Scratch Build – In Progress Project: Der_Meister - custom alu case *Epilogue Nov 8th, 2007*

@ zds: thanks for the concern, it's already changed (the tubing is one hole lower in the Aquatube, it's of course a different piece of tubing. It's now a couple of centimeters longer so the kinking is not a big issue. Besides, it's only used when filling the system so if kinking should occur, I can always just push it open when filling the next time.


@ all: thanks for the comments.


I've got good news: the new pump controller arrived today. I was anxious so I immediatly tested it. Success! Everything works 100% fine now. At the time I'm typing this, I've just finished filling the loop, the pump is now on it's standard programme (not filling-mode) and I'm going to leave it running like this till tonight (at least 8 hours). At least everything looks good at the moment: no leaks in sight!

Things left to do:
- keep an eye on watercooling 'test' run, make sure there's no leaking (today)
- system test (which includes installation of optical bay) (today/tomorrow)
- mount the last pieces of alu in the case (tomorrow/wednesday)
- prepare hard drives (thursday/friday)
- install hard drives (week-end)

So unless the system test goes very wrong, this is the last week
Since I've got some work left on the Samurize config and pics of system tests are boring, I don't think there will be an update with pics this week. I will keep you all informed about the things I listed above...

 

I've been following this build closely since I signed up to these boards. I'm looking forward to seeing the final pictures of this case. Get the tripod ready.

 

Wow. Congratulations.

Whats the first run on this monster? You have any games or to break this virgin beast in? You running vista?

 

small heads up.

Yesterday was a good day, I did A LOT on the Samurize config (it should be finished before I start using the case, which is a good thing of course). I also did more than I planned on the case itself. Here's the updated list:

Things left to do:
- keep an eye on watercooling 'test' run (done)
- system test (done)
- mount the last pieces of alu in the case (a few parts done, the rest today)
- prepare hard drives (thursday/friday)
- install hard drives (week-end)

The watercooling test went 100% okay, no leaks, no problems. The pump was pretty 'loud' at first, but it gradually went more and more silent. The sight of the water 'fountain' in the Aquatube is priceless.

The system test was a success as well, there were a few small things that needed to be taken care of, but it's all good now. Even though a few of the RCA contacts seem to be not 100%, but it's only a matter of putting in the right cable (some cables work better with some RCA sockets than with others, strange but true).

A few prelimerary numbers of the watercooling and the case:
(with all the fans at 7V or about 60% of their capacity)
-flow rate: around 95 l/h
-idle cpu temp: around 40° C
-idle mobo (NB) temp: around 35° C
-water temp: around 25° C
None of these are final, they're just read in the BIOS and from the thermal probes on the Aquaero. The only trustworthy one is the water temp.


Finally:

@B[x]: I will take pics on Sunday. A friend of mine is coming over. Together we'll have two D-SLR's (Canon 350D and Nikon D70), a few high range lenses, a few flashes, tripods, etc etc... The FIN pics will be sweet.

@Damouse: First of all of course will be installing all my software. Then I plan on a benchmark run with 3DMark06 (full version came with the vid card). After that, I've got a lot of games waiting to be played, even though I'm not a diehard gamer. Remember that the first aims of the case are silent operation, and full multimedia capabilities (movies, music station). Vista is still a no-no for me, I'm waiting for SP1

 

Nice that the watercooling is working ,waiting on final pics now.

 

Again, this project is exceeding my expectations. Keep at it.

 

Great project!Keep it up.

 

let's update this one:

Things left to do:
- keep an eye on watercooling 'test' run (done)
- system test (done)
- mount the last pieces of alu in the case (done)
- prepare hard drives (starting thursday)
- install hard drives (week-end)
- take final pics (sunday)

In short, looking at what's left, I can say that the case is, well...done. WOOHOO! But let's stay modest for a few more days, wait till sunday when I feed my winxp cd and start the installation...

Apart from this, the Samurize config is about done. I first had a very complex thing in mind, but -taking into account the 5" lcd and its s-video signal- I think in this case less-is-more. So it turned out rather simple, but it'll contain all info that I want. I'll try to finish it tonight and post a screenshot of it.

 

Come on , I will blow soon !! Please Photos , please , I cant wait , thank you

 

sorry, apart from the samurize config, no pics till next week. Sunday there's a photoshoot of the case, and then I'll be mostly installing my software on it. I'll work on the pics on my other rig though, but everything combined means it'll take some time.

 

Samurize config

As promised, here’s the Samurize config I’ll be using. Keep in mind that this is just a beta-version!!!! It still needs fine-tuning, especially the gauges!!!

Since I don’t have the Aquasuite (software by Aqua-Computer that essentially puts all the Aquaero data in a GUI in Windows) running, most of the meters are showing either cpu or mobo temp at the moment. It’s just for reference.

Here’s the config:


Very Der_meister style, right?

The gauges on the right are inspired by the incredible new Porsche Turbo…another product the Germans can be proud of. The middle gauge shows water temp, the other four are obvious if you look at the labels (VRAM is the vid card memory).

On the left, there’s the flowrate, followed by fan speed (as a %) and total MB downloaded and uploaded. For the fans, there’s a progress bar as well as a value.

On the lower right, there’s a Winamp info screen. The top line shows time played, total time and track number of the song currently playing, the lower line shows artist name and song title. The top line is fixed, the lower scrolls.

Once I’ve installed the necessary software, I’ll test it on the 5” screen. I’m a bit afraid that the left part will be too small. I can always scrap the download/upload meters and enlarge the others. The Winamp part is small but should be readable. It’s of course more to show off than anything else.

Tell me what you think…

 

WOW ?? Dude you PRO

keep it up , This look sexy

 

That's awesome. Is it heavy to run it on the background?
Oh and what's the flowrate's unit? Or is it relative to something?

 

/me trys to locate jaw

damn dude that is one sexy display

 

thanks guys,
@randosome: hope you find that jaw

The flowrate's unit will be liter/hour. In the pic I posted here it's amount of free RAM, since I have no watercooling in my temp pc that I made this on.

It's not heavy at all to run it. All the meters are very standard and have low mem usage. The background graphic is loaded when Samurize starts, then it's just updating those meters. I think all the other programs needed to get the info for the meters will use more memory (I need the Aquasuite for the watercooling info, Rivatuner for the vid card info and something like MBM for CPU and mainboard info).

 

Sometimes your work look sexy... sometimes look even sexy...
:-]
Good photo set, as usual I stay here with popcorn and coca waiting for you...
Someone want some popcorn? :-]

 

ohh, i see the Rammstein logo .

 

Looks good, but if you ask me, you should replace those "digital letters" with some other font... Perhaps the one you used for the "Benzin"-logo

Keep up the good work

 

I did it with the 'digital' letters because I think it'll look best on the small 5" screen. I needed a font that easily readable for it. I also wanted to get the look and feel of lcd screens...so that automatically implies an lcd-font...

 

You won't need MBM for CPU and mainboard info. Alot of those are available natively in Samurize (just hard to find). Otherwise you can pull the majority of your system statistics from Speedfan. Which you're already doing...
My offer of help still stands if there's anything you want to improve but are stuck on.