Green Tea: retro AMD-nVidia build

[ThE_MaD_ShOt]

Oh hell I though you where in the US. I would have traded you boards. I have a Asus a8n Sli Premium.

 

[eidairaman1]

Painted the kb and mouse.

http://img526.imageshack.us/img526/3774/img0043ls.jpg
http://img842.imageshack.us/img842/4285/img0046yv.jpg

I decided to paint the whole front panel green as I couldn't find a way to paint just the front without the edges looking like shit. I'm going to use black DVD and floppy drives with some green accents (the eject button and the floppy lid will be painted green).

Also bought a cheap LCD 5.25" panel:
http://img135.imageshack.us/img135/1048/3color11001.jpg

and the slim DVD 5.25" bracket it's on its way too. All that's left is to mod the power supply and recap the boards.



I got the u-channel molding and finished the window and top blower.

http://img839.imageshack.us/img839/273/img0052xi.jpg
http://img820.imageshack.us/img820/2229/img0053dcd.jpg

I'm going to replace those screws with black ones later.

Why not paint them green to match the case?

 

[TRWOV]

That would look tacky, I think

 

[theJesus]

I agree. Green screws would be tacky indeed. It's not like there isn't any black on the rest of the case for them to match with.

Also, you may have already said this (I'm one of those guys that mainly just looks at the pics and skims the text lol), but are you planning on painting the inside at all? I think it would look good black.

 

[ThE_MaD_ShOt]

I second thejesus's suggestion

 

[eidairaman1]

i was only sayin the same green paint on the case to match up, if you have it i mean it would save a few bucks etc

 

[TRWOV]

Anyone knows which is the current "GeForce" font or something similar?

I'm planning on putting a vynil decal saying "GEFORCE 7950GT" on the top of the heatsink plate.

 

[TRWOV]

Got the bracket in and a little something for another project

The bracket is very versatile, it can hold two slim ODDs, one slim ODD and one 2.5" HDD or one slim ODD and one 3.5" HDD (which in turn could be two 2.5" HDDs with a 3.5 to 2 2.5 adapter)

 

[Jayzilla]

That is one nice case mod gadget you got right there. I wish it could fits my Lian Li DVD bezel so I can get one free 3.5 room. Would you consider a SSD for this project?

 

[TRWOV]

That is one nice case mod gadget you got right there. I wish it could fits my Lian Li DVD bezel so I can get one free 3.5 room. Would you consider a SSD for this project?

I don't think so as the OS will be XP.



Another piece of the puzzle arrived:

Removing the floppy lid to paint it green

 

[TRWOV]

Got the LCD panel:

Had I seen it before, I would have preferred the STW-5027 model... I'll try and get it instead.

A handful of things left:
- find the misplaced reset button :shadedshu
- mod the PSU...I think I'll go with multiwire sleeving ATM.
- buy capacitors to recap the mobo and GPU

Haven't got a monitor for this; I'm thinking 17" 1280x1024 LCD but I guess a 15" 1024x768 would be fine too. I'll try to score a used one.

I'll buy and paint the speakers this weekend.

 

[ThE_MaD_ShOt]

Nice work Trwov It is really coming together.

 

[TRWOV]

It seems that I've hit a snafu. With the SATA DVD connected the bootup hangs after the RAM test and a code "423C" is shown on the lower right corner. I've tested with two other optical drives so I know it isn't just the slim drive.

Apparently it has to do with the RAID options implemented in the 2.10 bios which seem to conflict with the DMI in some way when a non-HDD device is connected to the SATA ports. I could rollback to 2.00 if 2.10 wasn't required to support my 7950GT

If I reset the bios and set the SATA option to RAID the boot up continues but then the hard drive isn't detected. Setting it to non-RAID gives me the error.

Waiting to hear back from Asrock although I won't be holding my breath. Looks like I'll have to get a slim ATAPI DVD-RW drive. I hadn't run into this because I was using a spare IDE DVD-RW drive I had lying around.

Or does anybody do bios modding around here?

 

[TRWOV]

Not much to report today: Asrock support hasn't solved my issues with the SATA ports.

I removed the PSU cables that I won't use and got the green connectors:

 

[TRWOV]

Testing the LED strip

Needs moar canned air

 

[TRWOV]

Reporting:

Asrock couldn't help me with the SATA problem and I had to hunt down an ATAPI slim drive. I also got an IDE adapter and everything is peachy so far.

Got a bunch of caps from badcaps (going to recap 3 boards, this 939A8X-M, my Conroe865PE and the Chaintech from my 98SE build)

Missing:
- round IDE UV green cable, <10 in
- round floppy UV green cable, ditto
- a second 92mm fan for push-pull config
- UV green cable sleeving kit
- crimping tool
- molex removal tool

Should I replace the PSU fan with a led one? I'm thinking this one: http://www.mipc.com.mx/index.php/ha...r-20cg-gp-r4-l2r-20ag-r2-120mm-led-green.html

The LED strip is pretty bright on its own though

 

[t_ski]

Got a bunch of caps from badcaps (going to recap 3 boards, this 939A8X-M, my Conroe865PE and the Chaintech from my 98SE build)

I have a package of my own on its way from Badcaps to me. Easy stuff and works well.

 

[TRWOV]

Recapping is in progress and ordered some stuff online to complete the rig.

I also found an used Acer AL1716w LCD monitor that'll be perfect for the build. I'll pick it up over the weekend.

 

[TRWOV]

Got tangled up and couldn't pick up the monitor. I'm scheduling another date for the pick up.

In the mean time, I changed the PSU fan:

I decided against the LED fan as the LED strip is pretty bright by itself.

 

[TRWOV]

Picked up the monitor today:

The backlight is pretty bright in the AUTO settings; dialed it back to 60. The viewing angle isn't pretty good and the colors look washed out but as it's an old TFT monitor it was expected. Could do worse for ~$35.

Now, should I paint it all green or just the front bezel? Apart from the inverter, is there any other electrical part I should handle with precaution while I take it apart?

specs: http://support.acer.com/acerpanam/monitor/0000/Acer/AL1716/AL1716sp3.shtml

 

[Jayzilla]

Picked up the monitor today:

http://img542.imageshack.us/img542/8087/img0564hg.jpg

The backlight is pretty bright in the AUTO settings; dialed it back to 60. The viewing angle isn't pretty good and the colors look washed out but as it's an old TFT monitor it was expected. Could do worse for ~$35.

Now, should I paint it all green or just the front bezel? Apart from the inverter, is there any other electrical part I should handle with precaution while I take it apart?

specs: http://support.acer.com/acerpanam/monitor/0000/Acer/AL1716/AL1716sp3.shtml

I got the same display as your. Mine is 22inch. Don't paint it. Display frame suppose to be in dark color. Do it ONLY if you like green that much.

I replied on the HD3850 thread. I wanna put you on my work log as a AGP helper. Cool?

 

[TRWOV]

Recapping almost complete:

also joined the TX3 fans into a single plug:

 

[t_ski]

Are you doing all the caps, or just the blown ones?

 

[TRWOV]

all of them... In fact none was blown but according to some reading I did the OST caps often don't bulge even if they fail. Besides I don't have an ESR tester so better safe than sorry.

The only ones I left are the small filter caps (100uf 16v)

 

[TRWOV]

recapping done... I was afraid of having done the board as it looked like one of the solder pads had broken Well, it's posting and alive so there's that... or maybe the cap isn't critical (it's one of the caps near the bottom PCI slot).

BTW, is it just me or it seems like no one in China knows how to properly wire an internal USB cable? It's the 2/2 card reader that I have to re-wire myself (this one was completely backwards).