Well, my [thread=134361]first modding experience[/thread] is on indefinate hold, but I enjoy designing different concepts. As Nexxo urged people to post their concepts in his [thread=160608]Ada[/thread] concept thread, I thought I'd post mine: This is a planned mini ITX media centre/NAS consisting of the following components: Motherboard: Intel DG45FC Socket 775 Processor: Intel Core2Duo E6600 Memory: 2x1GB Corsair XMS2 PC-6400 Power Supply: 120W PicoPSU System Hard Drive: 80GB 2.5" SATA NAS Hard Drives: 4x500GB 3.5" SATA Optical Drive: Sony NEC AD-7633A Slot Load The CPU will be passively cooled using heatpipes connected to the aluminium fins covering the top of the system. The lower section (HD & optical drives) measures 200x200x140mm (wxdxh) and the upper section measures 200x200x80mm. Due to the small dimensions, I'm hoping to mill the entire casing of each section from one piece of Ash, resulting in a (close to) perfect finish. The large knob on the upper section will act as volume conrol and an on button, wheras the lower section houses an analogue dial showing sound levels in db. This project is just in the pipeline at the moment and will hopefully materialise once I upgrade my current CPU to a Q6600, giving my the proc needed for this build. Sometime next year is the estimate, over summer? Thanks for looking.
Well I have these: They've got an ash vaneer, but not really fussed. This'll be something which sits under the tv, looking pretty lol. Was just thinking, placing the DVD drive in the upper section, making the two sections of equal height would work better. They could then be placed side by side and look alot better. I'll have a play tomorrow.
Updated Renders Here are the updated renders I promised: I've estimated the cost of components, not including Proc will be ~ £230, maybe less buying second hand. I've got an analogue gauge and the large volume knob to use. But the wood (Ash), aluminium and heatpipes will add another ~ £50min. I'd also need the money to upgrade to a Q6600, freeing the E6600 for this. Lastly, my Terratec 2400i has been included as the tv card. I'll see how things go over christmas on the money front, though I've just had a tax rebate of £120 which can go towards the mod. Cheers.
Question about your heat pipes and large heat sink it's connected to, are you planning on building your own heat pipes, hacking them off of existing heat sinks, or is that not custom and something that either was bought as an add on or came with the motherboard/processor?
As I recall, there are a few places on the internet where you can order custom-length heapipes. You just bend them into the correct shape and install them in your fins. However, I couldn't find any sources with just a few seconds of searching; it'll take a bit more effort.
Cool, I'll have to look into that, because I've been toying with the idea of playing around with heat pipes, but as I've seen with a few builds it's a little messy hacking them off of existing heat sinks. 2 second search gave me http://www.cooliance.com/custom_heatpipes.html I never even thought of companies who'd do that
mCubed sells heatpipes too. However for this project I would simply scavenge a Scythe Zipang heatsink. You can pick one up for £30,--.
The CPU cooler would be the most diffictult thing on this build if I was building it from scratch. I'm running a Thermalright SI-128 in my current rig which I could use, but it'll never quite look right as no Processor sockets are set in the centre of motherboards. The only way I can see of making it work would be with a scratch heatsink build, salvaging the block off my old Zalman CNPS 9000, where the heatpipes are removable. I'd look at buying some custom length heatpipes and bend them myself (can't be that hard?) then soldering on some aluminium fins. As this pc would just be used as a media centre/NAS (and the onboard video on that mobo handles the video decoding) I would run the Cor2Duo underclocked, enabling me to run it passively. I'm gonna need to come up with some cooling for the HD's aswell (without fans if pos), I'll see what I can come up with. Maybe something similar to the CPU cooler?
Love the concept! That heatsink looks wicked (as in good). Passively cooling the nuclear furnace of the DG45FC might be asking for too much - do you have a backup fan idea in place? Since I have owned the DG45FC (actually the DQ45EK) I see one flaw in your plan. There aren't enough connections on the board for 4x SATA and a slot-load optical drive. For this reason I opted to go with the Jetway Geforce 8200 mini-itx board for my NAS-only build a few weeks ago. Good luck!
You can't weld the two, but soldering them shouldn't be any problem. The materials themselves aren't mixing, they're just each independently bonding with the solder. If a metal can be soldered on its own, it can also be soldered to any other solderable metal.
Cheers for the input guys. I had just realised the problem with the amount of SATA ports available Shomann. Maybe I should just reduce down to 3 hard drives. Afterall 750GB or 1TB drives still have excellent excellent £ per GB ratios. Mayb 750Gb have overtaken 500GB drives as the best? So the DG45FC runs hot? That would deff be a problem. I'm sure some more boards will come out before I finally get round to building this, so I'll re-evaluate at that time. As long as it's got an HDMI port I'm sorted. Doesn't really need to be socket 775, just be nice to re-use my (close to) worthless Core2Duo E6600 once I upgrade (reducing rendering times by half is too tempting, and necissary when the rendering times are sometimes days!)
Let me clarify a bit - I had the "executive" version of this board, the DQ45EK. It is VERY similar and I choose it based on hoping it would be cooler than the DG45FC. It wasn't. Even just in BIOS, the ICH10DO (Network controller) would climb well above 90C - no heatsink on this chip. The northbridge does have a HS, but it was still in the 50-60C range, again just in BIOS. Now, I know Intel makes very high-quality parts and those temps are likely sustainable, but it was too much for my tastes. Your idea of going with 3 larger SATA drives is a good one as the price/GB ratio is likely as good or better. I would recommend a 5400 drive like the Western Digital Green series or the Samsung EcoGreen (I got 4 of the HD103UI and LOVE them).
Yea, that's what I mean, the last time I tried soldering aluminum, it wouldn't stick. Though if the holes are cut right, you shouldn't need to solder the fins to the heat pipes. The fins in hot water baseboard heaters aren't soldered to the pipes.
Aluminum is difficult to solder due to the thin layer of aluminum oxide that always forms on the surface. If you sand the surface down a little before you start, it'll make things easier, but really the key is to get the aluminum hot enough. If you're trying to solder something on a heatsink, which is designed to be very good at dissipating heat, it can be extremely difficult. You're unlikely to succeed with a small soldering iron; a 100+ watt soldering gun or a torch will help things go much more smoothly. However, as you say, it's not really needed. I just did a quick check of all the heatpipes in my system, and they're all a pressure-fit, with no solder.
I'm sure I could get enough solder on the joints to hold it firm enough. Pressure fit would be best, more practical and less messy, but will be tough to get the perfect fit. Cheers for the info guys, really healpful. Important to get all this kinda stuff ironed out before trying these things and making a mess of it. The exact reason why I posted it here on bit-tech, one of the best comunities on the web imo.
