VOGONS


First post, by nezwick

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Hey everyone - first post here!

TL;DR: Looking for my first 2 PC cases, see pics

Like plenty of others on here, I've been on a months-long quest to find the first 2 PC cases I ever built in when I was a teenager. Mine had been scrapped many years ago and obviously now with the resurgence in computer nostalgia, that was a mistake. Unfortunately, I don't have any actual photos of these from back-in-the-day, so I've been going solely on memory and what's out there on the web.

I check eBay and Facebook Marketplace several times a day, and I've scoured Vogons and Reddit and Google images and archived versions of Newegg and TigerDirect, but haven't found exactly what I'm looking for.

The first case, circa 2001-2002, I was actually able to more or less identify by digging through atxcases.com (colorcases.com) on the Wayback Machine. Seems like it was known as X-Blue or X-LUCENT X3. I know these translucent cases are super hard to find these days. There is a post somewhere on this forum where somebody is showing off their translucent case collection, and they have one of these. I do remember buying this on eBay way back then, as it was already a year or so "out of style" and had probably been sold to a liquidator.

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Anyway, I built my first custom PC in this case for my bedroom. I would have been 14-15 years old and had built and repaired computers before, but never for myself. I used an Athlon XP 1700+, a 20GB hard drive, 32MB ATi graphics card of some sort, probably 256MB RAM, and Windows 2000 Professional. The motherboard I had picked up second hand and it wasn't long before the capacitors blew. I got back up and running with a replacement mb from Gigabyte, but because the Athlon XP was basically a little space heater in a case with almost no airflow, I had overheating issues when playing games. IIRC, due to the placement of the PSU, I couldn't use any tall aftermarket coolers. So most of the time, I ran this case with the side panel removed. I had even bought some color-matched paint at the hardware store, and painted the casings of my beige CRT monitor and keyboard to match the PC.

I'd venture this was around 2004, when I got tired of the teal look and lack-of-airflow, and had a little more cash to spend, I bought my first "enthusiast" type case and added LED fans and cold cathode lights. This one has been completely elusive on the modern internet and I haven't found any examples or photos to share with the group.

The closest I could come up with is this Elements brand case from Newegg (pretty sure Newegg is where I bought it). The side window was "X" shaped and I had replaced the standard fan grille with a Biohazard one. But the front panel was quite different, as I'm pretty sure it didn't have a whole lot of silver on it. Just power, reset, and 2 LEDs in the center (with a small silver bezel), and front panel USB/audio at the bottom, which I think were behind a door.

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Looking back, it was honestly not a super well-built case, but it had the aesthetic style I needed at the time. So many of these gamer cases were really tacky and gaudy, and this one actually was not. It was mostly black, with a few silver accents and the acrylic window. The X-shape window was key, as I was the only one of my techie friends who had one. I had all green LED fans, blue cold cathode tubes, and a whole bunch of UV reactive bits like IDE cables and PCI slot covers. It was pretty sweet for the time. I had also upgraded the video card to 128MB, RAM to 768MB, and HDD to 120GB and was actually able to play DOOM 3! This box went with me to a bunch of LAN parties and whatever other occasions one would take their PC case to.

In 2007, our house got hit by a power surge and my motherboard, RAM, and power supply got zapped. The insurance company felt that this and other electronics were a total loss, so I got a check for like $600 (which was big money for me at the time). I used that check to build myself an Athlon64 setup in this same case, and kept that until probably 2012, when the entire setup got sent to e-waste recycling.

I look forward to having a discussion and maybe finding someone who is willing to sell their cases to me!

Last edited by nezwick on 2023-09-29, 17:11. Edited 2 times in total.

XP: A64 3000+ S754 / 2GB DDR / 500GB SATA / Audigy1
2K: AXP 1700+ @ 1.61 / 1GB DDR / 120GB IDE / X800XL / Audigy 2ZS
98SE: P3 500 / 512MB SDR / 120GB IDE / V3 3000 AGP / Vortex2
95: P200 MMX / 32MB SDR / 3.2GB IDE
DOS/3.11: Acer 1120SX, 386SX-20

Reply 1 of 7, by nezwick

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UPDATE with CLUES!

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Well my remembering was a little off regarding the case design. I actually found an old video recording on a VHS-C tape (of course filmed at night; after all, in 2006 I was a vampire) and it proves the "X" window was actually an "X" window. So it was even more awesome than I thought it was. Good thing it was all lit up with LED and CCFL goodness.

And, the silver panel on the front was actually rectangular. Obviously my brain memory has got some bad sectors or data corruption.

Yes, it was on the floor. 12th grade nezwick was too poor for a desk.

Maybe we'll get to the bottom of this eventually.

XP: A64 3000+ S754 / 2GB DDR / 500GB SATA / Audigy1
2K: AXP 1700+ @ 1.61 / 1GB DDR / 120GB IDE / X800XL / Audigy 2ZS
98SE: P3 500 / 512MB SDR / 120GB IDE / V3 3000 AGP / Vortex2
95: P200 MMX / 32MB SDR / 3.2GB IDE
DOS/3.11: Acer 1120SX, 386SX-20

Reply 2 of 7, by sangokushi

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If you ordered the black case from Newegg, do you still have the order confirmation email?
I noticed Newegg usually keep the product page even the product was discontinued. There is a higher chance to find the case if you have the item number from the email.

Reply 3 of 7, by nezwick

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Thank you for your response. I had thought about that, but unfortunately the confirmation email is a dead end. I haven't had access to that email address or Newegg account in many years. The Newegg account is inaccessible because it's associated with that old email address, so the "forgot your password" link goes nowhere.

Back then, my email address (actually, I probably used my mom's email address) was through our ISP and we used POP via a mail client like Outlook Express, so the messages weren't accessible via a web interface anyway.

It was xxxxx@alltel.net, then they migrated us to xxxxx@windstream.net, and then we ditched that ISP probably around 2008 when we moved to cable.

XP: A64 3000+ S754 / 2GB DDR / 500GB SATA / Audigy1
2K: AXP 1700+ @ 1.61 / 1GB DDR / 120GB IDE / X800XL / Audigy 2ZS
98SE: P3 500 / 512MB SDR / 120GB IDE / V3 3000 AGP / Vortex2
95: P200 MMX / 32MB SDR / 3.2GB IDE
DOS/3.11: Acer 1120SX, 386SX-20

Reply 4 of 7, by nezwick

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Just wanted to offer a small update to this thread, which I thought I had already done, but clearly had not.

I actually CALLED Newegg customer service to attempt to get access to my order history. Unfortunately, they were unable to merge my old account with my current one. Understandably, though no less frustratingly, they couldn't actually provide me access to the old account because it was in my mom's name (now deceased). We did manage to find a decent enough workaround however - the agent verbally read me the make and models of all the PC cases that I ordered between 2001-2005 on that account.

BUT, that was also a dead end, because none of the cases I had purchased matched the subject of this thread. Most of those cases were builds that I had done for my customers.

I'm still checking eBay/marketplace/CL nearly every day to see if one of these pops up. Sadly, I have no more photos or video stills to help with identification.

XP: A64 3000+ S754 / 2GB DDR / 500GB SATA / Audigy1
2K: AXP 1700+ @ 1.61 / 1GB DDR / 120GB IDE / X800XL / Audigy 2ZS
98SE: P3 500 / 512MB SDR / 120GB IDE / V3 3000 AGP / Vortex2
95: P200 MMX / 32MB SDR / 3.2GB IDE
DOS/3.11: Acer 1120SX, 386SX-20

Reply 5 of 7, by sangokushi

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nezwick wrote on 2023-09-29, 16:36:

...

BUT, that was also a dead end, because none of the cases I had purchased matched the subject of this thread. Most of those cases were builds that I had done for my customers.

I'm still checking eBay/marketplace/CL nearly every day to see if one of these pops up. Sadly, I have no more photos or video stills to help with identification.

Does it mean you purchased the case from local store? You mentioned you filed an insurance claim, maybe you kept the receipt of the case somewhere?

Reply 7 of 7, by nezwick

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I know what you're saying about those Thermaltake cases. Mine definitely was a budget/no-name case. I actually have three Thermaltake Xaser-III in my collection right now, and they are worlds apart in terms of quality (and size too). Had a Xaser-II recently also but I sold it to help fund my other retro systems.

As far as that insurance claim goes, I'm certain that would be a dead end also. Fairly confident it was just written up as a "custom built PC" or something and that was all. Although even after that power surge incident happened, and the Socket A MB/CPU got fried, I still re-used the case for my next Athlon64 build.

Just to keep this thread somewhat interesting, here are the two Xaser-III systems I have. They are pretty much fully built out, except for finding better graphics cards for them.

One is socket A, AthlonXP 3000+, ASUS nForce2 motherboard, 1 GB DDR400 in dual channel; 160GB SATA HDD; GeForce MX440 64MB
The other is Socket 754, Athlon64 3000+, ECS motherboard, 2 GB DDR400 in dual channel; 500GB SATA HDD; Sound Blaster Live; Radeon 9200 128MB

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XP: A64 3000+ S754 / 2GB DDR / 500GB SATA / Audigy1
2K: AXP 1700+ @ 1.61 / 1GB DDR / 120GB IDE / X800XL / Audigy 2ZS
98SE: P3 500 / 512MB SDR / 120GB IDE / V3 3000 AGP / Vortex2
95: P200 MMX / 32MB SDR / 3.2GB IDE
DOS/3.11: Acer 1120SX, 386SX-20