Custom Built Guild Wars 2 Gaming Rig

Apr 14, 2012

My good friend John Coppola recently told me that he had built his own CNC machine from scratch. Soon afterwards we discussed the idea that he would build my next gaming computer. I knew from personal experience how killer John’s computers were … he’s very meticulous, and really enjoys a cutom build. As excited as I was, I really didn’t know what to expect when he told me this one would be 100% of his own making, but I’ll get back to this …

In truth, I haven’t gamed much since 2006 when my wife and I got married, bought a house and had our first baby. I was a year or so into World of Warcraft then and had been agressively playing MMOs since 2001. I’d have dropped gaming all together that year if it weren’t for my fortunate discovery of Guild Wars.

Spoiler Alert: once you have kids you just can’t continue gaming like you used to.

Guild Wars was sort of like World of Warcraft for me, but geared more toward the casual gamer. More importantly, it had an MMO feel but there were no costly subscription fees. I didn’t feel compelled to play when I might have had more important things to do. When Guild Wars 2 was announced I knew right away I would be picking up my copy. I was also glad to hear that there would still be no subscription fees. Hallelujah!

To celebrate, I wanted to do something special and decided to go all out on building a proper gaming rig. John knew how to make this happen. I was already thoroughly intrigued by his CNC machine and come to find out, he had already put 200 hours into this custom case design he had in mind. Boy did that get my attention!

I could never have known how cool this machine would end up, and how perfectly it would fit my needs. You’ll notice that despite the etching on the side, there’s even a Guild Wars 2 look about it. Honestly, the etching was an afterthought. Johk John actually jokes that he chose white acrylic to make the case with because I was a mac guy and would eat it right up. He was right I guess. I present to you, the fruit of John’s labor …

And here are the system specs:

If you would like to have John make you something similar, feel free to contact him directly: john1253113@gmail.com