Help on Wire Management - Mother of God Help Us

maxxoverclocker said:

Hey guys, I have a HUGE MESSY problem on my hands. I cant wire manage, iono if its in my genes or something but i just cant. I'm going to be getting a new motherboard in a couple of days and want to have it look nice / no 50 pounds of wires into my fans. Could you guys give me some tips for wire management for my case? the pics should b attached (Beware, very disturbing lol)

BTW, IM DESPARATE!

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Two Words....GOOD GRIEF!

People have given you some good advise in this thread, I hope you post a few pics after you manage to clean that up.


PS, I'll give you one tip. I noticed you are running a Swiftech MCX159 passively with no fan, you probably would do better with a fan on it since that heatsink has dense fins and really isn't designed to be passive.

I suggest you Buy one of these , they cost $12 (It's what I use on my mcx159, and its the best fan you can buy for that heatsink, just run it at 7 volts to keep your sanity)

have you thought of w/c ,,,, less wires

The TT Big Water looks both pretty good and cheap for a pre-made...... From what I hear anyways.......

Silversinksam - Well i have the fan for the swiftech but quite frankly my motherboard is pissing me off by not booting correctly all the time at stock freq's so i decided to annoy my motherboard by removing the fan (i know lol no point) And also im going to put the fan from my 9800 pro on the chipset cooler when i get my new motherboard (AI7 for those of u that want to know) it does around 25 cfm and is about 50mm (quite silent too)

And watercooling costs too much for me, (no money at all, im still in debt lol)

Just to add some spice to the thread this is my 9800 pro that u see in that messy case lol

Well I'm not a big believer in bigger is better with cooling. Heat sink design tends to be more important.

The XP-120 however doesn't prove me wrong either as it combines a larger surface area with unique heat sink design......

Well that cooling system above allows me 463/796mhz in 85 degree weather so it works pretty nice

Try not to take me too seriously as I can get little bitter when others have better hardware than me. Thats getting to be a regular thing nowadays with the Athlon 64 around.....

I've still never even seen one here in Australia though.....

Several other posters have covered the standard ideas already, but I'm seriously OCD about cable organization, so I'll hit a few points again.

Plan your wires first. For example, my PSU has a couple of lines with only a single molex plug, a couple with only fan plugs, and a few standard 2 molex and 1 floppy plug. If you only need 1, run one that only has 1. It sounds obvious enough, but I know when I first put a machine together I really don't give too much thought to it.

Secondly, consider reversing your hard drives. You can tuck the cables back and around the drive cage and keep them out of the way. This also keeps all of that extra cable from hanging around, incase you don't have cables that are only 3-4in.

A good key rule is that nothing crosses the motherboard. Pick up a bunch of tie mounts and zipties and use them to run wires around the edge of the case. For example, my 12V is to the left of the CPU under the PSU, but the cable is really long--so I use tie mounts along the top and inside of the back of my case to run the excess cable around. You can completely "hide" the power connectors for your rear fans and GPU fans that way too. If you've got enough slack to keep the actual molex connectors on the top of the case, it'll look really clean.

I wouldn't worry about a modular PSU. It's a great idea, but making your own modular seems excessive, and if the one you've got works, why replace it? Run *all* of the wires you can behind the motherboard, and tape the ones you won't be using out of the way on the back.

I recommend running *all* cables through back there unless they connect on the left side of the motherboard--especially drive cables. You can bring them back out right by the drive cages, ATX connector, et cetera and hide the slack around the back of the motherboard tray.

Also, even though you already seem to understand this part just fine, zip tie the living hell out of things that are close to each other. After you finish this, you really shouldn't have many power cables or anything similar to zip tie together, but your motherboard connectors, additional USB plugs in the back, et cetera all have a bunch of wires that you'll never be able to really do much with--so just zip tie them together and tie mount them as out of the way as you can. Some people cut a piece of plexi to place over all of these wires at the bottom, but even I'm not that anal.

Good luck!

I say cut those 4 pin full sized connectors have to go.
In your case, theres something you should try that ive always wanted to...a 12V backbone line.

Get a wire, i would use standard psu wire or wire from an extention cord...and run it around your case...a big loop. Then splice the fans into it for +12V power. you can ground them to a second line if you like, but in my ghetto projects i always used to ground to the chassis for fans...(then again in an AT psu thats how it was done in the psu...i dunno about atx)

those connectors make it hard to manage/hide.

maxxoverclocker said:

Silversinksam - Well i have the fan for the swiftech but quite frankly my motherboard is pissing me off by not booting correctly all the time at stock freq's so i decided to annoy my motherboard by removing the fan (i know lol no point) And also im going to put the fan from my 9800 pro on the chipset cooler when i get my new motherboard (AI7 for those of u that want to know) it does around 25 cfm and is about 50mm (quite silent too)

And watercooling costs too much for me, (no money at all, im still in debt lol)

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So just don't use the Motherboard fan header, you can wire the Swiftech fan to run into a molex, or you could even splice the wires and it would cost you nothin

I'll add on to Arch's post. Cut holes in your motherboard back plate, and thread the wires through those. It helps more than any other mod I've done.

frozencpu.com sells 6 inch SATA uv reactive cables dont know about shipping though

You dont have to use any thing more then some time elecrical tape rounded ide cables and some tie wraps.

i do notice that you have WAY to much wires you dont need so remove any connectors you dont need.

any whay your final result should look somthing like this. (just spend time)

http://www.zippyimages.com/135112.html

Side:
http://www.zippyimages.com/135109.html

Side2:
http://www.zippyimages.com/135111.html

There ya go =)

your buddy Syber


PS guys how do i make my pic show up liek urs lol (n00b here) i tryed the IMG thing but didnt work

Did you do ?

Also, I can't open you pictures from this computer, so I can't see, but are they direct links to the photo, or do they only show thumbnails.

O i see there not direct links they have a boarder ect.
ok i understand now thanx =)
yes i did the IMG thing

Electrical tape ends up going all sticky and gooey. See if you can do something better.

Lucky my mobo tray from my Thermaltake Skull Series case has 4 holes alread cut into the mobo (never thought to use them untill now thx guys) and am gonna put my pc back together as soon as i get my mobo (hopefully friday) Im runing my computer ghetto style outside of my case.

ps2cho said:

that is...a REALLY big case LOL

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lol 46.5 inches tall 18 bay. I gotta have room for my big clumsy hands.
By the way this case has 16 fans in it so clean wiring is still capable.

Nice job guys.

FarEast said:

Ok the first thing you should do is strip the case remove all the additional fans and lighting and work on just the basics.

ATX Cable
Optical and HDD Power
PCI/AGP Power
CPU Fan

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I agree with this completely. Take everything out! Get the basics of your system wired. (Wire Ties are your friend) I run all of my wiring behind the mobo tray and back in where they need to connect. Wire ties will help keep them flat against the case so that you can put the side panel back on.

Once that is done you can start adding your fans. I would chain them together as much as possible and try to run them to no more then two or three seperate points in the case for PSU connection.

Big help would be to sleeve them, which is very easy with fans. The molex connectors come off easy and you can use some real small sleeving.

From what I see in your pics, it looks like all those fan wires are negating the benefit of having the extra fans in the first place. Remove them and your system will probably run cooler. Get those wires tidied up and you will have a screamer, as well as a looker!

Here are two of my towers. One on and one not