Well that certainly didn't take long. 303 done, Pax (aus) done, still had an itch, I got tired of my desk frame I knocked up (intended project, half baked, lost interest etc) decided I wanted something… better… stylish, less awkward. So here we are. During the last 3-4 months there's been a resurgence in popularity of a particular case I always fancied building in, the Inwin 909, after seeing builds completed by both watermod and twister mods I decided it was a perfect time to do something special. My intentions were simple, out side the box and something entirely unique. Logo cut into the front panel and a 480mm rad stuffed in there should tick those boxes. No? Couple that with some of the rgb work I had been doing in relation to the 303 and the ideas and modding juices were flowing. So I got the case, tore it down.. I love that inwin screwed the inner body to the outer. Talk about modular! 3-1/2 hdds have to go…. No problems, pass through up top needs to be bigger, easy.. the material so easy to cut with a 100mm grinder… I fell into the cutting so blinly I hadnt really thought to hard on what i’d do to mount the radiator… I mean I had some fair inspiration from daniels build using the same area for the 360mm but having spoken to him his method of fixing wouldnt work in my instance. So I hit the local hardware for some angle, 25x40 should cut it fine. So cut some lengths and played with a few ways to mount. I decided one long rail for support in the rear and a small almost bracket type deal was the best way to go. So got them all shaved up and fitting snug. (the bits power rad was only for fitting tests as I was using the ek se 480mm from the desk. So rads in and still squeezes into the case with ample room left.. Now for the daunting part… That front panel that everyone ooos and ahhs about is 4mm thick polished aluminum. There certainly was one ahhh and it was promptly followed by a certain four letter word. Easiest and best way to cut 4mm ally with only the tools at hand…. I tapped the hell out of everywhere I was cutting and most of the surrounding area to prevent acciddents, taped the outline down so I had a shape sent a quick prayer to the mod gods and drilled some pilot holes aka 3 points of no return. I broke out the dremel and attempted routing it… In 5 mins I had a hole about the size of a 5 cent piece… nah this aint working… I then remembered a cheeky purchase I made for the desk… bi-metal jigsaw blades… 6mm max… designed for aluminium and steel… ha! Fast forward another 5 minutes and I had this! Add another 5 and there was this! So I had the rad ready, the front panel cut, but wanted it to glow nicely. I didnt want the grainy sanded look of the clear acrylic frosted.. so I order some opal acrylic and backed it with that instead One of the things I worked out early on as I tore the case down was the front (side) io had a white strip light that had some “fancy” effects. Ok had… I pulled it apart to take a closer look at how it was setup… That looks suspisiously as wide as one of my custom led strips… *lightning bolt moment* So grabbed the soldering iron and whipped up some strips one for the io and one to replace the inwin logo which was also in white. If anyone’s joined the dots by now you can see whats coming. Loads of cases now support lcs, rgb lighting, and stuff like that, my aim was for a fully synced system running in-win aurora or aura if asus fixes the limitations and broken stuff on it! So without further ado ill leave you with the videos showing the tests for the lighting Thanks for dropping by for part 1, as this build is currently almost finished a lot of people will have already seen it, between work and trying to get it done fast as its my personal system have waited till its almost fully ready before posting so the next update should be up in the next few days! Til then!
The log continues So rads in, case is cut, some of the lights are in. Now the nitty griity. The constant place part here test fit remove repeat. So I played with various layouts of the case but using an ek dual d5 pump doesnt leave much room for a 250 res. As I had to close off the front rad/fan mount because of the lighting I decided to mount the res there and keep the dual d5 in the rear chamber. So here’s some various fitment pics and what I ultimately came up with layout wise. Please note disaster warning ahead. And also the sp120s arent the final fans, these were only being used till my aurora fans came so I ordered one of the first ek x3 250 RGB res, nice single colour rgb fairly tasteful fits any build style… was keen as hell to get it as ek is generally the cream of the crop with watercooling gear etc. so while im fitting stuff in various spots to see what will look best the cable went real limp. Ok was fine a second ago. pulled it out and the cable just fell out in my hands. …. well this sucks… so again I fired up the soldering iron, ready to restrengthen the solder so it wouldn’t just fall off any more… then I thought I have high count strips left over.. maybe go all out, so 5 mins later I ended up with this The intention was always to use the mayhems aurora fluid, after the 303 and the way the lights played on it, makes a great feature, so this time I thought id kick it up a notch with some addressables With the loop basically decided as there wasn’t too many ways left to do it that would work well or flow well it was time to start bending. So ill leave you guys with some progress on that and when I post part 3 ill start with the leak testing and fan replacement to basically where things are now.
thanks man yeah i was packing my self the whole time unsure how it would go but worked much better than anticipated!
Lovely work, especially cutting the ROG logo. Any chance of some hi-res pictures of your top rad mounting to clearly show how you did it? I've been knocking around ideas myself for a 909 mod with a rad up top and it's be good to see your take on it. I couldn't work out how Twister did his.
hey man, yeah twister went a different way and used a sandwich plate mounted up there to do his. i went this way as both sides will support each other i didn't feel the need to cover off at every screw mount.
Suppose i should wriggle on with the posting of the rest of my progress. So when i left you all last i was in progress of filling the loop and testing etc. So for the leak test i went straight di water and all went well there and then found some left over aurora, so tested with that. Came up better than i expected! But then the deliveries came and it was finally time to get things moving. so the overall appearance before fans and proper coolant. I found it a bit dark. the photos were nice an vibrant but there were a few dead spots. So i added some back lit shrouding which helped to brighten things up a bit basically trimmed some off cuts of the opal sheet to size, And with that ended up with this Now there's a feel of vibrance to the build from the colour effects, and these can be fully modified and run in what ever pattern i choose One last thing i did prior to this point was vinyl wrap the psu shroud panel with the logos hand cut. well, now i am only waiting on one last part for the build which is the last of the 2 mechanical drives this one will be my storage drive for all my bits and pieces, ill include a full wrap around set of photos once this is in and all done to show that no effort was really spared in any side of the build. and with that ill leave a list of the full specs below so you know exactly whats gone in. CPU - INTEL CORE I5 6600K MOBO - ASUS Z270E STRIX RAM - G-SKILL TRIDENT Z RGB 16GB @ 2400MHZ SDD - INTEL 600P 256GB SOLID STATE HDD #1 - SEAGATE FIRECUDA 2.5" 2TB SSHD HDD#2 - SEAGATE FIRECUDA 2.5" 1TB SSHD GPU - ASUS STRIX GTX 1080 CASE - INWIN 909 PSU - RM1000 LIGHTING - INWIN AURORA / CUSTOM STRIPS (ADDRESSABLE RGB) FANS - INWIN AURORA CPU BLOCK - EK ACETAL AND NICKEL SUPREMECY EVO GPU BLOCK - EK FCB STRIX GTX1080 PLEXI AND NICKEL RADIATORS - EK SE 240MM AND 480MM FITTINGS - EK BLACK 10/12MM RES - EK RES-X3 250 RGB PUMP EX X-TOP REVO DUAL D5
