ZapWizard's LAN PC -The Short Version

I have gone through tons of designs trying to find the "perfect" animation to run on the VFD... So far this is my favorite.
A simple sine wave.
The image here may look jagged but when the wave is moving it's all VERY smooth.

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Here you can see it in operation on the PC
Its really sets this apart as NOT A PC... just the effect I want
There is no good way to take a picture of the VFD.. it's just too bright. In real life the wave is super-sharp, smooth and bright.

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Here is the actual animation (128x64 pixels)
It was made in trueSpace

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Here is a video that shows it in operation.
(Newest DIVX Codec Required) 80KB in size

http://www.zapwizard.com/lanpc/vfd.avi

 

My original idea was to simply have a tiny slot cut into the back for inserting and ejecting CD's

But I changed my mind on the CD-ROM, as I simply won't have room for a full size drive.
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I do have an extra 24X Laptop CD-Rom lying around, so it will work instead.
/edit I have changed this to a Slim DVD drive instead
I will have to buy an adapter, which will have to wait another week or two (I need more money)
I have already changed it's LED to green, and vinyl dyed the eject button black.

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As you can see it is a lot smaller then a normal drive.
As far as the final mouting/stealthing, that will be determined once I get the motherboard.

(Please no links to Slim Slot-Load CD-Roms, I do not have the money)

 

I bought at IBM Thinkpad laptop for school a while ago.
I had since bought a DVD drive for it. (And gave my wife the laptop)
But the Laptop at 300mhz is not fast enough for DVDs

So Actualy a few minutes ago I convinced my wife to let me take the DVD drive, and give her the CD-Rom back.

So now i have a Slim DVD drive that I can use for this PC.

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Here is a picture of the Slim DVD Drive

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The faceplate on the DVD drive is nearly a perfect match for the case.

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Incase you can't see it, here is a closer picture.
The acutal mouting will be totaly flush with the case.
But this test mount give a good idea of what it will look like.

The Eject button though will be disabled, to prevent anyone from stealing DVD's out the back.
Instead the Eject button will be re-located to the front of the PC.

 

More details on the DVD Drive:



In order to keep the DVD drive from opening in the back of the PC, I need to re-locat the eject button to the front.

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The original button is a tiny surface mount button.
The actual signal trace unfortunently does not travel all the way to to the main PCB at the back of the drive.
So I have to do this the hard way: route a new wire.

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First the orignal button is removed, and a wire was soldered to the signal side of the switch (The other pin is just wired to ground)

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The new wire was routed along safe spots, until i reached the ribbon cable.
To hold the wire in place I used hot-glue, that was quickly flattened down to leave a thin spot of glue.

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The flexi cable was harder, but done in a similar fashion.
Unfortunetly this drive never ejected very well in the first place, and now with the extra thickness of the wire, it is even harder to get to eject.
I will figure how to fix this later.

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The wire was then run out of the back of the drive.
I will then solder it to a header on the Slim-IDE Adapter

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/EDIT

The thin wire idea didn't work very well as the wire would flew and bunch up inside the drive, making it sluggish.

I got the adapter for the CD-Rom in-today.

While testing it out (it works great) I found that the Eject wire I installed earlier started to bunch up, and was bound to break soon.

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Then I realized something:
Why the heck do I need to run the eject wire connected all the time?
After all the only time I need to eject the drive is when it's closed.

The solution: A simple spring and some copper tape.
The spring make contact with the copper tape when the drive is closed.
Shorting this to ground will make the drive eject., simple

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I then cut a hole in the lid for the trace to run through.
I installed the Slim-CD to Normal-IDE adapter, and then hot-glued in a new header that has the eject fuction.
This can now be wired directy to the front of the case.

 

Well, I have decided that I can't easily make the drive move any farther out, but that is not the real problem.
The real problem is that the drive sometimes sticks, where the spring is not strong enough to push it out.

The solution? LEGOs!

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I am not sure, but I may be one of the first people in history to vinyl dye legos.
I took them apart then, I vinyl dyed only one side.
I did it pretty light also as I don't want to add thickness to the inside, and jam up the spring.
I just need it to not be such a flat light grey color

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In the end, one spring was better then two, as two were so powerful that they would bend the faceplate, and jam the drive.

The spring end was hot glued, down, and then a guide using hot glue and electrical tape (reveresed) was made to make sure the spring stays on track.
Why not use the spring end on the front?
It catches on the case, when is is compressed.

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As you can see the spring really doesn't push very far, but it is very strong and at least ensures the drive will open enough that it can be manualy pulled open. (like normal)

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And shot from the front showing the vinyl dye

 

The original Logitech MX300 mouse does look great, but by its' self it doesn't match the LAN PC

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So the metallic paint parts, were vinyl dyed black.
I use layers of both shiny black, and flat black vinyl dye to great a unique textured effect.
(It doesn't come across in the photo very well)
It can best be seen on the dyed logi-tech logo.
You can see a shiny mirror reflection off the mouse, but it is slightly defused by the flat vinyl dye.

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Right now the mouse looks very, well... black.
But once the LEDs are added in it will come alive.

The bottom will glow green, both the running LED, and some edge LEDs. (The lower part of the mouse is translucent)

The fire-wheel will either be Green, or Orange, depending on which ends up looking best.

The logi-tech logo will be replaced with a custom lighting bolt logo, that will be backlit yellow. (Lighting as in Zap of course)

 

Not willing to admit defeat, I have to get at least more then a vinyl dye job done tonight.





Here are a few drawings I did to see which logo I would like best on the mouse.
I like the lighting logo the best.

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Here is the brand new logo installed.
How did I make it?
I cut a peice of thick alluminum tape to the correct size.
Cut out the lighting image using an exacto.
Placed a peice of electrical tape behind the image to protect it for now.
I then installed it and CAREFULLY filled the top with hot-glue.
I then kept the glue hot using a hairdryer, this allows the larger air bubbles to get out, and also allowed the glue to settle into a large bubble of glue.
There are still a few tiny air bubbles in there, but it just adds to the effect in my opinion.
But hot glue will cloud over when it cools.
I got around this, again, by using the hair dryer.
The hair dryer has a "cold shot" feature that just blows cold air.
I would blow cold air until the surface started to cloud, then I would heat it again until it went clear.
I repeated this until it was both cold, and clear.

Right now the logo looks great with a black background, but I want LIGHT!

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So the electrical tape backing was removed.
(DON'T do this until the glue is COLD, put it in the freezer if you want to be safe)

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I sanded the surface of an ultrabright yellow LED, (To defuse the light more)
I then hot glued it to the back of the image.
Note: the hot glue will merge with the existing glue on the other side, but that is a good thing

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Testing, works perfectly.
The entire logo lights up very bright, and even.

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With the lights out it's even better.
As you can see the entire bubble lights up, edge to edge (something I didn't expect)

In the end if the glue starts to wear down I think I may have to clear coat it, or apply some sort of hard, clear protectant.

 

I got the motherboard in today!

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Here it is with 512MB of Corsair 333mhz DDR, a 1800+ Athlon XP, and an OCz thin-fin all-copper heatsink.

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Here is the plan for the orientation of the board.
The board comes right up to the jacks at the front, but still has about 1/8" of room at the front.
A normal graphics card fits in the case, without modification, but a TI4200 or GeforceFX card will have to use a 90 degree riser to fit.
(anyone know of a slightly slim, but fast graphics card?)

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The connectors have just enough clearance to plug stuff in without modification.

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With the motherboard in-place I have though of some new ideas for cooling the case.
One side will fit a 60mm fan, (intalled on the inside though)

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The other side will house a 50mm fan, that will vent air into the whole case.
The front in-take fan will be turned around, into an exhaust fan.

 

I got the intake fan holes cut.
One side is 60mm, the other is 40x50mm

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The 50mm side.



And the 60mm side.
The grill works blends perfectly into the case, and you really can't tell that it didn't come that way.

 

Dredog was awsome and photoshoped the sticker image for me and made some awsome new images for me:

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QUOTE:

Since your box looks all weathered and everything i thought that the sticker should be weathered as well. Here is what i came up with still not done (got to make the edges torn), but let me know if you want to use it. I can make it more intense if you like.

 

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I have all the LEDs installed in the mouse.
A total of five: Logo, 2x Sides, Fire Wheel, and Optic sensor.
This mouse is VERY bright as each LED is 8000MCD

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A close-up of the fire-wheel.
I choose to use a smooth wheel, as I don't mind a little less grip.
I built it using Japala's guide here:
http://metku.net/index.html?sect=view&n=1&path=mods/firewheel/index_eng

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Now a test run of the LEDs
It is hard to discribe how pure and bright the green lit is.
My camera picks them up as blue, so all these images are color adjusted as close as I can.

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Here is the mouse lit up during the day.
It's still so bright enough to burn your eyes, (And saturate the camera)

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And a night shot.

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The logo was changed to green to match all the rest of the mouse.

 

In order to light the slots on the front of the case I had to drill a hole for a LED.
I drilled a hole into each slot, and another for wire to pass into the PC.

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Then each LED was carefully hot-glued in place, and aimed properly while the glue was still hot.

The LEDs will run off of +12volts in two sets of two.

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I then installed a piece of grill work to cover up the electronics.
This also give a nice bonus side light effect

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Just how bright are these LEDs?
8000 MCD, that is more than twice as bright as the LED in your optical mouse.
With 16 LEDs on the outside, that is a total of 128,000 MCD.
Enought to light up the entire area around the PC.

Of course my camera can't pick up the pure green color of the LEDs so all the images had to be color adjusted to as close as I could get it.

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Here is a shot with the slots lit-up and the front panel in operation.
It sure as heck doesn't look like a PC

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Now for the eye candy shots:
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-The Front

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-The Back

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-The Left and Right sides.
Here you can see the extra glow from the LEDs
Also the Fan grills at the bottom will also be lit.

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Two angle shots for you.

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In order create a glow effect beneath the PC I added some heavy duty rubber feet that I had.
(They also happen to match the case perfectly)

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The effect: (Refered to as UFO Glow Effect)
This image also shows the most true color of the LEDs.

 

Ok today I got two updates done, but like normal I screwed up somewhere on each:

First the PSU.



I had to remove the top-fan and install a side fan.
I put acrylic over the old fan and power hole.
I also cut the hole originaly for a 60mm fan, but the hole in the ammo case is only made for a 50mm fan.
So acrylic was again applied to correct this.

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The side fan will pull air in from here:

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I also re-located the 120-volt plug to the other side, this will give me the ablity to easily plug into the jack from the front of the ammo box. (Faceplate side)

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I cut the hole for the DVD drive at the back.
I actualy screwed this up, and cut the hole too big.
Fortunently, because this is an ammo box the plastic it is made out of is flame resistant.
What this allowed me to do was cut a flat scarp peice out of the door, use it to fill the extra heighth in the hole.
Then I was able to actualy melt some plastic shavings and fill in any gaps in the case.

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The DVD now fits as planned.
The hole is tappered on the inside to let the door open easy.

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As for the bottom, I may or may not apply grill work.
But I think I like the look of it on the back.
Then again it draws attention to the DVD drive where otherwise it would have been fairly hidden.

 

More updates:



I added some mesh to the front, as it seemed a little empty at the bottom.
I also printed off the new sticker (Using the edited sticker that Dredog did)
Images of that once I have it stickied and laminated.

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Yes, that is a ton of velcro

With this setup the case can with-stand 20 seconds of vigorous shaking, and a 4 foot drop without the PSU coming loose.
But just to be safe I will add some even stronger "hook-n-loop" tape that is made to hold CB radios under a dash.

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The PSU is a VERY tight fit.
It actualy touches (But doesn't rest) on the DDR Dimms.

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There is still room near the front for some circuitry and a harddrive.

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The DVD is mounted similar to the PSU

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Now with the DVD mounted and stealthed

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And with the drive fully open

 

This case was made for transporting night vision goggles, and is very rugged.
The top is held on by six very tight latches, and the handle is spring loaded so that it is never loose.
The lid totaly detaches from the top.
The small circle at the bottom is a pressure release valve as this case is totaly air/water tight.

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The case is the same size around as the LAN PC's case, only taller.

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Inside it has formed foam for holding equipement.
I plan on cutting new foam to hold my mouse, and cables.

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Without the foam the insides are 14x12 inches, and the top is 4 inches deep, and the bottom is 6 inches deep.

I plan on mounting a 15" LCD into the top or bottom, depending on how that works out later.

 

Ok today I got a shipment of parts in.
I ordered new XLR jacks to fix the potential shock hazard.
But unfortunently the faceplate for the new jack is smaller then the old jack. (It has a faceplate like the 4-pin XLR next to the power jack)
So the front will stay as it is.

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I now have every jack on the face-plate soldered, secured, and tested.
In the end most all the cables were shortened or change to make the faceplate fit and the over all efficiency to be smoother.

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A big tangle of wires, but it all works perfectly

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I also got 2" rack handles, and installed them onto the faceplate.
I think this completes the look of the face plate.

 

REALLY Bad news tonight.
I cannot get the motherboard to boot anymore.
I have booted it several times to test, but in the final test it just won't even get a beep out.

I had the entire PC assembled and tested, but it was giving me a VGA error.
I dis-assembled it then, I moved the Graphics card from the second to first slot on my PCI Riser card (No AGP yet)
It then booted, I shut if off, re-assembled it, but something has broke the second time I put it together, and the board is dead.

This REALLY blows, I am currently at work (at 1:00am) trying to find out if I can fix the board.
If not it will have to be RMA'ed and I will only be able to bring a "Simulation" to the LAN party.
I will have to take the Motherboard for my LAN PC, and run it externally in order to at least show the case off.

There are no missing/fried parts or traces.
I have changed every part out to see if it was the board or another part, with no luck.

I connected up a POST card, with no luck, the numbers it is giving me don't corrilate with the Phoenix Bios POST numbers.
(All it gives out is "AA", which means it is looking for a keyboard, when in reality it is just sitting there)

I have of course re-set the bios entirly, but the simple truth is this project has been set back at least two weeks.

 

Ok, and update on the board.

Three of us worked on the board for hours.
The BIOS is not even attemping to read.
There are no clocks traveling to the processor.

Also, after doing so much carefull examining of this board, I can say that I DON'T Recommend this Chaintech board.
I found mutiple cold solder joints. (One even on the CPU Socket)
The board behind the northbridge gets hot, and the heatsink mounted to the northbridge has ZERO thermal grease, nothing at all. (It's just for looks)

I hope the RMA goes fast so I can get this up and running.

BUT I do still have some new-stuff that I thought up and will be posting soon.

 

Well I have finaly decided on what I am going to do for the LAN.
I am going to use the motherboard for my Media PC and run it in the back of the case.
That way I will have the system running as close to original as possible. (As both boards a nForce2 systems)

But as you will soon see, very little coolness has been lost...

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The other motherboard is working just fine,I am typing this from the LAN PC right now.

(Using all custom jacks)
Since I need a lot of time for installing software, and tweaking, I don't think that I will have any images of the new temporary setup until later saturday.

 

Alright I am happy now
(More details on that in a bit)

SAVING THE LAN PC
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Since my original Chaintech board was a P.O.S. and fried out on me two days before the LAN I needed to come up with a way to save the LAN PC.
I then realized that I had the PERFECT save: My other case!
Even if this was the entire intended modification all along, it still rocks!
(Note all this change was done in just 4 hours)

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First off I need to get AC power to the new board:
I hacked apart a male and female power jack, soldered them together, injectd hot-glue inbetween the solder joints.
Instant power splitter.

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Since the parallel port (for the VFD) was obiously too small to fit through the hole in the new case, so I literaly cut the cable, and resoldered the 12 needed wires back together on the other side.

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I then installed the MSI Motherboard from my Media PC project ontop of a cardboard box, then installed the PSU, Harddrive and DVD drive. (And graphics card later)

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All the cables: VGA, Parallel, USB, Network, Audio, Power were all wrapped in tubing and routed into the orginal case.

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I cut a new grill work into the 60mm fan hole and installed the cableing into the second case.
Inside I used a Cat5 Couple, a USB hub to split USB for keyboard and mouse, and I also left the PSU inside in order to run the VFD, fans, LEDs, USB, and a 4" cold cathode.
The original PSU was then wired to the keyswitch so that when the switch was turned the PSU would power up.

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Do it work?
Or course!

I got all this done in one night, and windows installed.
Everything works perfectly as it should.

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I also got my green cold cathodes in, and installed them in the keyboard.

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