Juno Gets a New House

In January (2014) I moved my computer, Juno, into a new case. In part I did this to reclaim some desktop space, and in part to scratch an itch to work on a computer. It wasn't time yet to assemble a new computer; although Juno is four years old, I'm fine with waiting for one more generation of CPUs to arrive.

The old case, a Silverstone SG05, is a shoebox case -- not too tall, but relatively deep. The new case, a Lian-Li PC-Q03, is more of a refrigerator case ... square and tall.

Here is the box for the PC-Q03 as delivered:

I purchased it from an Ebay store, in preference to Newegg or Amazon, based solely on price. The case itself was well protected inside the manufacturer's box.

Here is a side view after all the packaging has been removed.

I hadn't realized that the PC-Q03 now included an adapter cable to allow the front USB ports, USB 3.0, to be used with a motherboard that had only USB 2.0 ports, as I did (see the sticker on the first photo). This made my previous purchase of such an adapter unnecessary, lesson #1. The supplied adapter was stiff, and made a long cable that much longer, but it worked fine.

I had also purchased an adapter plate that would fit the opening for the power supply, which I didn't need, and included an 80mm fan.

The fan was a PWM (Pulse Width Modulation) version, however, which my computer wasn't prepared to play with except with some cabling gymnastics, so instead I used a regular 3-pin 80mm fan I had in my spare parts box.

I had formulated a plan for modifying the new case. My idea was to cut a hole for a fan in the bottom plate of the case, which would suck air into the case through a filter. This technique of blowing filtered air into the case is called "positive pressure," and such computers accumulate dust more slowly than computers where fans push air out of the case, "negative pressure," which pulls unfiltered air into the case through any available opening.

To allow better airflow to this bottom fan, I purchased higher feet for the case. The original feet were tiny nubs.

Hole Cutting
I prepared to cut the hole for a 92mm fan in the bottom of the case. I taped newspaper all around so that metal filings wouldn't be strewn through the interior of the case when I finished.

This was my first go at cutting a circle in metal. I used a Dremel attachment that put the Dremel at the end of an arm, and various drill bits. The bits were likely not the best choice, as I broke a couple in the process, but I was already well underway before I realized it. There were plenty of filings.

After cleanup, this is what I had.

You can see the scratches where the guiding arm rubbed against the case -- lesson #2. Some protective tape was needed. And, although I measured several times, my technique was off, and the hole was slightly oblong (by 1 or 2 mm) and, overall, a few millimeters too large for the fan filter, which seemed slightly undersized -- lesson #3. I was learning a lot in case I ever cut into a case again.

I made a cardboard ring (three or four layers of cardboard, to match the thickness of the case) to shrink and circularize the hole.

Attaching the filter to the hole I'd cut in the bottom proved problematic. The first step, because the case is not magnetic (it's aluminum), was sticking on an adapter ring that's magnetic but has adhesive on one side.

When I put the magnetic filter on, at first things looked good. We'll revisit this portion of the case's anatomy later.

Storage Devices
I planned to stack Juno's two 2.5" storage devices, an SSD (Solid State Drive) and a hard drive' to save space, using a mounting kit. I cut the two side extensions off because I wasn't going to install the kit in a 3.5" bay.

I went with the centered hole in the case bottom, as previously described, because it looked like having both the drives and a fan on the bottom would be a tight squeeze, even with just an 80mm fan.

I seriously considered a vertical stance for the drives. Here I've placed the mounting kit and a 92mm fan inside the case to check the fit.

Here is another vertical stance test, after the hole was cut and the drives were mounted in the kit. Note that I'm using "slim" SATA cables for the drives, rather than the typical thickness of cable. This later proved to be a godsend.

I worried about access to the drive cables when the front port cables were reinstalled. With the PC-Q03 case, there is one and only one way to stick your hand in once the motherboard is installed, through the side panel. Here's the picture showing those front cables again.

When I did a trial insertion of the motherboard, and saw how little space remained, I gave up on having both the drives and a pusher fan in the case. I centered the drives on the floor, above the hole I had so laboriously cut.

Motherboard Prep
Now it was time to take the guts of Juno out of the old case.

Here the motherboard has been removed. The yellow gadget plugged into the ATX power connector, in front, is a picoPsu 150 XT. Note that the CPU cooling fan is as wide as the motherboard itself.

There were to tasks to perform before installing into the new case. First, the CPU heatsink would be in the "forbidden orientation" there. In the SG05, the motherboard was horizontal, and so the relationship of the copper heatpipes (which you can glimpse above, click to enlarge) to gravity was the same no matter how it was turned. In the PC-Q03, the motherboard is mounted vertically, and it is recommended that the heatpipe bends not be oriented above the heatsink. The heatpipes function primarily by capillary action, and we don't want that force to be hindered by gravity.

Second, it was time to properly fix the issue with the heatsink over the Nvidia 730i MCP (memory controller and integrated graphics). One of the pushpins had failed a while back, as documented here; the quick fix had been a partial success, as that chip then ran much hotter than before, but still within its limits. Now it was time to do it right.

Here the two heatsinks have been removed, and we can see the old thermal paste on both heatsinks and chips. That gets cleaned off.

The cleaned CPU chip.

The cleaned CPU heatsink. There is some staining on the copper, but that doesn't matter.

The cleaned Nvidia 730i,

And its cleaned heatsink.

I applied fresh thermal paste, and reassembled the components. This time a nut-and-bolt was used for both fasteners of the 730i heatsink, and I discarded the old pushpin. The 730i now runs 10º-15º C cooler! In this photo I haven't reattached the CPU fan yet, but you can see the black cross-bracket to which the fan attaches.

Final Assembly
In the PC-Q03, the motherboard is first attached to a separate mounting tray, which we can see again here on the far wall of the case. There is also a tray for a slim optical (CD/DVD) drive at the top.

I tried valiantly to insert the motherboard, but there was interference with the optical drive tray. The CPU heatsink was a few millimeters too wide. I clipped the black fan frame, and I tried different techniques of coaxing the motherboard tray into the case, but it just wasn't going to work. I had to remove the optical drive tray, and tape the faceplate to the case. (If you remove the optical drive tray from the SG05, you can screw the faceplate back in.) I purchased a external, plug-in optical drive instead. Lesson #4: be careful when considering a heatsink or fan that will extend beyond the edge of the motherboard.

Then I had trouble getting the side of the motherboard with all the I/O ports to align with the aluminum I/O shield. We'll have a photo of that in a moment. After snipping out a few small pieces of the shield I finally had success. Because the motherboard and its I/O shield both fit nicely in the SG05, I suspect some minor misalignment or out-of-squareness in the PC-Q03, likely with the attachment points for the motherboard tray.

Now it was time to attach a plethora of cables, wires, and small connectors to the motherboard. The front USB ports and status lights, audio connectors, and LED connectors were some of these. Then there were the fan cables, one for the CPU fan and one for the fan attached to the adapter plate mentioned earlier, and the power cables and slim data cables for the two storage drives. The wide CPU heatsink further constricted access to the motherboard. It was crowded in there, and my frustration level rose. Needle-nosed pliers and a headlamp were a must. With the SG05, you could insert your hand from top or from either side, while with the PC-Q03, I had one and only one choice. Finally, it was done. Lesson #5: consider the "degrees of access" for working inside a case; here, the SG05 had 3 while the PC-Q03 had 1.

Here's a view into the interior of the assembled system. The blue gadgets holding the 80mm fan to the back of the case are made of silicone, and help isolate vibrations of the fan from the case itself.

Some of the cabling mess is shoved to the exterior of the back, where nobody will see it.

In particular, the two Zalman fanmate controllers, which allow me to speed up or slow down each fan independently, are just slapped to the back, at bottom, with double-sided tape. It works. The silvery plate at left is the I/O shield mentioned before.

Then I discovered that the filter for the hole I'd cut stuck only weakly to its adapter ring. I ended up using some gaffer tape to keep it in place, but even then, it falls off every few weeks. This could be due to unevenness under the adhesive ring, or air turbulence in the case, or maybe it's not expected to function upside-down, or maybe the filter or adapter is just from a bad batch.

The finished system looks great on the desktop, with any ugliness hidden in the back. There's 2½ inches more open desktop in front of the computer. My mouse is free to roam.

Here's a closeup.

That blue power LED is also the on/off button, and it's much better than the one on the SG05, which was too bright. The SG05 had a second, small LED for a disk activity indicator which also was too bright. Disk activity on the PC-Q03 causes a red LED to light behind the power button face, and the combined blue and red gives it a violet hue. I like the approach.

I'm happy with this micro-refrigerator shape for a desktop computer. When the time comes in the next year to build a new computer, I'm tempted by the Jonsbo V3, marketed in the USA both as both a 'Rosewill Legacy V3' and as a 'DIYPC V3'.

• It's very close in size to the PC-Q03 -- 3mm wider, 3mm deeper, and 1mm shorter.
• There's no optical drive opening, which is fine since I now have an external optical drive anyway.
• There is already ventilation in the bottom.
• The bottom is detachable, which would made installing the fiddly cables and wires much easier.
• The left (non-motherboard) side panel is perforated for even more ventilation.

Here are two images from the web illustrating the V3 case.

I'm contemplating a design that will require only one fan for a well-cooled positive-pressure case. It would require some metal cutting in the back, but the shape required would be suitable for using a metal nibbler instead of a drill or Dremel. Should be much less messy and easier to control.

There are even smaller cases in this style, the Jonsbo V2 and Lian Li PC-Q02, but working in an even smaller space would be tough. Plus, they are not carried by the usual retailers and I'd need to find them on eBay. There's no reason to use such a small case, except for bragging rights.

 Stay tuned!