Want to do a bit of custom PC stuff but need advice

[Sega2006]

Been doing alot of thinking about a case and I was thinking about doing a custom one, recently I picked up an old Dell Optiplex GX620 tower and I really like the design which made me think could I do a custom one but I need to figure out if its going to be a suitable case, the PC in question will be a gaming spec one but I dont have the parts I want to use yet as I lack the funds to buy them all.
Basically Im looking at i7 with Good Graphics and sound so can somone tell me if the cooling will be adequte or will I need to modify the case a little, also will there be enough room and means to fit them?

And the last little thing is more of a favour than advice, could people look out for them being chucked out as they are Pentium 4 based so quite obselete by now, if you want the internals you can take them as I wont really need them (usuable spares are always handy to have though).

Ive also got a little arts and craft project that I could benifit from pointers on too, I just scraped a gateway PC but saved the Pentium 2 Processor in its cool little plastic holder, I want to make something cool with it but not sure what lol.

Thank you in advance and if your not sure what Im on about heres an Image pulled from google, the case looks much wider in the metal.

[hash47]

As the case was not originally designed for gaming i don't know if it will have good enough air flow and fan mounts to cope with the heat produced by a i7 + modern GPU. You could try dabbling with water cooling possibly but it might just be easier buying a cheap (£30) gaming case and modding that?

[Sega2006]

I did look at the cases but its not a case of wanting to cheap out, its a case of liking the design and having a ton of ideas about modding it, the ejector seat style side panel makes it easy to open too.
Airflow wise its pretty good as its supposed to be a high airflow BTX case, Pentium 4s do get really hot so I dont think cooling will be an issue, its just a case of needing to know if it will fit Gaming gear or not, I can pop mine open and take a photo sunday night if people will find it of help, Im not cutting that one up though as Its a good PC for practising stuff with.

[MattyC64c]

The problem with DELL computer cases is they typically only take a DELL motherboard. Fitting a new motherboard and a modern PSU could be problematic.

[speedlolita]

Those Dell are alright.

But really, when you can get something like a Fractal Design Core 1000 for so little why bother?

[markopoloman]

Mine is an i7 system - and it gets bloody hot in there! (although the two 470GTX cards throw out a HUGE amount of that when running games...).

What exactly are you intending doing to that case? Compared to modern gaming cases - it is f*cking ugly I'd go for a case that has plenty of room and get lots of silent fans or water cooling (like mine), as if you fry an i7.......... you are going to be crying for a long long time!

[Sega2006]

I was planning to create extra venting, fill the indentations of Dell in the side panels, custom paint, lighting postitioned to glow through the venting and the front badges changed to something of my own design, There is also scope on the rear panel for places you could drill out for radiator pipes.
Worst comes to worst Ill just do it on the Pentium 4 one I already have and just carefully strip it out and rebuild it when the Paints hardend, air flow in there is pretty good already though due to the way Dell designed it.