Austin Case Modders Take Their Exotic PCs and a Giant LAN Party to SXSW (Video)

As a nexus of both computer programmers and other creative builder and maker types, SXSW (and Austin generally) is a great place to witness the overlap. John Zitterkopf and his pal Red, while helping to run the giant (and charitable!) LANFest at this year's event, had on hand for display a few of their own modded computer cases. John and Red are both part of Austin Modders, which helps Austinites swap tools and ideas (in-person, and via forums) for creating the kind of enclosures that computer makers simply can't — they're too time-intensive and too personalized for that. It's especially fun to see the effects that the newly widespread availability of laser cutters makes possible. (C'mon, O'Reilly, isn't it time for another Austin Maker Faire?)

Comments

That's It?

[turkeyfish]

A 100 pound water cooled PC and a PC enclosed in a custom wooden box?

Sound more of interest to PC groupies rather than any serious computer users.

Come on. Isn't there anything interesting to show?

Re:That's It?

[Mickey21]

Austinmodders mod a whole lot more than just computer cases. Of which a majority of the case creations started from a pile of materials, not a manufacturers case. They have modded anything from a pinball machine, to a completely wooden ipod (1st gen), to a muscle car (among other cars), to a laser/light show, to a hand radio, to the tools they use, to a 1940's tv. And just about anything in between. I see a lot of people on here with the naive thinking and hate piling on uninformed opinions about anything anyone out there might be interested in. Really it is just pretty sad, but I guess I can't expect too much from most of the comments I ever read here. A lot of what those guys and many others like them have modded were modded before even modding was something you even heard about. Most of them are lifers who have always been interested in technology, but want to put another spin on it. I cant understand all the negative comments and hatred for a social club of techies who used their skills and corporate networking to "beg" others around them to help create an event out of nothing to generate money to donate to very worthy cause, and while they were at it, bring awareness to possibly like minded people to have some fun on their spare time and meet some great people. Something I thought people at slashdot might understand, along the lines of the makerfaire attitude. Not to mention they donate a prize so maybe others can contribute money to that cause, AND give away door prizes to those that donated ANYTHING to the cause. Expensive gaming keyboards, headsets, flash drives, the lot. I cant believe some of you people that would hate the world so much, that you gotta hate others that would seek to even make it maybe a little bit better for someone else. I can only really say, shame on some of you. This isnt necessarily to my reply, but the thread of conversation in general.

Austin Mini Maker Faire

[Circle of Owls]

There will be a Mini Maker Faire on May 12th: http://austinmakerfaire.com/

Re:Losers.

[L4t3r4lu5]

Don't they know they're all dinosaurs? I'm going to mod my iPad, with glitter and rhinestones!!!

I think that's technically a vagazzle, as you sound like a right c...

Re:Texan engineering

[GameboyRMH]

Yes quite a nice Weighted Computing Cube he's built.

CASE-modding

[theurge14]

Interesting for a little bit I suppose, but actual modding would be something more intriguing. I suppose I can put a different color Otter Box on my phone to mod it, or a nifty sticker on a Honda Civic.

Get a better camera guy.

[Lumpy]

WE want to see the cases not the dweeb that made it.

Re:Get a better camera guy.

[Anonymous Coward]

what you don't realize is the ten gallon hat on his 2 gallon head is actually housing a sun spark workstation cooled by guacamole