Anyone running an open system?

[hexploit]

My first few years of computer using were my early collage days in the mid 90's when I was so poor I could not afford a case. I had many different setups most of which boiled down to a motherboard tacked to a piece of plywood. Over the years I progressed from
having my hardware stacked in a small bookshelf over my desk, to building my own case, pic 2, pic3, pic4, through various other cases until finally last year when I purchased the Thermaltake Mozart TX thinking it would actually satisfy my compulsion. Well here I am a year later unsatisfied and reminiscing over the nostalgic days of having an open case setup.
I get so tired of moving my case once a month to tinker with things and I MUST tinker!
SO...
I am wondering if anyone uses an open case setup these days. Pics would be quite nice if you have them. I am seriously considering dumping my case for my primary rig altogether just to make life easier.

 

[FrozenGpu]

Nice, good ingenuity.

The closest thing I've ever built was using a chieftec case, which were monstrous, I guess they are considered full sized cases. It was so cavernous, I considered that to be open, i was running a heavilymodified water-cooling setup on a NF7 abit board with a barton 2500, got it up to 2.7ghz.

A while ago, I went to this lan-fest and I saw somebody with a crate pc, they used it for counter-strike and starcraft so it wasn't a demanding machine. It was pretty cool how he took a regular old milk crate and put pegs and stuff in right places. He said he got the idea from a picture he saw on the web, and when he saw it he was like that's perfect!

I tried to find the picture but alas to no avail...

edit: here's someone else from australia, I have to assume he is a criminal :lol: , it is a heavily modified crate though. http://forums.bit-tech.net/showthread.php?t=73734&page=4

here is another picture I found, not sure about this guy, but it gives u a good idea of what it looked like.

 

[Can Not]

Have you considered buying a case only to rip off the outer shell and use the steel frame?

 

[hexploit]

I love the milk crate case especially since I used to run a dairy department. I have thought about tearing off the shell of a case but it would have to be the perfect case. I have also seriously considered using one of the workbench style computer cases(can't remember what they're called). I just know I want something very "different" and very accessible. I'm definitely open to new ideas.

 

[FrozenGpu]

I would say go with what "Can Not" said, it woudl eb the cheapest thing to do as I'm sure there are many people giving away PC's thata re too old for them then just canablize hte interior take a dremel and just dow hat you wish with the internals, go to your local craigslist.org .

If you must spend more money for better quality here is the workbench:
http://www.highspeedpc.com/

and if you want to select a different one:
http://www.highspeedpc.com/Merchant2/merchant.mv?Screen=CTGY&Category_Code=Tech_Station

i think the top deck station is better b/c it allows easier access to the mobo/cpu/gpu/ etc etc etc

@ $80 its not bad, I'd rather get a brushed aluminum case, but hey it takes different strokes to move the world... :lol: [:kentuckyranger:1]

 

[FrozenGpu]

personally I love the idea of a crate pc, in fact I had plans to make one, but got really busy w/ school at the time so i forgot about it. Now I really like the Thermaltake lanbox, the black steel one, I need to reconfigure all teh fans use a fan controller, put some better fans in, do a little modifcation here and there but i'm sure I could get it cooled very well.

I curerntyl have a Antec 900 which I lvoe but man is this thing heavy to lug around...sheesh...plus the lanbox does have an extremly stylish yet functionala nd strudy handle on top...

[:kentuckyranger:1] [:kentuckyranger:1] [:kentuckyranger:1]

 

[hexploit]

personally I love the idea of a crate pc, in fact I had plans to make one, but got really busy w/ school at the time so i forgot about it. Now I really like the Thermaltake lanbox, the black steel one, I need to reconfigure all teh fans use a fan controller, put some better fans in, do a little modifcation here and there but i'm sure I could get it cooled very well.

I curerntyl have a Antec 900 which I lvoe but man is this thing heavy to lug around...sheesh...plus the lanbox does have an extremly stylish yet functionala nd strudy handle on top...

[:kentuckyranger:1] [:kentuckyranger:1] [:kentuckyranger:1]

You've got nothing to compain about. try packing a Thermaltake Mozart Tx to the LAN party.

 

[FrozenGpu]

now see that might be a decent workout...u oculd easily hit pecs, triceps, biceps, heck even quadriceps...lol do some squats with it...