Pridak - Buildlog

[N3rot0xin]

So its finally happened. I not only upgraded but i switched teams entirely. I used to be AMD, but they just couldn't keep up and i was sick of *almost good enough*. So I now fly the colors of blue and green, metaphorically speaking. As you'll see below my theme was a bit different. First some overview and specs of the machine, as well as the general direction i wanted to go with this rig. 

 

 

THE VISION  

 

For a very long time, since before i built my first computer, ive wanted to build a beautiful computer. Themed and matching from top to bottom. I tried with my old computer, going for a blue/black theme. It worked at first, i even painted parts of the case as well as one of my fans to match. It looked good, and i was satisfied with that for a while. But then i had to change parts and the theme went to crap. Since that time i've had this vision in my head of the next PC. Never been anything more then a mental image. I never mocked it up in photoshop or played around with other colors/themes, i just knew what i wanted and i was not unsure in anyway. I had to sit on the vision  for a while, as financially i could not afford such a thing. That changed with a new job. And thats where this build log begins. 

 

THE THEME

 

The colors i've picked I have actually been in love with for some time. What really triggered me on the color scheme were the LEGO Bionicle sets. Specifically, the Krika and then later Pridak. Both of these sets featured the white/black/red color pattern and i thought it looked beautiful. Over the years I kept seeing it (rarely, surprisingly its not that common). I know a lot people would associate Umbrella corp with the pattern, and thats where i drew some inspiration from as well. Inside the corp, White is the primary color. black is there as well. And then red (usually from blood) is a clean and crisp contrast. Thats how I wanted build of mine to be. Be really Clean with splashes of color. 

 

 

THE MACHINE

 

Ok enough philosophy for the day. Down and dirty. This was a completely new build not an upgrade. The only way i would get away from the disappointment of AMD is not use them. 

 

Intel Skylake Core i7-6700k 

Gigabyte GA-z170x Gaming 7

G.SKILL DDR4 Ripjaws 8gb (2x4)

MSI GTX 980

EVGA NEX650 Powersupply

Lepa AquaChanger 240 CPU cooler

 

THE BUILD

 

 

Right off the bat, i wanted to sleeve my own power supply cables. A lot of people said "just buy them presleeved, way easier". Yes, it would've been easier. But then i couldn't appreciate it nearly as much when it was done. So bought the stuff to do it myself and i did. 

 

Quick tips on sleeving

 

Its not super difficult. But it can be tedious and frustrating without the right stuff. For a guide on the actual sleeving, i used Lutr0 's video on the matter. (Lutr0 Customs Paracord Sleeving).

In this case i chose to use Paracord 550, which imo looks the best for what i was going for. If you have never sleeved before, i would first recommend getting some non-psu wiring (like go to the hardware store and get a small roll) and test out different methods to get a feel for it. 

 

Always measure. Always. What i did was got a measuring tape, and with tape i marked on the table how long certain things should be(sleeve and heatshrink). Then I would always cut to the tape lines rather than remeasuring every time. It went so much faster. The only thing i would've changed was maybe use precut heatshrink, but thats up to you. i ended up with 50 feet of bulk heat shrink as a result of this.. so, who needs some? (lol.. im kinda kidding.. kinda).  

 

Get a sleeving tool kit. I dont care what people say you can use instead. Get a tool kit if you plan on doing more then 2 wires. So much easier and way quicker. The one i used was the Phobya Extractor Kit. (My ATX pin tool actually broke, but thats because i was rushing and bent the extractor pins to far and they snapped off. This wont happen to you in normal use.). 

 

For heatshrink save yourself from burning wires/sleeving/heatshrink/yourself and get a heatgun. I got a really good deal on one locally, picked one up for $9.99 (was normally 39.99) and it was literally like magic. I would go as far as to say you should not attempt to sleeve without one.

 

Get a Multimeter. This is the most important tool you can have. If you only get one tool, make it this one. Anytime you de-pin an entire connection (like the 24 pin or 8pin gpus) you run the risk of crossing wires. This is especially possible if the wires are all black ( like a lot of manufacturers are doing these days) and sleeved. Using a multimeter, you can test each pin to make sure its still matches the pin-out diagram of your PSU for that connector. What I did was i sleeved the 2 wires needed to power on the PSU (any ground and the wire corresponding to "PSU_ON" or similar first so i could always test by jumpering and i would always know that connection was correct no matter what. I actually had 3, THREE, wires crossed that i would have otherwise never found without a miltimeter until my computer was on fire. So, get one. 

 

 

THE PICTURES

 

I dont have a lot of pictures of the process, had to reset my phone between starting the sleeveing and now. I actually got the PSU/sleeving supplies around christmas knowing it would take a while to do. Glad i did that. Because it did. So i only have a couple. Sorrrryyyy

Spoiler

 

 

[N3rot0xin]

As you can see, i went a little short on the sleeving. This is because A: I'm new at this and B: This end would be the PSU end so it didn't need to be anything special. Sadly, i do not have *any* pictures of me sleeving the dual 8pins for my GPU. I did that in under 4 hours because they werent done the day i ordered my parts. So I sped-sleeved them. I honestly didn't get a lot of pictures of anything. I took some at the start but then i was like "focus on building. Just do it". 

 

Spoiler

The Pile

 

Failed fancy shot #1

 

Failed fancy overview #2

 

At this point I was just looking at it, visualizing the concept up to this point, and realizing i was building a dream. 

 

At this stage I stared more at it, thinking what else i could do in the future to make this pop more. 

 

 

After all of that, I had one more beast to wrestle... 

Spoiler

CABLE MANAGEMENT

 

I REALLY needed that redbull to get thru this part. I'm super anal about cable management. And I cant just zip-tie things to loopholes and close a side panel. It has look acceptable on the backside or i'm not happy. So i downed half of that can and went to work: 

 

The part where i question life

 

Where i realized I'm not so terrible at this and feeling pretty clever:

 

Holy shit its done!! No super hard cable breaking bends, makes sense, the cables i may need to change or move are not tied to every other cable. 

 

 

PART C below.. 

[N3rot0xin]

THE FINISHED LADY

 

Before i post any pictures, I want to wrap this up with a few million pixels worth of words. I was building this pc, from ordering parts to sleeving, I had this vision in my head of exactly what i wanted it to look like. Everything I did, every part i picked, was done so to flow into every other part seamlessly. Some questions i will probably get asked:

 

Q: Did you cut corners or skimp to achieve this theme?

A: Not even a little. I actually paid MORE for this board then some other options i was considering. The case has been one of my favorites since its release but until now i had no reason to own it. Now i do. The cooler was actually the second thing i picked out, even before the CPU. The cooler would be the most difficult to match so if i couldnt' find one to match *this* build, i would have to make a change pretty early on. 

 

Q: Do you plan to do anything else to the case, either inside or out?

A: Honestly, at this point i dont know. I thought about painting the interior white bracket red, but after seeing it in there i like it white and red would be too much of red seeing how much there is everywhere else. I want to do something with a side panel but i'm not sure yet. The white is stunningly good to look at so i may just leave it. My *only* complaint is that the top of the case is black but thats not a big deal. 

 

Q: Case lighting?

A: Already in the works. NZXT Hue+. There weren't any available when i was ordering. 

 

FIN

 

Spoiler

Post Redbull fueled cable management session.. holy shit this looks soooo good. 

 

Some boot-test closeups:

...these were kinda bad.. sorrryyyy

 

Overly white balanced panel shots:

 

 

And then just one last naked shot: 

 

 

FINAL THOUGHTS

 

All in all, this was a pretty fun build. I enjoyed every part of it, and I'm so glad i did the sleeving myself. I can really appreciate the build that much more now. Only thing i would do better is the cables. I wanted to stitch them but honestly ran out of time. I may get cable-combs or something for the GPU but the 24-pin is gunna stay like that. a cable comb may put too much stress on the cables, not sure.  Definitely proud of this build, will enjoy this for a very long time. 

 

Thanks for tagging along this far into my oddly deep and philosophical post, that boils down "i like computers. I like red/white black. i want to combine them. heres pictures". I wanna hear your thoghts! 

[givegomezthegun]

Looks really good!  Sleeving the cables myself is something I'm hellbent on as well for my next build.. whenever it finally happens.

[N3rot0xin]

6 minutes ago, givegomezthegun said:

Looks really good!  Sleeving the cables myself is something I'm hellbent on as well for my next build.. whenever it finally happens.

As was I. It's an experience. A couple notes when you do it:

 Dont pull the wires near clothing. The little tiny pins that actually hold the wire in place (the pins you're depressing with your tool) can get caught on the fabric and, when you yank them out (because it does take come force even with a tool) they can bend backwards/break off even. 

Dont let your fingers hang over the edges when your holding the connector(the plastic bit). if you so, you'll loose skin/have cuts in prefect little 11s' on your fingertips. The crimp-on connectors have sharp edges that, when greeted with skin, dont care. 

Don't use *too* much force. If you have to use excessive force to remove a wire, stop. Pull the tool out and try again. 

Sometimes the ends of the wires can 'sink' into the connectors. Keep an eye out for this when sleeving.

 

These are things that nobody even mentions when sleeving but I feel are really, really important to do the job painfree. 

[pagani123]

man i wish i had the patients to sleeve my own cables. goods specs and the build looks awesome 

[N3rot0xin]

3 minutes ago, Maybach123 said:

man i wish i had the patients to sleeve my own cables. goods specs and the build looks awesome 

Half way thru sleeving i was contemplating just buying extensions. It does take lot of patience to do. But if you find a process that works good, weather  you depin all the wires at once and sleeve them all at once or do 1 at a time, its not nearly as bad. But no problem is a problem some Pandora can't fix!

[pagani123]

2 minutes ago, N3rot0xin said:

Half way thru sleeving i was contemplating just buying extensions. It does take lot of patience to do. But if you find a process that works good, weather  you depin all the wires at once and sleeve them all at once or do 1 at a time, its not nearly as bad. But no problem is a problem some Pandora can't fix!

ya luckily in the modding group im in I dont have to do the sleeves or backplates i just do the actual assembly and water cooling i would just screw up anything that has to do with graphic design and sleeving 

[8uhbbhu8]

Any tips for getting the core out of the para cord while sleeving? Ive got about a hundred feet of the stuff for my next build.... And even that probably wont be enough....

 

 

Looks Bad Ass and I love it!

[N3rot0xin]

8 hours ago, 8uhbbhu8 said:

Any tips for getting the core out of the para cord while sleeving? Ive got about a hundred feet of the stuff for my next build.... And even that probably wont be enough....

 

 

Looks Bad Ass and I love it!

Well first you're gunna want to get either some really sharp scissors or, what i used, were a pair of flush cutters. picked them up for a few bucks at the hardware store. If you look in the very first picture, those red handled things are what i used. Measure out how much you need+ just a little extra (half an inch or an inch at most). Make a clean cut with your cutters, what ever you choose. Then you can just grab the inner core and give it a pull and it comes right out. I had a couple hundred feet of the core, i used 550 paracord and it had 3 or four strands as a core. Check out this video i made demonstrating this. Quality is less then good, camera has no auto focus..

 

edit: did not know the video would have to be downloaded first. Can't have that. i'll youtube it.