Unusual Antec Aria Modification.

Bluefront · Post by **Bluefront** » Wed Mar 29, 2006 3:41 pm

I changed the title of this thread to reflect it's real purpose.....showing some unusual modifications to my new (cheap) Antec Aria. The heart of this mod was the removal of the std PSU, replacing it with a dc/dc converter, and an external 12V PSU (Radio Shack 15Amp). This PSU does have a small fan....but it's thermally controlled, and I've never heard it start up.

The converter is 200W and runs this P4 celeron board, maxtor HD, Lite-On optical drive, 120mm Yate Loon exhaust fan, small slot fan, AIW 8500 DV, modem, PCI wireless card.....without any problems I've found. I could not get this converter to work on a MSI board, but it works fine with the Asus board. As I complete this project I'll add to the photos. The Aria case needs some help/mods to run quietly with a P4 board and a relatively hot video card.....

Heh....it's in testing right now, so I'm still arranging stuff. There is one fan only, a 120mm Yate Loon. The hard drive (upper right corner of the picture) is running hot, but when finished I'll probably use a laptop drive. Haven't been able to fit an optical drive in there (yet).

For the time being the fan is running at 12V.....idles at 34C, maxes out at 42C (22C ambient, celeron 2.4). No prizes here.....You might be surprised.

Aris · Post by **Aris** » Wed Mar 29, 2006 3:55 pm

hmmm. lets see

VIA chipset, micro atx. the picture is labeled "top view" so its either a desktop style computer case or an HTPC computer case.

you have the 200w 12v DC/DC atx power converter plugged into it. which means your powering the system off an external brick PSU.

the PCB color of the motherboard sorta reminds me of ASUS boards.

the blue circuit board at the front appears to have a CF socket on it, like a memory reader. if i had to guess either desktop or HTPC, id guess it was an HTPC case.

copper cooler with heatpipes, so a fairly modern cpu cooler. looks like a tower design like the scyth heatsinks. also the way its ducted makes me think its a tower design with the exhaust fan on the left side of it blowing out the back.

the fact that your powering this off the DC/DC converter makes me think its not a P4. probably an AMD cpu.

Aris · Post by **Aris** » Wed Mar 29, 2006 3:59 pm

looks like an AGP slot with a passive tuner card on it probably, as i think its an HTPC computer

also that DC/DC converter plugs into only 20pin connectors, which also suggests an older motherboard

PhilgB · Post by **PhilgB** » Wed Mar 29, 2006 4:13 pm

Case is an Antec Aria.

Aris · Post by **Aris** » Wed Mar 29, 2006 4:20 pm

ive been looking around at motherboards, but havnt found it yet. im fairly certain its a socket 754 AMD mobo, he probably has one of the new Turion's in it, thats how he can get away with the external brick psu.

note the battery on the motherboard, its under the front of the AGP slot. ive been lookin through some mATX boards on newegg and still havnt seen a motherboard with the battery in this location.

Aris · Post by **Aris** » Wed Mar 29, 2006 4:30 pm

ahh i found it, i was wrong its a P4 board

Asus P4V8X-MX

looks like he put an aftermarket northbridge heatsink on it though.

qviri · Post by **qviri** » Wed Mar 29, 2006 4:31 pm

Bluefront wrote:idles at 34C, maxes out at 42C (22C ambient, celeron 2.4).

Aris · Post by **Aris** » Wed Mar 29, 2006 4:37 pm

yup thats the mobo. just checked newegg. its actually the stock northbridge heatsink. the one on asus' website shows a different heatsink

id say a celeron on it since its running so cool

Asus P4V8X-MX
Antec Aria
Celeron CPU
PW200M DC/DC ATX PSU

Bluefront · Post by **Bluefront** » Wed Mar 29, 2006 4:43 pm

Baaa....can't fool you guys. Now guess that heatsink.......all-copper, three "U" shaped heat-pipes. Fairly heavy, it mounts with screws through the board and a back-plate.

If you get this I'll eat my hat.....

Here it is in another case...

Aris · Post by **Aris** » Wed Mar 29, 2006 4:51 pm

it sorta looks like a thermaltake tower

this one: http://www.thermaltake.com/product/cool ... -p0024.asp

Bluefront · Post by **Bluefront** » Wed Mar 29, 2006 4:56 pm

Nope...

Aris · Post by **Aris** » Wed Mar 29, 2006 5:09 pm

its void of all markings of any kind. no product stamp or anything. kind of like this thing is sold incased inside something, like a platic duct or somthing that he took off it

Aris · Post by **Aris** » Wed Mar 29, 2006 5:56 pm

well i googled ALOT, i checked every manufactuerer i could think of, every major heatsink retailer etc.

then i decided to think outside the box. i checked bluefronts photobucket site for clue's. then i started searching the forum and posts made by bluefront and found this posting

http://forums.silentpcreview.com/viewtopic.php?p=252870

if you scroll down to the second post he makes, he referes to it as "that mystery CPU heatsink"

so either even he doesnt know what it is either, or its a preview heatsink that he is reviewing from some company that hasnt released it yet, and as such is bound to keep the secret until it is revealed by that company.

Aris · Post by **Aris** » Wed Mar 29, 2006 5:58 pm

oh one other thing. he did mention that he used Dell ducts in his computers.

it may also be a dell heatsink

Aris · Post by **Aris** » Wed Mar 29, 2006 6:12 pm

well as far as i know, bluefront doesnt do reviews with pre release samples n such

so i think its an OEM heatsink, probably out of the dells he gets his ducts out of.

Bluefront · Post by **Bluefront** » Wed Mar 29, 2006 6:27 pm

nope.....

Badger · Post by **Badger** » Wed Mar 29, 2006 8:06 pm

sillies... he made that himself and is selling them on his website for $15 each.

Aris · Post by **Aris** » Wed Mar 29, 2006 9:25 pm

since when does bluefront have a website? i did a google search and i looked on his profile, and didnt see anything.

Trunks · Post by **Trunks** » Wed Mar 29, 2006 11:31 pm

an areocool or thermatake with the shroud/fan removed.

Bluefront · Post by **Bluefront** » Thu Mar 30, 2006 3:13 am

Actually it does look quite a bit like that Thermaltake heatsink Aris linked to...the base and the mounting look the same. The fins on this one are squared off, and I didn't mod the copper parts. Probably nobody ever saw this thing without it's built-on duct and fan.

I was going to try it stock, but it was so damn big, it would not clear the memory on this board. So I had to remove some plastic parts.

Made by a major manufacturer, not of fans and heatsinks however......Aris should get this one, since the answer is right there.

Trunks · Post by **Trunks** » Thu Mar 30, 2006 4:25 am

Ventilateur
or
Asus Star Ice with the shroud and fan removed.

Aris · Post by **Aris** » Thu Mar 30, 2006 9:58 am

well it took me a while, but i finally found the article your refering to.

http://online.wsj.com/public/article_pr ... 50702.html

although the only picture i see is of a guy named isaak kuo

Bluefront · Post by **Bluefront** » Thu Mar 30, 2006 12:44 pm

You mean that signiture thing.....I'm the first person mentioned in the article. Through a slight mix-up they printed Issac Kuo's picture. The WSJ interviewed me almost an hour....they got it almost right, but the filters I use don't quiet anything.

Actually that heatsink is an Asus Star Ice, with the fan and shroud removed. The one article about it by Frostytech bad-mouths the thing quite a bit. Had I read it before I bought the thing, I may not have acquired it.....but it was only $15 on clearance. Actually with a Yate Loon and a custom duct, it does pretty well....so far.

Frostytech says modifying the thing wouldn't make it work better....bunch of crap. The fan it comes with is bad, and that plastic duct is a POS. Modifying it made it acceptable. Goes to show you not to believe everything you read.....

Bluefront · Post by **Bluefront** » Fri Mar 31, 2006 2:47 pm

Here are a few more mods to this Aria..... With the std PSU removed, you can fit a really big heatsink in there, even a Ninja. The problem then becomes the std drive bracket assy won't fit. And worse, you'll have a clearance problem even with the shortest optical drive (Sony/Lite-On chassis). I actually had to notch out the Asus copper heatsink to fit this Lite-on drive. Not too difficult and made no difference in the temps.

Then there's the VGA slot problem.....this area runs hot for lack of airflow. A hot video card like this AIW 8500 DV really gets warm. Can't touch the heatsink. Well the case comes with a PCI slot fan which would help out, at the expense of a slot. Not acceptable to me.....but there's a way around that. You mod the slot fan slightly by removing the std mount bracket. Then it can be mounted over the cards......and it works great like this. Amazing......I've got it running off the case fan speed controller (M-cubed fan amp), and it's very quiet at about 6V or so.

This project is coming along pretty well.....but there'e a way to go before it gets really quiet. More to come.

IsaacKuo · Post by **IsaacKuo** » Fri Mar 31, 2006 3:51 pm

Bluefront wrote:You mean that signiture thing.....I'm the first person mentioned in the article. Through a slight mix-up they printed Issac Kuo's picture. The WSJ interviewed me almost an hour....they got it almost right, but the filters I use don't quiet anything.

I was interviewed for over an hour also, and I know we weren't the only two.

AFAIK, there was no mix-up about the picture, it's just that the article got moved up suddenly without significant advance notice. I assume I was merely the quickest to reply on short notice with a suitable picture.

Unusual Antec Aria Modification.

Unusual Antec Aria Modification.

Re: Identify this computer......