Share Your Build

[Rich-M]

Well Catch 22 has been asking people who build to share photos, so I decided to share my new build mentioned in the last thread and some general photos of my working area. Sorry the builds are so dark, they didn't look that way in the camera. In the first shot you will notice a design affect in this Apevia case where the hard drive rack is too far out so that the stat cable and molex cable protrude preventing one from closing the case. I had to break the sliders and use 2/3 of them to be able to slide the second drive in and hold the case closed.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Rich-M]

A few more shop photos:

 

 

 

 

This was the case as I swapped out the Cooler Master mentioned in the earlier post.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811144289

[IceMan37]

Nice photos Rich! Great looking home office too looks like you spend lots of time there. Glad the mobo is working for you. It's nice to be able to pout a face, or space, or work to an internet ID. Fantastic thanks for sharing!

[allheart55 Cindy E]

You did an awesome job with your loft, Rich. It looks great.

 

I don't have any newer pictures of my work room. These were taken three years ago.

 

 

 

[Rich-M]

Looks great Cindy and I do remember when you did that on another forum, really nice job. The one major mistake I made I will correct some day is putting the electrical outlets under the counters, then my son-in-law blocked them with drawers which was "sheer genius" but I should have put electrical along the op of the counter wall anyway and one of these days I will fix it.

Nice photos Rich! Great looking home office too looks like you spend lots of time there. Glad the mobo is working for you. It's nice to be able to pout a face, or space, or work to an internet ID. Fantastic thanks for sharing!

[Rich-M]

Not sure how I made that mess above but thanks Catch I thought I had already posted to Cindy and then saw your post in the middle here.

And yes I really like new system. You all should look at trying some white cases. This is the second one I have had and I never dusted the first one in 2 + years. I dusted the black Cooler Master twice a week during the replacement period until this new case finally arrived.

[IceMan37]

I had the White Thermaltake commander (same as your old one I think) and I liked it but sold it with a system. I do plan on going white again as they look very sharp with blue MSI motherboards especially with white SATA cables and white fans.

 

And Cindy I guess your office looks basically the same even though that pic is 3 years old? anyhow, looks very clean and professional :cool:

[allheart55 Cindy E]

Yeah, Catch, it still looks the same. (Maybe a little more cluttered....)

[Rich-M]

One thing Cindy has I don't is space as my loft is about 8' square in the main area and then with a narrow entrance waythat is "L" shaped. The floor to ceiling cabinet holds all components for builds except hard drives . I have one more renovation left which will be to put cabinets on the wall that has the shelves over the copier and fax and then I will have done about everything I can do in here for space. Oh and on two of the counters you will see mail shelving units that are commercial and my son in law is doing those in oak a bit wider so I can get the power cords next to the laptops and that way increase the number of shelves in each unit to hold more laptop stock. They are all refurbished laptops for sale and that business has been slow this year for me.

[Rich-M]

This is my other white case, it's just sitting there now as I haven't figured out what to do with it.....

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811133196&cm_re=white_Thermaltake_cases-_-11-133-196-_-Product

I still love that case also but that is the one where the hard drive light and power light stay on when the unit is off...I have yet to figure out what to do about that.

[IceMan37]

That was the case I had. I didn't have that issue with the case sounds like your case might be faulty. I liked it too and I miss it. :)

[Rich-M]

Originally I looked at the Psu and then the motherboard but then when I replaced the system with an AMD system and then both lights stayed on all the time I realized it had to be the case. Originally it was only the power light that stayed on when the system was Intel and I am sure it didn't do that when everything was new.

[IceMan37]

Hey buddy put yourself a rear fan in there! lol. While you are at it take the unused PSU wires fold em' as neat as you can and stuff em' in a drive bay. If you need me to do it I may be there (or close enough Wimington) by December! I charge $50.00 and hour because my work is damn good, but in your case I will alleviate the cost factor for being my friend as long as you can serve me a plate of food! Texans GET HUNGRY lemme tell ya.

Never had me a proper Philly Cheese Steak Sandwich. In Turn I will cook you the best Texas Mesquite Grilled steak your stomach ever had. You might ask me to move in!

 

 

That second pic from the top reminds me of Mythical Sea Creatures on the Discovery Channel! lol

 

 

:groovy: :jumpimg: /j/k

[Rich-M]

Funny you should mention it I finally got around to putting in a back fan last night, really I am not kidding! It was on my list.

[Rich-M]

If you look carefully I cannot shove the extra wires into an empty drive slot because they are vertical and not horizontal and that big mess of wires won't turn the corner and still get the case closed. Remember I had to break off the sliders in order to do that as well on the Ssd drive. They are stuffed into the bottom which is fine because the board is a micro so there is nothing down there for them to block actually.

[Rich-M]

Hey that is interesting, Wilmington I mean. I was going to ask you how that job search is going. One thing we have up here I don't know if you have that will help you start up your tech biz locally if you want to is great Pennysavers or Merchandisers as we call them. I started my business with a $6 a week ad in the classifieds as most have a "Computer" banner. Basically many call them "Mackeral Wrappers" but they are delivered weekly into homes. While I have done a few other things over the years in advertising, this one basically built my business and the rest became word of mouth.

Steak is awesome looking incidentally....

Edited September 1, 2014 by Rich-M

[IceMan37]

As for job search, I can pick to remain with company picking out of 3 places I think, or I can leave, and I'm seriously looking at leaving. Yeah word of mouth helps a lot with a PC business, as does Twitter or FB as long as it's kept professional. Greensheet also helps. I have about a 400 person client list that are regulars. Half of them are local. So regardless if I move I will be able to keep most of them. I build about 4 PC's a week now down from 10 or so but that is likely to ramp up once I get settled. Of course I also do the laptop repair and PC/Network security thing. I also setup servers with Windows or Linux (red hat usually). I also do remote security jobs as well... virus wipes, spyware wipes etc... and I use Skype or Yahoo messenger to help guide the client as well if needed.

 

About those cables, you can unhook everything and pull them straight out of the case, sit there and stare (no kidding lol). Separate the individual PSU strands, and try to use one main strand for all your hookups. Looks like you can neatly flatten and tie the unused group and use the room within the drive cages/ drive bays I see a of of room there. If it were me I would take all PSU wires before any hookup and run them out behind the case, bring them back in through the empty space (this will also help take up some slack) and bundle the unused strand, and them run the ones you need through the holes in the cage. Like this_

 

 

[Rich-M]

When you said you could be moving to De I assumed you had pretty well made up your mind to stay with your current company.

As for the pile of wires, I originally had an Antec HCG in there which has removable modular plugs but unfortunately that one died on me.

It wasn't even very old either. But the lowest area you note is not where the front fan is, that is behind the 2nd tier which has no wires blocking it. It is my unit as I would never send any out looking like that to a client even though I know they would not open it. I tried every way of tying those back but you have to understand the fact that the two rows that hold the drives face outside the side of the case prevent any way of wrapping those wires around into the empty space because the ensuing bump that creates prevents the case from closing. I was thinking of buying another one of those psus that has the modular plugs and then be able to pull out the 3-4 unused wires so it isn't such a mess. The other thing I might do is go back to the Thermaltake case because the bays gface front and back so I could do as you suggest.

[IceMan37]

I plan on ordering that case either tonight or tomorrow so I should have it mid week and built sometime around Friday. I will post some pictures and how I wire it maybe that will help. Case looks very nice though, but I'm trying to decide if I want black-green or white-blue

[Rich-M]

I understand your idea on running the wires through the underside but needless to say at this point I would have to rebuild it and I would prefer less wires which to me would mean a Psu with modular plugs so I am going to look at exactly what is available in psus....I hate the wires though the back like Dell and HP do clipped to the various rails and extremely difficult to undo when you replace the psu, which on a unit with heavy use like my main desktop requires at various intervals. If I had looked at the side turned racks I probably would have passed on the case. You will see if you use an Ssd drive you will either have to break the sliders or mis use them to hold the drive in place and that was a really stupid move on their part. I bought it for the white and I love how white cases never need dusting.

[Rich-M]

OK Catch I just purchased a modular Seasonic Psu which will enable me to get most of the wires out of the case bottom. It is the same one I have in there but modular and if I had known at the time I would have this case problem, I would have bought this one instead.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817151095&cm_re=seasonic_modular-_-17-151-095-_-Product

I also read somewhere where in the modular units the wires are more flat so as to better enable you to run them behind the board and out of the way as may have to be done in this particular case.

 

I also found this an interesting buy which was holding me up from installing my new Cisco Small Business Router. I am not sure if my Lexmark

Laser printer (C544dn) has a dead RJ45 port or the routers I have been using are just crap from DLink but I am tired of the 3 month old router (DLink DIR 825) making me crazy everytime I have to add a notebook or desktop for service with rebooting the damn piece of junk router. But the Color Laser must work from every pc here because my invoices and brochures are printed from that and it has given me great service. I currently have my Brother HL 2040 (antique) in a cheap print server that only has one usb port, Found this for $53.99 with discount which looks to me like it will solve my issues should I move over to the new router and ethernet port fails to work on the Lexmark. It worked on the last Cisco Small Business Router which died an timely death during the Comcast upgrade.

:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16833164058

[IceMan37]

Hey Rich, yeah modular helps out tremendously with wiring. I had some of the same issues you are describing with the 825 with my old D-link DIR 624. Currently I'm using a Netgear router with no issues (/cross fingers).

[Rich-M]

Yeah I am going to fix the wires and router this weekend. I was waiting for 4 port print server as I don't want to deal with printers again and the router even though they probably will work fine on Cisco Router. It is bothering me I never checked the Cisco I threw out to see if it was set to right channel.

[Rich-M]

Ok I installed the Modular Seasonic 620 Psu:

[Rich-M]

Well looked better except Psu is defective so I put back the original Seasonic Psu and managed to spread the wires out a little better!