[build log] GAME HARD, FOLD HARDER - TJ07 - full watercooled - full custom panels

The purpose:
Because once you start modifying PCs you need another shot time and time again I have decided to build something for myself this time. I have made previous builds for others. One modified but still held back due to money concerns. This time it is for me and no cutting corners. I did want it to serve a purpose. For this build I am completely removing two purposes of my regular family PC. Which is gaming and folding. Especially folding will be the big purpose. Most of the time it will be used for folding 24/7. The build title is an adaptation of a line one of my sponsors uses. KFA2 uses "Play hard, game harder", for this project I have adapted it to "Game hard, Fold harder". Which basically means this build can be used for heavy high resolution high FPS gaming, but for a larger portion of the day it will be used to aid (medical) research through folding using software of FOLDING@HOME and B.O.I.N.C. The high end hardware will serve both purposes very well.
At a later point I will explain more what folding is all about for those that are not completely up-to-date with the term folding. I hope to promote the cause that is folding to a large audience with this buildlog.

The plan:
The plan is to completely modify a Silverstone TJ07. The theme will be completely black with orange accents. The shape that will be used a lot is that of the hexagon. About every panel of the case will see some sort of modifying. But it won't be a screaming build. It will be tastefull and have a clean look. The build will be using a i7-3770k (at first at least), overclocked to what the custom watercooling loop can handle. So max overclock for a 24/7 working system. It will feature the famous Samsung low voltage overclocking ram (also OC'd to the max) and two or three Nvidia GTX670 cards again under water and max overclocked. All wiring will see full custom sleeving. There will be multiple windows (with engravings). The cooling hoses that will be in sight are going to be made of acryl / plexi tubing. That is if it won't hamper the cooling performance too much. I don't want to spoil everything yet since that takes away the fun for me. I will update the thread in a chronological way. I want to keep some stuff a secret to hopefully surprise a few members.

Execution:
I have started the build a few weeks / months back. I didn't want to start a buildlog untill I could keep the thread flowing for a while with updates. I am not done with this build/mod yet. It will take a good amount of weeks to finish it. Sadly I am not a millionaire to buy everything day 1 .

First things first. The cse itself. I bought it used (because it was cheap and because I was going to modify it anyway). So here are a few pictures of her. Look at what the previous owner did.
The complete front full of ugly stickers, a big touchscreen fancontroller and knobs. YUCK. An additional top fan for who knows what reason. Holes in the top mesh and glue to fix it :facepalm: he case was even missing one of it's casefeet. How can you lose one of those?















Next update: cleaning this baby up. Looking at the damage done and fixing her up.

Lets first show a few pieces I will be using I received at that time. I had more photos of stuff, but I decided not to use that and other hardware instead.

I got this in a trade, a nice, clean looking Scythe 12 fan controller. This should work great with my radiator(s). It should be able to power them and keep them quiet enough. I love the style of it, really fits my case in my opinion.



A brand new XSPC dual bay reservoir deisnged for a D5 pump.
This is going to look and work great for this build. And I sooo like the look of it. Not screamy with the faceplate on. Space saving yet powerfull.



I found a store in my 4k inhabitants town that does powdercoating. They overcharged me like crazy in my opinion asking 100 euros for powdercoating the internals of my build. But I didn't feel like travelling for it and I wanted to get it done.





But before I could bring the parts to the shop I had to strip her completely clean including drilling out almost all rivets.



The sun was shining, the parts were in. Time to do some assembling. To much loose parts, time to combine it.

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Here are some pictures of her current state, I haven't fitted the sidepanels yet because I want to use thumbscrews for that but somehow the sidepanels have holes big enough to fit those wide fanscrews. So the thumbscrews I had didn't do the job very well. I have ordered other thumbscrews but now I have received (few weeks after these photos) a big pile of black 6-32 screws in different lengths with washers and nuts I might just go full screws and washers on the backside.







TUNNELVISION 8-)



What I didn't make pictures of is the two front bay covers I removed the stickers from. They look like new now and ready to use.

Parts that are on their way to me now:

- some Alphacool fitting, D5 pump, 16/10 hosing, black 6-32 screws;
- new stock top mesh and about 5 front bay covers (take a look at what that animal did to its poor top mesh :mad:

Seems to be a nice Project! I don't really know...but i think you are our first American User here! Welcome to the Forum!

DarkWhisperer schrieb:

Seems to be a nice Project! I don't really know...but i think you are our first American User here! Welcome to the Forum!

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Hi DarkWhisperer, I am actually from Der Niederlande

Thank you very much for welcoming me

Hmm I forgot to introduce myself.

My name is Tim and I enjoy doing caselogs. I always try and do things a bit different. Try and mod things others have not thought about yet.
I can actually read German quite decent, but writing it is a whole different ballgame. So please excuse me for writing English instead.

A small update this time. I received a package the other day from my good friends of..



Which contained some parts to restore my case to it's former glory. See mister TJ07 former owner / case demolisher, THIS is how a top mesh should ook like without holes drilled into it and glue all over it.
BTW At Silverstone Germany they have an amazing service. The front bay covers are 1.50 euros each and the top mesh 2.50 euros. I payed as much for shipping as I did for the items. Good stuff Silverstone :thumbsup:



I have a serious case of tunnel vision.





My new mesh installed. Looking like factory new.



The front bay covers testfitted. WOW how clean does this case look from the factory?
I might just buy a slim DVD burner + slim baycover at some point. But then again I really like this clean look. Silverstone did a great job designing this case. They should just update the case to a 2012 version with a black interior and a closed motherboardtray with cables holes. This case is a classic.



This is what I planning to do with it. Keep the outside original and turn around all the bay content. Close the rest with original bay covers. This way I get like a tunnel to put all the cabling through and a portion of the watercooling setup. It will house my fancontroller and my double bay XSPC reservoir and pump. Finally I wil make a custom bay cover side panel to make it all into one complete clean finish. At least I hope so



When daddy is working on his case and his youngest daughter isn't stealing his screws and other parts she is calmly making puzzles next to me



Even more tunnelvision

http://img803.imageshack.us/img803/2955/dscn0686u.jpg

That is it for now. I expect another package in the next few days. Hopefully

Youre welcome

This is a very good and clean work

I didn´t read the text yet, but the pics look very nice

BUT: I think the moderation wont see an eglish project, because the community rules mean, that the language ist german. I will ask for you.

coroc

coroc schrieb:

Youre welcome

This is a very good and clean work

I didn´t read the text yet, but the pics look very nice

BUT: I think the moderation wont see an eglish project, because the community rules mean, that the language ist german. I will ask for you.

coroc

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Thank you very much!

Well when opening this thread it had to go through moderation. So I guess at least one of them has seen it.

I really hope I can stay here and show you this project. A friend of me is German and asked me to show it here as well.
I just cannot write German good enough. It would be 5 yr old German

Hukkel schrieb:

Well when opening this thread it had to go through moderation. So I guess at least one of them has seen it.

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I don't know exactly what you mean by saying "this thread it had to go through moderation" - we don't have to unlock threads or postings so everything you are writing will be readable for the community instantly.

Referring to our rules, the official language for these forums is German, so your thread violates our rules, but personally i think your work here is really worth a closer look.

We will discuss this issue internally and hopefully find a way to do justice to both sides. I will close this thread als long as the discussion will last to firstly obey our rules (and to preserve fairness), but be sure that somebody of us will contact you (or open the thread again) when we have come to a satisfying result.


EDIT: We decided to make an exception for this thread/project so you can go on in english and the thread is opened again (see your private messages for further details).

______________________________________________

So noch einmal für alle die des Englischen weniger mächtig sind in Deutsch:

Es ist uns bewusst, dass in den Regeln steht "Die Forensprache ist Deutsch". Das wurde zurecht moniert und hier thematisiert sowie dem Threadersteller mitgeteilt. Wir haben das Problem intern beraten und sind zu dem Schluss gekommen, dass ein solch gutes Projekt nicht an der Sprache scheitern sollte und wenn ich einen Kollegen zitieren darf ein wenig "internationaler Flair im Forum" nicht schadet.

Daher gibt es eine Ausnahmeregelung für diesen Thread, der im Folgenden dann in englischer Sprache weiter geführt werden darf. Ich halte auch die Poster an, ebenfalls dann englische Posts zu verfassen um dem TE gegenüber fair zu bleiben (sprich dass er sie auch richtig verstehen kann).

Hey,
very nice work.
Incredible Alk, I think it's the right desicion.
Today a little bit internationality can't be wrong.

I will follow your worklog, hope it will end as nice as it begun.

@ Moderation:

@topic: very nice project, you get an [x] ABO and i will follow this project
You have many nice ideas and a veeeeery cool case

And so many pictures


So, than have fun with the project and take much pictures for us

Incredible Alk schrieb:

EDIT: We decided to make an exception for this thread/project so you can go on in english and the thread is opened again (see your private messages for further details).

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Thank you so much Mr. Alk. I am very happy I can stay here.

Dark-Blood schrieb:

Hey,
very nice work.
Incredible Alk, I think it's the right desicion.
Today a little bit internationality can't be wrong.

I will follow your worklog, hope it will end as nice as it begun.

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Thank you Dark-Blood

Happy you want to follow.

GeForce-Lover schrieb:

@ Moderation:

@topic: very nice project, you get an [x] ABO and i will follow this project
You have many nice ideas and a veeeeery cool case

And so many pictures

So, than have fun with the project and take much pictures for us

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I have many many pictures so hold on!

It is just a lot of work getting them on here since I am used to just link them from Imageshack (I uploaded myself). But I will do the work and get the pictures in here

Welcome to the Forum Hukkel,
this is a nice project "game hard fold harder"
great pictures, great hardware.
with a i7-3770K and 3x GTX670 you can expect 120K+ PPD average.
do you have a team?
join PCGH-Team 70335

@MOD's good decision to open that threat.

greetz sc59

Yes

I think it is very good, that the Thread is reopened

I hope your project will go on soon

sc59 schrieb:

Welcome to the Forum Hukkel,
this is a nice project "game hard fold harder"
great pictures, great hardware.
with a i7-3770K and 3x GTX670 you can expect 120K+ PPD average.
do you have a team?
join PCGH-Team 70335

@MOD's good decision to open that threat.

greetz sc59

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Hi sc59, thank you very much! I am not in a team yet. But I have some real life modding friends who are pressuring me to go and fold with them
But thank you very much for the offer.

coroc schrieb:

Yes

I think it is very good, that the Thread is reopened

I hope your project will go on soon

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Hi Coroc, I will try and make time tonight at home and give you all a new update. It takes a while since I need to upload all the pictures to this forum first. But no worries, I will give you updates. MANY updates

What do we have here.... a package. I like unpacking



This is how one should pack this stuff, quality.



All kinds of stuff; 2 new case feet, a mobo backplate with an extension part and combs. Beautiful combs :drool: Some screws, clips for cables and a huge bunch of bay covers. Oh almost forgot, a hexx PSU plate with dustfilter.







NUUUUU moar tunnelvision



Showing the difference between the standard one and the new hexx one.



A few more pictures of the motherbord. I think it truely is a work of art. Companies should give us such mobo plates standard in high end cases.











Everything installed. My case had one dented foot and one was missing so it was very unstable. Now it sits exactly right.



These aren't really flashy parts or updates. But I think in the end such parts make the difference between a nice mod and a great mod. The sleeved cables will be presented perfectly this way.

Great work and pictures

Where did you buy the backplate?

Thanks a lot!

I ordered it at ColdZero International - Coldzero

He also made me some custom parts. He is an amazing guy! And he has the right skills and tools for the job.

Thank you! This Shop is worth a lot! Nice Project, and this awesome backplate

Looks absoluetly stunning with this mat black finish and the nice mainboard tray!
You just earned a sub.

DarkWhisperer schrieb:

Thank you! This Shop is worth a lot! Nice Project, and this awesome backplate

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Thank you as well. The show owner Ricardo is an amazing guy. He does such a great job for decent money.
I am not being sponsored by him, but I will still recommend him everywhere. He is ace!

IDaninator schrieb:

Looks absoluetly stunning with this mat black finish and the nice mainboard tray!
You just earned a sub.

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Thank you very much, I hope you will enjoy it.

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I will leave these here. They're renders of the grills I designed to be used on this case. They will be lasercut from plexi. Each grill will have about 3 plexi layers and a layer of dustfilter. The top one will lose the most outside small pieces of hex so only full hexx will be there.





The very kind people of Coolermaster I had contact with and I explained my goal. They agreed I needed something powerfull but efficient. So they offered me a Silent Hybrid Pro 1050W. Now who in their right mind would say no to that? Not me anyway!



















I used to be all Corsair when it comes to PSUs, but I have come back from that. Recently I have been working on sleeving PSUs for others and I have seen quite a lot of different brands and I have really started to respect Cooler master for their PSUs a lot. I still don't understand why their Silent Pro Gold series has such a huge bundle of non modular cables. But their recent M2 line up is amazing value for money. And this Silent Hybrid Pro series is exactly what we want from them. Fully modular. No silly colours. Complete package. Strong single rail performance. That amazing brushes aluminum panel around the fan. 80+ Gold certified. And last but not least the 5,25 bay panel to have access to a fancontroller for both the main fan and the added fan power connections. I mean you get extra fan power connectors and a fancontroller with your PSU. A lot of builds can use them because there aren't enough fan power connectors on the mobo itself. I am very pleased with this amazing piece of tech.

Thank you very much Coolermaster! And thank you Marco for being so kind to sponsor this project with one. It is an amazing help.

I will post more pictures once I have fully sleeved the wiring to match the build.