Media Cabinet Outcome

2012-06-19

Unfortunately, I do not currently have any photos of the finished cabinet. There was a rush to get it done, then I moved on to other things, and then my camera broke.

Elevation

Critique

Good

Overall I am satisfied with every aspect of this project, except those I will mention in the “Less Good” section. Of the points in the “Less Good” section, you could consider “Big-N-Blocky” and “Wrong Era” as part of the charm of this piece of furniture.

Less Good

Big-N-Blocky

As I mentioned in the design section, the height and width dimensions were constrained by the window sash I was going to reuse. And the depth was constrained by needing to hold a full size computer tower. This resulted in something that his a big, block-like aspect. This issue is not terrible if you have a large living space. But if you have a small living space (which we currently do) then you start to notice how much space it is occupying.

Heat Dissipation

I was thinking about heat issues when I built this cabinet, because computers and electronics both produce heat that can get trapped in the cabinet. So I provided 120mm fans to vent each bay, blowing hot air out at the top and bringing in cool air at the bottom. Even with those precautions, the cabinet gets hot. Part of the problem is we don't have AC, so exchanging air with the room doesn't do much cooling in the summer. The cabinet would do better if we were normal people who kept our house cool in the summer. But since we are not, I worry that there's not enough heat dissipation in the cabinet to keep the equipment safe.

Wrong Era

I like to keep old equipment around for as long as it is useful, which is a merit or a flaw depending on your outlook. This cabinet was built around the equipment that we already had, even though some of it was dated at the time of the design. For example:

• It holds a full size computer tower, even though a modern HTPC can be tiny.
• It is sized to hold stereo components from the nineties, because those are what play our media collection. A better approach might have been to focus energy on digitizing the media, and play them through a small HTPC.
• It holds a big CRT computer monitor, and who uses those anymore?
  Mine just won't die. It died.

Casters Not Big Enough

This is not a big design flaw, I just haven't found the big casters I want yet. Small casters get pushed into carpet by the heavy cabinet. Less carpet would also fix this problem.