A 20 Year Old's System

[its phillip]

Looks great, man. I would have been far too lazy to sand it down and stain it, I would have just tried to ignore the damage

 

[Ito]

Haha, thanks. And apparently you are one of the few people who is good at giving feedback

I am really happy that I decided to stain the wood though, I feel like the stand fits a lot better with my style and my other equipment as well as makes me feel more proud of the system as a whole. I guess that's just a taste the feeling that people get from DYI audio stuff, makes me really want to give building some of my own stuff a try.

 

[its phillip]

Yeah, the stand certainly does match the rest of your setup and looks great. The cheap walmart tv stand I got for my computer monitor had a few chips and scratches here and there but I just colored them in with a black sharpie. Like you, I'm interested in the DIY stuff I see (particularly the subwoofers), but
1. I'm lazy
2. I have no tools
3. I have no space to work in
4. I'm lazy

So me building speakers or a subwoofer is pretty much never going to happen :/

 

[Ito]

DIY Computer time!

My computer has had problems with gfx card for a while so I decided to go ahead an upgrade. After deciding on the Nvidia GTX 460 I placed my order at Newegg and went to put it my computer. Well, it turns out that my psu just didn't have enough power (400 watts) so I needed to go ahead and buy a new psu (newegg has on replacement policy for gfx cards). Coincidence enough Nemo128 was selling his Antec 900 case and OCZ 600 Watt psu, so I decided to take him up on that. After purchasing the case and psu from him, my old computer decided to completely take a dump on me, so I just decided to go ahead and by the rest of the parts to go ahead and build a new computer. So I went ahead and ordered some new parts and took some out of my old computer. here;s the specs on the new set up

Antec 900 Case
EVGA P55 mobo
Intel 2.8GHz Core i5 cpu
Nvidia EVGA GTX 460 gfx card
PNY 2gb DDR3 1600 RAM x 2
OCZ 600 watt PSU
1tb Western Digital Caviar Black Drive (main drive)
1tb Seagate Drive
500gb Seagate Drive
Blue cold cathodes

My old roommate had the same case and I never really liked it, mainly because I always though the inside was ugly because of the plain metal on the inside, so I though I would take it upon myself to spray paint the case black. I will let the pictures do the rest of the talking, cause everyone likes pictures!

The case in pieces

Ah, sharp and pointy! Time to file!

Much better!

Spray paint time

Taping off the top of the case

 

[Ito]

The mobo is in! Having a friend help me with the install as well since he offered

Processor and heatsink is in

harddrives, gfx card, and wireless card are in

Wire managment

Everything in!

 

[Ito]

Now with the lights off!

 

[its phillip]

Looking good. Now you need to get a new HSF and sleeve those psu cables or buy a psu with cables that are already sleeved

 

[Ito]

Looking good. Now you need to get a new HSF and sleeve those psu cables or buy a psu with cables that are already sleeved

Actually, if you look the PSU cables are sleeved. The sleeves were already cut when I bought the psu from nemo128. The are only cut so they can fit easier on the back side of the motherboard panel. Some of them probably could use a bit of extra sleeving on the front side though. I didn't think of buying a new cooler when I was buying stuff from newegg and I am probably going to live with the stock cooler for a while, but I do want to buy a better one.

 

[jamie2112]

Nice job Ito looks great!!!

 

[Ito]

Haha, prefect, going to a LAN tomorrow

 

[UberNe]

Snoopy ^.^

 

[sawzalot]

I really like what you have done with your set-up Ito, everything looks really nice and orderly, the lighting is a nice touch as well good job and thanks for the pics, sawz.

 

[BoredSysAdmin]

Very nice build ITO, but philip has good point - replace the stock HSF with something cooler

P.S: I almost feel inspired to mod and fix old Lian-Li case I got lying around

 

[leousm]

Looks great! I was about 20 or 21 when I started buying my first HT gear. I bought a Sony receiver with some Tecnics speakers Later I upgraded to NHT SuperTwos SuperCenter and SuperOnes for surround. Needless to say it was a huge improvement. Oh and my DVD player was a PS2!

 

[Ito]

It's been a long time since I posted in my thread...well, mostly because since I have graduated college I am back at home and looking for a job, so my home theater stuff has taken a major back seat for now.

That said, I finally bit the bullet and added a SSD and a new CPU cooler to my computer

The cooler in its box

Had to take the mobo out, so I figured I would take everything out and rewire and try and make it cleaner (and dust!), which I think I accomplished. The cpu now runs at about 24C average versus the 40-ish of the stock cooler.

Also have all my gear together and ready to go, but this winter has just not been cooperating! Come on, Wisconsin!

Edit: Oh, I am also 22 now XD

 

[Adam]

Nice cooler! Your PC looks neatly arranged on the inside.

Btw, 24C? How cold is your house? Oh, wait...Wisconsin in January. Right on. Regardless, that a really small temperature rise.

 

[Ito]

Wisconsin in January in the basement lol. If I were to guess, I would say the temp in my basement hardly ever goes above 64 F lol. I have yet to play around with overclocking, but that is the next step.

 

[adk highlander]

Also have all my gear together and ready to go, but this winter has just not been cooperating! Come on, Wisconsin!

I hear you and feel your pain. Last year at this point I had 30 days in. This year I'm only at 10. Temps are all over the place. Last Sat-Tues the high was not above 15. Then it rained last night (got to 42) and by morning it was back down in the 20s. No snow and now I live in an ice cube.

 

[Ito]

Still got my beat...I have only, what, 4?

Though you shouldn't complain, I would trade a perfect day at any of the surrounding resorts any time for crap conditions at whiteface lol . Hell, the biggest reason I started skiing park is because 300-400 feet of vertical can only be interesting for so long without something added to keep it interesting and challenging.

However, the snow finally looks like it is starting to come (though we have had one warm day in between that kinda screwed it up a bit).

 

[Ito]

Since the last picture on my computer is no longer working, reposting it here: