completed Shadow Aurora

[Average Joe]

I finally managed to get my hands on all the components that I needed for the build.

So here goes my part list:

Case: SilentiumPC Brutus S20 - a small matx case that is small, cheap and got a lot of potential.

PSU: Cooler Master G750M -   It just was on sell long time ago

MOBO: Asrock B85M - I got it from my last build Asus Z97M

CPU: i5 4690K : Why K, well it was new and I got it for the same price that I would have to pay for non K.

GPU: EVGA GTX980 SC GAMING: Used, but i have 650+ days of warranty on it, and it was really cheap (for a used gtx980 that is)

RAM: Kingston HyperX Fury 2x8GB DDR3 1600Mhz

Drives: Goodram C40 120GB SSD + WD Green 1 TB HDD

Cooler: SilentiumPC Fera HE1224 v2 (tallest one that fits in this case)

Peripherals: Tracer Sniper mouse and Tracer Mecano keyboard - nothing fancy but works well.

The plan:

The case: The plan is to get rid of most of the drives bay (as seen on the picture) , and make an opening for a second intake fan at the front. I will also make the cable routing holes a bit wider. For now mATX motherboard is covering them a bit too much. I will also get rid of the SPC logo from the front. As for the side panel I will cut a window (and cover it with plexi of course).  



P.S. I will not make a hole in the front cover
 
Sleeving: Black/White with a little bit of light grey accents.
 
Painting: Interior of the case will be painted white white, exterior will remain black, but I'm considering some grey/white stripes on the side panel without the window, and maybe something at front. all of the fans and PSU will be painted white (the propellers will remain black) and the GTX980 cover will be painted white with plasti dip. It is likely that I will also make/buy a backplate for 980 and paint it white too. I will have to see if i will have to plasti dip the motherboard too, it may be black but all the circuits on it make it brown.
 
Lighting: RGB LED - thus aurora in the title.

Now the hardest thing is to convince my wife that tinkering with PC parts in my garage is something productive

[Morgan MLGman]

All  good and fine, but you kind of wasted the money on the GTX 980 imo considering other options out there and Pascal/Polaris right behind the corner ;p

[Average Joe]

I was thinking about waiting for next gen GPU's but  this 980 was dirt cheap (25% cheaper than the next cheapest used 980 with no warranty to it) i tested it at it runs fine so possibly I will not loose much cash when I will sell it, and i did not want to wait with intergrated graphics for any longer.

[Average Joe]

Little bit of progress with my little helper.

[Average Joe]

Fans are ready for a paint job.

 

[Average Joe]

Cutting in progress :

[Average Joe]

Update on the additional fan hole. I used a part of the optical bay to make a strip over the hole to have a place to mount the top part of the fan.

[Average Joe]

Lights test. The strips won't be visible when properly attached.

 

[Average Joe]

Next step brown motherboard is gonna become white.

[Average Joe]

Painting done. Next step sleeving the PSU cables.

 

[NaLu]

Boski build kolego! : ) Czym malowałeś płytę? Zrobisz jej więcej zdjęć?

 

EN: Great build!

[Average Joe]

6 hours ago, NaLu said:

Boski build kolego! : ) Czym malowałeś płytę? Zrobisz jej więcej zdjęć?

 

EN: Great build!

EN: Thanks. The motherboard was painted with plasti dip like rubber paint called THIS. There will be more photos soon.

PL: Dzięki. Płyta jest malowana gumą w sprayu coś takiego jak plasti dip o nazwie THIS. Wkrótce więcej fotek.

[Average Joe]

As requested some more Pictures of the motherboard. As you can see I did not paint most the power section (from the one painted on accident I removed the plastic). I will add some radiators there. There is some excess paint here and there, but it's easy to peel the excess off.

 

 

 

[NaLu]

Ohhh yes, this looks splendid. Where did you buy the paint? Morele?

[Average Joe]

Nope, allegro. But after the fact I saw that the shop that I ordered it from is located just 20km from where I live. You can also check local auto parts shops for it.

And after that I noticed that the label states that distributor for Poland is located in my town.

 

[Average Joe]

I wasn't able to make any progress last week. But here is DIY Backplate with 3 layers of primer and 1 of coating, still 3-4 layers to go.

 

[Average Joe]

And here is the card with backplate. Sorry for the poor lighting, will post better ones later. I decided to leave the card plastic shroud black.

First of all it goes with the theme and secondly there is very little of it visible.

 

[Average Joe]

Window cutout done. Now I need a lot of time with a file to make it beautiful.

 

 

[NaLu]

Kinda good, from my experience file is great but you need to be very careful when taking material off with it. Also... what kind of model is that makita? I personally use Dremel 4000 (also in case).

 

By the way what you use to cut plexi?

[Average Joe]

As for the case - it's for cordless 12V Makita 6271Driver-Drill

My rotary tool is an 8 year old PROXXON MICROMOT 50 (little green-yellow case on the left)- it never failed me.

For cutting the window I used Makita 4326 jig saw and the Proxxon for the "corners".

As for the files, don't worry i have used them many times before + the cuts are pretty straight not much material to get off.

 

For the plexi - same technique as with glass. I cut (more like a scratch) it a bit with precision knife and then bend it on the cut. Fast and clean if done right.

[Average Joe]

PSU sleeving complete. Took me in total 6h but it was worth the time.

 

And yes. I've changed the fan too.

[NaLu]

Nice~ : )

[Average Joe]

On 05/18/2016 at 2:33 PM, NaLu said:

Nice~ : )

I'd run into no post problem. I was sure that painting the mobo was not the issue. It turned out that  I had to flash the bios to run i5 4690k . I had one iteration older bios than minimum to run it. Thankfully I have a second rig with i3 4330. So this build is up and running. Still some cable management and overall cleaning to do.

[NaLu]

Can't wait for finished pictures

[Average Joe]

11 hours ago, NaLu said:

Can't wait for finished pictures

Still in progress:

 

https://twitter.com/AvgJoe412/status/734422675553189889