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Showing posts from December, 2019

The case of the missing filler (Dell PowerEdge Rack to Tower conversion)

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So you've bought some PowerEdge Tower servers but these were originally rack servers. No problem, you thought, as you remove the rack 'ears' and sourced a top cover + feet to turn your T430 or T630 back into a Tower. But one problem remained: On Rack Servers, the front panel is actually shorter by 15mm, leaving some of the internals/electronics exposed to dust and spills. Here's the top of a T630 converted back to 'Tower': Then I realized we were in 2019 and that 3D printing is now common. There are companies on the Internet that deliver your 3D printed CAD files to your door. So, I started FreeCAD's Appimage on my RHEL machine and designed a part that fit the size of the gap and borders I had just measured: The CAD files I created are located here: FreeCAD After a couple weeks, the parts (one for my T430, another for my T630) were received. I had gotten the color wrong but at least they did fit nicely: I didn't have an