Product: Shuttle SV24 Manufacturer: Shuttle Price: $250 Author: Brian Lee Page: 8

Ominous Warning: DSL/Cable Webserver is not responsible for any damage caused by this project.  Everything you do here is at your own risk.  Please use common sense and take all possible safety precautions.  You will definitely void your warranty with some of what is written below.

Being the computer geek that I am, I cannot leave a good thing be.  There were some things about the SV24 that bothered me and I did what I could (as all good computer tweakers do) to modify and "improve" upon the existing SV24.

The first thing I did was install a second HD.  In this case, there isn't really much room for additional hardware other than was it was originally designed for.  Since I plan on using the SV24 for a server, I didn't really need a cdrom or a a floppy drive.  Most everything I need to install can be done over the network.

The most obvious spot to put the second HD would be where the floppy drive would typically go.   However, I found this was not possible because the screws that hold the aluminum bezel cover for the floppy drive is in the way.  I resorted to attaching the HD to the side of the 5.25 drive bad using two screws.  A better solution would be to use one of those adapters that allow you to put a HD in a 5.25 bay so that you can secure the drive on both sides, but just one side is works okay as a temporary solution.

Update:  Here is how one ingenious reader (Mark) modified his SV24 to take a second HD.

"I just wanted to comment on adding a second HD.  Like you, I needed two HDs, but I also needed a CD-ROM.  I was able to mount the second HD in the floppy drive bay.  This required a few workarounds, however.

First, I had to remove the aluminum close-out cover from the floppy bay. Then I realized that I had to mount the HD upside down in the bay, since its power connector interfered with the 1st HD in the slide-out tray.  With the HD upside down, the power connector was a bit higher, and it cleared the 1st HD, allowing me to slide the 2nd HD back far enough so that it didn't stick out of the front of the computer.

Now, since the drive was upside down, none of the mounting holes in the drive matched the slots in the bay frame, so I had to drill new holes in the frame so I could secure the drive.

The final thing I had to do was get the close-out cover in so that I didn't see the end of the HD in the front of the computer.  There was no way that the cover would fit with the drive in there.  So I broke off the sides of the cover, just leaving the front panel.  The front panel is a shallow C-shaped beam, exactly the same thickness as a hard drive.  I was able to just snap this panel onto the front of the drive, and now all I see is the nice brushed aluminum panel, and no drive."

I first disconnected the power supply from the motherboard and peripherals and then removed it from the case.  I removed the tiny screws and opened up the power supply, careful not to touch the capacitors.  I looked for the red and black wires leading away from the fan and cut them as close to the circuit board as I could.  I then fed them out of the vent slots as shown below.

I used a hot glue gun to put two large drops of glue around the two wires where they come out of the vent slots so that the wires won't get cut open on the metal and cause a short circuit and lots of smoke.

I now needed a connector for the fan.  I cut this molex header off an old fan I found laying around.  Probably came from an old 486 cpu fan.

It's always a good idea to use heat shrink tubing when making wire splices in your computer.  I don't trust electrical tape because it tends to fall off after a while and leaves a really nasty residue.  Here you can see that I put the heat shrink tubing on the wires before I soldered them and then passed the section of wire over an open flame a few times to cause the tubing to shrink.  (Sorry, I don't have a heat gun.)

Next I had to build the 7 volt adapter for the fan.  Take a look here for detailed instructions on how to build this adapter.  After I was done building this part, I attached it to the connector that I added to the fan inside the power supply.  Attach the 7 volt adapter to an open molex connector and your good to go.  Make sure not to attach anything to the 7 volt adapter except what you intend.  Anything "downstream" of the adapter will run at 7 volts.  This could be bad if you accidentally plug in a HD or DVD drive to the 7 volt adapter.  Be careful.

After you perform the 7 volt modification, be sure to keep a close eye on the temperature of your computer.  It's a good idea to use the hardware monitoring software they include so that you can monitor the cpu temperature.  Depending on where you live, the temperature, humidity, etc, your power supply fan should be able to run at 7 volts without any problems.  However, this is not guaranteed and your situation may require that your power supply fan runs at 12 volts.

Additional modifications to the SV24 that I am considering are adding a handle to the top of the case and cutting a blowhole on the side of the case to better vent the CPU.  I'll wait on these two mods since I'm not too keen on the idea of cutting holes in the nice and shiny case quite yet. 

Back to Page 7

Take Me Home!