Wall PC without Power button

[PixelSpielkind]

How it started...

When I got this Mainboard from a otherwise broken Dell Laptop, I initially wanted to hide that under a desk as kind of a slim invisible PC. 
It´s not new, not overpowered or something like that, but it sports a Core i7-8850H with 6 Cores /12 Threads, 2666 Mhz DDR4 Memory -  so it´s perfectly fine as a daily driver for Web and Office Stuff... 

 

Well... as I´m currently kind of obsessed with WLED (which is a free Firmware for cheap ESP8266 / ESP32 Microcontrollers that can control hundreds of individually adressable RGB and RGBW LEDs)
I decided that I rather want to have some RGB added, which makes no sense if the whole thing is under a desk... 

 

So I kept the Idea of extra cooling with 2 self adhesive coolers on top of the Heatpipe + 2 Noctua 40mm 5V Fans, added a Backplate for Wall-Mount and 52 LEDs in Total. 

 

The Soldering:
The ESP32 Controller and the plugs for the LEDs had to go into some kind of housing, so I designed and 3D-Printed a quick' n'dirty Case solution that goes on the back of the Wall-PC.
I´m not really that much into soldering and attaching all the LED Channels to the controller GPIO was hard enough so luckily I had this 4 to 1 Adapter I could just stick the cables into..

I later added a 7th LED Channel for an LED Ring under the CPU Fan - maybe to show CPU Temps or load with corresponding colors? 

 

Test-Fit...

That begins to look like ... well.. a .. Computer of some sort.. :D. Since the Noctua Fans are 5V instead of 12V I can power them by USB, I just add a mechanical Switch to 

just turn them on when needed. In Case anyone wondering what those Drives are... 

Top Left: 1 TB WD Blue M.2 SATA SSD - interestingly the Mainboard supports using an M.2 SATA SSD in the WWAN Slot (although it should normally be a 2242 length one).

Bottom Right: That´s what a 2 TB Samsung 860 Evo 2,5" SSD looks like without the Case.

Bottom Left: Samsung PM9A1 NVME m.2 SSD 512 GB

 

 

Where´s the Power Button???

OK here comes the "if it works it can´t be that stupid"-Part... There IS a Power-Button, But it´s on the other Side of the Mainboard, just left of the LAN-Port. So bending the Mainboard to reach it was not a solution. and I didn´t want to print any kind of mini rocker switch... So Step one: Set the PC to Wake on AC in the BIOS... So i now turns on automatically when it has power... 

 

Call the Assistant...

OK here comes the weird part..  I´ve setup the WallPC to turn on via Wake on LAN as well. And since I use Home Assistant (on a Raspberry Pi4) for my Smarthome anyway incl. some 
Wireless Zigbee Switches to turn on some LEDs -> Now one of these Switches turn can on the Lights at my desk with a single touch and when I press it for 2 Seconds it will turn on the WallPC.
Or I can press the button on the Home Assistant Dashboard in the App of course..  

 

What about the LEDs then? For anyone who doesn´t know WLED - You can control the LEDs via WLAN with a browser or an app, you have 100+ animated Effects, you can define Segments, Preset, Timer etcetc.. 

AND - there is also a Home Assistant Integration. 

 

Not that spectacular yet...but.. there is a Home Assistant Agent for installing on Windows, that can forward Information about the PC to Home Assistant via MQTT, which means you can automate some stuff... 

For starters I have set up a sensor to tell my Home Assistant the CPU-Load (not in Realtime, update every 5s) of the Wall PC, which then can be used to switch the LED Presets. 

 

The Picture above was taken during a Cinebench Run. So the WallPC tells Home Assistant: CPU-Load above 80% -> WLED loads the Preset "RED" for the Leds. When it´s below 80% and above 30% ist will load the Preset "Yellow" 

and below 30% it will load the Preset "Green". 

 

Looking forward to play around with even more settings.. I could e.g. use the "Red, Yellow, Green" for Free Disk Space for the Drives and color the Edges of the Frame respectively... 

Or I can let all the LEDs blink like fireworks If I get the E-Mail that my LTT Screwdriver has been shipped...  

 

Let me know if you like it - or if you have any overclocking Idea.. As the Dell Latitude Mainboard has zero settings for that - I started to play around a little with throttlestop - the Maximum I could achive
was a 3 GHz AllCore at steady 75 degrees celsius with my added Noctua Fans. So it´s rather Throtteling due to Power not Temps.. 

 

And of course if you want to know any more detail, just ask - I just didn´t want to add a loooong boring article here..  

 

Regards from Germany! 

Edited September 17, 2022 by PixelSpielkind

[bal723]

what....

[bmx6454]

if that's what you built from a broken laptop, i would love to see a full custom pc build. very cool imo.

edit: what is the name of the display case it's mounted in(didn't see it if it was mentioned)? or is it custom built?

[PixelSpielkind]

13 minutes ago, bmx6454 said:

if that's what you built from a broken laptop, i would love to see a full custom pc build. very cool imo.

edit: what is the name of the display case it's mounted in(didn't see it if it was mentioned)? or is it custom built?

It´s custom... Basically I just ordered an Alu-Dibond & Acrylic Glass Plate with the Length & Width I needed in an Online Shop here in Germany.

I´ve then designed the Brackets in Blender and 3D-printed them myself, which sounds more complicated than it is :D.
And I used brass heat set Inserts so that I can screw all Parts together (saw that in the "3D-Printed Case"-Video on LTT a while ago and always wanted to try that  ).
And the Screws on Top are from an IKEA Skadis Pegboard - thought they looked way better more "professional" than normal Screws. 

The LEDs were cut from an SK6812 RGBW LED Strip and the Diffusors in front of them are cut form a 2m Diffusor that I had from some Aluminium LED-Profile. So I have 6 Individual addressable LEDs per Bracket, which are controlled separately, so even when the PC is off, I can turn on some szenes or Animation..