Kustom PCs offers a custom P180 - bit-tech.net Forums

Da Dego · 30th Nov 2006, 20:48

http://www.bit-tech.net/news/2006/11...C_offers_p180/

It's still the only ATX case I enjoy using...

overdosedelusion · 30th Nov 2006, 20:51

nice ^^ wanted one of these back in the day

DXR_13KE · 30th Nov 2006, 21:34

cool.....

pun intended.

specofdust · 30th Nov 2006, 22:08

Not to diss what Kustom have done, I think that's very cool, and I love that shop. However, I really don't believe that the window doesn't decrease noise dampening, just the sheer fact that it's two bits of material on the side instead of one now must make a difference. I doubt most people would care though, most people stick noisy bits of kit in their PC's.

Does look extremely snazzy though.

jezmck · 30th Nov 2006, 22:11

150 quid! I'd never ever spend that much on a case.

specofdust · 30th Nov 2006, 22:14

Quote:

Originally Posted by jazzle

150 quid! I'd never ever spend that much on a case.

If you spend long enough working inside bad cases, good cases suddenly seem worth the £100-200 they cost. A well designed, easy to use, easy to keep neat, and expandable case - is worth good money, especially if one likes the look of it.

Naberius · 1st Dec 2006, 00:24

The window looks crap tbh, they couldnt even fit it on the inside.

CodeRed · 1st Dec 2006, 01:23

£150 for the P180 with a window mod? are they using bullet proof glass or something, the P180 with out the window mod can be bought for £80.

To be honest I think it spoils the look.

Boon · 1st Dec 2006, 01:42

Quote:

Originally Posted by Naberius

The window looks crap tbh, they couldnt even fit it on the inside.

The legendary Coolermaster BlackWidow had a window on the outside so let's not hold that against KustomPCs. Now a £70 mark up can be held against them.

specofdust · 1st Dec 2006, 01:45

They provide a service, and a very good one at that. They also probably invalidate your warrenty so if the case breaks they'll have to pay to replace it. So it's them adding in a decent plexi window to the price, paying someone to make a good job of modding it in, picking up the cost of a 2 year warrenty, and trying to make a profit. Seems fair enough to me.

Woodstock · 1st Dec 2006, 02:43

i like it alot but by the time its shipped to nz it would cost me both arms so i couldn't install the hardware lol

notatoad · 1st Dec 2006, 03:40

ya, they spoiled it. the beauty of the p180 is the cleanliness, and having a window ruins the perfection, no matter how good a job they do putting it in.

Techno-Dann · 1st Dec 2006, 03:56

The trouble with it is that there's nowhere to hide cables from the PSU, with the window going down that far. I'd rather see the window just show the upper chamber, and maybe not the sides of the drive bays, either. That way, all the mess can be out of sight below the center divider, and the system can look neat and clean up top.

Then again, in my experience, "neat and clean" is relative in a P180.

Boon · 1st Dec 2006, 04:46

Quote:

Originally Posted by specofdust

They provide a service, and a very good one at that. They also probably invalidate your warrenty so if the case breaks they'll have to pay to replace it. So it's them adding in a decent plexi window to the price, paying someone to make a good job of modding it in, picking up the cost of a 2 year warrenty, and trying to make a profit. Seems fair enough to me.

Personally I think an almost 85% addition on the general retail price of the case alone is a little steep; but it's probably just me.

GraemeKustom · 1st Dec 2006, 10:57

Hi Folks,

Thanks for your comments here - I've joined to address a few points raised...

'They couldn't fit it on the inside'

Correct - it's not possible to fit a window on the inside of the P180 case since the structure of the case is almost flush with the side panel. Besides, it wouldn't look so great, since the panel is thicker than most cases and would look a bit ugly to be exposde on the outside. We've been fitting windows on the 'inside' of cases for 6 years, so it would hardly be 'new' news.

Yes, what we've done does draw inspiration from the CoolerMaster cases, although using black rivets to complement the P180 scheme rather than screws.

There's a few concerns about price - yes, it is a lot more than the standard case (which we do continue to sell). The acrylic makes up the bulk of the price increase - it's not something we can buy 'off the shelf' and so the 5mm sheets of acrylic (thicker than the 2mm or 3mm used in most cases) have to be chamfered and polished especially for this modification, since just using a ragged sheet of acrylic would look absolutely awful. I appreciate I shouldn't hotlink images on this forum, but if you click the product link to our site in the article and see the close-up shot you'll appreciate that this acrylic looks far better than what's fitted on most stock cases.

Other than that, it's simply a question of volume - yes, CoolerMaster could produce a windowed case for maybe £20 more than their standard version, but they likely produced a couple of thousand of those at a time. Whereas, we might sell 10 of these over the course of a year. Resulting in higher acrylic price and of course that there's a lot of hand-work involved in actually producing this finished product.

We would love to sell hundreds of them and make it cheaper, but realistically it's unlikely to happen. But at least now anyone looking for a windowed P180 case has a choice that they didn't have before...

Felt it was only fair that I defended our corner a little and explained some of the 'how and why' on this.

Thanks,

Graeme

Cthippo · 1st Dec 2006, 11:17

Thanks for the info, Graeme, and we hope you'll stick around the forums

dragontail · 1st Dec 2006, 15:22

Bit late now, might have thought about that before I bought my Lian Li V1000 PLUS...

Bluephoenix · 3rd Dec 2006, 05:47

I use a P180 for at least three rigs (media center, gaming, and CAD)

and for the gaming rig I felt it would be an interesting engineering project to see what could be done about fitting a window to it.

I threw out an exterior window as being too obtrusive and an interior one due to the fact that it wouldn't fit; so I decided to try a window flush with the exterior of the case.

the key to the project was the triple layer design of the panel. first I cut the window hole out neatly on a CNC machine I homebuilt out of old dot-matrix printers for a CAD/CAM project. once that was done I cut the plexiglas out slightly larger than the case window hole and had the CNC shave off some of the edge so the inner area was the same as the window.

then a couple of well placed drill holes in the corners with a beveled edge and some fan screws was all it took to finish.

I'm quite proud of it, my freind thought it was done by the original manufacturer!

only thing to think about now is some slots for the fan switches..

30th Nov 2006, 20:48	#1
Da Dego Brett Thomas Join Date: Aug 2004 Location: Cleveland, OH USA Posts: 3,906	Kustom PCs offers a custom P180 http://www.bit-tech.net/news/2006/11...C_offers_p180/ It's still the only ATX case I enjoy using... __________________ "Frankly that seems overkill. iluvtrees2 arguing with spec is the intellectual equivalent of a bunny rabbit taking on a pissed-off lion." - Nexxo

30th Nov 2006, 20:51	#2
overdosedelusion I mostly come at night, mostly.. Join Date: Oct 2006 Location: Hampshire UK Posts: 1,275	nice ^^ wanted one of these back in the day __________________ Lian-LI PCA71B \| DFI DK X38-T2R \| q6600 G0 \| ATI 4870X2 \| 4GB 800MHz \| Enermax Galaxy \| Samsung 40" 1080p \| X-Fi Fatality Pro (Games) \| M-Audio 24/96 \| Musical Fidelity V-Dac \| Graham Slee Solo 2009 Headphone Amp \| AKG K701/Audio Technica ATH-W1000 \|

30th Nov 2006, 21:34	#3
DXR_13KE Madeira's banana is the best!!! Join Date: Sep 2005 Location: Madeira ; Portugal Posts: 6,480	cool..... pun intended. __________________ RENEGADE X CONTEST! <---- CLICK if you want to win a free Command & Conquer 4 beta key!

30th Nov 2006, 22:08	#4
specofdust Banned Join Date: Feb 2005 Location: Aberdeen, UK, EU Posts: 7,622	Not to diss what Kustom have done, I think that's very cool, and I love that shop. However, I really don't believe that the window doesn't decrease noise dampening, just the sheer fact that it's two bits of material on the side instead of one now must make a difference. I doubt most people would care though, most people stick noisy bits of kit in their PC's. Does look extremely snazzy though. __________________ Like marmite, only no-one hates it Mmm bop!

30th Nov 2006, 22:11	#5
jezmck ____ Join Date: Sep 2003 Location: Whiteley, Hants Posts: 4,093	150 quid! I'd never ever spend that much on a case. __________________ Have you seen The SketchUp Components Collection's latest items? Interested in a DXF Blueprints Collection? Discuss it here.

1st Dec 2006, 00:24	#7
Naberius Multimodder Join Date: Nov 2006 Location: UK Posts: 193	The window looks crap tbh, they couldnt even fit it on the inside.

1st Dec 2006, 01:23	#8
CodeRed What's a Dremel? Join Date: Nov 2006 Location: East Midlands Posts: 6	£150 for the P180 with a window mod? are they using bullet proof glass or something, the P180 with out the window mod can be bought for £80. To be honest I think it spoils the look.

1st Dec 2006, 01:45	#10
specofdust Banned Join Date: Feb 2005 Location: Aberdeen, UK, EU Posts: 7,622	They provide a service, and a very good one at that. They also probably invalidate your warrenty so if the case breaks they'll have to pay to replace it. So it's them adding in a decent plexi window to the price, paying someone to make a good job of modding it in, picking up the cost of a 2 year warrenty, and trying to make a profit. Seems fair enough to me. __________________ Like marmite, only no-one hates it Mmm bop!

1st Dec 2006, 02:43	#11
Woodstock So Say We All Join Date: Sep 2006 Location: New Zealand Posts: 1,657	i like it alot but by the time its shipped to nz it would cost me both arms so i couldn't install the hardware lol __________________ Hell hath no fury like a hippo with a machine gun.

1st Dec 2006, 03:40	#12
notatoad pretty fing wonderful Join Date: Jun 2004 Location: alberta, canada Special:very Posts: 3,180	ya, they spoiled it. the beauty of the p180 is the cleanliness, and having a window ruins the perfection, no matter how good a job they do putting it in. __________________ the old: gigabyte P35, e4300@2.8GHz, 4GB DDR3-1333, 8800gts 512, win7 the new: DFI M3H5 Jr, phenom 810, 4GB DDR-1600, OCZ Vertex, debian notatoad.net fdo eff

1st Dec 2006, 03:56	#13
Techno-Dann Disgruntled kumquat Join Date: Jan 2005 Location: Pullman WA, USA Posts: 1,572	The trouble with it is that there's nowhere to hide cables from the PSU, with the window going down that far. I'd rather see the window just show the upper chamber, and maybe not the sides of the drive bays, either. That way, all the mess can be out of sight below the center divider, and the system can look neat and clean up top. Then again, in my experience, "neat and clean" is relative in a P180. __________________ The intellitxt demon fell dead, Sir Tim's lance embedded in its heart. The fair land of Bit-Tech was free from its influence once more. And there was much rejoicing.

1st Dec 2006, 10:57	#15
GraemeKustom KustomPCs Join Date: Dec 2006 Posts: 2	Hi Folks, Thanks for your comments here - I've joined to address a few points raised... 'They couldn't fit it on the inside' Correct - it's not possible to fit a window on the inside of the P180 case since the structure of the case is almost flush with the side panel. Besides, it wouldn't look so great, since the panel is thicker than most cases and would look a bit ugly to be exposde on the outside. We've been fitting windows on the 'inside' of cases for 6 years, so it would hardly be 'new' news. Yes, what we've done does draw inspiration from the CoolerMaster cases, although using black rivets to complement the P180 scheme rather than screws. There's a few concerns about price - yes, it is a lot more than the standard case (which we do continue to sell). The acrylic makes up the bulk of the price increase - it's not something we can buy 'off the shelf' and so the 5mm sheets of acrylic (thicker than the 2mm or 3mm used in most cases) have to be chamfered and polished especially for this modification, since just using a ragged sheet of acrylic would look absolutely awful. I appreciate I shouldn't hotlink images on this forum, but if you click the product link to our site in the article and see the close-up shot you'll appreciate that this acrylic looks far better than what's fitted on most stock cases. Other than that, it's simply a question of volume - yes, CoolerMaster could produce a windowed case for maybe £20 more than their standard version, but they likely produced a couple of thousand of those at a time. Whereas, we might sell 10 of these over the course of a year. Resulting in higher acrylic price and of course that there's a lot of hand-work involved in actually producing this finished product. We would love to sell hundreds of them and make it cheaper, but realistically it's unlikely to happen. But at least now anyone looking for a windowed P180 case has a choice that they didn't have before... Felt it was only fair that I defended our corner a little and explained some of the 'how and why' on this. Thanks, Graeme

1st Dec 2006, 11:17	#16
Cthippo Can't mod my way out of a paper bag Join Date: Aug 2005 Location: Bellingham, WA Posts: 4,475	Thanks for the info, Graeme, and we hope you'll stick around the forums __________________ Notice: If we see you flaming we will assume you are on fire and take appropriate measures - The Bit-Tech Fire Brigade.

1st Dec 2006, 15:22	#17
dragontail 7-2 offsuit Join Date: Jun 2005 Location: Belfast/Cambridge Posts: 1,389	Bit late now, might have thought about that before I bought my Lian Li V1000 PLUS... __________________ Project COMTAR Acoustic Guitar, meet Mini-ITX *[ * * * * * * * * ]* MBP 15" \| Dell 2408WFP

3rd Dec 2006, 05:47	#18
Bluephoenix Spoon? What spoon? Join Date: Dec 2006 Location: Daytona Beach, FL Posts: 936	I use a P180 for at least three rigs (media center, gaming, and CAD) and for the gaming rig I felt it would be an interesting engineering project to see what could be done about fitting a window to it. I threw out an exterior window as being too obtrusive and an interior one due to the fact that it wouldn't fit; so I decided to try a window flush with the exterior of the case. the key to the project was the triple layer design of the panel. first I cut the window hole out neatly on a CNC machine I homebuilt out of old dot-matrix printers for a CAD/CAM project. once that was done I cut the plexiglas out slightly larger than the case window hole and had the CNC shave off some of the edge so the inner area was the same as the window. then a couple of well placed drill holes in the corners with a beveled edge and some fan screws was all it took to finish. I'm quite proud of it, my freind thought it was done by the original manufacturer! only thing to think about now is some slots for the fan switches..