[Build Log] The Define Project (it's like the never ending story... c'mon inside!)

[adi518]

Introduction:

I'm Adi, 28, rooting from Israel. Oh ye, we love the Tech Tips channel out here too ! :)

Like others, I'm a rather causal subscriber to the channel, I've been following it about 2 years after it's initiation and learned a lot from it. Linus has that spot on attitude for videos that are fun and easy to watch. :)

This project started back in October 2012, but I went through a Long-a$$ learning curve. I've never done such project before, but I looked at other people's work and knew what I want my project to look like. So I aimed high, but my skills are rather low-mediocre at best. Also, part of the learning curve was learning (and still learning) hardware and what stuff exactly to get... it's tough when you have such huge variety of pc parts, AND it's even harder when most of the project has to base on parts imported from over-seas (shippings costs, customs, delays, oos, etc'). So far though, I believe I've done it right with perhaps minimal mistakes. So far. ;)

* This log is also posted on various other forums, content may differ a little. My nickname is the same on all forums so you can look them up if you want. :)
** Some pictures may not depict colors as they are in real life. Well obviously, but my camera is extra crappy and has a broken screen display so I can't really see what I'm shooting.

Here's the official spec planned:

Board - MSI Z77 Mpower (former board was GB z68x-ud3h)
Cpu - i5 2500k
Gpu - Evga GTX 670 ftw (SLI planned once I hunt down another ftw).
Ram - 16gb G.skill Sniper 1866 CL9
Psu - Seasonic X-560 (this beast can carry a 2500k and two 670 ftws! prolly not the best idea, but for a fact, it can)
Case - Fractal Design Define R4 (well, obviously lol)

Water cooling equipment:

Pump - Swiftech 655 -B D5 w/Bitspower modkit in matte black.
Radiator - Black Ice GTS (2nd gen) 360mm
Tubing - Nickle plated copper tubings in conjunction with Bitspower Multi-link adapters
Coolant - Ice Dragon Nano Fluid
Cpu Block - EK Supreme LTx (nickle and plexi edition) or XSPC Raystorm
Gpu block - EK FC-680 (old style, also nickle and plexi edition, this one is from the last 2012 batch in October)
VRM & Chipset blocks - Liquid Extasy (should be here by April)
Res - Bitspower multi-z upgrade kit for D5 (also have 80 and 250mm versions)

Sleeving:

MDPC: Orange, Shade, Black, Aqua Blue MKII, White
Techflex Clean cut: Black & Grey (only colors available)

* The first post is gonna get updated from time to time so be sure to check it out for some new info.

Lets go:

Taken apart anything that won't be used, hdd/od cages & gromits.



My first interaction with sleeving was cleancut so I used that for the first sleeving tasks:

Black & grey cleancuts:



- mdpc yellow -



- mdpc b-magic -



Sleeved the front panel with clean cut:



Quick test assembled:



Gonna give the usb 3 wiring a special treatment which I like to call the "mdpc treatment", more on that later. :)

Sleeved some sata cables, some for practice and some for using in the actual build:



In black (mdpc):



And as an extra practice, these two short satas:



Sleeved one of my fans:



And various other fans:







Painting the i/o shield white is a must (all pci brackets are white):

Prepping:



Quick assembly review:



Got an acrylic piece that will cover the perforated floor of the R4:



Cut into size:



New board:





New ram:



Close up:



The stickerless G.skill Snipers:



Yellow covers removed and heatsinks cleaned from sticky residue:



IO area cleaned from stickers:



Assembled:



Close up:



A'right, water cooling parts started to arrive:

Black Ice GTS 280... it's nice and everything but gonna need a replacement since it's slightly defected. Edit: Black Ice were kinda enough to ship a new radiator to me, a GTS 360 and as a bonus another 120mm radiator + free shipping with Fedex. Brilliant customer service in my book.



The new radiator:



With eLoops attached:



First attempt at making an adapter plate for the radiator:







First attempt went ok, but not good enough. I will use my first attempt to make a new piece, this time using the first adapter as stencil and duplicating it (minus the defects) using my Router.



Good old' XSPC Raystorm:



Unboxed:



Another block I got off ebay, it's an EK Ltx Nickle/Plexi edition:



Arrived a bit dirty so cleaned it up:



Also had to get a proper backplate for it:



"Old style" FC-680:



I also plan on getting this set of blocks for the motherboard. It was just released by a German brand called "Liquid Extasy". It's not a popular brand, but it looks serious. Their shop is a bit weird as you have to wire-transfer your payment (no Paypal option atm). Anyway, it should be in stock around April so it may get added after the build is completed:



Bitspower multi-link adapters, some new sleeving (Mdpc orange):





Rest of the colors:



Close up (the blue is way way off, I promise better pictures later on):



First attempt at uni-sleeving:



Swiftech "uber" 655, -B model with BP modkit & v2 top:



BP 80mm multi-z res (tube only):



Complete res, 250mm



I also got the upgrade kit so I'm covered in both tube size (I've got 80, 150 and 250) and both variations, either attached to the pump top or separated because all parts are interchangeable! :)

Close up:



BP res brackets for 140mm radiators:



Unboxed:



Close up shot:



Lian Li case feet (also got the wheels, not sure which I'm going to use yet):


 
// Updates from May-June 2013
 
Psu cables wip pics:
 

 

 

 

 

[Parkway Drive]

Love your pictures, I wish I had a camera that good.

Keep it up, I'm sure you're build will be featured if the quality stays the same.

I love the all black motherboard. I'll be keeping an eye out on this build.

+1 Like

[Wats]

THIS is what a build log should look like!

I'm very impressed so far.

I really like what you did to the MSI's heat spreaders.

[adi518]

I'm using an old Canon IXUS lol. Really crap camera if I'm honest. Thanks. :)

[TheCrazySquirell]

Damn this is looking real nice, the board minus the stickers looks soooo sleek.

Can't wait to see what it looks like done. :D

[frozenskipper]

This is looking amazingly slick. Am looking forward to more pictures :D

[KaRiM_BoNd]

This is some REALLY nice piece of hardware!! ... I'd really like to see the finished product!!

And btw I really like the multicolor scheme .. It looks BEAUTIFULL!

Keep up the marvelous job!

Greetings from Palestine :)

[Samdb]

This build is putting me to shame. So much that I've been inspired to improve my build with the stuff I have.

[Skov]

Wow, good job. Looking forward to more pictures!

That Mpower board looks sick with the yellow covers removed :eek:.

[defunkt]

Holy shoot.

[adi518]

Here's a photo of early wire management planning, along with my old Gigabyte motherboard (now sold):

I got my new motherboard through local sponsorship so I was very happy to rid of the old one. MSI also doing much better job at supporting users with bios updates (something GB lacked quite a bit with that board). :)

My current board as I work on this project:

Photos with the old project stamp were done using an iPhone 4 actually.

[adi518]

Some stuff from today...

The "Router". This thing rolls at 23,000 rpm, compare to my Drill's humble 3000 rpm. :O

My dad is the veteran when it comes to these things so after attaching the first adapter to a new piece of acrylic he went off with the Router and cut out a new piece. This took 2 minutes compare to more than an hour with the Jigsaw!

And finally, it's ready! :D

[byalexandr]

Amazing! You have inspired me to build something similar to this.

[Parkway Drive]

I really hope this build is featured on the live stream, I like the other guys "titanium" build too but that's just him posting a mate's build.

Keep the log coming. Loving this one. Puts my build to shame for sure, on a totally new level.

[MdX MaxX]

Everything about this build looks absolutely beautiful. Heck, some of those photos look like renders!

Quick question: what purpose does the radiator adapter serve? Is it not possible to mount the radiator to the top of the chassis?

[Parkway Drive]

Everything about this build looks absolutely beautiful. Heck, some of those photos look like renders!

Quick question: what purpose does the radiator adapter serve? Is it not possible to mount the radiator to the top of the chassis?

The top of the R4 only accommodates for a 240 rad, he's using a 360.

Agree completely on the photos, absolutely beautiful.

[adi518]

Mounting a 360 in the top is possible with some heavy modding to the top. Since I like to avoid cutting the case, it was much easier and more sensible to go for the front.

[unidentical]

If you don't water cool the ram, I was looking at it and I thought the 'sights' along the top looked remarkably like they might be able to pinch in a sleeved cable and it would be awfully cool looking to have four sleeved cables running the length of them in you had something to run those cables to.

just an idea.

[adi518]

Hmm... Not sure I understand. ;)

[byalexandr]

Hmm... Not sure I understand. ;)

Hey, what sleeving did you use? Like what diameter and what length? I want to use the silver mainly and the black for my build.

[adi518]

If you want to stick with black/grey then you could get for Techflex cleancut sleeving. It's sold by Furryletters on ebay. It's pretty much same quality as MDPC only it's much cheaper. However, it's only available in black & grey. Clean cut comes in few sizes, I used 1/4" for sata sleeving but it was serious PITA.. you really need a bigger size like the MDPC sata sleeve (I believe it's around 10mm). For small wires, you should get 1/8": http://www.ebay.com/itm/1-8-BRAIDED-EXPANDABLE-SLEEVING-CLEAN-CUT-25ft-/360266476987?pt=Car_Audio_Video&vxp=mtr&hash=item53e18e2dbb

1/4" is excellent for thicker usb 3 / audio front panel cables. Get both sizes in both colors.

[byalexandr]

If you want to stick with black/grey then you could get for Techflex cleancut sleeving. It's sold by Furryletters on ebay. It's pretty much same quality as MDPC only it's much cheaper. However, it's only available in black & grey. Clean cut comes in few sizes, I used 1/4" for sata sleeving but it was serious PITA.. you really need a bigger size like the MDPC sata sleeve (I believe it's around 10mm). For small wires, you should get 1/8": http://www.ebay.com/itm/1-8-BRAIDED-EXPANDABLE-SLEEVING-CLEAN-CUT-25ft-/360266476987?pt=Car_Audio_Video&vxp=mtr&hash=item53e18e2dbb

1/4" is excellent for thicker usb 3 / audio front panel cables. Get both sizes in both colors.

So, how many feet of sleeving would you say I would need? I want mostly silver/grey sleeving, but a couple black on the main connectors.

[byalexandr]

If you want to stick with black/grey then you could get for Techflex cleancut sleeving. It's sold by Furryletters on ebay. It's pretty much same quality as MDPC only it's much cheaper. However, it's only available in black & grey. Clean cut comes in few sizes, I used 1/4" for sata sleeving but it was serious PITA.. you really need a bigger size like the MDPC sata sleeve (I believe it's around 10mm). For small wires, you should get 1/8": http://www.ebay.com/itm/1-8-BRAIDED-EXPANDABLE-SLEEVING-CLEAN-CUT-25ft-/360266476987?pt=Car_Audio_Video&vxp=mtr&hash=item53e18e2dbb

1/4" is excellent for thicker usb 3 / audio front panel cables. Get both sizes in both colors.

Also, will the Bitspower High Density Sleeving work just the same? I want to buy from FrozenCPU.com

[adi518]

I don't know about Bitspower's sleeving. I'd stick to MDPC/Techflex. I'd say get 5-10m of sleeving. FrozenCPU are quite expensive too (generally speaking) and it's not a popular store to get your sleeving from.

[byalexandr]

I don't know about Bitspower's sleeving. I'd stick to MDPC/Techflex. I'd say get 5-10m of sleeving. FrozenCPU are quite expensive too (generally speaking) and it's not a popular store to get your sleeving from.

Okay, so can I get it on Performance PCs or somewhere else? I don't like Ebay very much.