Powermac G5 Modlog

[martinherrmann]

Hey guys.

So after a long time i finally decided to buy a Powermac G5 Case off eBay. Luckily the Guy who sold it told me the case was never used and just an replacement part Powermac. So the Case i received was pretty much untouched and only the hardware was missing. Also i've been lucky that the guy sent me the power supply with it for free. Then i bought a logic board that isn't working off ebay. I will cut the board away and only use the I/O Panel. My Dad who is an electrician will provide the wiring so everything is safe and done properly.

My Goals:

- keep the case as close as original
- don't touch the outside of the case at all costs
- keep as much from the airflow design intact as possible
- maintain a good cable management

So far:

After research how to use the stock fans i decided to buy new fans. I wanted to use the PWM signal from my Motherboard to make it efficient and not just put the stock fans on a molex and let them run on 12/5v. I bought a set of beQuiet! 92mm fans to replace the Fans that are just next to the CPU (pictures included)

I used pliers remove the placeholders. After that the preparation continued with using pencil to mark where the screwholders should be. I did that by screwing the holders on the motherboard and connect my graphic cards onto it. i placed the cards where the PCI I/O on the back of the case were and then knew where the holder should be. I used a pencil to mark the area and then made it rough. Done that i put the epoxy glue on it and place the motherboard on top with the graphic cards to the slots and let it dry for some minutes.

Also i tried to plan everything correctly so i know what metal parts i have to cut away and where the hdd's should belong since my board is too long and the 2nd graphic card takes too much space resulting in a non usable hard drive cage.

Results:
ATX screwholders
Graphicscards are in place
Fans replaced with PWM compatible ones

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Anyway this will be my log and i hope i will get everything done till next year or shortly after peace

 

[martinherrmann]

Hey Guys after a week new i finally made some progress i can show.
unfortunately when we used the flex i forgot my phone so i won't have picture of the process.

What we did so far:
- Cut away some space from the top metal plate and middle metal plate to make it ATX compatible.
- 75% of the Frontpanel done: Audio, Powerbutton+light and HDD Light done. USB missing since lack of another Front USB Cable.
- Replacement of the inside from the Power supply. rearranged Cables to fit current management plan.
- Cut away the I/O Panel from a logic board and rewired USB and Ethernet so far.
- Bought an USB3.0 PCIe Card to fix the lack of USB connections on the original case.
- Combined the Fan PWN Connector to 1 so we did need to buy a Y-Cable
- Replaced the Stockfan from the Speaker/PCI Fan holder and wired the Speaker ATX compatible
- Made small changes to the Backside Fancase so it fits with my Board.
- Removed my Boards DVI/VGA Adaptors in order to make space for the original I/O.

Yet to do:
- Make the Front USB work
- Make the Back Audio work
- Find a Better solution for the HDD's
- Get some Molex to Sata power cables to make the DVD Drive work and to connect my last HDD.

We had to replace the original Ethernet Slot because it was galvanic isolated and it was impossible to remove the isolation without harming the ethernet slot itself. On the front where the Firewire was there is now the HDD Led.

(I'm sorry for the bad image quality)

 

[toos]

Nice work! Will keep following this one.

 

[martinherrmann]

Update:
i didn't really do much the holidays but i got myself a Noctua U12P SE2 CPU Cooler and will probably switch from the beQuiet Fans to Noctua. ATM the System is pretty loud but i'm not sure what the Problem is. So i decided to switch all my fans to Noctua ones and make the System Fan manufacture uniform. I think maybe the Problem is the Powersupply Fans or the PCI bay fan that is currently some random fans. The CPU itself seems to be fine and i will report back.

With the new installation of the CPU Cooler i bought a Cable Management Set so i can align everything nicely.

i my research it turned out that only the CPU Cooler pwm slot on the GA H77 DS3H was linked to the CPU Temperature. I bought an Splitter from Akasa that sends that signal to 5 Slots and needs 1 Molex Power supply Connecter to make sure the Power doesn't come from just the Motherboard itself.

My Setup atm requires these Fans:

2x 60mm fans
http://noctua.at/main.php?show=productview&products_id=48&lng=en

1x 80mm fan pwm
http://noctua.at/main.php?show=productview&products_id=45&lng=en

4x 92mm fans pwm
http://noctua.at/main.php?show=productview&products_id=44&lng=en

The CPU Cooler runs 2 of these
http://noctua.at/main.php?show=productview&products_id=12&lng=en

i might switch to these
http://noctua.at/main.php?show=productview&products_id=42&lng=en

Overall i'm pretty surprised that Noctua is such a nice Company. They included much stuff like splitters, 5 and 7 volt adapters etc to make sure everything you want can be achieved.

 

[Mörkö]

I have same Noctua fans (painted grey) in my G5 mod and those are very quiet.