Nitemayr

Thank you! Every time I see it in my living room now I really like it. TIME TO GAME ON IT!

First off.... A HUGE thank you to the sponsors. ThermalTake, for their generosity with the case, PSU, watercooling gear, and putting this whole thing together. Newegg, for the components that will get MANY hours of gaming use. Avexir, for some of the sickest looking RAM I've seen. ASUS, Intel, Samsung - Amazing hardware. Quality components, I couldn't ask for more. Specs on this bad boy! Case: ThermalTake Core P5 Power Supply: ThermalTake Toughpower DPS G RGB 1250W Titanium GPUs: 2x Asus 980 Strix SLI CPU: Intel Core i7-6700K Motherboard: Asus ROG MAXIMUS VIII FORMULA RAM: 4x4G Avexir RED Tesla DDR4 Drive 1: Samsung 850 EVO 2.5" 500GB SSD Drive 2: Samsung 950 PRO M.2 256GB Cooling: ThermalTake Pacific series Radiator, Pump, CPU Block, GPU Blocks, Fittings, Tubing, Etc Other Purchased Parts: Sleeving: MDPC Sleeving from CaseLabs LEDs: NeoPixels and DotStars from Adafruit Acrylic: Tap Plastics The Build: It's been a long journey and a crazy couple of weeks getting it done... but it's done!!! The wood is a wonderful cedar from the forest near the shop. It was treated with an iron acetate solution to antique it and make it the dark greyish-brown it ended up. The center column has an aluminum emblem embedded in it. It's the banner my character has used in Diablo3 since it launched a number of years ago. The fan grills were my first attempt at milling aluminum on the CNC machine we custom built in the shop a number of years ago. It went amazingly well, and I can't wait to do more! The GPUs got a lot of treatment. The blocks were made black, the black metal cover made silver, an acrylic plate fitted over, and aluminum trim on that. Top it off with LED illumination and laser etching... and they really make the case pop. The PSU cables all were custom made (cut the wire, crimped new ends, put the sleeving on, put new ends on...), and the cable combs were custom made from aluminum on the CNC as well. The PSU itself got the LED treatment in the fans, as well as the silver/black treatment that you'll find elsewhere in the case. The CPU block got an alumnum treatment (can you tell I really liked the silver aluminum and black contrasts?), as well as custom LEDs inside. That RAM has an amazing crackle look that really accents the case and colors The Fans. The RGB Riing fans are amazing, but I wanted a LITTLE more control over them individually than I was afforded with the stock controller, so I ripped them apart and replaced all the LED bulbs w/ the Neopixels. Combined with the LED strips and bulbs elsewhere in the case... I can go from the red Diablo theme to.... PARTY MODE!!!!! The tubing... oh the tubing. The 90 degree fittings all have LEDs embedded into them. This makes the tubing and fluid glow whatever color I want!!! The Pump and Reservoir got a light laser etching, as well as LEDs in the lid. I really like this pump/res, the black metal looked great in this build. The front panel got custom etching as well. This guy was from one of the Demon Hunter cut scenes, and I really liked the way he fit down there withough being obnoxious. Lastly... the back panel. The piece de resistance. This was actually the first piece of art that inspired the rest of the case. I saw a picture of the stain glass in the cutscene from Diablo3 and decided I HAD to try it! It is a piece of acrylic laser etched with the design, and then airbrushed to have the effect of the stained glass. Because the paint from the airbrush is transparent, the light shines through and looks... AMAZING. The window frame was cut from the back panel using the CNC (my first steel cut on it!), and couldn't have gone any better. Lastly, but most importantly, I'd like to throw out a HUGE thank you to my family and friends. To my wife, thanks for giving me up for a couple months and being my rock. To my many friends and family, huge thanks for just being supportive and not making me feel like I'm (too) crazy. Thanks to Shannon for believing in me enough to give me this shot. I know this is just another mod for some of these guys, but this is only really my second big, public, not just for me build, and I'm extremely grateful for the opportunity and equipment. Finally, I'd like to thank my father for his example, companionship, assistance, and sanity checks. I couldn't imagine a better shop-mate, and look forward to many more projects and adventures with him! If anyone has any questions, wants to see pictures of a specific component, or anything like that, please post up! I'll keep an eye on these threads and see if we can't inspire some other people to take the plunge and go crazy with their builds.

Wonderful finish. Way to go, you should definitely be proud of this build. It's great, and I love mods that really dig in to all the little details. They're so easy to overlook, but really give mods that extra personality.

Strange, they show up just fine for me. Try this link for an album of them: http://imgur.com/a/Sf254 I'll be taking some better shots and doing a write up tonight too.

Quick photo post of the finished case... better write up to come tomorrow when I've had some sleep. ModMarathon... complete!!

To steal a phrase from Mike Petereyns... #modmarathon Last day to work, and boy do I have some pictures coming after today. For now... enjoy the wood. It's the little things.... the white on the stock SATA cables clashed horribly....

Wood stain preview.... Love this shot.

In crazy get this done mode, so only a real quick update while I take a short break in the work. Cut the back panel for the window design: The painting isn't done yet, but a rough idea of how it looks: I also took off a little black on the PSU to make it fit with the black/silver I have elsewhere. And back to work. Tons of wiring to do yet!!

Ok... I've had an airbrush for a couple months now and haven't REALLY gotten into using it yet, so I figured this was a good project to break it in with. I'm going to mount this on the back of the case w/ some carefully placed lighting to emulate a 'stained glass window' look on the back of the case. The actual window panes will be cut out of the back panel, and the acrylic mounted behind it. Still have more to peel and paint, but all told, for my first major airbrush project, I'm pretty pleased. I need to get in there and refine the black lines though, they peeled when I was peeling the pieces to be painted.

I hear that... dang day-jobs getting in the way! Good luck, can't wait to see it finished!

Things are coming together! Cable combs were all installed last night, and they did wonders for the cable runs. I also took a moment to tear open that awesome TT power supply and swap the LEDs in the fan for the same ones I used elsewhere in the build.

A first pass at removing the excess resin via a nice end-mill on the cnc. The CNC basically helped keep things level and smooth, without tearing tons of resin off/out of the grooves. Folowed that up with some planing, sanding, and general cleanup. I can't wait to see this with the wood stained dark!!! I ended up having to add another layer to the center support. Sadly, the original was just too narrow to allow all those sleeved cables to run inside. Despite extra pocketing, bending, pushing pulling..... it just wasn't happening. The extra layer was added and hides the black acrylic where the cables exit, as well as adds a ton more support. A little cleanup to be done on it, and then it can be stained. I also got the remainder of the cable combs cut out, so now it's a matter of adding them to the sleeving and getting it to sit where I want it. Coming together!!! While I was waiting for some passes on the CNC, I took a few minutes and etched on the reservoir. Some elements from the game that I always thought looked really cool.

Quiet night, but the PSU cables are cut, crimped, sleeved, and threaded. They just need their cable combs added and stuffed into the center support. Side note... center support pocket did not account for the additional volume of the sleeves.... have to make it a smidge bigger

Clear resin was successful. I used blue painters tape on the top side of the lid, this allowed me to pour the resin from the underside and have it sit flush on the top edge. It also adds a neat crackle/antique glass looking effect to the resin, which should pop really nicely once lit. Cable sleeving for the power supply cables is about 90% done. I have a few splices to make now, which will actually sit between the 2x brackets and under the center support.

For those of you who are enjoying the mod, thanks for the support!! For those who are commenting for the raffle, thanks for the support, I wish you luck! This is the unsanded clump of resin from a test board I was working on. It was primarily to get the mix of resin, hardener, and aluminum powder right. Here's another test spot with the resin (very roughly) sanded off. A couple small voids, but overall the resin filled in good! Now time to do the bigger pours.... This is the resin I used. It's really my first interaction w/ resin and powder, and I had only really done a resin pour once before. Getting the right ratio of resin : hardener : powder took a few attempts. And the cable work continues.... it's starting to shape up though.

Continuing the wiring. Doing a pre-sleeve run to ensure I get the proper lengths. I don't have a ton of room in the pocket of the support, so the less excess cable I have to deal with in there the better. Here's a shot of the pocket, and the holes that the screws nest into. The cables for the motherboard are test run... And with the GPU cables in there too... it's tight. REALLY tight. I do look forward to the sleeving and the cable combs making all of that look somewhat manageable though.

Yes, the cablecombs are pretty much purely for aesthetics. They were actually my original cable management plan, and a first attempt at milling aluminum. The Cable brackets came a little later, but I still like the alum+black look so I'll keep the combs too. The screws on the top of the brackets nest into holes in the cutout on the center wood support. It keeps the top of the bracket lined up and stable when I slide the center support pocket over the cables and brackets. I didn't originally think the screws holding the brackets to the case would be strong enough to keep them sturdy with all the cables and stuff going in... but it turned out they were. A little extra support won't hurt them though. I'll take some pictures of how that assembly fits together this evening.

Thanks for all the feedback everyone. It's crunch time now... MAXIMUM EFFORT! Began the arduous task of cabling. Here's a quick test fit I did before sleeving on the 8pin ATX plug: Then MDPC sleeving applied... And then test fit in the cable bracket in the case. I didn't feel like tearing apart the GPUs again, so here's a quick render of the parts and how they fit together:

Last night I spent the evening tearing everything apart and reassembling it. I needed to get the wall mount bracket out of the way inside the case, and the screws for that were behind the motherboard. It gave me an opportunity to actually apply the thermal compound to the CPU (the block was just sitting there temporarily), and do some wiring from the case front panel to the motherboard. I also tossed the RAM in there to see how it would look. I think it's going to need some tweaking but overall it's cool! It'll really pop when everything is powered on and lit up. This is the right side of the center column. I will be filling it with an aluminum resin mix to give a metal inlay look before I stain all the wood. Fun fact... that's been my banner in Diablo3 since launch. I'm about 50/50 success rate with that process... so we're going to roll the dice and hope it works! Tonight I'm going to really start hitting the wiring. I'll hopefully be posting a GPU teardown on the blocks now that the LEDs are mounted, so people can see how the layers all ended up working. CRUNCH TIME!!!!!!!

Me too! Truth be told, there's only so much hiding I'll be able to do, the rest will have to be neat and clean looking. Probably the most challenging part of all this will be getting all that to look nice. I've done a lot of edge-lit acrylic stuff in the past, and when I was describing some of the things I wanted to do with the GPU blocks, a good friend mentioned it would be cool if I could do the edge-lighting on that somehow... so there it is. The 3d effect is just a matter of laser power I'll post up a layer-by-layer breakdown on the GPU block in the next day or two so people can see how it worked out. Thanks! Being a part of the competition is already a win in my book. So exciting!

This worklog was all about the woodworking. Using some cedar from a tree that was downed within the 40acre area around the shop, I did some initial cuts on the shape, and then it was over to the CNC to pocket out some holes for the fan grills. The center piece is actually double width and has a pocket on the inside. This will be where a lot of the PSU cables run to keep things clean and organized. I used tape to mark the areas that were going to be covered by the center support, and then punched some holes for mounting it. The left and right supports needed some material removed to allow for airflow and PSU cord access. A quick rough-fit of all the wood pieces to make sure things fit. The window was cut out of .25" acrylic. A new one had to be cut due to the height requirements being slightly larger than the provided P5. I also really like the way the cast acrylic etches and lights up (spoiler). Some add'l shots of the wood pieces nesting around. The center support nests over a couple cable routing panels that will help guide the PSU cords in and out of the pocket. The unfinished assembly. All the wood still needs sanding, cleanup, resin, stained, and a myriad of other odd jobs. The top lid lifts up on a hinge and allows easy access to the upper components. Finally, a sneak peek of one of the next steps... wiring. This was just a quick run with some scrap wire to determine how to wire all those leds without making a spiderweb mess.

Last night I finished up wiring the LEDs in the fans on the radiator and did a quick test: (I know... I still haven't figured out how to embed the youtube video in the post itself yet..) I also think I've got my wood color narrowed down finally... Not much to do tonight, but tomorrow... full shop day!

Finished wiring up one side of fans and did a quick test. All the LEDs work and respond! LEDs in action:

Yesterday I spent most of the evening working on the fans. The LEDs need wired up in series, so I began the arduous task of figuring all that out... it's a mess

A quick test at a method to do an aluminum inlay in some cedar... Considering I totally screwed up my mix, it actually turned out tolerable!! The next step is to do an iron acetate wash to age the wood and see what we're working with. I also cut some cable organizers. These will be mounted in the middle of the case and help route the cables. Lastly, did a first run on the tubing. Happy with it for the most part, need to tweak a couple small pieces but otherwise things ended up where I wanted it to!