Armorsuit Sabertooth Z77 Mod by Paul Tan

Before this year's Computex, the ASUS TUF team sponsored a few modders - including Paul - to take the Sabertooth Z77 and design something TUF, sorry, tough enough to match its hardware credentials. With further sponsorship from Corsair that included Dominator DDR3, a TX850M, H100 cooler, Performance Pro SSD and some new Air series fans, Paul cracked on with his vision to create this: You can read and share your thoughts in Paul's full thread in ROG's modding forum.

Initial Plans

Using Adobe Illustrator, Paul drew up his outer design. This process took a week. [gallery include="" size="large" link="file" template="file-gallery" columns="2"]

The Package Arrives!

Ohhhh personalized. [gallery include="" size="large" link="file" template="file-gallery" columns="2"]

Keep The Box!

Modders - don't chuck out your box, recycle it to measure up the design! Paul received his board back in April, pre-Z77 launch, so there was no retail box ready at that time. This meant he could use the plain box to plan his parts! Once the Corsair TX850M and H100 arrived, Paul continued his measurements. [gallery include="" size="large" link="file" template="file-gallery" columns="2"]

Corsair Air fans, Dominator Memory and GT SSD!

The Corsair H100 with four Air fans fitted. Now time to mod everything... [gallery include="" size="large" link="file" template="file-gallery" columns="2"]

Aluminum panels

For this project Paul predominantly used aluminum so the case would be lighter. After finishing the measurements and design, Paul used a waterjet machine to cut them accurately. The different parts used different thickness'; 1mm sheet for the main casing, 6mm for the holder of the H100 radiator and 15mm for the sides. [gallery include="" size="large" link="file" template="file-gallery" columns="2"] With the aluminum fitted, the radiator design is taking shape (and the H100 also got a new cover): [gallery include="" size="large" link="file" template="file-gallery" columns="2"] The arm mount for the radiator: [gallery include="" size="large" link="file" template="file-gallery" columns="2"] With the 1mm alumium simply bent into shape, the parts come together: [gallery include="" size="large" link="file" template="file-gallery" columns="2"]

Painting

The aluminum and SP120 fan rings get painted with a base coat: [gallery include="" size="large" link="file" template="file-gallery" columns="2"]

Design work and final coloring

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Accessorized with TUF yellow

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The Final Result!

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Even UV reactive!

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Computex Booth