Amiga.org
Amiga computer related discussion => General chat about Amiga topics => Topic started by: CJK3o3 on November 14, 2012, 07:20:44 AM
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OK I am pretty new but I've been reading this forum for quite a while now.
I have a whole bunch of amigas and my weird hobby is fixing them up, turning them into their original state and trying to make them look brand new. Anyway a few weeks ago I bought this.
(http://sitetest.webtest.etop.pl/oldami.jpg)
When it got to me I realized this is the most abused amiga I've ever seen in my life. The case was cracked, covered in all sorts of crap. Surprisingly the mobo, disk drive and keyboard worked so I gave them a good clean and retrobrighted the keys.
Anyway the case was beyond repair so I came up with an idea to modify it to a case that could be used with any mini-atx mainboard. Some purists may hate me for it but I think its a better idea to do this rather than just throw the case away. After a whole lot of work with fitting, soldering, grinding and messing with here's the result of step 1 (fitting a pc keyboard into the case) :
(http://sitetest.webtest.etop.pl/IMG_0017.jpg)
(http://sitetest.webtest.etop.pl/IMG_0015.jpg)
The next step will be putting an ssd cf card reader where the floppy drive usually sits, and on the left side of the case a dvd. Also I don't want to modify the back of the case so I came up with an idea to use the original spaces for amiga ports in the back with the modern mobo.
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Impressive! You are almost giving TheDaddy a run for his money with his x500 cases :)
http://www.amiga.org/forums/showthread.php?t=62923&highlight=x500
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Gief more pr0n pics please!
Really nice and elegant mod. From what I can tell (I might be wrong) you got a keyboard's upper shell along with the keys and attached it to the A500?
Really nice man, can't wait to see more of the project (innards etc) :)
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Mfilos - that's correct I used the upper bit of a chicony keyboard. The bottom part will be fitted too of course in order for the keyboard to work. I already have a dvd case to fit in the bottom part. I will try to post more pictures today as I'm starting to mess with the bottom piece of the amiga case (It looks completely messed up but it does not matter to me, I should have enough plastic i cut out from the upper piece to form it into a trapdoor).
Today I will try to fit in new leds for the keyboard and for the future mobo.
I also tried a few mini-itx mainboards, they all should fit as long as there's a flat cpu vent. Also I'm considering putting a minimig inside.
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Here's some more pics :
(http://sitetest.webtest.etop.pl/ami5.jpg)
(http://sitetest.webtest.etop.pl/ami6.jpg)
Liteon DVD ready to be put into one piece with the bottom part of the miggy case (When I'm done it will be one piece of plastic) :
(http://sitetest.webtest.etop.pl/ami7.jpg)
....
I decided to repair the old keyboard and give it a new life in another a500 I'm putting together.
This is how it looked when I pulled it out of the abused amiga :
(http://sitetest.webtest.etop.pl/klaw1.jpg)
Taking it apart...
(http://sitetest.webtest.etop.pl/klaw2.jpg)
Membrane cleaned with contact cleaner, metal shield sanded to get rid of any trace of rust and repainted with non-conductive paint.
(http://sitetest.webtest.etop.pl/klaw3.jpg)
Each key cleaned up and retrobrighted (some are missing - they are still in the jar getting rid of their tan). Rubbers treated with contact cleaner. Each spring either replaced or de-rusted and all treated with a tad bit of wd to prevent future rusting.
(http://sitetest.webtest.etop.pl/klaw4.jpg)
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Looks great.
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Yeah, looks awesome.
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Mfilos - that's correct I used the upper bit of a chicony keyboard.
I also tried a few mini-itx mainboards, they all should fit as long as there's a flat cpu vent. Also I'm considering putting a minimig inside.
How many keyboards did it take for you to look through, until you found one that exactly fit the width of the A500 case?
Looking forward to seeing what you decide to place inside of this rescued A500 case.
Also, amazing work on your restoration of the A500 keyboard. I have great admiration for people who have the patience to restore old things that have been neglected and it is clear that you take great pride in what you do.
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How many keyboards did it take for you to look through, until you found one that exactly fit the width of the A500 case?
Looking forward to seeing what you decide to place inside of this rescued A500 case.
Also, amazing work on your restoration of the A500 keyboard. I have great admiration for people who have the patience to restore old things that have been neglected and it is clear that you take great pride in what you do.
Pretty much all the keyboards I had were thinner than the one in the amiga. I had to weld in plastic stripes on each side of the keyboard. I picked the chicony one because i have a whole lot of them and besides the bump on top they're pretty much flat (like the amiga one) (the escape key is not inside for a reason - when i was painting it i needed a hole in the case to hook it).
So far I resurrected a few a500's 2 1200's one amiga 1000 and one 2000. Seems like the old ones are the most well made :)
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Looks great ...apart from those nasty windows keys. Ah well, can't have it all.
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Looks great ...apart from those nasty windows keys. Ah well, can't have it all.
A couple of those Amiga stickers from ACube will solve that problem nicely :razz:
I think Amigakit carries them also
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That is some remarkable stuff. I remember being fanatical enough in the 80's to slightly modify the keyboard matrix of a Tandy Model 4P keyboard so I could install it in a Coco3.
You do clean work.
I was thinking of something similar myself, but going the easy route with a keyrah adapter. Then either a Mac Mini or a Powermac motherboard.
After all, since no PPC adapters fit an a500, I don't think MorphOS has ever been run on one.
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A couple of those Amiga stickers from ACube will solve that problem nicely :razz:
I think Amigakit carries them also
Yup, I'm using some to detox a Dell keyboard that I use with my MorphOS Mac Mini. Very nice! Now if only I could cover up that nasty Dell logo, too...
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I'm working on the bottom part of the case. I filled the trap door and the side gap, also flattened the whole inside and now I'm smoothening it out. This weekend I will install the dvd case and finish the keyboard - add leds and put the original amiga badge back on the case.
I was looking through my options in regards to what kind of a mobo I can put into this case. Is anybody here familiar with Efika? Is it worth it?
To me the most reasonable option at this point is putting a mini-itx dual core intel inside but it would be something like what commodore usa does.
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I'm working on the bottom part of the case. I filled the trap door and the side gap, also flattened the whole inside and now I'm smoothening it out.
What did you fill it with?
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What did you fill it with?
Melted plastic from the bits I cut out of the upper part of the case when making space for the new keyboard and fiberglass putty ro smoothen the whole thing up.
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Today I filled up the floppy holes. I drilled holes for leds and put the keyboard back together. It looks pretty crazy now when i put it on my desk and hook the keyboard up to my pc.
I still can't make up my mind whether to use the back of the case for the dvd tray or the side. Also I've been looking through mobos and came across this https://www.logicsupply.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/dn2800mt.jpg
Some dude already wants to buy it from me and use it as a gadget keyboard but I think it would be a better idea to finish it up and make it a standalone working computer.
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I would rather look for a AMD fusion board, the ASRock E350M1 Fusion cost same or less and is faster and got a way better better iGPU.
http://www.asrock.com/mb/overview.asp?Model=E350M1
I got 2 of those, one used in my HTPC and as a file server with a good SATA controller card.
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A little update... Lately I haven't had the time to work on it but I am gonna finish it sooner or later.
So I managed to fit the DVD inside.... At this point it looks ugly but with a bit of fiberglass and some sanding and grinding it will look like its always been there.
(http://sitetest.webtest.etop.pl/case2.jpg)
(http://sitetest.webtest.etop.pl/case3.jpg)
Of course it will be the same color and will be blended in with the miggy case. The inside looks nasty but I will smoothen it all and give it a coat of paint before fitting the mobo inside.
The keyboard is done along with leds... in fact I am writing this using this miggy :)
(http://sitetest.webtest.etop.pl/case1.jpg)
And here's a little bonus - A very old miggy I bought in a terrible state almost as bad as the one from the first post and here's how it turned out after receiving some TLC :
(http://sitetest.webtest.etop.pl/case4.jpg)
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DVD tray pretty much finished. I finally had some time to play with this thing.
(http://sitetest.webtest.etop.pl/both2.jpg)
And here are both pieces (almost) ready to be re-married...
(http://sitetest.webtest.etop.pl/both.jpg)
I will finish the plastic work but most likely the case will be put for sale for any price I can get as most likely I will have no time to continue working on it.
My 500's and nearly factory condition 1200 will be sold as well :(
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I will finish the plastic work but most likely the case will be put for sale for any price I can get as most likely I will have no time to continue working on it.
My 500's and nearly factory condition 1200 will be sold as well :(
:( INDEED! If it is only lack of time I'd say hold onto it! You have a thing of beauty there and I would hate to see you get rid of it.
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I guess I can say the plastic work is done. There are some imperfections but I am not going to do anything about them - I think they look kind of cool actually.
Here are both pieces remarried together along with a DVD recorder in its place :
(http://sitetest.webtest.etop.pl/finito2.jpg)
(http://sitetest.webtest.etop.pl/finito3.jpg)
(http://sitetest.webtest.etop.pl/finito4.jpg)(http://sitetest.webtest.etop.pl/finito5.jpg)(http://sitetest.webtest.etop.pl/finito6.jpg)(http://sitetest.webtest.etop.pl/finito7.jpg)
At this point the best sort of a mainboard for this thing would be a laptop one so if I don't sell the case to somebody willing to continue playing with it, I will probably find some nice lappy mobo to put inside and get it to be more than just a keyboard.
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OK I am pretty new but I've been reading this forum for quite a while now.
THAT IS AMAZING!!! You did a wonderful job! I was looking at your pictures and you are an artist with such skill!!!
I cannot find the words to tell you how impressed I am. Seeing the before and after images is just astounding!!
Cheers!
-P
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Little update :
I have the mobo. It's an intel atom mainboard with all the stuff I need including an sd card reader. A CPU that is not likely to overheat. An external psu and some other goodies :) Now I just have to come up with a nice custom made back panel and the monster will finally wake up. I fixed some small dents and cracks in the upper part of the case to make it spotless.
Also in the meantime I brought an old abused Amiga 1200 back to life and into a perfect condition. New membrane, completely restored keyboard, recapped mobo, cleaned up and retrobrighted case and keys. PC floppy removed and replaced with an original amiga one.
(http://sitetest.webtest.etop.pl/1200_1.jpg)
(http://sitetest.webtest.etop.pl/1200_2.jpg)
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Impressive work on your A500! Excellent!
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Pretty neat stuff.
You might want to consider a 2.5" laptop hard drive with an adapter.
It will cut down on space used, heat, and power draw.
Are you thinking of running AROS?
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Pretty neat stuff.
You might want to consider a 2.5" laptop hard drive with an adapter.
It will cut down on space used, heat, and power draw.
Are you thinking of running AROS?
I have a 2.5 disk and an ssd drive. I am not sure if the SSD works as I haven't tested it.
Keep in mind that every single piece of the Amiga 500 PC thing is made entirely out of computer junk :)
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I am nearly done... The back panel of the miggy needs to be remade to look nice for the new mobo ports but its partially done now :) I'm waiting for a few minor parts and hopefully in a couple of weeks this thing will finally work as a standalone computer with a battery, card reader, dvd writer, 160gb drive... but what the hell will i install on it?
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How did you do such a seamless integration of the Amiga 500s original casing and your custom contoured top? Did you use auto-body filler or something?
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How did you do such a seamless integration of the Amiga 500s original casing and your custom contoured top? Did you use auto-body filler or something?
I mostly used the original plastic - just melted with acetone and high temperature. When I ran out of plastic i used fiberglass putty that's elastic enough not to break or split when the case bends.
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So I have the mobo and all other bits. I want to finally put it together buy here's the problem I have. When the lappy mobo starts up it seeks the lappy LCD but does not automatically switch to the external VGA port.
It's an MSI Wind Mobo. Does anybody have any clue how to make it automatically switch?
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I have two dirt cheap Sylvania Atom based netbooks. Both have broken LCD panels. The smaller 8.9" unit doesn't switch automatically, and the larger 10.1 inch unit does.
The problem seems to be that a setting needs to be changed in the bios.
But if you can't see the initial display you can't change it.
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It is awake !
Today I put the whole thing into one peace and now it's running windows xp... (yeah I know - windows but it was the easiest one to install).
The faces of people at work looking at me running my 25 year old amiga as my desktop computer - priceless.
Pics and maybe a video coming soon.
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nVW64qfccfg&feature=youtu.be
Vid of the beast in action.
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Today I put the whole thing into one peace and now it's running windows xp... (yeah I know - windows but it was the easiest one to install).
I'm unsure which linux distro you've used that is that hard to install? The mainstream ones are as simple, if not even easier, than windows xp to install.
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I'm unsure which linux distro you've used that is that hard to install? The mainstream ones are as simple, if not even easier, than windows xp to install.
True. Almost all linux distros nowadays are pretty easy to install - anaconda installer or whatever but I wanted to run photoshop and a few other windows only apps.
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Too cool.
Thanks for the update.
I've been following this since you first posted and its great that you got it working.
And, if you want to run Amiga apps, there's always UAE.
An Amiga 500 that can run WinXP and Amiga apps side by side.
Persistence seems to be the hallmark of Amiga users.
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The intel atom Amiga 500 will go for sale next week. Now that I have it all finished I'm not sure what to do with it :)
Anyway the money that comes from it (considering that there is anybody crazy enough to buy it) will be used to buy as much dog and cat food as i can for the local animal shelter as I'm not really needy.
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It is awake !
Today I put the whole thing into one peace and now it's running windows xp... (yeah I know - windows but it was the easiest one to install).
The faces of people at work looking at me running my 25 year old amiga as my desktop computer - priceless.
Pics and maybe a video coming soon.
WinUAE is the best Amiga emulator out there. So Windows/WinUAE is probably the best solution for your emulated Amiga creation.
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Anyway the money that comes from it (considering that there is anybody crazy enough to buy it) will be used to buy as much dog and cat food as i can for the local animal shelter as I'm not really needy.
A crazy project from a crazy mind with a crazy big heart...
Dude, you rock! :elvis: