A while back I purchased and did a review
on the Thermal Take Tsunami case. It's quite
pretty as is, but the front of the case is somewhat lacking
in the lights department. It's got two high intensity blue LEDs
that shine nicely but I've heard quite a few people comment
that it would look better with a solid light. The more I've
looked at the case the more I've come to agree, so I decided
to try adding a cold cathode to the front of the case, and it
turned out to be remarkably easy to do.
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The
old lights.... They're nice... But not nice enough!
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What
you'll need for this mod:
• Small Philips (star) screw driver
• A hot glue gun
• A Sunbeam
cold cathode light (12 inch) or comparable
• Utility Knife
• 15 minutes
• Coffee
First
thing to do is the case disassembly. Take the sides off the
case, and open the front door and bezel. Follow the wire that
runs from the door into the case, it'll be attached with a
little white clip at the front behind the right side door.
Unplug it from your power supply, and pull it through the
front of the case. It's screwed into the back of the door,
so remove the screw holding the "C" clip that retains
it, and set the screw and clip aside so they don't get dropped
on the floor multiple times. Believe me, they're hard to find.
Now take a good slug of your coffee.
Next we're going to remove the handle but before we do take
your knife and mark the silver trim for cutting. Mark it just
inside the edge of the handle, we're going to cut it but we
want to make sure the end of it still goes behind the handle
to maintain the look of it. Now take a look at the back of
the door, you'll see three sets of two screws that retain
the handle along the outside edge of the door. Remove them
and the handle should easily come off. Pull the cable for
the lights through the front door. The lights are adhered
into their slots on the handle. Just pry the adhesive off
or give them a good tug to remove them. More coffee.
Now for
the aforementioned (and marked) silver trim on the front of
the door. It's going to interfere with our little mod, as
it goes under the handle and won't allow for the new cold
cathode light to be installed. You can easily remove the trim
by pushing on the little tabs on the back of the door, and
pulling out in the middle. You will be cutting approximately
1/2 - 3/4 of an inch off the end of the trim that is closest
to the handle, just where you marked it. Put it flat on a
table on it's side and push hard with the knife, it's pretty
soft so it should cut without any issues. Once the trim is
cut, reinstall it onto the case. Time for another chug of
coffee.
We're going to place the light into the handle now. Get that
glue gun all warmed up and ready to go. Put a generous glob
on the mounting points at the each end of the light tube,
and place it firmly into the slot in the inside edge of the
handle, with the wire at the bottom. I found it worked best
about 1/4 inch down from the top. Give the glue a few minutes
to set. Before we put the handle on we're going to have to
trim the little tabs on the sides of the power cable so that
it will fit through the hole on the the door. Once we've trimmed
those tiny little tabs off, feed the power cable through the
hole in the door on the case and reattach the handle to the
door. Take a break to let your hands stop shaking from all
that coffee.
 |
Craft
glue kicks ass. Also, I have to stop doodling on my
workbenches. |
Once we've calmed down, from the right side of the case run
the power wires for the cold cathode module through the front
of the case, bezel and outside. If you look carefully you
can see at the end of the red and black wire the velcro for
mounting the power module to the door. On the white wires
you can see the little 'C' clip that we didn't lose many times,
you know, the one that we're going to screw back into the
door to retain the cable.
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I
like wires. Wires are good. |
At this
point we attached the power module to the door and realized
that.. It's too thick for the door to close properly.
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Damn
it, why does nothing fit properly? |
So we took a knife to it and opened it up. By doing this, we've
probably violated the warranty, and various safety regulations.
Ah well, screw it. I want that door to close properly, safely
is sort of secondary to that. Carefully pry the casing off of
the power module with your knife. Try not to remove any fingers,
stab yourself, or shove the knife into the workings of the module.
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Now
THAT'S a knife mate! |
Hah! It fits, and the door now closes properly. You should be
fine with the power module naked, it doesn't seem to heat up
much at all. I wouldn't be sticking my tongue on it while it's
running though, just in case. These things have some fairly
serious voltages powering them.
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It's
naked! I tells yah, some computers have no shame. |
Attach all of your power cables, replace the 'C' clip on the
back of the door, plug it in and you've got the coolest looking
Tsunami case at the LAN party. If you had one of the Saitek
back-lit keyboards as well, that'd be one
sweet looking rig.
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Pretty
no? |
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And
even better in the dark, as is generally true with all
lit things. |
Total cost for the mod: (retail pricing, Canadian dollars)
$32.00
Sunbeam
Cold cathode light (Blue): $18
Walmart Hot glue gun: $10
Gerber Knife: $60 (A $2 Wallymart utility knife would work
just as well.)
Screw driver: You've got one around already, right?
Tim Horton's Double Double Coffee: $2
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