Project : Lupine

Hey! What is a coomputer without a mobo, and the mobo finally makes it's first appearance! An Asus A8V-E Deluxe (socket 939, VIA 890 based PCI-E solution) with an FX-53 already making itself at home!
http://home.comcast.net/~craig.tate/lupine/mobo0.jpg

Joining in the fray was a Coolermaster Hyper 48 CPU cooler. This is a $40-$50 cooler that I found on sale for under $9 NEW!!!! (bought 2!) I about flipped out! It looks great, and according to the reviews that I have seen, is a pretty darn good performer!
http://home.comcast.net/~craig.tate/lupine/mobo1.jpg

It comes with everything seen here, is P4 and K8 ready (not that I need the P4 bit... but maybe I can make something useful out of the spare parts later! ;) )
http://home.comcast.net/~craig.tate/lupine/mobo2.jpg

The base is very smooth, and only an insane CPU lapper would go after this surface... Mmmmmm, tasty! :)
http://home.comcast.net/~craig.tate/lupine/mobo3.jpg

After mounting the heatsink, and getting the heat pipes oriented the way I wanted them to go... I realized that the fan lead for the CPU fan was now hanging in the front of the CPU.... that is a "no no" in my book. 4 Screws off the top, twist the fan 2 clicks so that the lines are now sprouting out the back... and then I screwed the fan back into place!
http://home.comcast.net/~craig.tate/lupine/mobo4.jpg
http://home.comcast.net/~craig.tate/lupine/mobo5.jpg

Then I sleeved that awful loud colored cabling on the fan, trying to subdue it a bit and calm it down to work with the rest of my mod...
http://home.comcast.net/~craig.tate/lupine/mobo6.jpg

Damn, that looks a *lot* better, and leave plenty of room for my new memory that I won over on insaneTek (http://www.insanetek.com/forums/show...5&page=1&pp=10), TWINX1024-3200XL's with black heat spreaders!!!!
Yummy! ;)
http://home.comcast.net/~craig.tate/lupine/mobo7.jpg

Just waiting for the case to give it a home... damn. that looks nice all by itself!
http://home.comcast.net/~craig.tate/lupine/mobo8.jpg

What? What did you say? "What about the ATX adaptor?" "Did you finish it up or did you leave it half painted like the earlier pic?" Heck no! 4 coats later.... Hehehee... trick on this piece was that the cluster of cables caused problems getting all of them painted, so I'd have to wait until the vinyl dye dried, then I'd flex the bundle or twist it, until I had more cables exposed. Then I'd spray what I saw. Mind you, I made it a point to make sure that no dye touched the pins on the bottoms of the plugs. Only the sides and the tops... and the cables... were sprayed.
http://home.comcast.net/~craig.tate/...x_adaptor3.jpg


And this is a teaser pic for what I plan on doing with the rest of the cables in Lupine....
http://home.comcast.net/~craig.tate/...x_adaptor4.jpg
Mmmmmm, tasty!

;)

More tomorrow! I'm rolling now!!!

Wow dude! What an update... you've done so much. I really love the ATX power adaptor, the way you've sleeved it it looks so professional. Good job on that! Good job on everything so far. By the way this is the first time I see an inside of a PSU hehe, thanks for the pics. Anyway thanks for the update, keep it going it's looking awesome!

Looking very nice sir.

Thanks guys! Well... I wonk this morning and went out to see how the acrylic had fared during drying last night, and was not happy at all....

Apparently my heating of the acrylic changed the physical properties a bit, and my special silver paint caused a really whacked out pattern of out-gassing. It honestly looked sick (like a bad rash or something) on the side that I was expecting to be glossy smooth...

So, Plan B. Keep the acrylic shape that I busted a hump on, but now make it an opaque, deep purple (if I can find that color) *orrrrr* I can shot the outside with the Metalcast primer then overlay is with the Purple MetalCast. *ding*... I like that last idea!

"Oh well..." what 'cha gonna do?
;)

Nice work! Are you going to be routing the cables behind the motherboard tray?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by James

Nice work! Are you going to be routing the cables behind the motherboard tray?

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Yep! I will be housing all of the cabling behind the tray.

I didn't realize that Heatsink was so huge.. I love the Purple Springs.. Have we figured out the Plexi Shield you was working on. Did a couple more coats help or what?? BTW: thats some excellent RAM. I have 2 gigs worth in my Fragbox...

No... the shield ended up needing a painting on the out side to cover up the problems on the inside. I'll know how it came out when I get home tonight, and give the purple a rub down.

Also used the springs on my 2 fan headers, my front panel USB and firewire cables. Looks pretty cool! I've got an idea to route them that might be pretty sweet!

It's all in the details!

That is one sweet looking case!!
Keep the updates coming, haha.

Too tired tonight to post up all of the pics... so I'll give you a teaser pic of the end result achieved!!!

I'm about 90% done with the power supply:
http://home.comcast.net/~craig.tate/.../ps_teaser.jpg

More tomorrow!

It's almost a mirror! That's some very impressive work so far. Keep it up!

Quote:

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Originally Posted by SprySpectre

It's almost a mirror! That's some very impressive work so far. Keep it up!

---

Yeah indeed. It looks so pure... good job man!

Thanks guys!
I have to move on, so the power supply will just have to do for now. I have a plan on making this chrome effect much better in the future, but deadlines are deadlines!

For lack of a better word, vinyl chrome! ;)
http://home.comcast.net/~craig.tate/...s_material.jpg
http://home.comcast.net/~craig.tate/..._material2.jpg

The powersupply pulled apart before getting attacked:
http://home.comcast.net/~craig.tate/lupine/ps0.jpg

The top with the vinyl treatment:
http://home.comcast.net/~craig.tate/lupine/ps1.jpg

Showing off the reflectivity with 2 fan grills that I hit with the purple Metalcast:
http://home.comcast.net/~craig.tate/lupine/ps2.jpg

Close up of the vents on the supply. Those hex holes are going to be the death of me! ;)
http://home.comcast.net/~craig.tate/lupine/ps3.jpg

I did these side holes (that will not be visable from the window) just to see if I could find a mechanism to make the hex mesh chromed, and I found a way... but it is VERY time intensive. It involved poking an X with an exacto knife in each hex center through the vinyl. Then, using a hex wrench that was sized to perfectly pass through the mesh hole... I put it on top and pushed it through the X spot. The vinyl then went through the hole with the wrench, and left a little tail of material that was to be trimmed off later. My main concern where the large vented area was, is the close proximity of current bearing devices (read: electrical components) and I just did not want to risk accidentally having the vinyl touching something and shorting out... this is a silver vinyl after all, I'm sure there is some sort of metal in it.... so I have a plan on the large meshed area, but I need more time to complete that task, so that is one of the fixes that will have to eait for later....
http://home.comcast.net/~craig.tate/lupine/ps4.jpg

Fan grills in place, PS *effectively* completed. I say effectively, because I know what I need to do to fix the errors that I made on applying this material, but I'll have to reapply the vinyl at a later date to resolve those things.

Now, I need to go and install the supply and start working on the remaining cable management, and LED placement. Drop in the board, and get this thing installed!
http://home.comcast.net/~craig.tate/lupine/ps5.jpg

Test fit, not final by any stretch, but the exercise lets me see how everything is working now. Found 2 issues that I need to affect changes to, in order to complete the case later.

But these will give you an idea of where I am going, and how the collection of parts works together!

http://home.comcast.net/~craig.tate/lupine/testfit1.jpg
http://home.comcast.net/~craig.tate/lupine/testfit2.jpg
http://home.comcast.net/~craig.tate/lupine/testfit3.jpg
http://home.comcast.net/~craig.tate/lupine/testfit4.jpg
http://home.comcast.net/~craig.tate/lupine/testfit5.jpg
http://home.comcast.net/~craig.tate/lupine/testfit7.jpg

I have some work to do back here, and not a whole lotta space to work with. Have an idea though. and will try that tomorrow while the last paint will be drying.
http://home.comcast.net/~craig.tate/lupine/testfit6.jpg