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Portal cube PC

bjelisha

Hi everyone.

This is my Portal PC build guide. This pc is build to be a media pc/streaming/download machine.
I went for cheap components that can do basic stuff, no gaming or anything like that although Minecraft
runs like a dream on the integrated GPU.

 

So i made this:

 

 

b9fP4x4l.jpg

 

 

The parts are

MBO:    MSI H81I mITX
CPU:     Intel Pentium G3220
RAM:    1x4GB Kingston value or whatever it's called
PSU:     Corsair CX430M

HDD:    500 GB Seagate

 

qL8JaLbl.jpg

 

 

This build was in the works for the last 3 months or so and now its finally done.
The materials are 3 different thickness MDF panels cut down to size, painted and glued together.

 

After careful planning, sketching, measuring and playing lots of portal :) I finally got all the
materials and started building.

(yeah the pics were taken with my Samsung GS2 in pretty low light so bare with me, and yeah I know portrait mode...shoot me

 

 

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Blank canvas.

 

2vOyhnyl.jpg

 

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Test painting to see how will the paint hold. It was terrible, the MDF soaked up all the paint event though I hit it with some wood primer. But after 3 coats it finally looked good. After a clear glossy coat it will look all shiny and cool.

 

 

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The circles all marked out with my trusty dvd spindle.

 

 

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They didn't have enough of the thicker MDF I needed in the store so I decided to glue two thinner pieces together.

 

 

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Glue and gravity: 1, me: 0 :(. Off to the store to buy more MDF and freaking clamps :)

 

 

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All the corner pieces cut

 

 

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All the middle pieces cut

 

 

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My trusty jigsaw

 

 

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Cutting the rounded pieces from the corners. Only 23 to go :)

 

 

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It's coming together, a smile on my face :)

 

 

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The middle pieces are cut. Looking nice just need to sand the hell out of them.

 

 

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I can't even begin to imagine how terrible this all would be without power tools. Event with this sander it takes an insane amount of time to do one corner.

 

 

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Looking good.

 

 

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Firs of the circles. I made a cardboard template of the aperture logo and just sprayed it on the piece. It's not perfect but good enough for me.

 

 

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More circles all done and shiny.

 

 

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The base "cube" structure is coming together.

 

 

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Just checking out how the paint looks. I'm pretty happy.

 

 

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The inside. I actually planned to paint the inside but decided to leave it full of glue and nasty, it's like cable managing the back of the motherboard plate, who cares its closed :)

 

 

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Top side fan.

 

 

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The first of the motherboard standoffs. Had to buy them of ebay because not a single hardware store in my town ever heard or seen a motherboard standoff let alone the longer one I looked for.

 

 

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Getting ready to put the components inside. See how the standoffs are all crooked and not straight :). Not a problem they will be once the motherboard is inside and screwed in.

 

 

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Yeah I could actually fit a mATX board in here...or maybe larger...

 

 

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Almost done.

 

 

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It's actually huge... and heavy as all hell( over 12kg ) This is a MIDI tower case next to it as you can see.

 

SE2hUa8l.jpg

Finished.

 

QpBBNTLl.jpg

 

 

So thats it. It was and amazingly fun project to do. A little tedious at some points like the never ending sanding but I am more than happy with the result.
It is by no means perfect nor it is intended to be. I probably could painted it better with the proper primers for mdf and proper paint but if i did it "professionaly" it would cost a hell af a lot more than
it did now. Even now with the money spent on this "amateur" made stuff i could buy a wicked mITX case so yeah...

But it wouldn't be nearly as awsome as a portal cube :)

 

Original quality pics http://goo.gl/efGVXS

Thanks for reading and hope you like it.

 

peace out

| AMD Phenom II 1100T @ 4.0GHz | Corsair A50 | MSI 990FXA GD80 | 8 GB Corsair XMS3 1333 | MSI GTX 660Ti PE 2GB | Corsair HX 750W |Samsung 840 Evo 120GB | Seagate Baracuda 2x 1TB | Coolermaster 690 II Advanced  |

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God didn't bless me with talent like that, cause I'll make a living form it. 

The time you enjoy wasting, is not wasted time. 

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That looks incredible. I think you sell yourself short on how good it looks. It really does look like a professional job (well maybe not the inside but still :P)

"If you do not take your failures seriously you will continue to fail"

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Damn, that is actually really awesome.

What does it look like when its actually wherever its left? Like in its "natural habitat" would be interesting to see.

CPU: 6700k GPU: Zotac RTX 2070 S RAM: 16GB 3200MHz  SSD: 2x1TB M.2  Case: DAN Case A4

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Keep a fire extinguisher at the ready

CPU: Intel 3570 GPUs: Nvidia GTX 660Ti Case: Fractal design Define R4  Storage: 1TB WD Caviar Black & 240GB Hyper X 3k SSD Sound: Custom One Pros Keyboard: Ducky Shine 4 Mouse: Logitech G500

 

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Yes because the 100s of degrees you need to start a spontaneous fire on wood can be produced by a computer...

It's called a joke...

CPU: Intel 3570 GPUs: Nvidia GTX 660Ti Case: Fractal design Define R4  Storage: 1TB WD Caviar Black & 240GB Hyper X 3k SSD Sound: Custom One Pros Keyboard: Ducky Shine 4 Mouse: Logitech G500

 

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This is brilliant. Great ideas by a great community. 

Cpu: Intel i5 4690k @3.5 Ghz*cooled by Corsair Hydro H105* | Case: NZXT H440 Black/Green | Motherbord: Gigabyte Z97X-UD5H-BK Black Edition Ram: Avexir Venom 16GB
Video Card: Asus Nvidia GeForce GTX980 4GB | Power Supply: Corsair TX850 | SSD: Samsung 500GB 850 Pro SSD: Samsung 500GB 840 Pro 
Monitor: ASUS 27" ROG Swift G-Sync 144mhz | Keyboard: Logitech G710+  | Mouse: Logitech G700s| Headset: Logitech G35 | Speakers: Logitech X530 5.1
NAS Set-up: Netgear ReadyNAS 104 "populated by 4 x 2TB Western Digital Red in RAID 6"
 

 

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Great job on doing what many of us had thought of doing but never got around to.

#BuildLogOfTheMonth

If you ever need help with a build, read the following before posting: http://linustechtips.com/main/topic/3061-build-plan-thread-recommendations-please-read-before-posting/
Also, make sure to quote a post or tag a member when replying or else they won't get a notification that you replied to them.

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Looks great!!!

n0ah1897, on 05 Mar 2014 - 2:08 PM, said:  "Computers are like girls. It's whats in the inside that matters.  I don't know about you, but I like my girls like I like my cases. Just as beautiful on the inside as the outside."

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WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN ALL THIS TIME!?! I was waiting so long for someone to finally build something like this!You're like better then ramen noodles

It's not a bug, it's an undocumented feature!

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I'll always upvote Portal-themed builds :D

Interested in Linux, SteamOS and Open-source applications? Go here

Gaming Rig - CPU: i5 3570k @ Stock | GPU: EVGA Geforce 560Ti 448 Core Classified Ultra | RAM: Mushkin Enhanced Blackline 8GB DDR3 1600 | SSD: Crucial M4 128GB | HDD: 3TB Seagate Barracuda, 1TB WD Caviar Black, 1TB Seagate Barracuda | Case: Antec Lanboy Air | KB: Corsair Vengeance K70 Cherry MX Blue | Mouse: Corsair Vengeance M95 | Headset: Steelseries Siberia V2

 

 

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How the hell do you turn it on?

Main rig on profile

VAULT - File Server

Spoiler

Intel Core i5 11400 w/ Shadow Rock LP, 2x16GB SP GAMING 3200MHz CL16, ASUS PRIME Z590-A, 2x LSI 9211-8i, Fractal Define 7, 256GB Team MP33, 3x 6TB WD Red Pro (general storage), 3x 1TB Seagate Barracuda (dumping ground), 3x 8TB WD White-Label (Plex) (all 3 arrays in their respective Windows Parity storage spaces), Corsair RM750x, Windows 11 Education

Sleeper HP Pavilion A6137C

Spoiler

Intel Core i7 6700K @ 4.4GHz, 4x8GB G.SKILL Ares 1800MHz CL10, ASUS Z170M-E D3, 128GB Team MP33, 1TB Seagate Barracuda, 320GB Samsung Spinpoint (for video capture), MSI GTX 970 100ME, EVGA 650G1, Windows 10 Pro

Mac Mini (Late 2020)

Spoiler

Apple M1, 8GB RAM, 256GB, macOS Sonoma

Consoles: Softmodded 1.4 Xbox w/ 500GB HDD, Xbox 360 Elite 120GB Falcon, XB1X w/2TB MX500, Xbox Series X, PS1 1001, PS2 Slim 70000 w/ FreeMcBoot, PS4 Pro 7015B 1TB (retired), PS5 Digital, Nintendo Switch OLED, Nintendo Wii RVL-001 (black)

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This is awesome

 

@Whiskers

-The Bellerophon- Obsidian 550D-i5-3570k@4.5Ghz -Asus Sabertooth Z77-16GB Corsair Dominator Platinum 1866Mhz-x2 EVGA GTX 760 Dual FTW 4GB-Creative Sound Blaster XF-i Titanium-OCZ Vertex Plus 120GB-Seagate Barracuda 2TB- https://linustechtips.com/main/topic/60154-the-not-really-a-build-log-build-log/ Twofold http://linustechtips.com/main/topic/121043-twofold-a-dual-itx-system/ How great is EVGA? http://linustechtips.com/main/topic/110662-evga-how-great-are-they/#entry1478299

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Thanks for the positive comments, I'm glad you like it ;)

 

A few answers:

The temps:

idle 29-31 celsious

full load (prime95 which is ludicrous and over the top) around 54 on all cores

This is without the top fan which i turned off since it was too loud.

So yeah I'm pretty safe in the fire department :)

 

Someone asked how do i turn it on?

Wake on lan but I do have a ghetto switch just hanging on a wire on the back side :)

 

And yeah to sell it... I'm sorry but it's priceless :)

| AMD Phenom II 1100T @ 4.0GHz | Corsair A50 | MSI 990FXA GD80 | 8 GB Corsair XMS3 1333 | MSI GTX 660Ti PE 2GB | Corsair HX 750W |Samsung 840 Evo 120GB | Seagate Baracuda 2x 1TB | Coolermaster 690 II Advanced  |

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So amazing  :wub:

CASE: FRACTAL DESIGN DEFINE R4  |  MOBO: MSI MPOWER Z77  |  CPU: Intel i5 3570k @ 4.4 GHz  |  CPU COOLER: NOCTUA NH-D15  |  GPU: EVGA GTX 770 SC |

PSU: CORSAIR AX860 W/ RED BRAIDED CABLES | SSD: SAMSUNG 840 EVO 250 GB | HDD: WD BLACK 1 TB | FANS: 3x NOCTUA NF-A14 | MONITOR: HP W2371D

KEYBOARD: CM STORM QFR MX BLUES W/  PBT KEYCAPS  |  MOUSE: LOGITECH G502 | MIC: AUDIO TECHNICA AT2020 | HEADPHONES: SENNHEISER HD 558

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Did you manage to fit any old test subjects in there?

OnePlus 6T

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