What's the most ghetto way you've gotten a PC to function the way you've wanted it?

[H0R53]

What's the most dangerous/jankiest/scrappiest/weirdest/illegitimate way you've gotten a PC to function the way you've wanted it?

Try to keep your responses concise, if you leave info out and you want to add it, don't make another post, please edit your original reply.

 

Right now I have an SFF Dell Optiplex running a full sized GPU (550Ti), modded PSU (soldered on a 6-pin), and a cut PCI x1 slot for a secondary GPU. Next, I cut out the drive cage so I could put two fans up front for better airflow. After that I cut the side panel so I could put it over the 550Ti.

[Neutrideo]

My power supply blew, so I made one out of some parts and an arduino, then used that as a psu.

[manikyath]

a bit tied for me..

 

either this ridiculously 'please dont" adapter, because it was for a server build:

(oh, and because it was in between a seasonic prime titanium, and an i7 with 32 gigs of ram on a poopy OEM board)

 

or this thing, everything about this thing:

a biref list:

- the cpu cooler is a bit out of spec and pulls VERY hard on the mobo around the cpu

- legacy pci vga card that needed a legacy flag to be set in grub to not have garbled text in linux (later on i actually managed to get xfce working)

- 4 different sticks of ram because yolo

- the power supply actually only fit after i sucked an LED off the board, and is supported by the bottom most pci slot and twist ties linked together holding the back mesh and the wires, going trough a hole in the top of the case.

- the rear fan has a blade missing, which had been replaced by a carefully shaped and weighed piece of ducktape

- the cpu cooling fan is the wrong size => more twist ties

- the fact that power supply's voltage regulation is/has gotten so bad i can measure 230V fluctuations on the +12v rail.

- the rear fan is too big, twist ties are godmode.

- this entire build came together for a budget of €0.00 every part here was fished from scrap, given to me by someone who was going to scrap it, or traded for with stuff aquired as before mentioned.

- this thing catches fire almost every time i turn it on, but i keep it operational trough excessive bodging.

- EDIT: in case it was unclear, this is an ATX board in a µATX case.

[Droidbot]

i3 530 machine with a noisy PSU and the worst mobo

 

Literally found the way to fix the PSU - slide a chocolate bar wrapper into the fan through the hole. it works

[Purgent]

The H110i GTX I bought to cool my CPU is too large to mount with fans attached to the radiator.

 

Not wanting to return it, I mounted it as intended, but had to put the fans in pull config on top, outside the case.  The fan wiring goes through the back where I've removed a block off shield for a PCI device.  

 

As a consequence, my room glows with the power of a thousand suns as those two fans have LEDs.

[H0R53]

1 hour ago, manikyath said:

- EDIT: in case it was unclear, this is an ATX board in a µATX case.

I fit a proprietary EATX board in a Vivo Smart mATX case. It was super janky but not as janky as my first one.

 

1 hour ago, Cooly568 said:

second monitor was VGA. I didn't have cables to adapt, so I plugged in my 550 TI along with my 970 to drive it.

Display Port to DVI? I have one of those laying around.

 

1 hour ago, Purgent said:

The H110i GTX I bought to cool my CPU is too large to mount with fans attached to the radiator.

 

Not wanting to return it, I mounted it as intended, but had to put the fans in pull config on top, outside the case.  The fan wiring goes through the back where I've removed a block off shield for a PCI device.  

 

As a consequence, my room glows with the power of a thousand suns as those two fans have LEDs.

Have you ever heard of zip ties?

 

Coincidentally there isn't a single zip tie in my main PC or my media PC. I'm building a site server out of an old Optiplex and I removed the drive cage because I want to put a 120mm AiO in it.

[manikyath]

4 minutes ago, H0R53 said:

I fit a proprietary EATX board in a Vivo Smart mATX case. It was super janky but not as janky as my first one.

were you using the (metal) brace for the power supply as standoff for the mobo, and using a pci slot as a brace for the power supply?

[Misanthrope]

CPU fan died and I was fully broke and couldn't afford another cpu cooler. So I aimed a house fan directly at the CPU cooler without the sidepanel on. To my surprise my temps improved by like 10c actually.

[kelvinhall05]

I was working on a laptop when I overvolted the fan. I didn't have a new one so I ended up blowing on the heatsink every few minutes to keep it cool until my new fan arrived.

[Jasun]

I have a slim version of the very old Dell Inspiron desktop and when I bought my GTX 750, it didn't fit because it required two pci slots so i had to bend the back of the case and took the whole side panel off. I also had to prop the mobo up with some paper (because the slim version of the case couldn't hand normal sized gpus) and I taped it down so the mobo had some sort of support. 

[Jasun]

Just now, valdyrgramr said:

Passive breath cooling?

best type of cooling. free. 

[Jasun]

Just now, valdyrgramr said:

My only concern is that saliva would get inside.

just don't blow too hard.  

[kelvinhall05]

3 minutes ago, valdyrgramr said:

My only concern is that saliva would get inside.

Yeah, that happened.

[Bananasplit_00]

EVERYTHING about the LAN PC 3.0...

 

motherboard mounted with tape, one screw and cardboard

old dell server case

power button was some jumper wires and a breadboard going out of the 5.25" bay

PSU was in the case technically

the motherboard was already dying

no fans exept the intel stock cooler and the GPU

i ripped the old motherboard out with plyers

i stomped the case shut, which it didnt really, just kinda.

i assembled another computer that i brought to the same LAN party in case this one died, it did after about 1h

windows installed, but not really, but then it was. not quite sure what was going on with that

the I5 680 was overclocked 20% BCLK or it would not boot

motherboard just in a general state of sortof dead

RAM would only work in super specific combinations of slots and overclock jumpers

you had to route USB cables through the old, welded in, IO plate

you had to get the DVI cables through the PCI cutouts, you really had to FORCE the cable to get through

 

there is probably something im forgetting here too lol. i dont think i documented much about the LAN PC 3.0 and forward so there are sadly no pictures.

the Toaster Project is pretty janky aswell, right now thinking about ways to beef up the PSU so i can get it running so i can bring it to my friend im going to in a few days...

[JoeCoke]

I had a Socket 939 PC where I had to hold the CPU heatsink on with zip ties. The video card's fan had died so I removed it and attached a spare CPU fan to the heatsink with zip ties. The damn thing worked though, and well. The CPU fan was actually a huge upgrade.

[H0R53]

8 hours ago, manikyath said:

were you using the (metal) brace for the power supply as standoff for the mobo, and using a pci slot as a brace for the power supply?

I used the normal standoffs that I could, and removed the drive cage.

5 hours ago, GamingMemeKing said:

I posted this recently but...No AM4 bracket...lol

AM4 design is lame, why can't AMD just make it square for once?

[Thimsarpel]

Asd

[VIVO-US]

In my first PC build, I got tired of the noise from the hard drive, so I grabbed some spare silicon gaskets from where I worked at the time, cut them up, screwed the pieces onto the hard drive, and tied it all into a 5.25" bay with some copper magnet wire I had laying around.  Even though it looked like it could've fallen apart at any second, it worked!  I eventually replaced it with an Arctic Cooling hard drive cooler/silencer.

[Satisfoxy]

Zip ties for the SSD instead of buying the converter.

 

Twist ties for the broken DVD drive door, wedged them twisted inside the door.

[H0R53]

2 hours ago, Satisfoxy said:

Zip ties for the SSD instead of buying the converter.

 

Twist ties for the broken DVD drive door, wedged them twisted inside the door.

I hope your signature is not your main build...

[ElZamo92]

There was this one time when a register in one of the retail stores I used to work for had its proprietary PSU die. It was mission critical, so I basically ductaped an ATX PSU th the outside of the case... Too bad I didn't take photos of the thing, it was HILARIOUS, but it worked until I had the chance to replace the whole machine a few days later. 

[Nicnac]

I love these ghetto mods ? 

Did something similar to op to fit my CPU cooler. 

Build log is in my sig. 

 

 

[H0R53]

2 hours ago, Nicnac said:

I love these ghetto mods ? 

Did something similar to op to fit my CPU cooler. 

Build log is in my sig. 

Oh, in a while I'm putting a 120mm AiO inside the machine in the original post. I'm also getting a 1050Ti FTW for it since I have a 6-pin.

 

In all honesty I'm probably going to move it to a slightly larger (or better) case.

[Zodiark1593]

Double side tape for the SSD, even though there was a cage for it.

 

My PSU...

 

Taping the front case LEDs so as to run encode and rendering jobs without lighting up my room at night.

[Zando_]

Uuummm.... bending an LGA socket pins back after I gouged it getting off my backplate (which I then hacked to bits with a Dremel so I could fit my Cyrorig M9i on properly). Lower temps now though!