PROJECT: HTPC-3

images by Weston Colton
www.westoncoltonphoto.com

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PROJECT: HTPC-3 Part 7

And we're done, I believe.

Here it is, hooked up to my 7 year old 15" LCD (best post honeymoon purchase ever) and getting Vista Home Premium loaded on it. Internal hardware includes:

AMD Athlon X2 BE-2400 2.3 GHz
1G (2x512mb) Coarsair DDR2 533mhz
BIOSTAR NF61S-M2 TE Motherboard
PNY GeForce 8400 GS
Rosewill Wireless-G PCI
DVDROM/CD Recorder
400W PSU
120G Seagate HD
160G Seagate HD (both 7200.7 series so a little old)
IR receiver for the remote.

Weston the photog was in town this weekend and took some really nice shots of the system that I will post later once I get them. Overall I'm happy with how it turned out. Not perfect by any means, but I learned a lot from this that hopefully will result in better builds later on.

Late

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PROJECT: HTPC-3 Part 6

Light at the end of the tunnel, kinda.

Well, here we are, coats of primer, flat black and 2 coats of clear.

And here we are a couple of days later and 3 or 4 coats more of clear.

This thing is shiny.

All in all, it turned out alright. The white specs you see on the 3rd picture are really there, but much less visible. I know that kinda sucks, but it's barely noticible and given what I have to work with, I feel pretty lucky to get it that clean.

I'll post a few more pictures once I get all the components in. The clear coat was still slightly tacky this morning, so I'm hoping it will harden a little more by the time I get home from work. I still have to mount the fans and I'm thinking of putting some screen to filter the dust and to "stealth" the fans slightly. I went looking for some metal mesh locally, but none is to be had and I don't feel like paying the price they want on the internet. More later

Late.

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PROJECT: HTPC-4 Part 1

Yes, I started another one, before I had even started to paint HTPC-3. This one is a lot less complicated and besides, I needed something to do while the paint/wood filler/etc etc dried.

Here's a shot with the sides and front panels glued on.

This case was going to be low-low profile, measuring inside the box at 2-1/2" tall, 16" wide and 10" deep.

The outside dimensions being 3-1/2" tall..

17" wide...

and 10-1/2" deep.

And sorry about the pictures (all of them in fact). The photographer and the camera are horrible.

Here's a quick shot with the top laid on it.

Here's my trusty Dremel drill press.

I used my router attachement to make this... but what for?

This.

I'm experimenting with different ways of attaching the top to these boxes. So far both are pretty weak but manage to keep the top in place. Still they aren't very effective and may just go back to just gluing a couple of pieces of wood to the underneath of the top to keep it in place. For now though, this works and turned out great.

This is how I glued the nuts in place. I filled the hole with wood glue screwed the bolt in just enough, placed the top on and pulled all the bolts up, thus preventing the bolt from sinking to the bottom of the hole. I'd didn't work quite that easily, but it worked.

And the finished product. Verdict: UGLY

I was going to go about this one a little differently, that is to say, I was going to use sheet metal for some parts. So I bought this and prompty measured out the cuts.

And voila!

Two cuts and the holes drilled for the M-Atx PSU (2.5" High). Because the case is so lo-profile, it won't allow for a dedicated card. It will acomodate a 1/4" height WiFi card, and that's pretty easy to drill a whole for, but for the most part I'm keeping this simple. Make sure your mobo has a 780G Northbrige or equivalent and you don't need a dedicated card.

Yes, I am the absolute worst at cutting holes with a jig-saw. I need to buy some bigger hole saw bits. But the sub cuts, courtesy of my router addon to the dremel worked awesomely.

Seriously, I suck.

Here I used some metal for the side mount and a piece of MDF as a spacer on the side against the front panel. Worked perfectly. I added some wax paper there, as the spacer was stil drying and had some glue squeezing out.

A quick shot of the rear panel, unglued

The rear panel being glued on...

And due to some forethought, I fastened the panel with some screws before-hand, just in case. Well, the glue didn't hold at all, (I forgot I used liquid nails last time, doh.) and the only thing keeping it on was the screws. So I drilled a couple more on and there we are.

More on this as it develops... it just needs to stop raining.

Late!

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PROJECT: HTPC-3 Part 5

I'm actually a bit further on down the road with this project than the pictures suggest. I'll get caught up either tonight or tomorrow but for now, an update:

Remember when I said I had messed up the HD cage and that I'd just probably drill the hole on a slim peice of sheet metal and glue it on the cage? Well, that didn't happen, what did happen is that I bought a 16oz box of wood filler and fixed the holes, then redrilled them using my new dremel attachment. Work semi-perfectly. Almost srewed up the alignment again but, eh, I got it to work.

As soon as I verified the holes, I sanded it a bit, sprayed it with a few coats of gray primer, and sanded some more to prepare for the black. Turned out pretty nice.

And here's the box after a couple of coats of primer and a sand or two. Almost ready for black paint. So far it looks like crap, but I can verify with the black paint and clear coat, it is looking pretty slick.

More tonight, or tomorrow on this project.

Late!

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PROJECT: HTPC-3 Part 4

Alright, after a busy weekend/week I finally got some time to work on HTPC-3. As I mentioned before, I bought another sheet of MDF and fabbed another top. I successfully drilled the holes and the countersinks, and I cut the blowhole directly over the CPU for a 120mm fan to mount. I don't know why I decided to cut the octagon degsign afterwards. Honestly, I just started to do it and bam, octagon. Probably in case I could could figure out a war to cut out space enough to "embed" the fan deeper in the MDF instead of right on the surface.

So, I woke up on Saturday deciding to make some major progress on the box. I got in my car with my 4 year old, fully planning on going to Home Depot, but at the last second turned left instead of right and went to Harbor Freight Tools. Once there I was able to pick up this:

For $22. Oh, yeah. Sure it's probably a piece of crap, but I don't plan on using it all hardcore, just to make my cases... for now anyway. I also picked up a 5 piece router bit set, only needing the 3/8" corner maker. And I picked up these:

for $5 a piece. HFT is awesome for people like me... need just enough tool to get the job done, but not so much that it costs me an arm and a leg.

So I had to fabricate a "router table" made out of spare mdf anf plywood.

The guide is semi permanent, really I just wanted to make something to get my 2 cuts done. Later on, I will make a permanent add-on to my "work bench".

And here's the box with the sides rounded. Really turned out good. A quick sand to smooth them down, and all set.

Here are some shots of the box after the first coat of primer. MDF soaks up the paint, and I read somewhere, probably on Hardocp.com, that primer creates a good seal and allows for better painting. So, I paint with primer until I empty the can and then use the can of black.

Below is the hard drive case. I will probably add 2 small pieces of sheet metal, since I botched the screw holes.

The top, and did you notice something different?...

Yup, I went to HomeDepot later in the day, looking for a specific attachment for my dremel tool and I found it, for $15, plus $5 for a cutting bit.

And here's something new. I decided to place the buttons on the left side of the box for a couple of different reasons.
1) Mobile infants, toddlers, and curious youngsters LOVE buttons.
2) Clean looking front, tottally discreet.
3) I dunno, I just couldn't place them anywhere on the front that I liked.

The RESET button will be further back and the POWER button will be up front, since you can't read which is which, discernment by location.

More later, like Monday or Tuesday... hopefully.

Late.

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