Parvum Systems Project Magnus

[imersa]

Sponsors/Support:


It's 2014! We are still here and with one of my favorite bits! Lighting starts!

First we start with yet another break down. This time was to fit the final motherboard tray and fit the single LEDs:




Next we add the Phobya LEDs, 2 pin setup, so nice and simple:




Installing:







Installed into the case:




Connection terminal:




Honestly so stoked on how the white LEDs look in the XSPC blocks:




Chucked a LED strip in the bottom just to see how the res's look:







Until next time. Questions please?!

[imersa]

Sponsors/Support:


Another update all!

As mentioned previously we more than had to do something about the raid card. Not only for aesthetics but to help with the cooling. The passive cooling is pretty weak and not helped by the lack of any system fans near by.

Now this is what I love about modding; never throw anything away! I've been saving this little EK bridge block for about 6-7 years. I didn't even buy it back then to use it just saw it going cheap second hand. I since rescued it when I was visiting my parents over Christmas. Now we put it to use! So perfect for the job:



Next we cut a small piece of 5mm clear and tapped it for the fittings:



We then cut the 5mm black acrylic lid. Used a 1mm deep V bit to make a nice detaling. Also trying to keep within the XSPC style here:



Copper block installed with M3 bolts; as you can see O ring doing its job:




Passive cooler removed and fresh thermal compound added:



Clear acrylic and block installed to the raid card:



Grabbed the old springs from the passive heat sink to help reduce risk of over tightening:



With the top installed; wow we are super happy at this point:



For what was a relatively quick to make solution... over the moon. It took a lot of time to get the measurements bang on but the rest went together super easy:



Installed in the case with 2 x LEDs for a test fit:





Certainly fits the XSPC monster now and look forward to not having any temperature issues. *In theory at least...*

Thanks for stopping by... another update very soon!

[Lord Brand]

Can we see the rest of the that custom block cover for the RAID card? I, for one, am curious about you're going to connect the drives to the card. I assume the black acrylic on the underside does not cover the entire card. Am I right? Did you solve it another way?

[imersa]

Can we see the rest of the that custom block cover for the RAID card? I, for one, am curious about you're going to connect the drives to the card. I assume the black acrylic on the underside does not cover the entire card. Am I right? Did you solve it another way?

You would be correct in assuming the underside is not covered. We did consider adding a 15mm black block to the bottom to house it entirely but in this instance it was never going to be visible and made it a quick fix for the cables

[imersa]

Sponsors/Support:


Welcome back. Nice to see you all.

First up we would like to say Thank you once again to tiny tom logan, he of course mate the raid card mod possible.... by supplying said raid card. Thanks mate.

We would also like to thank Asus for the support along the way. They did a great little write up on the rog.asus website that managed to pull in a MASSIVE 31,797 views. This is huge for us and considering the builds not finished.. very impressive. Thanks for the continued support Asus UK and Richard.

To the update!

We start by cutting the 'final' top panel:



That took some SERIOUS measuring skills that's for sure. Couldn't have done it without our trusty digital caliper. To any modder looking for a new tool... it's the one of course:




Now we have to get to work on the pump/res connections. Sorry to anyone who is big on symmetry. Lines pretty hectic here also:







Installed an additional D5 in the second layer of the top panel... more accurate measuring require of course to allow it connect directly to the fitting below:



Next... despite having the wonderful b neg help us out and bend the tubes for the front of the case we just could not get it to fit in with the build, even trying to make the front panels cover as much of the bend as possible it still didn't look neat enough.

So more measuring... more replacement panels... so many replacement panels...!



Pretty accurate fit:





Cheeky shot with 1 of the 2 full pipes installed:



MUCH happier for sure. Both will be filled with white coolant. Really cant wait for this.



Until next time... what are you all up to this week?

[imersa]

Sponsors/Support:


Back once aaaaaaaaaaaaagain!

This time we our tying up some lose ends and working on the cable management in the rear. Horrified if I'm honest at how much wire needs to go in this build.

We start with laying the beast down. Not actually as easy as it sounds:



First problem to address:

Due to the thickness of the res' in the bottom you cannot screw the bottom of the pass through fittings on.. this is a bit of on issue because a few of the angles connected to the acrylic tubing are maybe out by 0.something of a mm or a degree:



To fix this we came up with a solution that worked out EVEN better than expected. Starting with some extenders:



Another pass/fill port:



With these combined you can actually use the ring/nut on the fitting to tighten and pull everything into place:



All done here.... expensive fitting bill...!





Next up we start to install the cables for the rig. Must say Pexon did a great job on the PSU for us. We gave him the exact lengths needed for a LOT of cables. Results super happy. Wanted to keep to one tone, keep it super neutral:






On to hell... the rear! A LOT of cables to deal with:



So before we do this we consulted the Parvum Guardian:



He said if we don't sort it quick time he will hit us with his hammer.. >.<,

MORE mess:




To combat this we need to cut another pane. Drawing first:



Next we grab one of the old panels from Magnus. Love to reuse every bit of acrylic we can. Then of course recycle whats left after that:





Little beauty:



Slotting our cable management beast in:



Super stoked on this:



Finally for this update in goes the slot loading blue-ray:




That's all guys and girls. Was great, getting very close now. Loads of progress.

Until next time... What did you have/will have for dinner tonight?

[imersa]

Sorry for the lack of an update. We have been busy working like mad and spent the weekend at LSUCS LAN 44. For more info check out the website here:
http://lan.lsucs.org.uk/

We attended this event to showcase our cases but also to help raise funds for the special effect charity:
http://www.specialeffect.org.uk/

We auctioned a Parvum ITX with all money going to the charity. It has been a great little event. A couple of photos of the LAN:









For all who want to see Magnus, we will be updating the thread start of the coming week!

Hope you all had good weekends?

[imersa]

Sponsors/Support:


HI ALL!

First up then some cables to connect for the raid card. 8 sata cables in fact! MOARRR cables




Connecting the raid card water block to the top GPU block:




Next rather large task was to start connecting all the crazy pass through's in the bottom of the case:









Now for something we have been planning since the start. SSD heaven. In the form of 8 as you may have already seen Hyper X SSDs. These things are amazing. Physically/aesthetically the best SSDs I've ever seen and used and from what I gather the performance will match any other drives out there. Black with orange drives? Not here thanks!










A cheeky shot of the icydock! This will be really useful and fills that spot great:



Last for the update we managed to get the back of the case finished. 95% complete at least. All cables and wiring for the build finished. All fans routed to the required fan controllers, all other cables filtered up the frosted cable cover. Nice LED strip installed behind the cables to make some nice shadows. Again to match the front 4 more Hyper X SSDs. This is a massive focal point for the build. We really wanted to show these drives off:






That's all for today. Honestly though this update was huge for the build. Not TONS of eye candy but just completing the lower loop and ALL the wiring was a HUGE task.

Until next time.... do you like the back of the case and what are you all watching on TV?

[imersa]

Sponsors/Support:


Going well all. Sorry updates have slowed a little, more tweaking stages at the moment.

First up was to finish the cable management, pop all these wires into the allocated holes:



Next install some MORE SSDs! Had to modify this sides top section to allow for the fittings to actually fit. Just one of them things....



Rear return tubes and all cables no complete:



We actually then went ahead and filled the loop with clear coolant. Just to double check each loop and ensure the system is running with no problems. We did not test any of the hardware from sponsors on air first (silly I know). However fortunately no issues at hand. Bios no problem and everything detected. Got some F/W stuff to sort out with the raid card as having a few issues there so will spend the next week or so bleeding the nightmare loop and running some tests with the system.

Its by no means finished cosmetically as we have quite a few external panels to cut but the wiring and loop side of the build is finished. A few teaser shots before we spoil the grand coolant colour photos and any video etc:





We will see you all VERY soon with EYE CANDY!!!!

[imersa]

To all following:

Just to keep you up to date. We are waiting on LSI at this stage. Had some firmware problems. Until we hear back from them the build is on hold.

We are flying to Germany for CeBit tonight to land back Thursday. If anyone wants to say hello we will be at the event Tuesday and Wednesday.

Updates soon we promise

[imersa]

Sponsors/Support:


Hi all. Very happy at the Parvum HQ.

The beast that is Magnus is alive. All hardware working, huge raid speeds and almost fully bled of air! In fact all cutting is now 99% complete. We have a few tiny touches like a SLI bridge cover to make but otherwise its ready!

This comes with good timing, we wanted a good month clear to arrange final photos at the studio and shoot an awesome video. This month being until Insomnia i51 at the Ricoh Arena! Magnus will be on the Asus stall during the day running a Gsync Demo. But also with us in the gaming hall in the evening. Seats: JH-A16 - JH-A20 so please come check it out if you are there!

So onto the update. Before we show any coolant I'd like to introduce what I believe is the final sponsor on the build and with no better way to finish; than with Western Digital.

From the start if you have been following you will know there is a tidy Icydock just chilling in the rear of the system. This of course would never be complete with out some storage drives.

WD stepped up here big time to supply us with 3 x 2TB Black drives for Magnus. I must say they are just mad quality and fit the build undoubtedly!





So perhaps onto what you want to see.... giving you SOME, but not all. We are heading to the photo studio to shoot final photos before doing an on location final video of the system.

We just wanted to at least show you some awesome sneaky preview shots of the now its filled. The whole build was really based around the two tone, we wanted to have the black and white alternate and at times even pass through each other.

To finish the look we opted for colour changing RGB LEDs, but set to white light, the light they create is not exactly pure white but a mixture of colour that in this case, the frosted acrylic will disperse to give an almost pearlescent look. Much happier with this than solid white as it really gives the bottom chamber more depth.

I wont say any more and let you see some eye candy!
















Hope you all enjoy Any questions please ask!

Any comments do say! Really want to get some response, feedback, compliments, questions so please GOGOGO

[Trigger5521]

Easily the nicest and well thought out extreme build ever!

Makes me wonder when custom PC building will have a TV show like custom choppers and custom cars.

[imersa]

Easily the nicest and well thought out extreme build ever!

Makes me wonder when custom PC building will have a TV show like custom choppers and custom cars.

Thank you very much!

Honestly we'd make a pretty good TV show, it's like a mad house down here!

[imersa]

So our friends over at Nvidia sent us an awesome little gift. In fact one of the only 3 Nvidia have in the UK. Since we have the 780's it was only the correct thing to do and use the LED feature. However the decision is how and what to do with this? It fits in PERFECT with the build... just is the green too out of place? I imagine the LED is probably actually white, with the green rubber giving the green tone. I mean we want to support team green as much as possible on this one but will it kill the monotone?

Please let me know what you think and if you have any ideas?

[CarbboN]

beautiful projects. congratulations

[ScottALot]

The whole rig is custom, maybe you can see about replacing the green with white? Sure, Nvidia is the green brand, but whiting out the brand would look SICK

[imersa]

beautiful projects. congratulations

Thank you! Super happy here.

The whole rig is custom, maybe you can see about replacing the green with white? Sure, Nvidia is the green brand, but whiting out the brand would look SICK

Agreed on the white.. however:

As it happens the thing wont fit lol. We test fit before thinking of any mods and it hits that XSPC rad. It's about 10-15mm longer than a standard bridge due to the tech. I've spoken to Nvidia and they said we can do what ever we want with it. We will run some kind of giveaway. Perhaps more of a modders only you tell us your project or something like this. The problem is I can already see interest from a few forums so will have to think of a way.

[imersa]

Sponsors/Support:


Hi guys, almost time for the final photos. But first... we had to take them. We visited a good friend of ours Tom Barnes. Now usually he shoots portraits, lots of band promo and model work. Something different for him here. At least the model did what he asked

Check out his portfolio here: www.tombarnesphoto.com

I suppose this can be considered a teaser; one last one before the final photos. But a chance for anyone interested in photography to ask questions. What gear was used etc.






So please if there is anything you want to know about the camera, lights, settings... we will do our best to help!

More news on the SLI bridge giveaway soon!

[imersa]

Sponsors/Support:


FINAL PHOTOS YEAH WOO PARTY!

So it's been a long journey. A lot has happened. A lot went right, a lot went wrong. It took time and effort, blood, sweat and tears. But we made it.

Full System Spec:

• Intel 4770k
• 3 x Nvidia GTX 780
• 8 X Hyper X 120GB SSD on LSI 9271-8i (Raid 0) & 3 X 2TB Western Digital Black
• 32GB Hyper X Beast 2400
• Asus Maximus VI Extreme
• Antec 1200
• XSPC 5 x 240mm AX, 1 x 360mm AX, 3 x D5 Pumps, XSPC Raystorm CPU, RAM & GPU blocks, 2 x XSPC reservoirs, 160 x XSPC Fittings, 2 x Custom Parvum reservoirs & 16 Phobya e-loop fans.

The build goes out with special thanks to:

Paul Edwards, Adrian Mundy, Andy McLean, Daniel Harper, Jim Knee, James Logie, Norman Morton, Pascal Bregeon, Stephen Emery, Michael Wood, Tom Barnes, Hans Peder, Tom Logan, Rick Napier, Richard O'Neil, Gareth Ogden, James Churchill, Richard Swinburne, Nate George, Lee Bryan.

Many more and we are very sorry if we missed you. Someone who did the most probably wont have their name above woops!

Final photos where shot in Tom Barnes' studio located in Guildford. We've said it before but his work is amazing. If you want high end portrait/band/magazine stuff head his way.

Without further ado:























Thank you for reading. Enjoying and sharing this build with us.
We cant thank the community enough. Throughout the forums this has been posted on response has been awesome. Loads of comments & interaction.
For that we thank you all!

To see the build in person your next chance will be:
Multiplay Insomnia i51 @ Ricoh Area Coventry

Stay tuned for the Nvidia SLI bridge giveaway. That will come, just figuring it out and clearing it with mods and stuff


WE WILL BE BACK! But first; let us finally retail that Parvum ITX case

[dietje1908]

[imersa]

Hi guys, thought I would post a couple of photos. System has been sitting proud on the Asus stall this event. Been really fun, met lots of great people and even managed to play a few games. Metro last light looked awesome!

Sadly no Swift monitor yet... but SOON....












In the process of working on a Magnus video. Location has been found... !

[imersa]

So Magnus made it to the UK i52 event. Got loads of attention and was a really good show. If anyone saw it at LAN; thanks for checking it out

[Johnny87au]

And ur images don't work =/

[imersa]

And ur images don't work =/

Weird, working on different browsers and multiple connections here. Including my 4g data.