Mods/Hacks: Who's done what?

[Ronmor]

Two weeks ago I had a 4000 mobo that booted up but only showed 2 megs of memory, but had all the memory sticks installed.
So I repaired all the traces that was damaged by the leaking NiCa battery, and installed a Lithium coin case and battery from a HP mobo. Eveything working fine even the clock which wasn't working before.

 ps. I have 2 other 4000 mobo that need repaired but need Rom chips. So if there is someone who has up graded to 3.1 roms but wants to sale the old 3.0 roms let me know.

[Generale]

@ronmor:

I have a question about your NiCad to Li battery conversion...well sort of a statement ant a question.

Did you put in a power diode to protect against reverse current? That is, if the circuit sends a charging voltage through when the power is on.

About 6 years back I bought a secondhand notebook. Ex Telstra. I'd been using it, seeing what it could and couldn't do. Then I stepped away for a minute to use the toilet. Just after I got up from the table and made it to the next room, the computer exploded. I'm talking a proper explosion here.
The explosion had enough force to rip chips off the boards, tear through the layers of metal, propel the keyboard across the room, and the keys throughout 2 rooms, and took a chunk out of the table it was sitting on.

After the smoke cleared (an hour or so at least. That smoke was like concentrated evil), inspection revealed that some bright spark replaced the NiCad with a Lithium, and as near as I can tell, it was because the mainboard had tried to charge it.
Hope I haven't scared you.
If you don't mind resetting your clock, I suggest taking out the battery, starting up and _carefully_ check the connector/battery holder for a voltage.

I just don't want this happening to anyone else. Especially with nice bits of hardware  :-)

[mendark]

That does scare me dude! I thought it could'nt do any harm, since the battery are being charged really slooow.

I just sold my A4000 with fixed battery. The new battery was an LIsomething... I hope it does'nt harm the new owner...

[DethKnight]

My first/last/and only Amiga Mod/Hack

Opened A3000 , saw leaky battery, tryed to lift it out,
was corroded to the "post" , desoldered the post,

cleaned all corrosion from the area, re-assembled
A3000 , machine refused to boot ever again
just flashes yellow now

[Ronmor]

thanks for the info. Generale, a diode won't be a problem.

  ps. did you pass any gas before you left? :lol:  :lol:

[StormLord]

Actually too many to remember but I'll try..
many blizzppcs 040 upgrades to 060.
many many keybs adaptors for pc keybs.
2 towerings and one desktoping of an A1200
a conversion of an A1200 desktop having a combo slotload drive disk drive hard drive and some excelent mod ventilation for blizzppc and bvision waiting to come.
2 pic programmers for amiga from aminet.
tried ps2m but for some reason failed and didn't look at it again cause I got my black amiga mouse as presend from friends ;-)
many AT-amiga power adapters and much more ATX-amiga.
tried rom extenders so to fit grex and power flyer together something happend(short circuited) or PF asked for more amps that the cable could handle and after a little smells burning rubber and smokes going out of the cables!
well.. an amstrad 6128 color monitor to A1200 conversion..
and a failed change of a plcc ppc to bga..
I must forgeting many more but my amiga life is "hacking the Amiga" and some time burnit too.. like 5 days before testing a ppc I burned the mobo by shorting a couple pins on the 23D connector.. (I will try to find whats wrong because I don't want these hardwares die anymore!)
some moons ago started to build a rom for amiga to make it boot from Cd but because I couldn't find cheap rom chips an Prom programmer I forgot it quickly.
AND!! MANY to come! :-)

[coldfish]

@ Generale

If youve got an empty JAMMA cabinet sitting there I strongly recommend the A500 mod.  

It actually brought new life to a lot of my old games!  There really is nothing like thrashing the sticks on an arcade cab whilst playing Speedball-2 with a mate, its a totally different experience compared to playing on a desktop.  Then there's Silkworm, SWIV, Turrican 1-3, Alien Breed, Xenon II, Risky Woods, Golden Axe, Wonderboy in monsterland...  

And, the conversion is a simple case of hooking up the right wires, easy!  

JAMMA has RGB+Csync in, L+R Audio (needs a little amp), and all the Joystick pinouts.  I hooked up the PLR1+2 buttons to heavily used keyboard keys (space, esc ect)

You should have no problems.

If that hasn't convinced you... :-D

ps:  Ive now built a MAME cab' using an old PC (K6-350) and emulation, it just about plays all those Amiga classics spot on, plus a lot of actual arcade games.  

Iz gooood!!!

[Generale]

@dethknight:
Yellow, eh. The generic something error. Ouch.

@ronmor

Well, I've heard of a lot of people replacing NiCad batteries with Lithium, and I don't think I've heard of others having problems. But I have to admit, after what happened to me, I'd rather be safe than sorry. I guess those warnings on batteries about them exploding if they are recharged are more pertinent than I expected.
Anyhow, putting a power diode in, or possibly cutting a VCC trace to the battery circuit may do it. Personally I think the diode is simpler.

Heh. Naah, no gas. Mind you, the pee I was going to have had to be postponed somewhat.

[Framiga]

An experimental CSPPC heatsink.

http://xoomer.virgilio.it/cieffeeditingvideo/CSPPC/

Heatsink size: 45x45x16.5 mm
Fan size- 45x45x10 or 50x50x10

Others are WIP :-)  

[Framiga]

Could someone tell me, to how many degrees (C) runs his 604e (at 200 Mhz but even at higher clocks) with the original heatsink/fan?

Both > StandBy and 100% CPU used

Thanks