my "essential question" is "What are the skills and steps required to make a non-traditional computer case?". I am going to be taking an aquarium and making and extension in the back, to where a computer will be in the back, water res in the middle, and a freshwater fish tank in the front. I have made a couple of drawings on paper, but made a little finalized drawing in ms paint. I only have the top view done.
Here is my basic idea:

It is possibly going to be a media center, so I am not 100% sure on what hardware I will be using, but to do mock-ups I am going to use some old hardware. If you have any extra ideas, please, let me know. I am very open to new ideas on anything. Not sure when this will start, but I first have to get enough money to but the starting point, a.k.a the tank.

[Eclecticos]

Looks like a fantastic Idea. +Rep

I think the easiest thing to do would be to buy an existing oval front
acrylic aquarium, they come in all shapes and sizes.
Then partition it with plexiglass, and apply sealant.
You will defiantly need to test the seal
for leaks, before installing the hardware.

Or you could build a rectangular frame out of wood, put an oval lip
on the front of it and sit the aquarium on top.

You may want to consider using a inline water filter
to keep the fish poop out of the loop.

[Karbon Killa]

the res would be completely different from the tank. Just a little sectioned area on where the coolant can sit. It is going to need to have a removable back, so I can do hardware changes if anything craps out on me. So what I was thinking, was to buy an oval fron aquarium, and build a new back for it. By that, meaning, make everything behind the purple line in my next drawing, removable.

There will also be some sort of hinged lcd screen that folds down and hides behind the "case". Since it will most likely be a media center PC, I won't need the monitor all the time. The tv will mostly be the monitor. Accompanied with a wireless keyboard and mouse.

[moon111]

I've seen fish tanks available on Freecycle. You can give away or request items there. Someone might have a tank they're no longer using.

[Karbon Killa]

I am trying to figure out what h/w I should get to build a decent Media Center/HTPC. Only thing I'm not 100% on is motherboard choice. I know I want a socket 775 board. Just for the fact that I have a couple of extra confidential chips that I need to use. I am also not sure on what video I want. I know I want the capability of HDMI use. But I can just use dvi-hdmi adapter. Still, any ideas guys???

[Karbon Killa]

Sorry for double post, but anyone have any suggestions for hardware???

[Eclecticos]

I would recommend a moderately priced reliable motherboard from ECS Elite Group.
My experiences with there motherboards have been great.

[Xpirate]

Sorry Eclecticos, but I would not recommend ECS stuff to any one.

I had to return one, then the next one I got had some kind of weird video problem. It did not matter if you used the AGP or PCI slot. When you first power it on, you hear the beep code for a monitor problem, then you had to hit reset and it will finally work right. Then I had another one where the Ethernet connection died and I had to install an Ethernet card, which would only work in one of the PCI slots. I guess the other three slots were messed up or something.

[nevermind1534]

Everybody has their bad experiences with a board. My first one was with an ECS Elitegroup board; it wouldn't post, or really give me any kind of display, although, it was open box. I couldn't return it, because, by the time that I had got the CPU, the time that I had to return it to newegg was gone, and I never followed through with returning it to ECS. I usually won't buy something such as that only if I have more than one bad experience with them. There's also PC Chips. I used one of their motherboards in my parents' computer, and it's been fine, dirt cheap, too. I have an full size atx Foxconn motherboard that I got new for only $30, and it's been great for a cheap board.

[Karbon Killa]

I have hadboth PC Chips and ECS mobos. I have an extra ECS lying around, but I just didn't know if hardware other than video needed to be decent. I know I need storage for it aswell.