Scratch Build – In Progress Woah Black Betty (Bam-A-Lam) - New editing suite desk and case build/mod.

First things first, the name.... When I was starting the design work, I was listening to the radio when Ram Jam came on.... then it struck me - I like simple, non-intrusive designs, and I like simple black cases with no "glam", however, this kids gone wild.

So moving on, this is a combination scratch build and mod, with the desk and many components being scratch built and the case - currently being modded - soon to be scratch built, materials and tools pending.

Design goals:

Background: The minister of finance and I live in a modest 2 bedroom house with 2 sprogs and space is often at a premium. We're not into gaming (Much) and we mostly use the computer for semi-pro video and photo editing.

Our environment is complex to say the least and chock full of gear in a very confined space, so I'm trying my damndest to build a desk which will ensure everything is self-contained in a little space as possible, and keep the wife happy, whilst still having the most complete system available.​

The Design: Starting with the Desk, it's going to be 1800x800x600mm WxHxD and despite my complete lack of skills in any form of deign tool, I seem to have bashed up a semi-decent looking design. (To my mind anyway)​

Above all else, the desk must be easy on the eye as it lives in our master-bedroom, quiet and extremely reliable.​

The Desk will have have 3 rack mount areas, the Left will be primarily for drawers, the right for the computer, scanner, VCR, UPS and more, and the top surface will have a 3U space for the desk mounted CD/DVD/Blu-Ray and the soundcard.​

I'm new to modding, and scratch building and I hope though this journey to achieve something elegant; and whilst I could never shine a light on his amazing work, I credit Attila Lukacs aka oldnewby with providing me the inspiration to even consider trying. ​

The Specifications: Here are the specifications of the entire system, some are not yet here, others are, and then there are some which I have yet to commence, but it's comming.​

Anything with "This build" is what I'll be using temporarily, until budget allows for the intended.

In the PC:

CPU: To be: Intel W3680 or X5690 (This build: Xeon E5506)​

MB: Asus P6X58-E WS (I'll make sense soon, I hope)​

RAM: 24GB Kingston 1333Mhz ECC​

GPU: MSI GTX 580 Lightning Xtreme Edition 3GB (This build: MSI GTX 560ti)​

PSU: Enermax MaxRevo 1500W​

Though I'll proberbly never use 1500W, it was selected because it provides stable power and hopefully the fan will barely turn under normal use​

CPU Cooler: Noctua D14​

HDD: 24 x 2.5" NL and Enterprise Class SATA and SAS disks (I'll explain more as I go)​

A Whole bunch of Noctua Fans (As budget allows)​

RAID: Internal and LSI 9265i SAS​

Case: 5u PCI Case CRS-9008b (It may look like a turd, but it's going to suit as a temporary soltion) Soon to be scratch build.​

On the desk:

Sound: Focusrite Saffire Pro 24 DSP​

Speakers: KRK RP6 G2 Phantom Grey​

Headphones: AKG HSD-271​

Screen: HP LP2475w WCG IPS​

Printers: Epson r800 and ALPS MD-5500​

Scanner: Epson v700 ​

Interfaces: Bella DV 3.0 editing keyboard, 3dConnexion, Wacom Bamboo mouse/pen, Novint Falcon ​

​

Let's begin with a preview, there will be more to follow, but as I'm often time-poor between work and the kids, it's going to be a bit slow, sorry.

Also, I'm a first time modder, builder, etc. so please be kind to me.

I do apologise upfront for the terrible Google sketchup images.... I'll get there...

There have been many ammendments to the design since, however, it's all in my head and I'm going to spend the time building now, rather than designing.

The Desk:








The PC:

 

In progress...

One thing I failed to mention in my previous post is that work is currently well underway and my worklog is well behind, I though I had better get started writing this up, but hopefully i'll pull my finger out and keep things going.

As mentioned, work is in progress, and I show pictures of the desk build shortly, but for now I'll do a it of an update on the PC.

I'm working on this in two streams - Noisy (Durring the day on the weekends) and Quiet (Anytime) so as not to upset the neighbours any more than normal.

Below you can see what I mean when I say this case looks like a bit of a turd, but even Myth Busters managed to polish a turd, so let's see what I can do.

The reality is, this case is only (hopefully) a short term solution - It's going to server a few purposes, the first is to get this new PC up and running so that we've got a new running PC. (duh)

The second is as a base for the next phase of the design - modification to be a Case close to the intended design.

The third is as a bit of a test bed, allowing me to expreiment with different aspects of what I want to do without costing me a load more than I have to budget with.

It's a good-ish, cheap, solid-ish 5RU back steel case, with loads of volume for me to playwith and enough room to fill with almost any potentions component and cooling I wish.

Soon I hope to replace it with a complete scratch built case, but I need a platform to work from first -this is it - as it's my first ever mod and scratch build in one.

The case in it's un-mollestered state:




These are interesting - internal PCI retention units - Hmm, I'll see what I can do with those:


The Case with it's soon to be internals:

 

Very good looking, nice work on the renders

 

WIP: Quiet Stream - A case of case molestation

Thanks xSoMBrAx, loving Little Angel myself.

The computer is going into use shortly so to make things easier to mod as I go, I'm drilling out all the damn rivets that was used to assemble it.....









Brushing out the shavings:



Lot's of rivets (lesson, remove the rivets from the drill bit as you do them, it's a sodding task removing them as a big bunch):



... and replacing them with screws and nuts:

(Being organised for once)





In two pieces:



The front part of the case (shown on the right in the image above) will go and be replaced with a grid of 8 x 92mm PWM fans controlled by the motherboard connector, but powered via the PSU.

The goal here is to help it breath a little better, but not sound like that mouth breather who works at the supermarket checkout.

It will be prefaced with a custom mesh air filter to keep the dust bunnies at bay and a 5U black anodised aluminium 19" rack panel with openings cut out of the front.

I plan on doing somthing interesting with the fans and ducting it to the right places, possibly using CF or fibreglass etc. but I'm experimenting here, so let's see how we go.

I've drilled out, shapped a hole and added an 8 pin female mini-din connector to the rear of the case which will serve as the connector for the front pannel headers (Power and reset switch, HDD and Power LED) - I'm also doing somthing interesting with the motherboard header, which I'm sure has been done before, but I loath cables especially messy internal cables. - You'll see soon.



If we refer back to the 3rd render in my first post, you'll see I'm running the DVD/Blu-Ray drive from on the desk, the idea being never having to reach down to the PC to access these common items.

This will be a custom 19" 1U rack plate which will hold the:

• FocusRite Saffire Pro 24 DSP Sound card
• DVD Drive
• Front Pannel Switches - Power/Reset
• USB and FireWire Ports
• CF Card Reader

Despite the image, this is now a 3U space, not 2U.


The CD/DVD/Blu-ray drive and CF reader are powered and run via a 2 port ESATAPd (5v+12v) PCIe card and 2 x 2 meter ESATAPd cables. (I'll put up a photo of these shortly) They're frekkin' fantastic, combining both power and data in one cable.

The soundcard is FireWire powered, this will drive the two KRK RP6 G2 Studio Monitors and AKG HSD271 headphones.

Sidenote: As all wiring is to be hidden thoughout the desk, I'm using an extrordinate amount to right,left,up and down angle power and data cables.


Nothing quite prepares you for the size of the Noctua NH-D14 CPU Cooler - I lived in an apartment once that was smaller than this thing:



Starting some assembly - PSU first:

The cross member seems like a great place to hide the CPU 8 pin and PCIe Video Cables:



And I'm loving this modular PSU business (I'm a bit out of touch):



ATX 24 pin is an unrully beast that you can do nothing with, but this seems like a good-ish idead:



Getting a grip on the auxilary cables (CD,HDD etc):





Attempting to wrangle the cables:






And assembled for the initial testing:



I'm planning on doing somthing special for the cabling, but I'm waiting on parts to do so at the moment and experimenting whilst I wait; hopefully the wonderful image in my head will work out.


The motherboard arrived today also, however, it was rough handled in transit (boxes look like it was runover) and doesn't work, so I'm going to have to wait a few weeks before I get it back. (From the US)

That's it for tonight, more later I hope.

 

I will be following this one!

 

I've sub'd

This looks very interesting.

 

IMHO you're there!

This looks intriguing! 24x2,5" discs... Actulaly can't wait to see this get going!

 

WIP: Bit of show and tell and what's going on. oh and a bit of advice needed.

Thanks Lance, hopefully the brainfart will turn out.

Tak Angel OD, Love the work you did on the G5, turning it into a real computer.

###

So the build is well underway, the claim for the motherboard is in and I'm working on some of the experiments.

But first, I thought I'd share with you what I'm replacing....

The original desk, which is an unfinished MK I if you will is just crammed with stuff right now and it's getting irritating and the complaints from its main user are mounting.

But this is the current situation in all its glory, I'm only showing the top of the desk, because the rest is just too embarrassing:

The desktop (the surface of the desk, not the ima... ah, you know what I mean):



Detail on the keyboard etc:


(That came out a bit blurry, must get my eye's checked!)

Detail on the left:

1 x Epson R800 Printer
1 x KRK RP6 G2 Phantom Grey
1 x Billion 7404VNOX Router
1 x Snow White DVD (Which my daughter watches on the computer in our bed sometimes.)
Camera Battery Chargers, Corner of the monitor, etc.



Detail on the right:

1 x Alps MD-5500 Printer (under the dust cover)
1 x FocusRite Saffire Pro 24 DSP
1 x Wacom Bamboo Fun Medium
1 x KRK RP6 G2 Phantom Grey
Camera Battery Chargers, Corner of the monitor, USB card reader, etc.




You can see it's a bit of an unholy crowded desktop.

Side note: I chose the KRK phantom grey's because normal KRK (and other studio monitors for that matter) tend to have Yellow or other brightly coloured cones, which if fine for music studio work, but for video, it's a distraction, the grey cones are not. Particularly when you go to lengths such as high CRI lighting, colour corrected LCD monitor and neutral walls.

Now, what have I been doing?

Experimenting.... that’s what.

First time making PSU cables, for one:



I'm experimenting with different glues at the moment, you'll see soon I hope.





Lesson: if you're ever going to make your own cables for the first time like I am, (ATX, PCIe, etc.) buy about 1000 of the connector pins - and when you’re done practicing with those, buy 1000 more, have one PCIe connector done clean the remainder from the floor and buy 1000 more to do the next PCIe connector. I'm missing a pint of blood I'm sure and have used my entire repertoire of profanity do so.


and making custom header connectors...

Side note: Asus make these great little connectors they call q-connectors, with the motherboard power and reset switches and PWR,HDD LED's as well as the speaker, making installation easier.... I'm taking it a step further.

If you remember this little puppy:



This is where it's going:



... and this is what I'm going through to get there:







Next is to solder up the cable to the mini-din 8 pin connect and create it's matting connector for the desktop component.


Now for the advice needed bit... I'm not real happy with the crimp tool I'm using, I have zero confidence in the crimps, i'll probably solder them as an extra step and have bought the MDPC tool, but wanted to know what others are using, especially as I'm using 16AWG wire.

That's all for now. I’ll try and get some pics of the desk in progress this weekend.

And thanks to those who've offered the compliments and support to a newbie.