Almost a year and a half ago we started thinking about building a homemade renderfarm. After a short research we’ve found many people building renderfarms consisting of many individual computers networked together which wasn’t exactly what we were looking for, mainly because of lack of space and so on. After a while and with a bit of luck we found one farm that was different. It was an interesting idea but not exactly what we were searching for. Then we have found another one, which was more precisely made, more elegant and actually a piece of art in itself. The base for both of them is IKEA Helmer cabinet. That was the right inspiration for our farm. But in our case we wanted from it not just raw processing power but both a workstation and processing power. The decision was made and we started the planning phase which took several months…

Luckily, we were serious about planning. The Helmer is small and tight. You can’t imagine how little the space inside the cabinet is until you actually buy one, put it together, take out a tape measure and start measuring and comparing it with your hardware components’ dimensions, but that was just one of the main problems. The other problem connected with space, was cooling. When you render, you get all CPUs on 100% load and you have to cool them well unless you’d like to get a computer combined with a grill. And another thing connected with cooling was noise which we wanted reduce as much as possible. That means you need hardware which a) takes as little space as possible b) is well cooled c) is as noiseless as possible. A pretty tough problem to solve. We spent countless hours, searching internet computer shops for components which would fit inside. After several weeks the hardware list was ready, ordered, paid, delivered and then, the big day came. Here is what’s inside:

top workstation:
  MB:            GigaByte EP35-DS4
  CPU:           INTEL Core 2 Quad Q9300
  CPU Cooling:   ARCTIC Freezer 7 PRO
  RAM:           8GB DDR2 800MHz PC6400 A-DATA Extreme Edition
  HDD:           SEAGATE Barracuda 7200.10 T-Lite 80GB
                 SEAGATE Barracuda 7200.11 500GB, SATA II NCQ 32MB cache
  GPU:           MSI NX8500GT-TD256EH, 256MB
  Power:         CoolerMaster Extreme Series 400W
  Cooling:       Fan ACUTAKE ACU-FAN80
  Optical drive: SAMSUNG SE-S224Q - DVD±R 20x

each (from 3) render node:
  MB:            GIGABYTE G31M-S2L
  CPU:           INTEL Core 2 Quad Q9300
  CPU Cooling:   ARCTIC Freezer 7 LP, socket 775
  RAM:           4GB (KIT 2x2GB) DDR2 800MHz PC6400 A-DATA Extreme Edition
  HDD:           SEAGATE 2.5" Momentus 5400
  GPU:           --
  Power:         CoolerMaster Extreme Series 400W
  Cooling:       PrimeCooler PC-8015L12C SuperSilent, 80x80x15mm, 2000rpm
                 ACUTAKE ACU-FAN80 PRO PWM White Wing Fan
  Optical drive: --

support:
  D-Link DI-524 Wireless 802.11b/g Router Switch 4x10/100
  D-Link DGS-1005D 5port 10/100/1000 switch
  APC SurgeArrest P5B-FR + overvoltage protection
  Zalman Fan Mate 2, fan speed controller, 4x

The construction itself was quick and efficient thanks to the detailed planning and after three days of metal cutting and drilling, putting things together with insulation tape, fitting hardware pieces, connecting and getting out of the way many meters of wires and cables, most of the work was done and Helmer booted for the first time and came to life. In the next days there was some more tuning, like test driving, putting in the additional fans and nice red power buttons.

Long live the Helmer!

Just in case you need an explanation..

D-76
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Water (125F/52C)                750ml
Metol                              2g
Sodium sulfite (desiccated)      100g
Hydroquinone                       5g
Borax                              2g
Cold water to make             1000ml