Project: Blue Shift

[UnWantedSoldier]

I have been following the forum for some time now and i've just been amazed by the talent I've seen here and it has inspired me to try my hand at my first cosmetic mod.

I just got an antec 1200 as an early xmas gift and quickly moved my system over and began tweaking with things. In the past most of the mods i have done have been internally, i cut a few extra holes into my Antec 900 to allow me to route all the cables behind the mobo and also cut a hole in the bottom to allow me to flip the PSU. But since the 1200 has a much better cable management system i found that there is very little internally that i want to to it. So that leaves the outside to mess with.

I have three bay items (DVD Drive, Temperature displays, and a Drawer) that i am going to camouflage to look like the empty drive bay covers.

First up is the dvd drive.

after many hours of trial and error last night (I've never worked with styrene before lol) this is how far i got. Sorry i don't have any pictures of how i got to this point but since it involved a bunch of fumbling around i figured it best to leave them out lol.

I'm nearly finished with the drive i just have to make a cut out for the drive button and paint the styrene and touch up the mesh. I still need to figure out how i'm gonna mount the mesh piece that attaches to the dvd drive tray. I think i will use some kind of epoxy but I'm not sure at this point. (any suggestions as to how to best do that would be greatly appreciated.)

as soon as this is done I am gonna build a Temperature display using two of these:

and my remaining drive bay cover. I should have the parts for this coming by the weekend so as long as i finish the dvd today or tomorrow i should have that done some time next week. Unfortunately that is as far as i can go right now as that will use up all my drive bay covers (The dvd drive used up two and the temp will use the third). I have contacted Antec via email to attempt to acquire more but no response yet. But until then i wont be able to finish the project and cover the drawer. Does anyone knows where i can get some more drive bay covers for the 1200?

[SXRguyinMA]

this should be neat to see

[FuzzyPlushroom]

Ooh, 1200 mods. Nice.

Antec has 'em (they're the same for the 1200 as for the 900, right? I've never seen a 900 in person), but they're smoking giant rocks of crack as far as pricing's concerned. On the other hand, if you really need 'em...

[UnWantedSoldier]

Ooh, 1200 mods. Nice.

Antec has 'em (they're the same for the 1200 as for the 900, right? I've never seen a 900 in person), but they're smoking giant rocks of crack as far as pricing's concerned. On the other hand, if you really need 'em...

They changed the drive bay covers for the 1200. They use a hexagon mesh while the 900 is a perforated mesh, i can post pictures of the difference when i get home from work.

[DonT-FeaR]

nice start man... im liking this

[UnWantedSoldier]

just finished the new button

this little guy will mount over eject button and move it so that it will pass through the outside mesh. I apologize for the poor quality of the pics, cell phone camera is all i have right now.

i just painted the styrene face plate, bay cover, and eject button and they are drying, so long as they come out alright i should have this thing assembled in the next few hours.

[FuzzyPlushroom]

They changed the drive bay covers for the 1200. They use a hexagon mesh while the 900 is a perforated mesh, i can post pictures of the difference when i get home from work.

Well, the 1200's almost certainly looks better, then...

Any chance of finding some identical mesh at a hardware store, perhaps? Failing that, would the hexagonal Modder's Mesh be close enough (it looks right, but could be the wrong size holes)? It's got to be close. Those little holes must be about a quarter-inch...

[UnWantedSoldier]

Well, the 1200's almost certainly looks better, then...

Any chance of finding some identical mesh at a hardware store, perhaps? Failing that, would the hexagonal Modder's Mesh be close enough (it looks right, but could be the wrong size holes)? It's got to be close. Those little holes must be about a quarter-inch...

that sounds about right at that may be what i have to do, i got a reply from antec today and they said "Unfortunately the Twelve Hundred is a fairly new enclosure and we haven't received enough spare parts to offer these items for sale. You should return your enclosure to the dealer for a replacement because it may take some time for us to get these parts in stock"

so i'm gona either have to wait it out or come up with something else, unless some one here has a 1200 and a couple of drive bay covers they would be willing to part with.

[UnWantedSoldier]

woo hoo, finished the drive today. it came out pretty good, though i think i will need to redo the drive tray piece at some point, the paint didnt come out as well on it as the rest but untill i get some more mesh (since i would rather do it that way than try to sand it all down and start over) this will do nicely. And most importantly the drive still works lol.

again the image quality sux, there is no good lighting in my room i would move it to a better location for pics but the rig weighs over 50 pounds so I'll wait till I'm done with the temperature display before i move it for pictures.

the second image you can see the switches i added to the top of the case, the first three control the fans (front, middle, exhaust) and the 4th(the one that is turned off) controls the UV CCF

[blueonblack]

Looks good. I don't like those cases at all myself, but you did some very nice work on the mesh. +rep