Rebuilt my Hack in a Lian Li Case

[nano2nd]

Once again, this has nothing on the Mac Pro case mods you guys are delivering but I'm pretty pleased with the results. I have moved my Bad Hack 2, my main everyday machine these days, into a new Lian Li PC-V1010A chassis.

The case is all aluminium, a lot larger than the Gigabyte Aurora 3D I had before and was a pleasure to install. I sustained zero injuries! ;D

I'm a real sucker for cheesey packaging and loved the "The Legend Returns!" tagline on the box:



Here are a few photos I took once I was resonably happy with the build. Clearly the cable management is still not up to your standards Aquamac!






The cooler is a Xigmatek HDT 1283 but I put a Noctua NF-P12 fan on as the one that came with it wasn't so quiet. The Xigmatek has the heatpipes exposed on the base so that they have direct contact with the CPU.



Here's a wierd camera angle showing a bit of Gainward 8800GT Golden Sample I've recently installed. I finally upgraded to EFI 8 and graphics strings (I read somewhere that the new kexts in 10.5.5 don't play well with injectors).



Space for six drives (even though I've only got 4 working ports on the D975XBX2). Cooled by a big silent 140mm fan up front. I've hidden most of the cables behind the drives and the external drive bays.



Temperatures are pretty good. The case has a built in fan controller for the front 140mm, rear 120mm and the 120mm fan used to cool the chipset. I've got it set to the lowest setting and the whole thing runs pretty quet.

Overall, I'm loving it. The case looks great, it is quet and the build quality is excellent.

[aquamac]

Looks very nice. Lian-Li make some good cases with lots of HDD storage. That cooler looks pretty trick on your graphics card too! Tidy job on the wiring as well, you could fit a house in that case!!

[HackJoe]

That case is HUGE!!!! good work.. I've had a Lian-Li in the past. they are the best.. Have you seen the case they make for the 360? very cool!

J.

[nikonnut]

Nano,
That looks fantastic! The wiring looks great to me and I really like the chip set / RAM fan. Great work and I can't wait to see what's next

[nano2nd]

Aqua, LOL it is rather big I guess. I'm not overcompensating for anything honest.

Joe, yes I'm tempted by the 360 case. We've already had the red ring of death once. Might think about rehousing in one of those when the warranty goes.

Nik, thanks for the compliments. I liked the chipset cooler too - problem with the sideways coolers currently en vogue is you don't get the downward airflow onto the chipset/mosfets. I like to think this helps a bit.

There won't be much more from me for a while (may invest in one of the new 150GB Velociraptors but thats all). Got a baby due in just under four weeks so my attention will be elsewhere!

Cheers guys!

[aquamac]

Hey congrats nano, don't forget to tell us when it's born - if you have a minute that is!!

[nano2nd]

Aug 17, 2008 20:59:28 GMT aquamac said:

Hey congrats nano, don't forget to tell us when it's born - if you have a minute that is!!

Thanks man, will do!

The dashboard widget I made tells me there is still 31 days, 12 hours, 45 minutes and 20 seconds to go so I've a little while left yet... ;D

[B B]

Congratz nano2nd. Say hello to the mammy.

[B B]

How does it work for the HDD's, just slide and attach with screw already on the sides like the G5 case way ? Seems easier than previous PC systems. Lot of space anyway.Welcome Raids.

[nano2nd]

Aug 25, 2008 7:44:41 GMT B B said:

How does it work for the HDD's, just slide and attach with screw already on the sides like the G5 case way ? Seems easier than previous PC systems. Lot of space anyway.Welcome Raids.

The HDD bays have rails on each side. The case comes with a bunch of screw-on bolts with rubber "tyres" that you attach at four points to your disks. They then slide onto the rails and lock pretty tightly into position.

The cabling is all round the back - no pluggable bays or anything fancy. The one downside is that you have to take off both side panels if you want to change out a disk.

Pics below of the bays etc - I'm being lazy and linking to the Lian Li website if you were wondering why my case turned black! ;D

[B B]

That's what I was tinking when I said : "just slide and attach with screw already on the sides like the G5 case way". Very nice and easy. To avoid to take off the second side panel, you maybe can turn around the HDD's and put the cabling in the front side like in the G5 case ?

[nano2nd]

Yeah, I just liked to route the cables round the back for that nice clean look

But cabling aside, I found it still quite difficult to remove the disk without a hand on the other side as a certain amount of upward motion is also needed to get it moved. First time I tried, one HDD banged quite hard against the frame above it - oops!

[B B]

Oke, can imagine.