Transparent Water Cooling Case

thefalconer writes "Over at the Via Hardware website one of the users there recently posted a very unique case mod that combines all of my favorites into a very cool design. Not only is the case totally transparent, but so are the covers on the hard drives, and it sports a water cooled Dual Athlon XP 2100+ processors. The case and all of the internal mods are entirerly hand made and it looks awesome."

Comments

Kind of cool

[JudgeFurious]

Looks like a still. That boy making Moonshine?

Re:Kind of cool

[Apocalypse111]

Looks like a still. That boy making Moonshine? That brings up a couple questions...

Does an Athlon XP REALLY run hot enough to purify alcohal?

Would an alcohal cooling system work better than a water cooling system?

Would Guiness work better than Miller?

Why are we drinking warm beer?

Re:Kind of cool

[MrFredBloggs]

"Why are we drinking warm beer"

Its not warm, its cool - the way beer is supposed to be! Cold numbs your tongue, though for certain American beers this is desirable.

Beer festival in London next week - I`m there, dude!

Re:Kind of cool

[saider]

Alcohol's specific heat is much lower than water's. Water is one of the best fluids for transporting heat because of this property.

Re:Kind of cool

[xoff00]

Does an Athlon XP REALLY run hot enough to purify alcohal?

Yes. I think it was ./ed as well...

The pages are borked, but the site was http://www.exaflop.org/docs/x86still/

Re:Kind of cool

[binarybum]

Its not warm, its cool - the way beer is supposed to be! Cold numbs your tongue, though for certain American beers this is desirable.

This is also desirable when the beer is served with English food.

Re:Kind of cool

[IAR80]

Oil is even better.

Re:Kind of cool

[Weh]

not really, whilst oil might have a higher specific heat capacity water can conviently be evaporated which means that it can absorb and give out the fase change energy on top of it's own heat energy. (I don't really know what happens when you evaporate oil? - I guess it must combust at some point)

A lot of heating and most cooling systems work with transferring energy through evaporation/condensation and not just through the conducance in a single state. For heating mostly steam/water is used and for cooling it's just some refrigerant.

Re:Kind of cool

[packeteer]

you can get a liquid with a specific heat that is higher than water AND evaporates better... i heard they use it in super computers as they can dip the entire case in a tub of it and it wont conduct... too bad its $500 a gallon... dont remember what i heard it was... anyone know?

Re:Kind of cool

[class_A]

Would Guiness work better than Miller?

Maybe if it was Guinness Extra Cold :-)

Re:Kind of cool

[saider]

Flourinert.

Mineral oil is also a good cooling liquid and is used in transformers. The specific heat is not as high, but the stuff is fairly cheap. You just have to keep it clean.

First Post Haiku

[Rhombus]

First post will be mine
Just must type faster than troll
Damn...too slow again.

It's the Fortress of Solitude computer!

[gevmage]

It can always be sold as a piece of modern art when the machine is retired. :-)

Re:It's the Fortress of Solitude computer!

[Jucius Maximus]

Is it just me or does that contraption (loadable pics on the mirror below) look totally and irrevocable UGLY? I would want to hide this thing under a cloth so nobody would see it.

Re:It's the Fortress of Solitude computer!

[cetan]

Actually it's going to look pretty bad once the dust starts to collect in there.

Re:It's the Fortress of Solitude computer!

[MaxVlast]

You could put it in the attic/closet with the water heater and the rest of the plumbing.

A Step toward the IMac

[Apocalypse111]

If the watercooling system leaks, all you need to do is add some fish and you've got an aquarium.
Aw, isn't that cute, he's swimming around my CPU...

Re:A Step toward the IMac

[EvanED]

Rememebr this?

Re:A Step toward the IMac

[Darkstorm]

Now what would be really cool is to integrate the Clear case with an aquarium....all the extra space not used could have a fish tank built in it...then the fish could be swimming in the working computer....

That would be cool...hehe

Re:A Step toward the IMac

[wagemonkey]

Not bad but I after reading the article I was daydreaming of building a watercooled PC inside a fishtank, with real tropical fish. Before anyone thinks I mean immersing electrical components I mean having a double skinned case, with the PC in the middle and fish swimming round it.Hmm, an U shape with the opening at the back for all the cables and an external DVD/CDRW should do it nicely, alternatively have a drawer that slides out the back that holds the PC, then the fish can swim over the nice hot bits too. So long as we have an angelfish called Wanda and a little treasure chest with the key to the PC hidden in it.
When is someone going to use leaded glass (like out TV picture tubes) instead of plastic to keep the interference down?

Oh, I only daydream about case mods as life's too short - I'd rather be cutting code, mountain biking or being a family man, and not necessarily in that order (biking comes last).

Re:A Step toward the IMac

[Anonymous Coward]

The EMI would drive the fish insane. Most would die of streess within a few weeks.

Re:A Step toward the IMac

[Darkstorm]

Goldfish are cheap.

Re:A Step toward the IMac

[agallagh42]

Actually, I heard that goldfish are cheaper than goldfish food. It would be cheaper to just not feed them, and replace them every week or so. PETA might not like that plan very much though ;)

better hardware monitoring

[prisen]

w00t! Now I can *watch* my Athlon XP catch on fire after I try to overclock it to 400*13!

Looks: Unimportant

[MrSloth]

Despite the fact that I am typing this on a shiny G4, I don't think it matters what a computer looks like. There is absolutely nothing wrong with a beige mid-tower. I wish the computer industry would get away from asthetics and focus more on power and affordabilty.

Re:Looks: Unimportant

[prisen]

and appearently for the VIA crew, some stability and/or compatibility would be in order...

Re:Looks: Unimportant

[thefalconer]

Hey, it will be a good practice in server maintenance. I don't think they've ever been slashdotted before. :) They're just gonna hate me in the morning. :D

Re:Looks: Unimportant

[JThaddeus]

Amen to that! I have a VIA chipset in the box I configured from Tiger some while back and it has been nothing but trouble. Every time you call some vendor--HP, Diamond, etc.--with a problem, the first thing I hear is "Oh, VIA, huh?" HP ThinkJet tech support told me that don't test with anything but Intel chip sets, which sounds suspicious to me. Do all HP-Compaq machines use *only* Intel chip sets?

Re:Looks: Unimportant

[Silverstrike]

Several years ago, a simple Pentium 100 would cost you $5000. A few years before that, a 386 would cost you $7000, and a few years before that...and so on. The reason we see all these spiffy case mods and so on is for that precise reason. I can pick up a perfectly good 1Ghz machine for under $400 now. So why not spend an extra hundred and make it a conversation piece? Its not like those beige boxes are gone, you still have the option of buying a plain box.

Transparent Hard drive Case?

[Anonymous Coward]

The guy broke the seal on his hard drive? I'm venturing that he didn't have a clean room (and I may be wrong on this).

Why would you even THINK of doing this to a hard drive that you actually want to store data on? Don't you have any idea just how big a pollen of dust is to a hard drive?

Re:Transparent Hard drive Case?

[Anonymous Coward]

Is it pollen or is it dust? They are not the same you know.

Re:Transparent Hard drive Case?

[Satanboy]

actually to break the seal on your hard drive, there is a special way . . .

you need a few things

1) saran wrap

2) latex gloves

3) a good box fan

4) a hair net (or hat) and a dust mask (just to keep the drive safe from you)

5) a screw driver to open the drive

go to your bathroom and turn on the shower for about 10 minutes on hot, so there is lots of steam in there

then, take the box fan and blow the steam out of the bathroom, this will catch all the particles of dust that hang in the air and blow them with the steam outside of the bathroom, you then take the top of the drive off and IMMEDIATELY wrap it in the saran wrap.

you can then mod the drives top and then put it back together in the "clean room"

it is not guaranteed to work , but I have seen it done with no issues, you just need to wear the right clothes and be super careful.

Re:Transparent Hard drive Case?

[Fzz]

go to your bathroom and turn on the shower for about 10 minutes on hot, so there is lots of steam in there

then, take the box fan and blow the steam out of the bathroom, this will catch all the particles of dust that hang in the air and blow them with the steam outside of the bathroom, you then take the top of the drive off and IMMEDIATELY wrap it in the saran wrap.

When you blow the air and steam out of the bathroom, where does the air that comes in to replace that air come from? Unless you filter the air coming in, I'm not sure this will help you a lot. Wouldn't it be better just to wait for all the large droplets to settle out?

-Fzz

Re:Transparent Hard drive Case?

[Hollinger]

You're serious? More power to you for being brave enough to do that. The problem with this is not only junk getting onto the surface, but said junk hitting the read heat at 5400 (or 7200) RPM, causing an actual disk crash. Not a computer crash, but flying read head actually crashing into the disk, and kicking up even more junk to corrupt other parts of the drive.

I wish I could find a picture, but someone I know at Seagate has a poster on his wall showing the gap between the disk head and the platter. Next to it's a scale drawing of a (relatively small) particle of dust that's huge compared to that gap.

Like I said, more power to you.

Wow.

Re:Transparent Hard drive Case?

[Sneftel]

This is idiocy. When you blow the steam out of the bathroom using the box fan, do you have a vacuum left in the bathroom? Temporarily, yes! And the air to fill it has to come from somewhere, and that somewhere is (gasp) outside the bathroom. So while you've steamed up the bathroom air but good, you immediately discard it, and replace it with nice, dusty room air? Duh.

If you want to use the water vapor trick, you have to wait for the vapor to subside. And you still have a problem with high humidity, which can be hell on hard drives. Even if you don't notice anything for the first couple of weeks, there's still water particles banging around in your drive, just waiting to corrode things.

Bottom line? Don't do this. If you absolutely MUST mod your hard drive, construct a mini clean room from a plastic aquarium, latex gloves, a fan, and a HEPA and an ULPA filter working in concert (the HEPA filter first, then the ULPA). It's cheap, and your hard drive won't, you know, DIE.

Re:Transparent Hard drive Case?

[JudgeFurious]

Excellent point. A lot of us have seen one version or another of this set of instructions. The one I happen to remember did not mention blowing any air out of the room. It did point out that you needed to get the air very moist but not enough so that it created condensation on anything and everything. Not sure of what a difference making the floating particles moist would be (maybe they then drop to the floor?) but even my simple mind can see that the air that leaves has to be replaced with something.

Maybe you could get one of those ridiculously expensive filters that catches everything possible and set things up so that the only air that could enter the room would come through the filter when you blow the air out?

I'll never bother to try it though so it's all just mental masturbation anyway.

Re:Transparent Hard drive Case?

[Satanboy]

sorry forgot to mention that, I hung a clean sheet over top of the boxfan and just taped it to the door top and to the top of the box fan

Re:Transparent Hard drive Case?

[Apocalypse111]

The instructions I read for this stated that you simply wait a few minutes for the steam to clear up, at which point all the particles in the air would (theoretically) have fallen to the ground due to their increased weight. All in all though, if you manage to do this mod, you've got cohones grandes.

Re:Transparent Hard drive Case?

[isorox]

So while you've steamed up the bathroom air but good, you immediately discard it, and replace it with nice, dusty room air?

But do it for long enough and you steam all the air worldwide!

Re:Transparent Hard drive Case?

[pmz]

then, take the box fan and blow the steam out of the bathroom, this will catch all the particles of dust that hang in the air and blow them with the steam outside of the bathroom,...

But, what about the incoming air? This is significant, unless you plan on maintaining a vacuum while you work. Perhaps blocking all of the doorway leaving openings for the fan and a HEPA filter might be less risky.

Also, some latex gloves are manufactured with a powder in them, which could ruin all other preparations for cleanliness.

This drive mod recipe sounds more like those plans to prevent pregnacy by doing jumping-jacks after sex; it just leaves out too many variables.

Re:Transparent Hard drive Case?

[Anonymous Coward]

You are so full of bullshit. :-P Everyone knows you are mixing past slashdot articles with stuff pulled out of your ass. Heat, simmer, let it cool and your done!

Re:Transparent Hard drive Case?

[NETHED]

http://www.pcguide.com/ref/hdd/op/heads/opHeight-c .html

thats a good representation

Re:Transparent Hard drive Case?

[tHiNk411]

I bought a "non-working" computer for $5 at a yard sale, I re-seated the ide cable and then started using it again. Anyways, I decided to mod the HDD with a plexi window and cut a hole in the front of my case for it as seen on UnixMonkey.com and I did this outside, I opened the HDD, even ran it outside while using a dremel tool to cut the hole in the top, used the computer with the HDD exposed, and put the thing back on with a plexi installed on the top of the HDD, has worked fine! Clean rooms are not needed. Just get some balls.

Re:Transparent Hard drive Case?

[blueroo]

A vacuum? In your bathroom? Bro, wait until you pass 6th grade life sciences and physics before posting again, ok?

Re:Transparent Hard drive Case?

[Jonsey]

Actually, as discussed here: Icrontic Forums and here: Overclocker's Article You should *not* use a box fan.

The trick about the shower is to get some steam in the air, such that it will adhere to the airbourne dust, and weight it down somewhat. You steam up the room nicely, get the air a *bit* (not much) saturated with water vapor, then kill the shower, and let the dust settle in the room. The fan would ruin the effect, as it would only whip up the dust that's just settled.

Now, this is nowhere near as good as a clean room, it's quite a ghetto hardware mod, but you can get the room clean enough such that you can take off the cover, and saran wrap it quickly enough to avoid harming the drive 90+% of the time.

Another cool tip?: Clean the acryllic very very well before installing it.

- Jones

Re:Transparent Hard drive Case?

[Anonymous Coward]

Ah, and forgot to post this in mine, the quick saran wrapping is generally enough to keep the drive from going FUBAR in the humidity. But letting the dust settle, and the majority of the humidity vent are important... I should know, I've done it twice : )

Re:Transparent Hard drive Case?

[tHiNk411]

My bad, UnixMonkey.NET

Re:Transparent Hard drive Case?

[Sneftel]

That was stupid of you, so here's a short, easy response.

When you START blowing air out of the room, for a few nanoseconds, a small vacuum is generated. That vacuum is then filled, partially from other bathroom air, partially from outside. So gradually the humid air is replaced by dusty air.

Come to think of it, that was way too much time spent humoring you. I'll have my secretary bill you. ;-)

Re:Transparent Hard drive Case?

[RandomCoil]

Regarding constructing a mini-clean room, I wonder if you could use the air vented off a HEPA filtered vacuum (as in carpet/upright vacuum). You'd probably want to empty the dust-bin/bag first, but the vacuum combined with a (clean) dryer hose might provide a decent air handling system for mini-clean room.

Re:Transparent Hard drive Case?

[Anonymous Coward]

Fuck you slashdot auto-filter assholes for always screwing up URLs. what purpose does that serve?

here. now it's an href. leave it alone.

http://www.pcguide.com/ref/hdd/op/heads/opHeight-c .html

Re:Transparent Hard drive Case?

[hugecrow]

or just use a laminar air flow unit to maintain a clean room environment. I work in one everyday, it would be perfect.

Re:Transparent Hard drive Case?

[Sir_Stinksalot]

Of course I work for a company that mantains electron microscopes and one of our products is a wafer inspection tool. These just happen to exist inside some of the cleanest cleanrooms on the planet. I think I will take my harddrive there to do the modding :).

Re:Transparent Hard drive Case?

[Kintanon]

Aquariam + glass cutter + rubber gloves + aircompressor + plumbers goop + a couple of good rubber gaskets = Excellent clean room for small things. You get a perfect vacuum, nice and airtight.The hardest part is making the lid, I recommend getting a glass panel the same size as the aquarium top (of course) and to use the plumbers goop and some rubberized piping to make a nice airtight lid for it. Works really well for a lot of experiments, when my HS chem/physics teacher couldn't get the school to buy him a vacuum chamber for something he wanted to do, he brought all this stuff in and our class for 2 weeks was him teaching us how to build one.

Kintanon

Re:Transparent Hard drive Case?

[dar]

That explains all the humidity here in Chicago.

Re:Transparent Hard drive Case?

[Sneftel]

I've thought about doing this too. Even if you don't directly use the vacuum cleaner, the HEPA filters for vacuums are likely to be much cheaper than the industrial dealies. Just make sure it's HEPA, and not "HEPA-compliant".

Re:Transparent Hard drive Case?

[bbc22405]

You get a perfect vacuum, nice and airtight.

Nice and airtight maybe, but perfect vacuum no.

Re:Transparent Hard drive Case?

[Kintanon]

I phrased that badly, I meant perfect in the sense of 'A perfect cake', not in the scientific sense. I should have been more clear. But with the aircompressor running and sucking everything out of the tank, you certainly don't have any air in it....

Kintanon

Re:Transparent Hard drive Case?

[Kaz Riprock]

You could always get one of these.

I don't think the guy in the suit comes with it though.

Re:Transparent Hard drive Case?

[Anonymous Coward]

But with the aircompressor running and sucking everything out of the tank, you certainly don't have any air in it....

Once again, you don't know what you are talking about.

Re:Transparent Hard drive Case?

[Kintanon]

I don't see how I can be any more clear, but an airtight container, with an air compresser pump hooked to one end pulling air out, with no way for more air to get in, makes a box, with no air in it. Don't tell me you're stupid enough to argue that?

Kintanon

Re:Transparent Hard drive Case?

[blueroo]

Yes, and when you fart, for a few nanoseconds, a vacuum is created in your rectum. Then that vacuum is filled with your head. Then you get the bright idea of posting to slashdot, and here we are.

Damn /. effect.

[Rhombus]

Wish I could see this damn case...site is slashdotted. :/

Guess I'll try again after lunch.

Re:Damn /. effect.

[Ashran]

Does it help if I tell you it looks nice?
*very evil grin*

Really Nice Design... but...

[Anonymous Coward]

The inside looks so cluttered...

Maybe he could handle the piping a bit different or clean up the wiring, then it would be a really really nice mod.

As well, a friend of mine modded his computer so the water for the cooling would do a little waterfall in a waterproof tank that you could see(Through a piece of acrylic on the side of the case), perhaps that would be a neat addition to this mod.

Just thinking.

Re:Really Nice Design... but...

[Skyshadow]

As well, a friend of mine modded his computer so the water for the cooling would do a little waterfall in a waterproof tank that you could see(Through a piece of acrylic on the side of the case),

Idea borrowed, no doubt, from the Cray waterfalls, available on several machines and cooling towers, including the Cray 2.

Re:Really Nice Design... but...

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't suppose that you work in the NCSA? That's where your link points to. Is that waterfall there? I've been inside Beckman several times, but I've never seen it, do you know where it is?

Re:Really Nice Design... but...

[Skyshadow]

Nope; I did my internship at Cray.

I've been to UIUC a couple of times, but don't recall seeing the Cray 2. I'm sure if you inquired around you could find it -- it's a hard thing to misplace.

Re:Really Nice Design... but...

[pmz]

I wonder if there really never was any such thing as a super computer.

Conspiracy theory: These Cray folk were really high-end furniture dealers posing as computer salesmen. The machine rooms housing Crays had rows of workstations under the tiles to do the work, while the sysadmins were enjoying their waterfalls, cool-looking couches, and lots of blinking LEDs. The tall black cabinets housed expensive beer, snack mix, and big TVs. Other cabinents had small humming devices and hiding places for party-goers, so passing managers thought the money spent was totally worth it.

Sounds like "win-win" as far as I can tell.

Re:Really Nice Design... but...

[Anonymous Coward]

Beckman Institute is one crazy place... I did a neat 3D model of the exterior (well, along with the whole campus... I'm a loser). Quite a fun building to tweak verts on.

EMI

[LBU.Zorro]

The main problem with acrylic / perspex cases is the lack of radiation shielding..

Macroman from Bit-Tech.net suggested that the foil he uses on one of his cases (reflective unless internally lit) might block the radiation plus give a great effect.

If you place acrylic cases next to your TV or radio, then you can see the interferrence..

Also I remember reading that an open case / case window was screwing around with a remote garage opener..

Just a thought if anyone is planning to use it as a tv top box since it looks so nice :)

Z.

Re:EMI

[Anonymous Coward]

That's why we need transparent aluminum. I'll call scottie and have some delivered.

Re:EMI

[izto]

Well.. remember that Faraday guy they talked to you about in high school?

A nice addition to the transparent cases mods would be a thin, grounded chicken wire layer. It wouldn't be very visible and it would certainly reduce EMI to nearly zero if done right. Just like they do with microwave oven's doors.

I think it would add to the mod's looks, too! :-)

Re:EMI

[Anonymous Coward]

My PC contains no sources of radiation, thanks.

Re:EMI

[abcxyz]

Transparent Aluminum.

Re:EMI

[EvilBudMan]

I wonder if you can purchase some metal grateing like the stuff used on microwaves that will let you see in but not let the EMI out? Just a thought?

Re:EMI

[LBU.Zorro]

You'd be better off using the stuff they use to electrically heat car front windscreens..

This stuff is so fine that you can barely see it unless you look for it, BUT would work as a faradays cage, aslong as you connected it up properly..

Seen it on a Ford I had, I think BMWs have it aswell..

Z.

Re:EMI

[EvilBudMan]

Cool,

If only you could attach it to plexiglass somehow. I wonder if there are any faradays cage case mods of some type out there? Also I wonder if case modding violates FCC rules?

Re:EMI

[ikeleib]

There are plastic vendors that have aluminized acrylic for sale. It's acrylic with a very thin layer of aluminum on it. It's still mostly transparent, but forms an effective EMI shield. A similar process is used for military airplane canopies, but the material is not acrylic.

Re:EMI

[Anonymous Coward]

I have the answer to shielding this case. During the Reagan years I worked on a military project modifying aircraft to prevent damage from EMP caused by an nuclear explosion.

We used glass and plastics with a micro fine gold mesh embedded inside. Transparent, with a very slight tint.

Only problem is, I estimate this would push the cost of the case to about $86 million.

Re:EMI

[BlowChunx]

This is what makes the later editions of the iMac so cool, from a design viewpoint. Apple figured out how to shield the computer all the while encasing it in a clear plastic (doctored with metal particles?). I believe they also patented that idea...

Re:EMI

[esoteric0]

actually, that works on a microwave because the diameter of the hole is smaller than the wavelength of the radiated field. if you tried to shield a computer case in this manner, it would take a mesh so fine that for all intents and purposes it would be opaque.

Re:EMI

[sdo1]

No true geek/modder ever has the cover on their PC anyway, so EMI problems are somewhat irrelevant.

-S

Re:EMI

[Deadstick]

Must be a zero Hertz CPU...

rj

Re:EMI

[Mignon]

remember that Faraday guy they talked to you about in high school?

At my age ... "remember"? Maybe. "high school"? Definitely not.

Re:EMI

[NeMon'ess]

When a modder finishes the case, sure the thing gets closed up. Once its been dyed black, leds replaced with blue ones, holes cut for windows, lights inside placed, holes for fans cut and fans installed, CPU water cooled, hard drive window cut, drive faces dyed black. Close it up and show it off.

Re:EMI

[SubtleNuance]

you know those old crappy cases with three sides (top + left + right) covers that slide on from the back, the type that have a plastic-front that snaps on?

Ive had that cover off my PC for about 2 years, the unit sits under the table. It makes a good foot rest. its shamefully full of dust bunnies and cooled by a 50 year old table-top fan pointed in the side.

Tomorrow I pick up my new 512MB(CAS2 PC2700)@533Mhz)/2200+/80GB screamer... funny that you mentioned keeping the cover off at the time when im about to retire this old girl (PII266) and make her into a ApacheServer...

Re:EMI

[Cecil]

First things first: Microwaves operate at 2.4GHz. Minus any slight harmonics at higher frequencies, I don't think many computers that would have any parts operating at frequencies higher than this and still less would putting out significant EM radiation in those higher bands.

The shielding on most microwaves is fine-grained enough to give reasonably good blocking of EM radiation up into the 240GHz range. They also have much thicker wires than a normal Faraday cage will need, because they are absorbing massive amplitudes of microwaves in comparison to the kind of amplitudes a computer will put out.

Secondly: For a faraday cage to be opaque, you'd be looking at holes somewhere around 40 nanometers across. (1/10th of blue light's wavelength of ~400nm). That's completely useless, unless computer is emitting too much radiation on even shorter wavelengths that you feel you need to block?

Well, if your computer is putting out UV and X-Ray radiation, perhaps you've overclocked a bit too much.

Well....

[Osiris Ani]

It's plainly obvious that everyone needs one; "everyone," of course, referring specifically to me, and "needs," in this case, meaning "lusts after."

Pretty awesome but...

[MjDascombe]

A case is just a case. I'd rather double the CPU speed/RAM and house a PC in a shoebox than have a P100 in a five hundred pound case :p

Re:Pretty awesome but...

[Osiris Ani]

A case is just a case. I'd rather double the CPU speed/RAM and house a PC in a shoebox than have a P100 in a five hundred pound case :p

Well then, double the CPU speed/RAM in your own system so that it might occupy the time you would otherwise spend bitching about what other, more clever people are doing with their own time. By the way, as the article states, this particular case will house an Iwill MPX2 board with dual 2100+ MPs, which is hardly a P100.

--
"Beware: history speaks of goals never intended." - Andrew Boyd

Re:Pretty awesome but...

[MjDascombe]

No, but I bet it costs more than a vanilla dual 2100+. Besides - I wasn't bitching about anyone, just stating an alternate point of veiw.

Re:Pretty awesome but...

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh, sorry, didn't realize you were so sensitive to high prices. I should have known better - your mom sure was cheap last night.

Re:Pretty awesome but...

[checkyoulater]

Besides - I wasn't bitching about anyone, just stating an alternate point of veiw.

Don't you know that such things are forbidden on Slashdot? Toe the line or be banished.

Re:Pretty awesome but...

[teaserX]

You must be the guy that drivres that 500 hp Eclipse with the brown door and stock wheels.

Thanks again

[Anonymous Coward]

CmdrTaco you cock for destroying another webserver. What is the point of posting links to these things if in doing so you make it so that the info can't be accessed? Really, it's not amusing anymore, it's rude and stupid.

Transparent water?

[Anonymous Coward]

That's fucking incredible! What will they think of next?

Re:Transparent water?

[Anonymous Coward]

Transparent aluminum

Re:Transparent water?

[JasonMaggini]

Dehydrated water! Just add... oh, wait.

That thing looks huge.

[Anonymous Coward]

If it doesn't work out as a computer case you could make it into an apartment.

not finished

[zoombat]

Note that while the system looks dang cool, it's not actually finished yet (2 weeks to completion according to the site) and he's looking for feedback. Perhaps the /. mod crew can weigh in.

Re:not finished

[gerf]

yup, the only text the guy had was

"Hello, I wanted to share with you the latest project I am working on. The case is a custom acrylic design and will house an Iwill MPX2 board with dual 2100+ MPs. I am about 2 weeks from completion...any feedback and suggestions are welcome." along with 4 or so pictures.

Why even post a half-azz job on /.? it's cool and all, but please, let the guy finish it before toasting the forums he posts it on.

Re:not finished

[mike3411]

There's a great deal more info on his work log, which is also /.'d to oblivion. I agree, though, that it would have been more appropriate to wait until he actually finished the thing, complete w/ oc numbers/temps, benchmarks, etc., as at this point is more of a pretty toy than anything technically interesting. I'm very interested in what kind of performance he'll be able to get out it.

Re:not finished

[liquidsin]

I'm a l337 master modder. Here's my input:

Just slap some racing stripes on it and call it a day. Racing stripes are proven to make everything more aerodynamic. This translates to fuel savings. You can use the saved cash to replace the processor when the cooling system springs a leak.

Hope this helps.

Re:not finished

[checkyoulater]

Just slap some racing stripes on it and call it a day. Racing stripes are proven to make everything more aerodynamic.

I thought all the extra performance came from those "Powered by Honda" and other assorted racing company stickers?

Ummmm...

[DaytonCIM]

Wow!!! I do agree with some of the other board's posters... "where's the tap?"

Re:Ummmm...

[Anonymous Coward]

I am sorry this has nothing to do with your post it does how ever have to do with your sig. Damn that is funny I love it!

Re:Ummmm...

[Niles_Stonne]

Awesome Sig! Very funny.

Water Jacket for Head.

[Rhombus]

Recently I thought it might be neat to construct a water-cooled hat...something with fins and a fan to dissipate the excess heat.

(Note: I work in a building without AC...it was 97 degrees in here yesterday when I came up with this brainstorm. :P )

Re:Water Jacket for Head.

[eyepeepackets]

"Recently I thought it might be neat to construct a water-cooled hat...something with fins and a fan to dissipate the excess heat.

(Note: I work in a building without AC...it was 97 degrees in here yesterday when I came up with this brainstorm. :P )"

Dude, that's called a brainfart, not a brainstorm.

*comf*

Re:Water Jacket for Head.

[AlecC]

Which, according to Terry Pratchet, makes you a Troll. His trolls, being a silicaceous life-form, have brains that get slow when hot. Detritus the Guardsman has cooling fins and a clockwork fan on his guardsmans helmet.

Or maybe you just need a Beanie-cap whose propeller is motorised. Become a real propellor-head - and inflict significant damage when you head-butt your pointy-haired manager.

Re:Water Jacket for Head.

[reddywhipt]

Necessity is a Mother.

Jim

Re:Water Jacket for Head.

[Anonymous Coward]

it was 97 degrees in here yesterday when I came up with this brainstorm

If the ambient temp is 97, your watercooler would put more heat into your head than it takes out. Your core temp is only 99, and the surface is distinctly cooler.

Re:Water Jacket for Head.

[blincoln]

The Sharper Image beat you to it.

Now you too can look like the cyborg security guards in Cloud City.

Re:Water Jacket for Head.

[Anonymous Coward]

hi. you're a moron.

I have a dual XP 1800+...

[fire-eyes]

I haven't been able to load that page yet, but... The coolest thing to me sounds like the transparent hard drive covers.

I'm guessing you'd have to rent/aquire access to a clean room to pull this one off.

P.S. - I thought XP's wouldn't do SMP with 2000+ and above? Maybe its just a bridge mod?

Re:I have a dual XP 1800+...

[MjDascombe]

Contry to common beleif - Hard drive's arent THAT sensitive to dust, within reason. Aslong as you take reasonable precautions, you can dismantel and reconstruct a harddrive in normal conditions. If you do this, though, always badblock it completely before you put anything on it you dont want to loose.

Re:I have a dual XP 1800+...

[lokki]

Yup. A quick search comes up with several HD window mods. Linear, from bit-tech, has one of the best, IMO

http://www.bit-tech.net/article/66/

Re:I have a dual XP 1800+...

[Jucius Maximus]

"P.S. - I thought XP's wouldn't do SMP with 2000+ and above? Maybe its just a bridge mod?"

I wouldn't be surprised. There are kits in existence that are designed to help people do such mods.

Re:I have a dual XP 1800+...

[mike3411]

He's actually using MP's, the headline blurb is wrong. As far as 2000+ XP's, I believe any XP with its L5 bridge intact (either from the factory or modded) can be detected as an MP and used in a dual-proc rig. I'm running 2x 1800+ XP's that I modded to short the factory-cut L5 bridge; and I'm running at a 150MHz FSB, bumping them up to 1.7GHz each, and they are detected as 2 2100+ MP's.

Apply this technique...

[eyepeepackets]

to their webserver, it seems to need some serious help right about now.

The running score in the battle between Slashdotting and Webservers might look something like this:

Slashdot 4^12/Webservers 4

Plumbers

[Skyshadow]

According to office lore while I was interning at Cray in Chippewa Falls, Seymour Cray used to tell people he was a plumber. If you look at any of the liquid-cooled Cray machines, you could see why he said that -- the most obviously complicated aspect of them was their plumbing.

Looks like we're coming full-circle here.

Another piece of office lore, incidently, said that if the florinert used to cool the machines ever boiled (so, if there was an electrical fault that flash-boiled the coolant), it would have the same effect on you as mustard gas. Not sure how true that is, but it made working in a computer room sound a lot more sexy.

Re:Plumbers

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.sunhelp.org/pipermail/rescue/2002-Febru ary/048755.html

Re:Plumbers

[bbc22405]

Another piece of office lore, incidently, said that if the florinert used to cool the machines ever boiled (so, if there was an electrical fault that flash-boiled the coolant), it would have the same effect on you as mustard gas.

No, not like mustard gas. Probably more like helium, etc. There may be a reason why they named it fluorINERT. From the 3M website: Liquid, 3MTM FluorinertTM Electronic A family of perfluorinated liquids offering unique properties ideally suited to the demanding requirements of electronics manufacturing, heat transfer and other specialized applications. Non-flammable, non-corrosive, low toxicity, compatible with sensitive materials. High dielectric strength.

Perhaps you were thinking of Halon, a gas that was/is often used in fire suppression systems for machine rooms (and aircraft, etc)? They (the people that create rumors) told us that Halon was bad. But I justed surfed, and that says "low toxicity" also.

You'll have to try something else to make it seem sexy to work in a machine room with a Cray. I vote for the waterfall, or the nifty bench seats.

Re:Plumbers

[Phs2501]

The reason Halon is bad for you is because to put the fire out without water/liquid CO2/dry chemicals the oxygen in the room has to go away. Which makes breathing hard if you're still in the room once the Halon system goes off.

Re:Plumbers

[Phs2501]

Or perhaps I could be wrong...

Re:Plumbers

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, at high temperatures halon decomposes into all sorts of acidic naughtiness. Hence the large number of halon extinguishers in my house from when they phased it out of the fab where my dad worked :)

My favorite part....

[ziggy_zero]

Is the built-in bong in the middle of the case!

Re:My favorite part....

[pcmills]

First thing I saw also.

Smoke em if ya gottem.

LEDs!

[Winterblink]

What'd be cool would be to have an array of blue LEDs on one side of the case, rigged up to respond like a spectrum analyser to the soundcard output. With that clear case it'd look funky as hell.

His Worklog

[Anonymous Coward]

And more pics at
http://www.extrememhz.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=12

Mesa no karma whore

Re:His Worklog

[Rhombus]

Thanks...too bad that site's slashdotted too, now. :/

Whatever

[Anonymous Coward]

on ebay you can buy all sorts of custom case mods. Plexi glass windows, neon lights, neon fans, neon cables. Makes about as much sense as those rice burning hondah civics.

A link to the work log..

[The Pi-Guy]

http://www.extrememhz.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=12 . Note that right now it's got the /. effect (you've got it watercooled. now let's overclock already!! :), but it was fine a few minutes ago..

--pi

Re:A link to the work log..

[Silverstrike]

opps....looks like we ran his site over its bandwidth limits. Thats not cool....

Re:A link to the work log..

[Anonymous Coward]

He should turn it into a bong

the B5 species changing machine?

[gevmage]

It looks like the Mimbari species changing machine from B5. The case will slowly be assembled over this season.

When the machine is turned on and rebooted, then the author of the page will go into a chrysalis and emerge three weeks later as a chartered accountant.

household appliance integration

[wuHoncho]

Absolutely amazing. We can now hook indoor plumbing up to our computers to cool them instead of using electricity. Now we can start working on embedded devices for toilets and super soakers.

Transparent Water, eh?

[senine]

I thought this was NEWS for nerds... water's been transparent for YEARS. Sheesh.

Re:Transparent Water, eh?

[T-Kir]

For Years eh? Did it have on off period for a while ;-)

Plus, everyone knows that water is blue, just look at the sea!

Re:Transparent Water, eh?

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, water is blue. http://www.dartmouth.edu/~etrnsfer/water.htm

The real story is at

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.extrememhz.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=12

Re:The real story is at

[thefalconer]

Nope, looks like that got slashdotted off the map too. :)

Re:The real story is at

[Anonymous Coward]

Forums are doing fine now. Sorry for AC post (I run viahardware's stuff). Just some minor tweaking

EL CID

Newsworthy

[Giggles Of Doom]

Is it just me or does /. seem to be posting an increasingly large number of case mod stories? Not that I mind cool little projects like this, but are they really newsworthy? Isn't this why there are sites like pimprig and HardOCP?

Re:Newsworthy

[teaserX]

Alright pull over. Your geek lisence is now under supension. In this instance it is best to just stay quiet and nod if you din't get it. Mods are cool.

/. insurance?

[rmarll]

With as often as viahardware gets hammered by /., you would think that CmdrTaco would offer /. insurance for these guys.

Isn't this the third time in the last 60 days they've had their server obliterated by us?

Re:/. insurance?

[Apocalypse111]

I thought that's what Google's "cached page" function was for! :-)

Re:/. insurance?

[phillymjs]

It's not so much 'insurance' as 'protection'...

Taco: "Gee, that's a pretty nice webserver you've got your case mod info on. Sure be a shame if somethin', uh, happened to it, like, I dunno, fifty million slashgeeks all trying to load pages from it at once and reducing it to a puddle of slag."
Case modder: Looking disgusted, he hands CmdrTaco a bulging cloth sack with a "$" on it.

~Philly

Re:/. insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

Think again. What good is a case mod site without pictures?

Re:/. insurance?

[bafreer]

Isn't this the third time in the last 60 days they've had their server obliterated by us?

Maybe they should just stop posting such interesting and delightful stories, so that all of us can enjoy them ;)

Re:/. insurance?

[jred]

One of the later posts is by an admin that claimed they used the /.ing to make a few tweaks. Hey, maybe CmdrTaco should charge for stress-testing servers :)

Re:/. insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

screw them.

Never trust hardware that requires WEEKLY driver updates (4-in-1)

Depends on the water

[wiredog]

The water in the local river isn't particularly transparent.

Ahhhh...

[davidsansome]

The transparent case is so you can see everything catch fire as it's slashdotted :-)

Re:Ahhhh...

[SkulkCU]

It's SO transparent that I can't see it at all!

Simply stunning!

HD modding

[t_allardyce]

Doesnt the metal casing on a hard-drive protect it from electro/magnetic inference (or something like that). Replacing it with plastic would remove that surely? Then again, removing the case would not be a great idea anyway...

Has anyone modded their HD and found there are big data integrity problems? (obviously it doesnt count if its an IBM deskstar)... lol

Nothing is cooler than a G4 cube.

[Anonymous Coward]

Nope. Nothing.

Not even those Kmart cases that are all the rage in the microATX form factor.

Apple. Bring back the fucking cube. G5 please.

One question

[Zabu]

How do you feed the fish?

Re:Plumbers of perfluorocarbons

[Anonymous Coward]

oxygenate the stuff and put a couple mice in their
why don't ya.
If you are feeling really adventuresome the stuff
can be used a blood replacement.
fluorinert

THIS POST WAS NOT A TROLL

[Anonymous Coward]

Sorry to break it to you, but this post was the most insiteful post in this discussion.

Too bad the real moderators got banned, huh?

Re:THIS POST WAS NOT A TROLL

[Anonymous Coward]

" insiteful "

that's insightful...

insight.

see into...

damn, you people are stupid.

Water cooling?

[Anonymous Coward]

Taco, shouldn't you be out looking for some venture capital, or trying to find a buyer for slashdot, or selling some ad space, or polishing up your resume or something?

Everything sweet, but HD mod is idiotic...

[Eric_Cartman_South_P]

Sorry, but I'm not gonna keep ANY data on a hard drive that's opened up. It's hard enough avoiding bad HD's that are sealed (IBM and Maxtor drives have been known to have lots-o-problems). Everything about the mod is smart and shweet, but c'mon, don't fu$k with the HD... that's just dumb IMO. You really want to keep your work/skewl/pr0n on a drive like that?

Re:Everything sweet, but HD mod is idiotic...

[mike3411]

If the worklog weren't completely /.'d, you'd read that his main storage is on a SCSI RAID, the modded IDE drive is relatively small and only used for music/movies/etc., so data integrity is less important, and in this case can apparently be sacrificed for transparency.

whoa.... that last sentance gets my award for most unintentional plays on words.

Re:Everything sweet, but HD mod is idiotic...

[slakdrgn]

Actually (alltho I haven't been able to get to the website due to the /. effect) he prolly opened it up in a clean room, we have one here in the pharmacy I work at that is twice as clean as any computer clean room (has to be for some of the drugs we deal with). If he opened it up in a clean room (a real clean room) then his hard drive will be fine, provided he took all the proper steps to ensure nothing gets in it.

Re:unF

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm using lynx to post this. Graphical browser users are as smart as Jon Katz! ha ha ha

WEAK

[Anonymous Coward]

This mod is incredibly weak...and it looks bad..

I hope...

[chamenos]

his cat jumps on the top of his case after he's done building it, then the whole thing will topple over, causing all his hard drive heads to crash into the little dust bunnies that got in when he opened them up.

its just begging to be kicked over, ain't it?

seriously, doesn't the whole thing look too top heavy? i hope he included some counter-weights in the bottom of his case cos the center of gravity of it looks way too high for comfort.

plumbing problems

[paradesign]

dosent it look as if the plumbing will get in the way of adding pci cards and grafx cards? unless the case is like ultra wide.

otherwise cool, even though im not a mod fan at all, you have to admire the effort and craft.

whoa

[natefaerber]

Dude, I have a bong that looks just like this!

Re:whoa

[babaliong]

and i thought i was the only one that saw a bong in there .. party on, garth!

Pretty nice, but...

[Zspdude]

This is by far the most impressive mod I've seen:well implemented and professional. But I can't help thinking:

What's this costing? Custom case, components, etc, etc? Not just $$$ but time as well. Looking nice is one thing, but wouldn't you rather just run a Walmart Mandrake box for a fraction of the cost?

Re:Pretty nice, but...

[jmu1]

Hobbies are fun. They are time an money consumers which occupy one's mind. In a world where everyone is worried about something... it's good to forget about it all and "constructively break something".

Shielding?

[potuncle]

I don't see much shielding in his prototype. I like to keep the gigahertz inside the box...and all else that hertz outside of the box.

That's been done...

[sterno]

The industry has ridden the affordability horse about as far as it can go. That's why you see more effort to go for aesthetics. Common trend in commoditzed markets is that there's tight price competition until the market reaches a point where it's hard to get much lower. Then they try to differentiate themselves by marketing, aesthetics, etc.

Been there, done that.

[SaDan]

Except a friend and I did repair work on a hard drive in a dorm room. We did some stuff we figured would help filter the air, cleaned all of the tools we were going to use, and fixed a frozen bearing in a hard drive.

Ran fine after that, no bad sectors.

Of course, this doesn't mean that one will be this lucky every time you break the seal on a hard drive!

worthless eyecandy

[Anonymous Coward]

Translucence? Who cares. Give me the command line any day. Oh wait, wrong article.

Man.. that's nothin

[OmniVector]

My friend Steve at RIT Made the best case mod I've ever seen.

It was simplistic, yet functional.

It was well ventelated

And you could also see all the computer parts just like this one. It's called the "no case" case mod. Instead of fooling around with all those screws and metal, just get some unused college books and cool the computer/yourself with a nice rotating fan. Sure wish I had a picture, I had to hold back the laughter everytime I went into his dorm room :).

Re:Man.. that's nothin

[Anonymous Coward]

yeah, next time post a picture or a link or something why don't you!

Re:Man.. that's nothin

[Anonymous Coward]

Personally, I would feel the urge to active the sprinkler system whenever I walked in... Stupid idea.

Re:Man.. that's nothin

[Anonymous Coward]

Seriously? Man, you're a prick. Would you feel the same urge if students were working on electronic projects in a lab?

Oh and in case you were joking, :-) .

English language rant.

[wagemonkey]

VERY UNIQUE, so it's extremely the only one of its kind, as opposed to being only slight the only one of its kind?

Re:English language rant.

[Anonymous Coward]

Good point. But seriously, would you have noticed or cared if you haven't seen someone else rant about "very unique"?

What if it springs a Leak?

[Anonymous Coward]

Shocking, to say the least.

cache the site

[psycht]

can someone at /. take a snapshop of the website before posting it so that we all can enjoy?

not a flame, but a suggestion.

New category

[andy@petdance.com]

Isn't it time for a new "Casemods" category that I could add to my exclusions along with Katz?

Re:New category

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, because you're compelled to read each and every article on slashdot, right?

For the love of God...why?!

[Kakarat]

I still don't see why people want to have translucent cases. I know I wouldn't want to be reminded daily about the family of dust bunnies and the piss poor airflow that exist in my case. Out of sight, out of mind.

Re:For the love of God...why?!

[cbuskirk]

If you did that, you would never know when one of the dust bunnies became sentient and grew oversided feet.

I'd like to see the Cube come back too.

[JudgeFurious]

At around $999 and bumping the eMac down to where the old CRT iMac is now. Cube looked sweet and all I agree but it wasn't worth what they were charging for it.

The kind of people who were going to pay that for a computer mostly wanted more computer and a lot of the people who would have loved one weren't interested or able to pay what Apple was asking.

I hope...

[Anonymous Coward]

You step in front of a moving bus.

You're just begging to be turned into a roadstain, arent you?

Coz it's /.ed....

[Bill_the_Kid]

Here's the main jist of it: Error Occurred While Processing Request Error Diagnostic Information Request canceled or ignored by serverServer busy or unable to fulfill request. The server is unable to fulfill your request due to extremely high traffic or an unexpected internal error. Please attempt your request again (if you are repeatedly unsuccessful you should notify the site administrator). (Location Code: 26)

Legislation???

[fmaxwell]

I know I've said this before, but the real danger I see from this kind of thing is legislation that will purportedly "protect the public" from RF interference.

I'll try to be brief:

Q. How would the legislation work?
A. It would ban the sale of PC componentry to people not licensed by the FCC to produce personal computers.

Q. Who would want this?
A. Microsoft and the big computer makers.

Q. Why would those companies be in favor of such legislation?
A. Microsoft would want it because almost every brand-name PC sold comes with a new Windows license for which Microsoft is paid. If a consumer can upgrade his PC with a new motherboard, CPU, hard drive, etc., Microsoft does not sell another license. The Dells and Compaqs of the world would want it because it would put screwdriver shops out of business as well as forcing consumers to buy new PCs rather than upgrading older ones.

Q. What makes you think Congress would pass such a law?
A. Because Microsoft, Dell, Compaq, etc. have tremendous lobbying power. They would spend whatever it took to get such a law passed if they thought they could succeed.

Q. Why would the American public tolerate it?
A. Because case modders and all people who build their own computers would be referred to as "computer hackers" on the floors of Congress and in the press. The lobbyists would convince (through television and newspaper coverage) the American public that passing the legislation would result in crystal-clear TV reception, interference-free cell phone calls, and reduced incidence of brain cancer. George Bush would probably get on TV and claim that profits from the sale of generic PC clones were being used to fund Al-Qaeda and that cutting off the flow of parts to build these systems was striking a blow against terrorism.

And thus would be passed the "Digital Pollution Reduction Act of 2003."

Re:Legislation???

[Anonymous Coward]

Now I (an average European) am confused.
Please tell me that this is a joke !
Otherwise, when will you start doing something ?

Re:Legislation???

[fmaxwell]

It's not a joke. Just a prediction/fear.

Re:Legislation???

[hyperizer]

I liked your theory better when you used to predict a SWAT team of FCC agents swarming a Senator's apartment to fix his poor TV reception... ;-)

Re:Legislation???

[Fyndo]

FCC Part 15. 15.3(k), most specifically. We have this legislation now. There are limits to how much RF a "digital device" is allowed to put out, and if you go over, and cause interference with other people's radio/TV reception, the FCC can order you to not use it.

Re:Legislation???

[rnd()]

I certainly wouldn't hold my breath waiting for the government to crack down on home built PCs. They make up an extremely small sliver of the market, and Dell and particularly Microsoft very likely do not see them as a threat.

Re:Legislation???

[Fulcrum of Evil]

George Bush would probably get on TV and claim that profits from the sale of generic PC clones were being used to fund Al-Qaeda

Yeah, Osama could really use that $2.50/box

Re:Legislation???

[fmaxwell]

I certainly wouldn't hold my breath waiting for the government to crack down on home built PCs. They make up an extremely small sliver of the market, and Dell and particularly Microsoft very likely do not see them as a threat.

It's not just home-built PCs. It's PCs upgraded at home, too. It's PCs built by the two and three person screwdriver shops. That's a lot of PCs and you underestimate the greed of both Dell and Microsoft if you think that they would happily give up that market.

Re:Legislation???

[fmaxwell]

I liked your theory better when you used to predict a SWAT team of FCC agents swarming a Senator's apartment to fix his poor TV reception... ;-)

Considering that the FCC dispatches RF sniffing vans to find sources of interference, it's not so far-fetched. In fact, I know a ham that was paid a visit by the FCC after his rig was determined to be the source of interference.

Re:Legislation???

[fmaxwell]

We have this legislation now.

And we have laws making murder illegal, but it doesn't stop Congress from passing a new law every time there is a school shooting, does it?

While the FCC has regulations dealing with interference, it does not mean that the Congress won't see fit to pass other legislation if they deem the existing regulations to be unenforceable.

Re:Legislation???

[fmaxwell]

Yeah, Osama could really use that $2.50/box

And when did logic enter into this? Consider the Bush claim that the sale of drugs imported from South America and sold by kids on the street was funding Al-Qaeda.

Re:Legislation???

[Pfhor]

Wait..

I thought that was how the CIA was able to fund their own personal military campaigns....

Oh wait, Al-Qaeda, CIA, sometimes I get them confused.

Re:Legislation???

[camken]

I am a Ham (Callsign W7MB if you care) and in my experience, more often than not, it is the device recieving the interferance that is the problem. You tell me, which is more plausable? (1) My $3000, highly specialised Ham Radio system is causing interferance? or... (2) Your $150, Mass produced TV is recieving stuff it wasn't meant to? Admittedly, this is not always the case, but also in my experience, a Ham is 10 times more likely to be willing to go purchase the neccessary filters if he is causing the interferance than an average person is to go get the filter to keep said interferance out of the equipment that is pulling in more than it's designed to. BTW: I have purchased filters (without compensation) for numerous people whose equipment was faulty, for two reasons... first and foremost because it isn't their fault they bought faulty equipment, and secondly, because Hams try very hard to keep up the excellent record of public action and responsibility that we have. Anyone who cares can go look at http://www.arrl.org/ to find out all kinds of good info about the ham radio population and the public services we provide.

Re:Legislation???

[fmaxwell]

I am a Ham (Callsign W7MB if you care) and in my experience, more often than not, it is the device recieving the interferance that is the problem.

In this case, the HAM that was paid a visit by the FCC was using a kilowatt through a high-gain antenna to talk 15 miles. That's far in excess of the power necessary to establish and maintain radio contact at that distance on that terrain.

My $3000, highly specialised Ham Radio system is causing interferance? or... (2) Your $150, Mass produced TV is recieving stuff it wasn't meant to?

HAM radio gear is expensive because it is not mass-produced, therefore, the cost has more to do with the quantity than the quality. By the way, you don't want to start playing the "look how much it costs" game with me. My speakers alone cost more money than your entire HAM radio rig.

Re:Legislation???

[Anonymous Coward]

I think the first 'case mod' you should do is to remove that overtight tinfoil hat..

Re:Legislation???

[inKubus]

What are you, schitzophrenic? Don't be an idiot.

Re:Legislation???

[fmaxwell]

What are you, schitzophrenic? Don't be an idiot.

What a wonderfully coherent, intelligent, reasoned response!

In answer to your question, I'm a rational human being who recognizes that laws are tightening constantly. I understand that there are special interest groups who push for laws that are in their best interests, but not in the best interest of the public. For a good example, look at the DMCA. Look at the law being considered that would make it legal for the RIAA and MPAA to hack P2P services with no judge, jury, or court order.

You go right on living in your fantasy world where no one passes laws that hurt you, but I'll deal with reality. And the reality is that, if the FCC saw fit to limit RF interference, laws are likely to be passed if homebuilt computers regularly exceed those limits.

Re:Legislation???

[Anonymous Coward]

My headphones cost more than your speakers.

Only a matter of time

[Marqui]

Before the /. effect is labeled as a modified DoS!! Damn, I won't be able to see it until I get home!!!

Nice Pix!

[Anonymous Coward]

"Error Occurred While Processing Request
Error Diagnostic Information
Request canceled or ignored by server
Server busy or unable to fulfill request. The server is unable to fulfill your request due to extremely high traffic or an unexpected internal error. Please attempt your request again (if you are repeatedly unsuccessful you should notify the site administrator). (Location Code: 26)"

Har har har!

The computer equivalent of a SUV

[Junks Jerzey]

This smacks too much of SUV owners, who don't give damn about fuel efficiency, but only want something that looks cool. So now we have people who buy hugely inefficient computers, then resort to water cooling to keep them from burning up. And they justify it because the computer looks cool. Brilliant. You'd think geeks wouldn't want to be in the same class as suburban yuppies.

Re:The computer equivalent of a SUV

[RazzleDazzle]

I totally agree with you plus, who the hell really cares?? How is this "Stuff that matters"?
And how is it NEWS? You want to blow your money and time on crap that is most incredibly unnecessary, fine; leave me out of it.
Urge... to slit... my wrists... increasing...

Re:The computer equivalent of a SUV

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, if you read down this far it obviously matters to you. Not to mention actually taking the time to post about it.

ac

Re:The computer equivalent of a SUV

[Anonymous Coward]

Your comment about SUV owners smacks of a single people, with no spouse or children.

Do you have any idea how much stuff a family of four has to carry around with them, particulary when one of the children is under two years old?

Diaper bags, various snacks and liquids, strollers, portable cribs/playpens...

My SUV gets awful gas milage, without a doubt, but if not for it's size, my family would be totally cramped whenever we went somewhere, and we wouldn't ever be able to do simple tasks like grocery shopping were it not for all of the space.

Besides, it's not like we're asking you to pay for our fuel, so shutthefuckup.

Re:The computer equivalent of a SUV

[Anonymous Coward]

The argument could be made that, due to your increased fuel consumption, you are increasing the demand for fuel. Hence increasing the price at the same time. This does hurt.

Let's not even start on environmental implications.

Plus, an SUV is really a badly designed if you're concerned about hauling your family around. Get a fucking mini-van if you have lots of shit to take with you. Otherwise you are just driving a large death machine that seems typical of our testosterone driven society that hints towards yuppies jerking off over the fact that they would kill an entire other family in a car if they hit them.

What I'm trying to say is, the additional space is really a bad argument for owning an SUV. Get a mini-van if you need space. I'm sure all the urban off-roading you do, the SUV is paying off.

Re:The computer equivalent of a SUV

[Anonymous Coward]

So whats next? Eletric cars? (They effectively are fossil feul cars because they are charged with power made from natural gas, or coal). We burn fossil fuel for most of our power because green peace fuckups like youself dont want nuclear. You live in a box. If we could switch to better forms of energy, like nuclear, we could explore removing fossil fuel everywhere it exists today. Sadly, though, I fear every last drop of fossil fuel will be burned come hell or highwater. So if its 20,000 Honda civic HXs or 5000 SUVs, all the gas is going to get burned.

Lets get serious about electrolyssn for hydrogen fuel and nuclear power. Otheriwse, all these tree hugging hippie fucks are the same retards that are at fault for why half the USA burned to the ground this summer. YOU CANT CUT THE TREE! ITS MORE SACRED THAN HUMAN LIFE!!!. (Now that checkboarding forest management didnt take place for so long the forest floor lit up like crazy).

Thanks hippie fucks for trying to act globally with really crappy local knowledge extrapolated impossibly to the scale of the entire earth. You are *NOT* scientists.

jesus

[carpe_noctem]

Lots of people out there seem to like to submit case mods to /., but every time their servers get pummeled before anyone can see the pics. I guess these guys are better at -building- servers, not -running- them. ;)

ive seen this

[Anonymous Coward]

I have seen this first at Pimprig.com its a cool machine, just hope his hard drive is still working. I would love to own one with a bunch of lights added in

stating the obvious

[Anonymous Coward]

Transparent Water Cooling Case

Funny, I had always thought water was transparent, but I could be worng.

Re:And I hope...

[Anonymous Coward]

you drop that bar of soap.

you're just begging to be someone's loverboy, aren't you?

HD Question

[caveat]

kay, i /really/ dig the clear HD tops, but there's no way in hell i'm gonna open up my drive in the Great Outdoors. i have access to all ranges of cleanrooms at the lab, from (ISO) Class 8 down to better-than-Class 1 (i don't have personal access, but i know people with access to the rooms who'd be happy to slap a plexiglas cover on my drive). so my question is this: what class cleanroom would be the best for cracking a drive? i could just send it in to the cleanest one onsite, but i'd like to keep the hassle for everybody involved to a minimum, and that means using the minimum cleanroom neccessary.

Re:HD Question

[Anonymous Coward]

God damn it, why dont you ask your people who have access to these clean rooms..... they should know where to take it.... why dont you submit this to Ask Slashdot like every other fucking moron.... maybe try a Google search or two.

Re:HD Question

[caveat]

well, shithead, i have asked the people in the cleanrooms, but since they don't work with hard drives, they don't have the foggiest idea of where to begin. Ask Slashdot? damn...you must be dumber than you look. i really don't think this is that much of a burning question on most slashdotters minds; i'd assume most of them don't have cleanroom access. why don't i try a google search? god damn, do i come off as THAT stupid that i would just post without even trying to find the info myself? jeez.

infinite apologies for feeding the trolls.

Re:HD Question

[Anonymous Coward]

Class 100-1000.

Someone has a CD/DVD Fetish..

[AnalogBoy]

Anyone notice that? What could you POSSIBLY need so many CD/DVD Drives for?

Re:Someone has a CD/DVD Fetish..

[hmale]

Those are not all CD/DVD drives you see. Included are SCSI drives that are in an aluminum enclosure for cooling and noise reduction

Re:Someone has a CD/DVD Fetish..

[thatrez]

I usually put 2 writers and a DVD and DVDr in some systems I make, the ones using the larger cases obviously. Especially when I make for friends, as they are cheap enough now and I get em wholesale. The advantage being, that you can do direct copy to copy of CDs without making a image file, and the same thing with huge DVD files, also makes ripping DVD in DivX or VCD a lot faster and easier. Add NTI's virtual CD rom emulation proggie, and your golden ;) -Most of our imports, they come from other countrys
Dubbya right before the stock market plummeted -Is it hot enough out for you?... No, I like sweat to be rolling down the crack of my a like niagra
Robin Williams

Re:Someone has a CD/DVD Fetish..

[thatrez]

it would be really nice if when you typed something up and added a BR tag, if slashcode would actually put in a line break... it would help a lot with formatting, and my posts wouldn't look as if they were written by a hyper 12 year old, they would look as if they were written by a hyper 21 year old ;)

All water is transparent

[Anonymous Coward]

So what's the big deal?

two mirrors to help if you cant see the main one

[thatrez]

Mirror One Mirror Two _ I don't need the karma, but mod this up so people who read at a high threshhold like me can see it

Wurlitzer effects ...

[Spectre]

I'd want internal illumination with bubble channels ... my own "Wurlitzer Bubblematic PC"

He should have...

[Anonymous Coward]

set up a transparent proxy to handle the /. effect.

You know what I.Q. stands for?

[T1girl]

I Quit!

No way I'd work indoors in 97 degrees.

Instead of water use corn mash!

[i_want_you_to_throw_]

Instead of water use corn mash! Operate a little distillery from your PC!

Use Seti@Home to crank out some extra cycles for big batches!

"I was running Distiller, and it wasn't Adobe".

Great for LAN Parties

[Anonymous Coward]

Player1: Dude, all this fraggin' got me thirsty.

player2: Hold on. I'll tap my case and get you some water.

Player1: What the...

Fluorinert - not harmful

[panurge]

No, fluorinert does not have the same effect as mustard gas. I know this because of a software error in a PID controller we once built. By the time I noticed the bug there were 2 litres of fluorinert in the atmosphere of the office and I hadn't noticed. (it was a bit difficult hiding the loss of $3000 worth of heat exchange fluid, though)

[OT] Begone, Grammar Police!

[harlows_monkeys]

I just know someone is going to complain about the phrase "very unique", and say that unique means one-of-a-kind, and can't be qualified with "very".

So, this is a preemptive strike. It is perfectly logical to qualify unique. In some sense, everything is unique. E.g., the UniBall Micro pen sitting on my desk is unique...it's the only one in the world that is sitting on my desk, afterall. However, that uniqueness is not significant. If the pen falls off my desk, it loses it. If someone puts another pen on the desk, and takes the first one, the uniqness is transferred. Etc.. So, it would make perfect sense to say that while my pen is unique, it is not very unique.

Qualifying unique serves to indicate the significance of the uniqueness, or how long it will last.

Have you guys tried having sex instead?

[elroySF]

i mean, jesus!

Re:Have you guys tried having sex instead?

[Anonymous Coward]

Clearly not.

Re:Have you guys tried having sex instead?

[Anonymous Coward]

The creator of the case attends University of the Arts in Philadelphia. I am sure his options for getting laid look much better than mine.

Re:Have you guys tried having sex instead?

[hmale]

I tried it...once! LOL

flames ignite!

[Satanboy]

WOW

I had no idea so many people cared . . .

if you do have any info on other ways to do this, I am plenty interested

the way I discussed is not fail safe, its one of those hit or miss things, so its good to use a cheapo 5 gig drive just so you get the affect without damaging a nice 80 gig

if there is a way to get a clean room made that could make this 100% safe, I would welcome a link to a site with details etc.

I only wanted to state that it was possible to do at home, I was not suggesting everyone go out and do this unless you're like me and have a billion spare parts lying around and just don't care.

Easily Improved Upon

[Bowling Moses]

If this guy wanted to be really cool he'd a a dye to the water cooler that changed color in response to temperature. Should be a good gradient to work with: 22 degrees C room temp and what, 90-100 degrees C right next to the chip?

Re:Easily Improved Upon

[thatrez]

do you mean something like this? http://www.franktrezza.com/bass I'm new to building custom cases, I usually have my friend rob the tin knocker just change old AT cases to ATXs, it's cheaper then payin 20 bucks for a cheap case that breaks in a year cuz its all plastic and tin foil type metal... and has a shit 150w power supply... take it easy

Re:Easily Improved Upon

[Bowling Moses]

I checked out this link http://www.pccasegear.com.au/category45_1.htm from your site and it shows neon colored tubing that I think was used. There's lots of dyes out there that are say blue at low temp but red at high temp and are reversible. Finding one available on the market might be difficult, though.

Advertising

[Anonymous Coward]

I will get modded down for this but this is an all-time low. The cold day in hell hath come. I sit here reading slashdot and low and behold a Microsoft .NOT add pops up. WTF is this all about? Slashdot has sold out completely heart and sole.

Wait till you see my mod!

[ZipR]

I'm doing something similar with my refrigerator. It'll be really sweet-- I'll be able to tell if I have beer without even opening the door! Pics coming soon!

Watercooler System

[SEWilco]

When I read the headline, what I visualized was a system inside a clear plastic water bottle on top of a water cooler. Gee, there's even a chiller there to cool the water.

Better link

[Charlie Bill]

The entire mod brokedown is here

I'd like to say that this is a case of bad editorial research, but unforunately that's something of an institutional joke around here...

Extra time on my hands

[hmale]

Hello everyone, I am the person that posted the project at via hardware that you have been commenting on. First let me say that I have read all the posts here and I have had great fun reading your comments and have had some great laughs along the way. Thank you! Being that I have some extra time on my hands now that my site was down (slashdotted), I thought I would answer some questions that have come up today. 1. The hard drive mod is one that is totally useless in terms of funtionality, but there have been requests from our site members to show it. In response to the requests, we performed our version of that mod. 2. No, the modded HDD is not the primary drive. I have several seagate cheetah X15 SCSI drives that comprise the backbone of my storage subsystem. The modded drive is one that is used for file storage. If it were to fail..no big deal. 3. This project was done to appeal to our site's constituants who comprise the overclocking and modded case community. We have dubbed this the extrememhz.com "flagship case" 4. The project is far from finished there is quite a bit of work to do still. We should be finished in approximately 2 weeks. I hope interested people visit www.extrememhz.com and check out the final result and share your thoughts with us. As for me, I run the site as a hobby, as I have always been tinkering around with diffrent technologies. I am an engineer by profession and geek by happenstance... :) I also have aquariums, so if the case doesn't work out...well you know! BTW the site is operational...the IP addresses have been reset by our hosting company, so if you reboot your system and try to log in you,will be able to. Visit us at www.extreme.mhz.com The project is in the forums under worklogs. Thanks...any questions just holler. I am a big fan of slashdot. Cheers!

Re:Extra time on my hands

[thatrez]

mod that up, I almost missed at since I read at a threshhold of 3 unless I'm really bored and wanna see things like my own posts from my other /. account ;)

More info

[OrangeHairMan]

You can get more information here: http://www.extrememhz.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=12 .

Orange

Why is this cool?

[cardshark2001]

I think it looks rather ugly, personally. It's like making your skin transparent so that everyone could see all the veins and muscles that make up your body.

Ok I hope he has thought about

[Anonymous Coward]

1. Water temperature
If it changes much isnt there a good chance of condensation building? Then zzzzaaap!

2. Bacteria

If he is using water, i didnt see what has been done to it. I read distilled is best to use since it reduces the chances of bacteria forming.

3. New Drives

Unsealed the drives? cool acrylic doorstops.

Re:Ok I hope he has thought about

[Bornagainsinner]

Condensation, cha Cha CHA!!!!

Re:EMI - 2.45 GHz Cooks You

[virtigex]

Bear in mind that 2.45 GHZ is the resonant frequency of the OH covalent bond of water, which you're mainly comprised of. Wonder how much power you'll be absorbing.

Naaa---that's the CIA

[Guru2Newbie]

I thought it was the CIA that imports and then sells drugs to local distributors (who take over the sales) to raise $$ for their covert ops.

One Word

[Prof. F�HL]

ORAC!

Check out...

[bobdole34]

http://www.modz.ca/clrcases.htm

Pretty cool case

Re:EMI - 2.45 GHz Cooks You

[camken]

Bear in mind also that THE FACT THAT 2.45 Ghz is the covalent water bond is precisely why microwaves operate on that frequency! THEY SPEED UP THE WATER MOLECULES IN FOOD IN ORDER TO HEAT IT!

This is Typical and Pathetic

[Anonymous Coward]

This is Typical of kids these days. Hell, look what they do to their cars. Ooo boy next thing you know they will be adding spoilers and $2500 caster wheels for the look. Truly sad. Back in my day we put all of our extra cash on the inside of the computer or car. I mean what would you rather have, a 1970 Challenger with a 383 Hemi, in turd brown, with factory wheels, or a riced out 1990's Honda with a rice-bubbler exhaust and clear lenses? Its all about Image these days. Truly a pathetic reminder of our addiction to advertising. Bah I am getting old

how rude

[g4dget]

that combines all of my favorites into a very cool design.

You mean like disrupting radio communications of fire, police, medical equipment, and amateur radio operators in your vicinity?

Unshielded computer cases show that the person building it either has no clue about electronics or doesn't give a damn about the people around him.

Re:how rude

[hmale]

Please! when have YOU ever experienced this for yourself...or can you supply a CREDIBLE source that will substantiate your claim? The person that did this project is yours truly...an MSEE with 20 years work experience! The mere fact that the computer is contained within a house will prevent any interference of the type you are talking about. Who is rude now?

Re:how rude

[g4dget]

Please! when have YOU ever experienced this for yourself...

Yes: radio interference from unshielded computers is a clear problem, in particular for AM, but also for FM.

or can you supply a CREDIBLE source that will substantiate your claim?

Look at your FCC regulations or most computers you buy in the store: they are all shielded, and they all come with statements to that effect in their instruction manuals. Even the transparent iMac has a carefully constructed metal shield inside around the CPU. Many devices use conductive plastic, which is quite a bit more expensive than regular plastic. Do you really think that the industry would waste money on shielding if it wasn't needed?

The person that did this project is yours truly...an MSEE with 20 years work experience!

So? Having an MSEE degree doesn't give you license to operate RF sources. There are other certifications for that, and in order to earn those, you would actually have to learn something about RF safety and interference. Those are not subjects usually covered in MSEE degrees, even good ones.

The mere fact that the computer is contained within a house will prevent any interference of the type you are talking about.

Typical US homes do not provide shielding for most parts of the radio spectrum that an unshielded computer interferes with.

Even if your home is spacious enough and shielded enough, or if your neighbors just don't care, you are setting a bad example by bragging about your system on the web.

Who is rude now?

Still you.

how about a sealed case with a heat exchanger ?

[dickens]

Ok, so he's got this huge radiator on the thing, but it's *inside* the case !

How about putting a small one inside the case to pick up the heat from the non-water-cooled components, and then plumb the water lines through the case to a fan-cooled radiator outside the case.

Then just seal the case up and presto, no more dust bunnies.

With a few extra yards of hose, you could put the fans off somewhere where you wouldn't hear their noise so much.

go ahead rice up your case!

[Anonymous Coward]

this is crap

Fucking morons

[alexburke]

Take a really nice (and expensive) 15Krpm SCSI hard drive, and do this to it.

Fucking morons.

Charles Darwin would be proud to see his theory working well! Uncle Ben would be proud, too, to see how technologically advanced rice has become.

*sigh*...

Re:Fucking morons

[hmale]

Alex..Alex..Alex! Before showing your ass to the world, please note that the drive is NOT what you claimed. The drive you linked to is an old Western Digital. I perfromed that mod at the request of the people that frequent my site. At my site the comment I made on the subject is that it is a totally useless mod in terms of functionality. If that drive (or you) were to die tomorrow, it would be no big deal!

Re:Fucking morons

[alexburke]

I've seen photos of this same mod done to both 10Krpm SCSI drives and 5400rpm Deskstars, so I would imagine there *are* people out there that would be sufficiently stupid to butcher a 15Krpm drive in that manner.

As for the cheapshot, I'm not even going to gratify that with a response.

Re: Very unique case mod.

[Anonymous Coward]

.... very unique case mod?

VERY UNIQUE? .....

When will these people learn grammar? Unique cannot take a qualifying word; it is an absolute. Something is either unique (No others exist that are the same) or it in not-unique (Others the same may or do exist). There is no 'very' or 'almost' or 'a little bit' unique; not in this language.

Dom
dom @ domhowells . com

Making OC Easier

[c4tp]

Finally, the simple man's overclocking alarm: If the water's a boilin', you got problems my friend!

Also, you better not use any electronics near your computer, because water and electricity don't mix! ...Wait, what's a computer again?

I have *extremely* 10 fingers!

[jbayes]

Rob types:

a very unique case mod

Unique means "one of a kind". You wouldn't say, "slightly one of a kind", or "the Solar System has very nine planets"; it makes no sense. Neither does "very unique".

Instead you could say, "a very rare case mod", "an original case mod", "an extremely creative case mod", or "a highly unusual case mod".

There are billions of phrases in the English language which make sense; why use ones that don't?

I've water cooled, modded, and overclocked...wtf

[DenialX]

This guy modded his Hard Drive so you could see it. Wow real "G-Wiz" Factor there. Only ignorant or very,very well connectected people mod hard drives. It doesn't matter how you do it unless you own or have access to a REAL clean room. One particle, UNO as in singulary dust particle gets in the drive and it will not last until the warranty exprires(which modding violates). Let me paint you a picture if a Grater or a D8+ Catapiller had a 6-8ft plow made of Solid Titanium attatched to the front of it and then started plowing the paved asfault. That is kinda what one micron (millionth for the layman) of dust does each time it touches the platter. Also keep in mind that the head hovers at .XX microns above the plater. Throw wrench into a spinning blade and watch sparks fly. I have to admitt I think that building a clear case and water cooling is cool and fun, but if you want to just throw money away on hard drives...you could always send it to me. Funny I always thought the data on the drive was more valuable then anything else, because often it's unreplaceable(unless you back up very regularly). It just goes to show any idiot can make the front page and have 15 minutes of fame.