My mod

Having built hundreds of systems for myself and to sell in my store I sometimes have to innovate to get what I want.
I had a lot of parts for a new system but couldn't find a suitable case for my new "water cooler" system. I mounted the parts in a new small case but it overheated almost immediately so I knew I needed a larger case. The Motherbord is a 4 slot MSI-SLI board, AMD Black Edition quad core CPU (unlocked), 8 gigs of Gskill ram, 320 primary HD and 2 TB external so I utilized an older full tower case I already had.
Because the ambient temperatures approach 80 deg F. daily for most of the year I decided on an ECO-water cooled CPU cooler and G-skill ram with heat sinks and the primary H.D. sitting 1/2" under a large fan (140mm) and lots of air flow. ATI 5770 video card with a giant heatsink and a 120mm fan mounted on the side of the case blowing directly onto the video card. I had a local fab shop make me a couple of "mesh" panels to fit the fans and provide adequate ventilation. I cut the old case and fitted all the parts then painted and reassembled it.
I am really pleased with the operation as it lowered the temperatures on the CPU, HD and video card by 15 deg C., quiet and cool now. I originally had bought the full tower case 10 years ago from a local guy when I had my store and wasn't using it 'til now.

Retro is nice.:t

Since I don't throw away anything... I have an old Compaq machine that looks to be huge like yours... I keep thinking I too will build some sort of monster pc with it. You can fit almost anything but the kitchen sink in those oldies but goodies.

Steve,
I couldn't believe the guage of the metal on the case cover that I cut out. The old case is heavier than a dead minister to start with, now a lot lighter plus the components are cooler than "The other side of the pillow" now.

I normally don't throw anything away either but lately because I had so much junk left over when I closed my store I been assembling a few and giving away for charity to the schools etc.

very nice clean cuts on the sides.

i need to do that for my old full tower as well

but having a hard time with the sheet of hard metal only found in the old cases

the new cases are like paper thin aluminum very easy to cut