[Oinkypig]

Decided to build a low cost server for home use.

If a purely DIY from scratch, does not belong here, apologies.

Anyway,
Details:
VIA ITX C3 800 Mhz processor. this came from a Chilli Box set. (75 bucks, if I remember for casing + MB)
A PICO PSU - 70 bucks
An IDE 400 GB HDD - 2nd hand unit, don't remember the price
1 stick of 512 MB DDR333 Ram

3 pieces of MDF
Black Arylic Sheets
Clear Arcylic Sheets

Pictures to come later

[Oinkypig]

First, the design of the unit



It's a ITX board, 17X17, so I put in an original design size of 17.6 X 19.5 X 9.5 cm. It is very small and compact.
Due to space contraints, I had to bump it to 20 X 20 X 9.5 cm. Slightly larger but still smaller than a A4 sheet of paper

[Oinkypig]

The bottom is made of MDF 20.0 X 20.0 cm



Clear arylic 3.00 mm was cut to fit. It has slots for provision of other support blocks of MDF.
A paper sketch of a ITX board provided me the locations to mount the standoffs.



The thickness of the arylic was smaller than the threads of the brass standoffs, so I had to machine clearance holes on the MDF board, also provision for mounting the arylic board on the MDF is done here.

1st step with the MDF, Arylic Sheet and MB mounted

[Oinkypig]

2nd Step

The front panel and IO panels are prepared and placed for assembly.
The machining was a little rough, but I don't intended to compare to off-shelf purchased casings.

[Oinkypig]

3rd Step: Top Assembly

While I was assemblying the PICO PSU to the MB

There was a problem in that the capacitors of the MB is very close to the capacitors of the PSU. If I snapped down the connector, the two would touch (probable long term failure), so I tried to power the MB as shown and it could power up. Thank goodness. So I left it as it was.

[Oinkypig]

Slide in the 2nd sheet of clear arylic



An put an old HDD to gauge my machining distances



Clearance of the PICO PSU to the 2nd Arylic



Darn close for comfort



But there is still a small space.

[Oinkypig]

Took it out for spraying black paint,



Routed the IDE cable.
(Could find a shorter ones which can make the cabling better )
On the left side, a small hole is machined for mounting the PICO PSU adaptor to the laptop power brick.



Once the paper is removed, quite a nice view of everything.

[Oinkypig]

Cut to size and mounted the black arylic sheets.

Four views of the NAS

Front View, One power up button, 2 LEDs for Power and HDD activity



Left side, Air exhaust out through a 50 mm fan



Right side, Air intake



Back IO



Top Black Arylic plate paper has not been removed, (can see the paper liner).
Black glossy arylic attacts dust to it everywhere...

Thanks for viewing!!!

[Nashaz]

Good job!... Very nicely done...

[moonSymph]

nicely D.I.Y Casing.. Good Job.. How much u spend in total?

[Oinkypig]

I got most of the raw material in bulk.
An estimate is less than 18 bucks for the casing.

But you need a lot of time.

[bianco]

looks good! nice work!
hope you don't mind sharing where you sourced your materials from?
thanks!

[Ar3s]

nicely done project log. love the result. looks awesome.

[Oinkypig]

Originally Posted by bianco

looks good! nice work!
hope you don't mind sharing where you sourced your materials from?
thanks!

I got the MDF from Artfriends (BBC Branch), they got tons of MDF with different sizes.
Good thing most of it are pre-cut, so nothing much to remove, unless it is very complicated machining to do.

Arylic is from a stockist in Tuas (you probably can find somewhere nearer if you stay at central).
I got Clear / Black at 38 bucks per 4ft X 6 ft, so it is approx about 1.60 per square foot. Catch is they do not cut up for you much. So I got them to cut into 4ft X 3ft to fit a car :-).

Rest of the stuff, is normal DIY hardware like Door Stoppers for the rubber padding to reduce noise.
MDF is quite a good insulator against noise... so the fans are superquiet even using "normal" fans..

Hope this helps

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Updated 09-Jun
The link to the stocklist

San Seng Co (Pte) Ltd

The last time I drove there, it looks like the warehouse site may have been redeveloped, so please call to verify they are still in the same place doing business before proceeding.

Cheers
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[bozo]

do you have access to a mill? Cant quite figure out how you did the keyboard faceplate lol....