Is been a while since the last Featured Mod now, the initial thought was to…
Featured Mod: Slipperyskip’s SkyVue
It is finally time for a new Featured Mod! This time I had the privilege to talk to Jeffrey “slipperyskip” Stephenson about his recent build, SkyVue.
So Jeffrey, tell me a little bit about yourself and how you started with modding?
I’m a retired 61-year-old living in rural Florida near the Suwannee River. I started “modding” back in 2002 after VIA released the very first Mini-ITX motherboard and there were few available cases for it. I discovered that a desktop cigar humidor was the perfect size and proceeded to mount a computer inside of one. VIA invited me to display my creation at CES 2003 and things kinda took off from there.
What was your idea behind this project?
I was intrigued by Corsair’s new low-profile water cooler (H5 SF) so I decided to do something that would highlight it in a build. At the same time I had a Silverstone LC-02 HTPC case that was all-aluminum but more importantly, it had the risers and extensions necessary to mount a video card in a “laid down” position. The idea for the Art Deco skyscraper cover came only after the assembled internal component structure looked like a tall, stepped building. I had a three-year-old Art Deco lamp design that meshed nearly perfectly with the physical requirements of the cover
What was the biggest challenge with the build?
Ensuring adequate airflow for the graphics card was challenging. I decided on a large vent that was designed to look like stylized windows. To hedge my bet I made a mount for a small 40mm exhaust fan at the case top but I haven’t needed it yet. Cooling any computer system is all about airflow. I say this because a constant challenge with all my projects are “experts” who will tell me that wood doesn’t make a good computer case. They think that using wood for a case material is somehow new but the fact is hot electronics have been mounted into wooden boxes for over a hundred years. There is also a lot of nonsense about grounding and EMI problems with wood but that information is at least thirty years old and is no longer relevant.
Thank you so much for the privilege to talk to you. Any last words?
Thanks for allowing me to share my work with your readers.
If you want to see more of Jeffrey’s work, check out his website:
