How the CoolerMaster CM HAF 932? - Page 5

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Hey johnny or anyone else with the case can you tell me how long it is from the bottom of the case to the top of the bottom hard drive bay(how tall is the bottom hard drive bay which is turned sideways)

The distance from the inside bottom of the case to the bottom of the upper drive cage cage is 9.5 inches. That lower drive cage is riveted to the bottom of the case and to the upper drive cage. I removed mine as I didn't need it.

Any chance you are from Philadelphia, PA? I'm originally from Chester.

I just picked on up at microcenter. I dont think im going to mod it. May put it together this Saturday

Other progress. Went to IKEA yesterday evening and purchased a birch veneer desk top that is 78 inches wide and 25 inches deep for $40.00 plus table legs at $5.00 each. The depth is perfect for flat panel monitors. Had to put the new desk in the bedroom because of the width. Just finished setting up the pc in the bedroom. So far, so good.

Ordered another tube of IC 7 Carat Diamond Thermal Compound and a couple of 3 pin fan cable splitter for the el cheapo motherboard. Now I just have to think a few things through.

Those temps are pretty respectable. oolddman and I are getting the same readings.

Do you mean the front bezel & front grill? The front grill is located at the bottom front. It's the horizontal grill with the CoolerMaster Logo. You can reach under it and and pull it off. Just apply steady pressure. Do not yank or jerk it suddenly. The probgs might break. There is black perforated modder's mesh attached to that grill. The mesh has a few tiny tabs that hold it in place. You can simply bend/straighten the tabs to remove the mesh. Next remove the perforated mesh drive bay covers. Once you have the grill and drive covers removed you will see small screws used to secure the black upright pieces on the left and right of the front panel. Just remove the screws. The big fan in front is also held in place with screws and can be easily removed.

I also removed the black plastic USB/Audio/Firewire panel at the top front of the case. The rubber padding in the bottom of the tray comes right out exposing a couple of screws which hold the panel in place.

There is a panel that covers the top rear mounting hole for a top mounted psu. Just unscrew it.

There is a psu mounting bracket in the bottom rear of the case. It's held in place with a couple of tabs and screws. Once the screws are removed the tabs will come out of the slot.

I removed the bottom internal hard drive cage. It was riveted in place. I never replaced the bottom cage because I had no need for it. I can always put it in later if I need it.

I also removed all those tooless hard drive mechanisms in the upper drive cage. I just screw my components to the upper drive cage. I don't normally swap drives so I didn't put them back in. There's a little trick to those tooless drive mounts. You have to push and try and slide the mechnism toward the rear of the case - BUT ONLY WHEN THE BUTTON AND MOUNTING PINS ARE IN THE OPEN POSITION! If the button is pushed in and pins stick into the drive bay as if a hard disk was mounted in place, then the mechanism will not slide out. You'll probably have to apply quite a bit of pressure with your thumbs and fingers.

The only thing left inside the case was the uppter drive cage. I didn't take anything else apart as it was easy to spray paint the interior flat black.

I did not remove the panels or take apart the frame. I didn't need to for the painting I did. I did cut away the mesh covering the rear exhaust fan and the front intake fans. for unrestricted air flow.

bohmann took his case completely apart. He popped every rivet. That's because he was planning on chrome plating his case. He was hoping to have his case done by Christmas but he hasn't posted here in quite some time.

You'll see what I did in the photos. I'm not at home right now and I have a Christmas concert to go to this evening. It will be late by time I get the photos on line.

Nice thanks for the pictures what type/brand of paint did you use?

phillyman36,

All metal parts were primed with Rustoleum Painter's Touch white primer spray paint. The interior of the case was then spray painted with Rustoleum flat black. The top panel was spay painted with Ace Hardware copper followed by Rustoleum Clear Coat Laquer. I purchased all of the paint at my local Ace Hardware store.

The plastic horizontal grill was sprayed with Master Modeler white primer, copper, and clear coat. I purchased the spray paint at my local hobby shop.

Do not paint plastic parts with spray paint designed for metal. The solvents in the paint will eat into plastic and ruin the paint job. Instead, use a spray paint designed specifically for plastic. The paint is available at hobby shops.

Well, the fan cable splitters arrived along with some other items I purchased arrived. Time to move forward but I am having a hard time justifying an Intel quad core cpu and motherboard. I do not have any software programs that make use of four cores.

CPU Core temperatures - Before I attached the side panels to the case I ran several cpu temperature utilities. With an ambient room temperature of 68F, the utilities showed core temps of 19C and 22C at idle. After I attached the sid panels I got the same temps at idle. Looks the case and fans have excellent air flow and cooling.

Wishing I had a machine shop and a milling machine in the garage so I could do case mods like the pros. SIGH!

I was over at tigerdirect.com checking prices for the Biostar motherboard when I noticed a video clip. I watched the video which was a sales pitch for the board. There was a Tiger TV logo at the top right corner of the screen.

Later in the day I was over at compusa.com. Thety had the exact same video but with a Comp USA logo at the top right corner of the screen.

Did Tiger Direct buy Comp USA? I know Comp USA was in financial difficulty and closed many retail stores. Did Biostar make a general purpose sales video which any online vendor could use? Inquiring minds want to know.

Those newer 790 Biostar motherboards may have the same chipsets but they don't have the same specs. The original one I picked out has 128MB of DDR2 side port memory. The others only have 64MB of side port memory. Now I just have to figure out what it is. Found out by accident. Tiger Direct had a board for $10.00 less than everyone else but when I looked at the detailed specs I discovered it was not the original board that I liked. It's starting to look like the original board was the best and the others have some cost cutting. You'd think they'd keep improving the board.

Done deal! Ordered the Biostar motherboard. It should arrive in a couple of days. Once it gets here and I install it, I can work on a little touch up and cable management.

ARRRGHHHH! UPS revised/rescheduled delivery again due to high volume. The new revised date for delivery is January 5th. So much for 3 day select!

Nothing worse than being stuck waiting for parts to arrive.!

For the past two days the new motherboard has been somewhere between Louisville, Kentucky and Phoenix, Arizona. Doesn't look like UPS is sending the motherboard by air.

Still no motherboard! Looks like it won't get here until Monday afternoon.

Finallysome good news. Motherboard arrived in Phoenix last night. It's already on the UPS truck for delivery later today!!!

It's alive! I'm up and running but there seems to be some sort of memory issue. I'll have to do some research after work today.

Is this now a blog?!?!?

Like uve had 639 posts...but they are all here.

Not trying to be rude....its just its annoying to see this dead thread bumping everyday...(Johnny u literally posted everyday straight basically)
They made "private messaging" for something

OK! I'll measure the distance when I get home from work.

Thanks JohnnyLucky, I bought it Saturday from FrozenCPU (I just went there saved shipping). Have to say it is a well put together case minus not having some sort of dust protectant but i can fab something up.

As for the harddrive rails I have to say not as good as I would have hoped, I just wish they stuck with screws instead. The 23CM fans work great, however they didn't seem to flow as much as I'de hope but that could be im not used to having 800RPM fans which are pretty quiet. I bought another fan for the 120MM that goes next to the power supply and blows cold air in my video card.

Now I do notice my power supply cranks up it's fan (I have a Ultra X connect 2) but I have it faced downward, so I might just rotate it 180 so it sucks air from inside the case.

Now as far as cooling goes. I have to say it does a great job. I was going from a smaller case so naturally I will get a few degrees cooler even without the large fans. My internal temp went way down at least 15 degrees, and I noticed my video card doesn't crank up as high as it usually did with my other case but this is also do because I have that 120mm fan on the bottom blowing up at it. I still need to get Nvidia's monitoring app so I can get temperature comparisons. As for my CPU it was a little colder but stayed pretty much the same but I can't nock it because it is the OEM fan.

Still debating on which aftermarket cooler I want to get but I need it to be compatable with an AM3 board for when they come out.

As for cable managment this case is phenomenal, I still need to go back and make it better but I'm still trying to find a company that makes sata cables at a 45 degree angle so I can route them better. I hate the 90 degree ones, they are a pain in the ass to get off the harddrive/motherboard.