This is a cunning idea I had a few weeks back and have been designing ever since, so far running into over 15 pages of designs which have evolved substantially. I’ll go through the whole development of my idea here and include links to pictures of the designs as they appeared to keep the first post shortish (in terms of screens) so people can skip it easier if they like. This is a project that I can work on to escape the boring world of revision and really get stuck into after they have finished. Anyway, on with the log. -The Idea- The initial idea was to use one of the cases I have kicking around the house to make server for lan use and general backup storage at home of media and files. This then evolved into a MediaPC/Server. Incorporating a 15 or 17” TFT for travelling to lans so that I don’t need another monitor or a KMV to use it. The screen needs to be capable of being moved into a better position for viewing should the need arise (ie, if the pc is on the floor I cant see the side of the case easily). The PC also needed to have sound built in so that it could be hung on a wall almost like a plasma screen (all be it 8” thick) and operated via cordless mouse/kb. Eventually this idea was dropped due to the speakers not being ideal and not of sufficient quality but they are included in the designs for a while. The idea was to have them hinged on the side of the screen, thus when they were closed they protected the screen and when opened they would provide limited stereo separation and angling. Page 1 This is where the problems started, how do you have a screen moving up, down, left, right, in and out? Simple answer, you cant unless you want the movement restricted to fairly small amounts (making it pointless), or overly complex and space filling inside the case (not possible as its only 6” wide). So additions to the case were planned, steel box sections welded on allowing the screen to pivot left and right a limited amount on a custom made steel box frame, this limited about of movement eventually lead to a better design on Page 2 This design allowed for about an 8-10” gap to be created at one end, a substantial amount of angular movement. This through some late night (or is 4am early morning) thinking evolved into the design on Page 3 with some new ideas. Don’t know exactly how this happened, it just did. This page is really messy and covered in spur-of-the-moment annotations. The basic idea was to have a screen on a single pivoting bar which slides along the length of the case. This would give 90 degrees of angular movement, but only in one direction, which wasn’t ideal. The screen would be folded away facing the case with the pivot at the right hand side of the case, the screen would fold out 180 degrees and then slide along the case length to its fixed position for head on viewing, or it could be left at an angle at any point along the case length sliders. This protected the screen and gave huge amounts of angular movement. It was scrapped when I decided it needed to be moveable in 2 directions. The same page also shows the glass doors idea. They would have protected the screen when not in use or just idle and the screen was on for monitoring purposes. Again this was scrapped when the ideas of having plate glass in the boot of my car being moved around a lot finally got the better. Page 4 and Page 5 just shows more development of the swing door idea with various buttons locations Page 6 was the first of the designs for version 5 of this case. Using a gas strut similar to those used on the boot of many hatchbacks (I was going to borrow the ones on my VW Golf to test this idea) I was going to hinge the TFT from the top of the case, (top right of page 5). This then became a multi linkage using 4 struts instead of 2 to allow the screen to lift off the front of the case and be angled better (I cant work out how exactly from my drawing (another 4am job) but it was the idea) This then briefly strayed into a desktop case which could have the keyboard inside, but then I decided this was ridiculous as I already have a laptop and don’t need another one with less power and more space used (especially at lans where desk space is worth more than property on Wall Street). So that was version 6 scrapped On to version 7, also handily placed on Page 7. This is when I finally got serious about the internal layout and the fact that 2 cases was a must for this idea. The cases I have available are both fairly short and so the HD bays obscure the IDE connectors, an immense hassle should I need to do anything with them (changing an IDE cable took me 3hours once *shudders*) So, using half of the other case I have attached to the side would allow the screen lifting mechanism to be housed, along with the hard drives and a psu to power them and their cooling. The lifting mechanism was cunning to say the least. It allowed the screen to be visible through the side of the case and have it lifting and tilting for when it was sat next to me anywhere I was. This came a cropper when I started to ponder the actual extension of one of these struts, so a backup plan was created in Version 8, again, handily located on Page 8. Have the screen on a collapsible concertina style lifting mechanism powered by a short stroke gas strut. A marvellous idea until I got some Lego™ Technic™ (god that stuff rocks) and started playing about with it making the sort of thing I was thinking of. It didn’t work out as I planned (hence the ‘Scraped’ motif to page 8). On we go. Page 9 entirely depended on there being long travel gas struts available and was superior in design to Version 7 as it would (at least in its first incarnation) allow the tilting up of the screen and the rotation left and right with a fairly simple mechanism in a small space. The variation in the top right (Version 9b) of the page shows an alternative which didn’t allow rotation and so was scrapped. The advantage with the twin parallel struts of Version 9a was that they didn’t have to be full height, only half height. Marvellous. Next the hard bit, how the hell do you get a wide flat thing to rotate on another slightly less wide, but equally flat thing. Again after some time thinking about it a design emerged on Page 10. This page progressed left to right across the page. No suitable compound curve could be created to allow the axis to be worked correctly, so the idea of having 2 separate movements arose. One which tilted a unit supporting the screen and rotating mechanism and one which rotated the screen on the tilt mechanism. The multi layer hinge idea on the far right was developed more on Page 11 (middle of the lower area). Yet again the concertina idea arose and was dropped again after more Technic™ fiddling. The gas strut used to power the screen upwards was also going to be used for tilting the screen outwards assuming there was enough power. A rack system was also looked into for all of about 5 minutes as the lower right corner shows. This idea was so good it actually made it to a Technic™ prototype, I’ll dig the unit out and make it more obvious as to how it works and put a picture up at some point before I continue the rest of the log as it’s a good show of what a physical model can do to a design. After a conversation with my dad this idea was firmly laid to rest as the struts are only about 5-6” travel and far too strong to be able to simply push down without a strong leaver (such as a boot lid! ) And so Page 12 was started and showed Version 10. This was far simpler in its design, less cutting and rejoining needed and more space available. But this had its problems, mainly big and ugly. The idea in essence was simple, this was an all in one server, mediapc, and control stand. This would stand on the ground and be almost 30” tall, not including the screen. The screen would be kept between the 2 cases on some sort of sliding mechanism (more on that later) and the keyboard in a fold down area that covered the hole the middle where the screen emerged from. This seemed at the time to be the perfect answer, if only in functionality. To get the screen moving a long distance in one direction as this design required was a problem which was solved in a stroke of brilliance (imo). Kitchen draw sliders. They can extend their full length and be easily modified to not fall out when (almost) fully extended. Horah . Maybe not. I remembered my dad saying he wanted some for the garage/workshop that ran the full depth and that they cost about £30 a pair, and even then I didn’t have any to look at that worked in this way to see how I could modify them. A mouse pad that emerged fro a 5 ¼” bay was also pondered till the idea of this huge monolith was abandoned and Version 10 was laid to rest. Version 11 to follow but I have just noticed that its is 6:49am while I’m typing this and that and I have <100 characters left to write about the design. I’ll post this once I’ve got the pics uploaded (thanks philth) and start work on the final case design description for posting tonight.
The design so far: Finally, Version 11 arrives, (well, it arrived last week but we’ll gloss over this). This is the project as it is planned at the moment. After much work in the early hours the design evolved to the one you see above in the middle of the page. The scale is a bit off but the overall dimensions are 17” tall, 15” deep and 14.5” wide. This limits the screen size somewhat, but I’ll address this later once the design has been finalised. The design labelled 1 on the paper is hopefully how the case will appear, (without the small screen and ‘other opening’ on the side like this). The right of the paper shows the 2 different mechanisms that have been considered for the lifting screen. The initial design being V11.1.1 the top mechanism is V11.1.2 The screen is mounted on 4 arms that are spring loaded in a similar style to an angle-point lamp. This means that the screen can be positioned in any part of its arc of movement and not fall back down. The first version of this (shown as 1.1) has all four arms equally placed, with the pivot placed at a half way point along the front and top. This concerned me as I didn’t feel that the screen would actually clear the corner of the case. To combat this initially, V11.1.3 was designed. This just has a vertically lifting screen which while combating the problem of 1.2, produces another problem, the screen can now no longer be seen easily if the case is on the floor. So a compromise was devised. Behold! Version11.1.4 was born. This uses 2 ½ height arms at the base and 2 ¾ length arms on the top, spring loaded as before. This *should* allow the screen to avoid the corner, a scale model in wood is in production at the moment to test this idea to ensure its feasibility. The latest version also has a slot loading DVD drive incorporated (purchased last weekend at a fair along with other bits). Other ideas displayed on page 13 were a 5” TFT/LCD for monitoring the system when the full screen isn’t needed. The ‘Other Opening’ This was an idea from last year after I had been browsing PimpRig.com in the featured rigs section. A guy there had combined his full tower case with a coffee machine to make The Caffeine Machine. An interesting read if you have some time to kill. I decided there and then that I would attempt to put a fridge in my case for some cans of Jolt Cola (always handy at lans). I began my search for a suitably thin fridge which would fit my old case. Alas, the only one I found was in America and so shipping would have been horrendous for an 8 can fridge. The challenge was now staring me in the face, build and fit my own custom 4 can fridge that would fit in a 5 ¼” bay unit 3 bays high. I almost succeeded too, (its about 2mm too high, nothing a file and 5minutes cant solve). This will sit in the side of the case, possibly where the DVD drive is currently and that will be moved into the back case which has one 5 ¼” bay once it is cut down. I have a cunning plan for the fridge door but I’ll leave that till I can actually work out if its possible to do before I say anything about it. Either way, this now becomes Version 11.1.4b (mmm catchy), shown on Page 14. Decided not to bother with the monitoring screen at the moment, as it wont be facing the same direction as the main screen. Might reconsider depending on what happens with the rest of it. Another update tonight most likely of the developments of today’s searching in Newcastle for bits.
Interesting project log well written. As i was reading this i was imagining in my minds eye where teh design was going at each stage. Unless i missed it i thought of a way to mount the screen quite simply that you dont seem to have thought of. Most TFTs are supported by a single "Leg" and a wide foot on the bottom. You could have a bracket on the back of the monitor kind of U shaped that a telescopic suporting strut could attach to at a pivot point on each side of the U bracket, allowing a verticle adjustment of the screen, only limited by the design of the U bracket. At the bottom end of the telescopic strut you could have a low friction rotating mount allowing for horizontal adjustment. The screen could disappear into the top of the case through a slit as detailed in one of your other designs (could even have a window on the side to see through so you can monitor the system with it all packed away. The main problem i can think of with this design is that the bottom of the case would need reinforcing. But then i guess you will need to reinforce the parts of the case where the screen is attached anyway. Good luck with this project, i'll be keeping an eye on it.
Preliminary Work The cases, both steel construction throughout with plastic faceplates. Small one is about 15 ½” deep and just over 7 ½” wide. The height of this case is just less than 17” and so sets the maximum height for the cube. It’s a fairly standard 3x 5 ¼” bay, 3x 3 ½“ bay case with a removable motherboard tray that swings out from the backside, rather than pulling out. The Large one stands about 24 ¼” tall and is 15” deep (15 ¼” including the raised fan grill on the front). The problem with this case is that its less than 7” wide. And so everything is a tight fit for width, cables cant be effectively routed and the air flow it terrible due to a strangely placed horizontal plate below the 6x5 ¼” bays and above the 5x 3 ½” bays. It dawned on me having done the designs for this case that this thing could be fairly heavy and having a bit of a back problem lifting this beast may prove to be a problem. So I got the bathroom scales and did some weighing. The small case with all its removable panels off weighs a little over 7lbs and feels reasonably light when its picked up. Oh the horror that dawned on me when I weighed the larger case. Just under 14lbs. A STONE! And that’s without panels, just a bare chassis. I knew it felt heavier but it didn’t feel that bad. So with a wary feeling inside I loaded both sets of panels up and looked at the weight, 16lbs… I wasn’t impressed. Decided that some new panels would be made from 1/16” or 1/8” aluminium sheeting (4’x2’ sheet is only £8.99 iirc) sanded down with 600 grit wet and dry and sealed as the total weight of the case would have been 37lbs, less the small amount that would be removed from 2 of the larger side panels, making it probably about 34-35lbs, not including screen, cooling system or the computer. Anyway, that’s the last backdated log, all the stuff posted now is done as it happens so the massive and frequent posting will probably dry up as exams get closer. Possibly get another update done tonight with todays modding.
Thats some hardout planning and ideas there. I will be keeping an eye on this project as it seems to me that it is going to be a nise big one, with excellent results, incorperating some original ideas. Good luck -cLoWn
if i can get it wroking then i will have something ive never seen anywhere before, atm however im not sure how i will do some of the stuff even at the basic level so any fancy stuff is being left till ive sorted these niggles. Im gonna go work on reversing the motherboard tray now as if i leave it the way it is, there will be the fridge, the HD rack, and the watercooling rig to get past in a 14" hole before you reach the board. Hopefully have an update of the cut down case done tonight. More niggles wityh that too and as ive been awake for 28 hours so far and been standing selling cameras and stuff ffor 8 of them, in already fairly knackered. Ah well, off to work
Sounds like a good day. And you are really going at this mod, respect for the hardwaork you are putting in this. You are going to rewarded for it with the finally outcome me's thinks! -cLoWn
i hope so, im trying not to do too much on it cos revision comes first for exams in a weeks time (eep) but i cant revise during the day well, dunno why, it just doesnt work. so i work on this once ive got up from a night of studying and then hit the books around 2200-0000ish for a good few hours. then go to bed. I coudlnt sleep this morning (spent 2am-7am lying around trying my best to relax and i just got more annyoed at the thought of doing 8hrs work with no sleep) but i survived thanks to 4 cans of the finest jolt cola When i am awake and doing nothing, (ie in bed trying to sleep) my mind starts working on how i can do things to this case (its caused me lots of hassle with redesigning already) and i *think* i have a plan on how i re attached the top and bottom parts of the big tower, but i might not. its not even an eacy shape to cut :/ I also hope to have this chassis at least built in time for a lan in 26days time. No presusre! otehr wise i cant play and leech (not that'd ever doo that, no no, just hypothetically you see ) Ive gat everything bar the sound and graphics sorted, going to a computer fair tmorrow to pick them up, any suggestions on a possibly dual output (VGA and DVI) gf4 variant for as litle as possible? Cheers
My GeF4 Ti4200 is cheap, dual output, and it runs CS, UT2003, Unreal2, AvP2, Q3 and anything else i have thrown at it without any problems! A good clocker too, got my about 3000 extra points in 3DMark 2001 with a few memory and CPU tweaks. If you have more money though, of course buy a better one, but if you are strapped for cash then this will do ya What exams you got??? -cLoWn
If i bought a better one it'd be going in this machine this is a Ti4400 so anything better tha that goes in here and that becomes my backup gfx card inca se of lan failure I have A2 exams between the 16th and 26th of june, only 5 sitting but 6 exams :/ Computing (90min), 2 chemistry (45 and 50 min), a physics (dunno how long) another chem (90min) and another phsyics (90 min) Jsyt been working on the case again for the last god knows how long I have *almost* vanquished its height but the new psu hole is being a bugger. Havent taken any pics as its boring work and i want it over with, will try and get the earlier case hacking up tonight, cant promise anything tho, tomorrow if not, deffo cos the case should be done (the shortening anyway) ready for some mobo tray moding :/
Ahh fair enough, i wasnt sure on how deep your pocket was, some people spend amounts of money on GPX cards. Bah, lots of exams like me, good luck m8! You really are hardout and commited to this mod, dont think i have ever seen/heard of someone work so continously on there case, especially when having exams and a free summer looming. to hardout you!! -cLoWn
Sorry bout not posting this last night, needed to get some revision done, means you actually see the cases lopped down to their final size. Anyway. This is the cases as they stand before anything was done. This should be an easy job except for a few little things. The top of the small case comprises of the entire upper section of the case, its popped riveted on in 6 places and the CD bays and hang from the side rails, which are part of the top. Bugger. This means that simply removing the overhang which holds the cases apart slightly is more complicated and cant be thought about till after the chop down of the tall case. The tall case is a bout 8” taller than the small one, so all of this need to be removed in the form of 5 ¼” bays. The case looks fairly easy to take apart but upon closer inspection its actually spot welded. This takes all possibility of being able to pop rivet it back together afterwards if I make a mistake. So it began, this case was put together well, such a pain in the backside to cut thought, every few minutes had to stop and rest my hand cos of the cramp from the force needed to cut thought the double thickness steel which was handily located EVERYWHERE I wanted to cut. http://www.philth.org.uk/~phat/PlainLazy/TowerCase/CaseCutting.jpg After about 45min the bays were cut though apart from a small piece which held the case together enough when I cut the back. Another 30 ish minutes and the whole case was in 2 pieces. Now to turn the attention to the lower half of the case The bays that remain on the lower half are not needed, only one 5 ¼” is used in this machine so the rest are removed to drop the height down. Again these were a pain in the backside as some of the welds didn’t hold so the mobo tray guide rail is loose. Other did and so the case survived (just) Decided to move outside to cut the rest of the case off as had just purchased some cutting discs for the pseudo-dremel and broke one by dropping it, so was a bit nervous of seeing this shatter and bounce round the garage. This phote was taken when it was still light, by the time I went back inside it was dark and I had worn down a 40mm disc to about 20mm across. Lots’a grindin’ And behold! The cut down case, 8" shorter than before. Didn’t take many pics of the actually fitting together to get it right, it was so dull to try and try again, the mildly interesting part was cutting a new hole for the psu for the mobo and DVD drive, as the hole in that case was removed entirely to cut it down and keep the top and side rails in one piece. Even this was a pain and isn’t really finished yet, that’s the next thing to do (the mounting holes are spread over both parts of the case) Still lots to do, next is finishing the psu hole and drilling the screw holes then it needs a bracket to hold the psu more securely from the top. Followed by changing this (now small) tower case from being ATX to MTX (I think that’s the right one).
OMG that is a lot of hard cutting, especially with your "ghetto" hand saw . Well done for just cutting it all and being able to type afterwards! Looks good, nice and small kill the monster server case!! Good luck with the PSU and change over, i think you are through the hardest of it now! Nicse work -cLoWn
no chance, that was the easy stuff. It was just a bit of cuting, joining it back together is the next hardest bit to do after the mobo tray move. and the hardest part is the screen. That WILL be hell
Oh yeah Hoepfully won't be too much hardwork, you have planned well, hopefully will all go smoothly..... -cLoWn
Sadly my planning has let me down on this one, the screen mechanism is gonna need some full new fabrication,a dn the thinnest steel i can get welded it 1/16th inch which is heavy :/ Thus some new plan need to be devised.
Another plan is this going to be like version 12?? Hmm, heavy = bad. But heavy usually = strong too, without being expensive, have to find a balance bah, its too late at night to try and get tecnically -cLoWn
