Akin To Normal

Apologies for the lag in posting the final pictures.  Though she still doesn’t have her internal monitor and speakers, the Zen-Puter is complete, in the purest sense of the word.  All the cables are hooked in (thanks a lot to my friend Kyle,) the fans are installed, input jacks complete and mounted, and even the power switch has been completed!  Here are some pictures of it all coming together…

Installing the motherboard and cpu fans was actually rather easy, especially since they were mounted onto wood and didn’t need as much insulating.

The four holes are for the old power supply mount.  We installed a new, 750 watt power supply, as well as the groovy little orange fan at bottom right…

The fan after I got it installed (had to hack off the old speaker mounting screws, which was interesting.  You can also see the power switch cord at bottom left and the cords from the front input panel coming down top/top right (the greyish ones.)  Also, thanks to Kyle for letting me use his phone as a flashlight…

And here she is, hanging out on the desk.  All the knobs are back where they were (though two of them don’t do anything at present,) and the black upper platform is mounted (supporting my external hard drive at the moment, but the space will later be filled by the small monitor, once I get it hung up.)

For the power switch, I did a bit of finagling, and used a cylindrical, clear piece of plexiglass I pulled out of another unit.  I drilled out a hole in one of the knobs, slid the plexiglass in, and then mounted the power switch underneath it:

Using plumber’s tape, zip ties, springs, and a C clip, I rigged up the old knob to push down, rather then turn, and this is what it looks like when the computer is on, now:

IT GLOWS!!!!  (I was really excited, maybe ya’ll don’t feel the same.)

Actually, the whole thing glows, now that the fan’s been installed :)  And that, as they say, is that (at least for now.)  Time to focus now on cleaning the god awful mess in my living room, and getting that monitor hung.  Thanks to everyone for your words of encouragement!

-George

I decided to trim out the lower edges of the zenith, both to cover my horrible mess of a dremel job, and to hide the water damage from the storage by its previous owner.

Instead of staining the wood, I’ve decided to paint it, gloss black, and hope for the best.  I must say that it turned out rather well.

It took a lot of finagling to mount things, but I finally got the plug/shelf mounted at a level height.

Here you can see the method used to mount the shelf (brass brackets at center and bottom right) as well as the jury rigging of the hard drive casing.

A sample of the exterior trim.  This door is mounted over the rear vent hole, and can be flipped up to change plugs and so forth:

..like so.  The square hole at the left will act as a gateway for cords going in and out of the computer, I hope…

And, after further testing, my friend Kyle and I were able to gut the old compy, and mount her bits onto the plywood I’d selected to carry them:

And this is what it looks like now.  Note that the hard drive will be relocated (to the case seen a few pictures above this one,) and the motherboard will be pushed back a bit to allow for the graphics card adapters to sit inside the case.  the power supply will move to the current location of the hard drive, and be mounted using a network of angle brackets and mounting braces.   Also involved here will be pieces from another record player’s vent screen, to better support the structure of the motherboard.

The last bit to complete is the ‘front panel,’ which will actually sit inside the upper compartment of the computer case.

at first, I thought I’d carve everything out of wood, but my dremel work leaves something to be desired, so after setting it up:

I decided to use pieces scavenged from the old tower to help flesh out the trim.  The difference is pretty apparent.

The flash drive bay

and the faceplate for the other outlets.  Now it’s just a matter of mounting the power supply, and wiring up the faceplate, and then the computer, essentially, is complete.  Then it’s just a matter of putting it all together, and praying it fits…

Thanks to everyone for your continued support on the project!  I’m really hoping it turns out nicely :D