Computer cooling obsession

Since I now have two computers, a work computer + project computer, I needed to find an adequate case for this new computer since I have been very picky on the interior cable management. Since this new dual core was inferior to my current quad-core at stock settings, it was expected to be overclock so I could milk as much processor power out of it as I can.

After a few days in San Francisco to attend one of my uncle's Microsoft sponsored events, I spent a few nights over staring at an computer I left there for "future ideas". The computer was super old, something like 10 years - but it was clean and had a very sturdy feel to it. Anyway somehow I ended up watching a few clips of youtube videos (mnpctech) on case modification and eventually I ended up disassembling the entire computer before i knew it! Taking almost everything apart down to the steel parts I admired, especially the detachable hard-disk tray - something uncommon these days.

The computer was an old Athlon 2100+ or something like that with some salvageable DDR memory, two faulty hard disks, and a CD drive. The computer parts were actually given to me from a friend who said it was busted which wasn't the case - eventually I just shelved all the parts someplace and began planning on innovations that this 10 year old case needs.

One very cool thing about this old case was that it had a detachable rear panel as you can see me working on in the photo - this was a huge advantage for me to route/hide excess wires from the power supply. Aside from that upgrade, I had ideas to improve the airflow by attaching an attractive 200mm PSU LED fan that I salvaged from a blown PSU through a good friend of mine. Inspired by many modern cases, I started to add 120mm fans to many common places all over: the top, the front and the back. The initial upgrades cost me nothing until I decided my uncle's cordless dremel was not sufficient and I needed more cooling power based on the "cpu stress tests".

So a week later I began spending a lot of money. I purchased my own CORDED dremel for $50 and a 4-pack of 120mm fans and some random parts i found at a neat computer store, weirdstuff.com, that was a 1 hour away, bike wise. This new computer store reminded me of all the good times I had at swap meets digging for cycling parts except it was a now for my new project computer. I spent a few hours here searching for items for my project case - FAN GRILLS FOR 50 CENTS! I have noticed myself wake up extra earlier everyday to see prices of CPU coolers change and stay on top of any deals and this led to my purchase of one of the single most expensive items that I have purchased so far - the XFX Radeon 4870 1GB DDR5 video card @ $141, one of those top tier GPUs. And shortly afterwards I spent some $50 on a promising cpu cooler, the OCZ Vendetta 2, + more fans.

So far, the video card has not come home yet and the $33 CPU cooler i bought didn't even fit into my case! So.... the next day or two I researched on a new fan and it looked like I narrowed it down to the Coolermaster Geminii S fan or the risky Geminii (original) heatsink. Both of these were sold from the coolermaster store for REALLY nice refurbished prices and I wanted to buy two but considering my space issues from the previews fan i just got the newer / less bulky one, the Geminii S. Their online store has a lot of the last little things i needed to completing my case - especially the items you can't find on older cases: audio / firewire / usb jacks!

In the end, all the tools / parts / stuff for case cost me an extra $150... but the entire process was fun and kept me busy for days. =)