"Rebuilt" my machine...now what do I do...

[Arch_Enemy]

Got tired of the MASSIVE case I had taking up all the space in the room, so I found an older, used one with what I needed. Got an Antec $120 case for $40...mising a few parts, but I didn't need them anyway.

Started in on what I thought would be a fun 1.5 hours...4.5 later I finally had a working system. SHould have known better.

Since I started in this business I have built ~600 computers, mostly custom, from scratch, and about 1% have had issues when done.

Except for my own, of course. That's running about 90%. Maybe because I always try pushing the limits?

But, I got it done, I have some desk real estate back, and all is right with the world!

[chiefjim]

I'm also a home builder. Learned years ago how much easier it was working with industry standard parts rather than brand specific proprietary. Think Dell power supplies.

Only true regret along the way was opting for a mini-desktop case, APEVIA X-QPACK. Concept sounded great taking up less desk space. Discovered working with such limited space meant fingers cut on sharp edges and access to things like memory and cable connections was no easy task. On occasion partial disassembly required. For this user the mid-tower has been ideal.

[Arch_Enemy]

I'm also a home builder. Learned years ago how much easier it was working with industry standard parts rather than brand specific proprietary. Think Dell power supplies.

Only true regret along the way was opting for a mini-desktop case, APEVIA X-QPACK. Concept sounded great taking up less desk space. Discovered working with such limited space meant fingers cut on sharp edges and access to things like memory and cable connections was no easy task. On occasion partial disassembly required. For this user the mid-tower has been ideal.

I have 4 drives for photographs; three depending on subject and one where I take the good ones and back them up; also for my viewing pleasure. I wanted a dock to be able to swap drives quickly, 2 DVD drives (because booting from a Linux DVD meant no drive available if I needed it!), front panel card reader and front panel USBs. I picked an Antec 900 with nine slots, but still under 19".

If not for wnating drive access I would have gone with one of those Silverstone cases, or one of the others that looks like a nice stereo component. I could have hung the dock out to the side, but I wanted it in one package.

I also have a full ATX mobo with 6 expansion slots, since I was given a server CPU LGA1366 (Commercial equiv of an i9). Boards were limited.

[Portreve]

I've built several computers for myself over the years, and several for friends.

One of my favorites was a Shuttle XPC unit that had a liquid cooling system for the CPU. I really liked that little box.

I have a definite preference for industry standard-compliant parts, from the case to the motherboard and everything in between.

[Jim Hauser]

I have always assembled my own computers except for one (after Hurricane Katrina my local parts source was down.) It is getting harder as I get older because my eyesight is trying to dwindle and my mind is not as sharp. I like the idea of knowing exactly how the system is assembled. This makes it a lot easier for me to diagnose hardware problems and to make changes as needed.

[Arch_Enemy]

I'm also a home builder. Learned years ago how much easier it was working with industry standard parts rather than brand specific proprietary. Think Dell power supplies.

Only true regret along the way was opting for a mini-desktop case, APEVIA X-QPACK. Concept sounded great taking up less desk space. Discovered working with such limited space meant fingers cut on sharp edges and access to things like memory and cable connections was no easy task. On occasion partial disassembly required. For this user the mid-tower has been ideal.

I was a Dell on-site repair "engineer" for 10 years.

Yeah. The used their own power supplies, then went "standard" for ~3 years, and then went back to their own again.

Must have lost too much money from people going to Staples, et al...

[Citizen229]

Same boat here. My first was a AMD k6 with a voodoo card.

Been all over the spectrum for cases. For general purpose use atx midtower. For mitx/atx, dont push the hardware. Rebuilding these small cases is frustrating.

Im just glad there is no longer polarity issues with the case wires anymore.

Fractal Designs- Define R5 is currently the best case I have ever owned. Cannot recommend it enough for mid tower atx.

As with most things in life, spend good money on quality, you will be happier in the end.

Link for eye pleasure:
https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product. ... 6811352048

[chiefjim]

When it comes to the actual cases I've been very happy with the Newegg house brand - Rosewill. Money saved being spent instead on quality power supplies.

[Arch_Enemy]

Same boat here. My first was a AMD k6 with a voodoo card.

Been all over the spectrum for cases. For general purpose use atx midtower. For mitx/atx, dont push the hardware. Rebuilding these small cases is frustrating.

Im just glad there is no longer polarity issues with the case wires anymore.

Fractal Designs- Define R5 is currently the best case I have ever owned. Cannot recommend it enough for mid tower atx.

As with most things in life, spend good money on quality, you will be happier in the end.

Link for eye pleasure:
https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product. ... 6811352048

I couldn't find a Rosewill with enough front bays small enough to fit my desk. My massive case has been hanging between the desk and the 'printer tower' for a few years and I wanted to get some space back, and be able to load all my photo drives from the FRONT. The CoolerMaster I had was also blocking the studio reference speaker on that side...

I also ordered a trayless dock for my 2.5" SDD "WORM drives that I store the pics I want to keep handy so I won't have to fudge with cables any more. Everything from the front...

[Arch_Enemy]

Would have loved to have gotten one of these and hung it on the bookcase with my my audio gear. Maybe someday when I build a simple computer and not a Swiss Army Knife...

[Citizen229]

@Arch

For my mass storage I use a usb 4 bay hub. Hot swap devices have let me down in the past. So I opt now for total drive access.

Here is what i use:
https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product. ... -_-Product

I got 2-4tb nas drives. One for data the other for back up and then gets unplugged for shelf storage. I chose this as raid seemed not needed. And I still dont have need.

[chiefjim]

I couldn't find a Rosewill with enough front bays small enough to fit my desk. My massive case has been hanging between the desk and the 'printer tower' for a few years and I wanted to get some space back, and be able to load all my photo drives from the FRONT. The CoolerMaster I had was also blocking the studio reference speaker on that side...

I also ordered a trayless dock for my 2.5" SDD "WORM drives that I store the pics I want to keep handy so I won't have to fudge with cables any more. Everything from the front...

For my needs I found for a great alternative, external USB hard drive docking station. Multiple hard drives available when desired without unnecessary powering on cycles. Wonderful side benefit is they are easily used on any other machine with a usb port.

[Arch_Enemy]

@Arch

For my mass storage I use a usb 4 bay hub. Hot swap devices have let me down in the past. So I opt now for total drive access.

Here is what i use:
https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product. ... -_-Product

I got 2-4tb nas drives. One for data the other for back up and then gets unplugged for shelf storage. I chose this as raid seemed not needed. And I still dont have need.

I was looking into that as well.

[Arch_Enemy]

I couldn't find a Rosewill with enough front bays small enough to fit my desk. My massive case has been hanging between the desk and the 'printer tower' for a few years and I wanted to get some space back, and be able to load all my photo drives from the FRONT. The CoolerMaster I had was also blocking the studio reference speaker on that side...

I also ordered a trayless dock for my 2.5" SDD "WORM drives that I store the pics I want to keep handy so I won't have to fudge with cables any more. Everything from the front...

For my needs I found for a great alternative, external USB hard drive docking station. Multiple hard drives available when desired without unnecessary powering on cycles. Wonderful side benefit is they are easily used on any other machine with a usb port.

I tried one. It was so slow it was excruciating. I don't know why it runs so slow.

[chiefjim]

I couldn't find a Rosewill with enough front bays small enough to fit my desk. My massive case has been hanging between the desk and the 'printer tower' for a few years and I wanted to get some space back, and be able to load all my photo drives from the FRONT. The CoolerMaster I had was also blocking the studio reference speaker on that side...

I also ordered a trayless dock for my 2.5" SDD "WORM drives that I store the pics I want to keep handy so I won't have to fudge with cables any more. Everything from the front...

For my needs I found for a great alternative, external USB hard drive docking station. Multiple hard drives available when desired without unnecessary powering on cycles. Wonderful side benefit is they are easily used on any other machine with a usb port.

I tried one. It was so slow it was excruciating. I don't know why it runs so slow.

USB 2.0? Dog slow. eSATA was my choice before USB 3.0 came along.

[BG405]

This thread has reminded me that I have a tall tower case I've yet to put to use. Plenty of front bays and enough room inside to accomodate a low-spec energy efficient system for use as a fileserver etc. alongside the higher spec motherboard, providing some bays and ports for each.

Just need one of these:

[Arch_Enemy]

Here ya go!



Wait...I need one too!

[Jim Hauser]

Same boat here. My first was a AMD k6 with a voodoo card.

Been all over the spectrum for cases. For general purpose use atx midtower. For mitx/atx, dont push the hardware. Rebuilding these small cases is frustrating.

Im just glad there is no longer polarity issues with the case wires anymore.

Fractal Designs- Define R5 is currently the best case I have ever owned. Cannot recommend it enough for mid tower atx.

As with most things in life, spend good money on quality, you will be happier in the end.

Link for eye pleasure:
https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product. ... 6811352048

I also had a K6 with a Voodoo card way back when.

I don't use anything smaller than a mid-tower case for my systems. My current case is a Corsair Carbide 100-R

http://www.corsair.com/en-us/carbide-se ... tower-case

I choose the 100-R because it had provisions for a water cooling radiator (barely.)

It also allows installation of drives without any tools...

But most importantly... it gives me room to move around inside of it as my hands get older.

[Arch_Enemy]

Same boat here. My first was a AMD k6 with a voodoo card.

Been all over the spectrum for cases. For general purpose use atx midtower. For mitx/atx, dont push the hardware. Rebuilding these small cases is frustrating.

Im just glad there is no longer polarity issues with the case wires anymore.

Fractal Designs- Define R5 is currently the best case I have ever owned. Cannot recommend it enough for mid tower atx.

As with most things in life, spend good money on quality, you will be happier in the end.

Link for eye pleasure:
https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product. ... 6811352048

I also had a K6 with a Voodoo card way back when.

I don't use anything smaller than a mid-tower case for my systems. My current case is a Corsair Carbide 100-R

http://www.corsair.com/en-us/carbide-se ... tower-case

I choose the 100-R because it had provisions for a water cooling radiator (barely.)

It also allows installation of drives without any tools...

But most importantly... it gives me room to move around inside of it as my hands get older.

I had a K6 as well. Clocked the cr@p out of it! Got it up to 500MHz, but as soon as the OS loaded it would crash. Had to settle for 470MHz.

[BG405]

I built an AMD K6-2 500MHz system back in the day. Was after a 550 but they were a bit scarce at the time. Updated the BIOS to allow >32GB IDE hard drives & used this to partition such drives for use in older machines, giving for example my Pentium I 40GB+ storage avoiding the dodgy dynamic drive overlays. All good fun. Glad the proceeds from the K6 allowed development of the Athlon, the following build; 1.2GHz although with its recent resurrection Linux reports it as 800MHz, probably doesn't see the multiplier. Worked fine anyway.