Minimig Case

[arnljot]

@Darrin

$ is toy money now-a-days, he said €...

Besides. Look at good looking ITX cases, the Nexus Psile is about £180 (that is about €224). Other cheaper ITX cases with hints of design: Silver Silverstone SST-LC12-S Mini-ITX is about €80, Silver Casetronic C137 Travla Mini CheckerCube ITX at €97.

Yes, you can get ITX cases at around €30 to 50. But they look like c*ap.

With the MiniMig case you get:
1) Unique Amiga design case, for a unique form factor card
2) Exclusive limited edition production run (euforism for small scale one person initiative)

I'm sure I could count more points, but it doesn't matter. With his design skills and entrepeneurship I'm sure Loranio could have made a killing on producing unique designs for ITX flex (SAM) and ITX(efika). There really isn't much to choose from. My dream is a Psile-like case just a little taller than a mac mini. And I'd buy two of them. One for a x86 AROS/Ubuntu box, and one for an efika MOS/*nix setup.

But think of the scale Silverstone and Psile can produce in. And still be so expensive as you consider them. And then what someone like Loranio can achieve in that market...

Thank god he's focusing on MiniMig! hehe

(but TheDaddy, you need to fix up Efika and SAM before Natami, Natami can still wait some months!

[TheDaddy]

@codenetfx

>>TheDaddy deserves all the respect for pulling though this project.

Thank you.

>>Owning an Amiga is very similar to owning a classic muscle car Your wallet and your foot is ready to go whenever opportunity knocks

Excellent metaphor...can I use it?
 :-)

[TheDaddy]

@arnljot

>>Besides. Look at good looking ITX cases, the Nexus Psile is about £180 (that is about €224).

I wanted to buy that I remember thinking:"Mamma Mia!":-)

I build pcs in my spare time and I have gone through Antec cases to Silverstone to Coolermaster to Lian-Li and so on and the medium to high end one are freaking expensive! Scarely! Some go well into £200-300 (GBP) without the psu!:-o

My original idea was to create something similar, big, aluminium bits, chrome, flashing lights then the engineers told me:"Son, you are going to have to sell it for £200, let's cut the crap, go back to the drawing board and think small, compact, light, you might even enter Apple territory design wise" so off I went, cut cost here (the reset switch) cut there (the Menu switch) cut the aluminium, the chrome, the cover for the LEDs and so on...hopefully the price will be accessible...I hope so anyway. :-)

>>Other cheaper ITX cases with hints of design: Silver Silverstone SST-LC12-S Mini-ITX is about €80, Silver Casetronic C137 Travla Mini CheckerCube ITX at €97.

Add to that your time, effort, skill with a dremel to make the holes fit, if the case is too big you will have to purchase extensions...a nightmare!:lol:

>>With the MiniMig case you get:
1) Unique Amiga design case, for a unique form factor card
2) Exclusive limited edition production run (euforism for small scale one person initiative)

Hmmm...talking of exclusivity who wants the one with serial number 4? :-)

>>I'm sure I could count more points, but it doesn't matter. With his design skills and entrepeneurship I'm sure Loranio could have made a killing on producing unique designs for ITX flex (SAM) and ITX(efika). There really isn't much to choose from. My dream is a Psile-like case just a little taller than a mac mini. And I'd buy two of them. One for a x86 AROS/Ubuntu box, and one for an efika MOS/*nix setup.

Keep them coming I will be on it once the Minimig is sorted :-)

Talking of mac mini, we are not too far away, at least shape wise (no fancy bits though).

>>But think of the scale Silverstone and Psile can produce in. And still be so expensive as you consider them. And then what someone like Loranio can achieve in that market...
Thank god he's focusing on MiniMig! hehe

:lol:

>>(but TheDaddy, you need to fix up Efika and SAM before Natami, Natami can still wait some months!
   :-o  :lol:

I am drooling about the idea of making a case for those two motherboards, even though I have people pushing for a replacement A1200 case...

Thanks  :-)

[Darrin]

Amiduffer wrote:
C'mon Darrin, in the history of people who have invented products, its normal to put everything into something and not get an immediate return.

Just ask Elias Howe, who had to go seriously in debt and wait decades before people accepted the sewing machine.

Yeah, but I think there was a bigger market for sewing machines then than there is for $200 Minimig cases now.

What hurts this project is the fact that the Minimig formfactor is so unique and it is only houses Minimig v1.0 and v1.1 boards.  Perhaps if the design can be adapted to house an Efika without the production company charging the same development costs then future projects will help to recover the costs of this first venture.

[TheDaddy]

@Darrin

>>Yeah, but I think there was a bigger market for sewing machines then than there is for $200 Minimig cases now.

True, but my target is less than that for two reasons:

1) I wouldn't feel comfortable charging $200-300 for a case
2) I worked my backside off to cut all the nice features and save costs, although this is a challenge a designer loves.

>>What hurts this project is the fact that the Minimig formfactor is so unique and it is only houses Minimig v1.0 and v1.1 boards. Perhaps if the design can be adapted to house an Efika without the production company charging the same development costs then future projects will help to recover the costs of this first venture.

The sketches I have made for the Efika are not too dissimilar, we'll see.

If the meeting goes well and I can keep the price at around 85 Euros ($135 or £65 GBP) I would be quite happy and with me the people who buy it. :-)

I have this feeling that they'll say things like:"Have you included your time, your expenses, phone calls, days off work) which I haven't...

My main worry is starting production, reaching 50 sales (pre-orders) otherwise is Ciao, ciao

 :-)

[Darrin]

arnljot wrote:
@Darrin

$ is toy money now-a-days, he said €...

Strange, I get paid in US$ and I seem OK.  ;-)

[TheDaddy]

Cool! I have got a pre-order from Dennis...

Thank you  :-D

[Darrin]

TheDaddy wrote:
@Darrin
True, but my target is less than that for two reasons:

1) I wouldn't feel comfortable charging $200-300 for a case
2) I worked my backside off to cut all the nice features and save costs, although this is a challenge a designer loves.

>>What hurts this project is the fact that the Minimig formfactor is so unique and it is only houses Minimig v1.0 and v1.1 boards. Perhaps if the design can be adapted to house an Efika without the production company charging the same development costs then future projects will help to recover the costs of this first venture.

The sketches I have made for the Efika are not too dissimilar, we'll see.

If the meeting goes well and I can keep the price at around 85 Euros ($135 or £65 GBP) I would be quite happy and with me the people who buy it. :-)

I have this feeling that they'll say things like:"Have you included your time, your expenses, phone calls, days off work) which I haven't...

My main worry is starting production, reaching 50 sales (pre-orders) otherwise is Ciao, ciao

 :-)

It's just a shame that you've put in so much work if you don't get some sort of reward at the end.  Mind you, perhaps seeing people want to put a Minimig in your case will be reward enough for you.

I'm more worried about people saying things like "does that $135 include the motherboard, PSU and an SD card?"  ;-)

When you finally show the case pictures, can you also show the original design so we can see how much had to be lost to keep the cost down?  I'd really like to see your "ultimate Minimig" case concept.

[TheDaddy]

Talking of expensive Amiga stuff...

If you click on the boing ball on my site there you can see my modded A1200, which I sold for only £350 (pounds) a year later.

Look at the specs and if I had known that the BLizzardPPC alone goes for more than £350 I would have put it on ebay... :cry:

Massive mistake!

[arnljot]

TheDaddy wrote:
>> (but TheDaddy, you need to fix up Efika and SAM before >> Natami, Natami can still wait some months!
   
:-o  :lol:

I am drooling about the idea of making a case for those two motherboards, even though I have people pushing for a replacement A1200 case...

And I sympatize with them, But a new wedgie for the A1200 doesn't make sense. Either you have a working A1200 in a Tower or a wedgie, or you have a broken A1200 in a wedgie or a tower. Either way you do not need a new custom case for it. You might want one, but you do not need one...

ViaITX, Via PicoITX, Jetway ITX, Efika and SAM users are the one who needs cases.

Sure I can order a buttugly cheap ITX case from an online store and order a custom decal for it. But it'll be like getting drunk in a bar and settle... or - yeah you get the idea.

After seeing a hybrid mutant between the mac mini and Psile with my third eye, I've contemplated building my own from plexi. But cost of materials and tools, and lack of skills are holding me back.

The efika open client isn't ugly, but it's not pretty either. And only the GA630iBK for SAM is simple enough, but I'd spray it white and put on some amiga decals... But then I'm just glossing over again...

Requirements for a kick ass case for the Amiga users, with appeal to any ITX buyer:

- Plastic case. Three colors: White (pearl), Red (crimson), blue (midnight).
- Decals: Aros cat, morphos butterfly, amikit eye or your linux distro
- Roomy for cards: one AGP or PCI paralell to the motherboard (could be problem with samflex?) Also some Amiga people would like to have two cards: GPU and Catweasel.
- Room inside: 2.5" disk and slimline CD rom
- External front: One USB, on/off/read write led.
- External bacl: Power plug and cutout to i/o shield backplate. Backplates for Efika or sam included.
- No screws design. Itx card "snaps into place", and top can be removed from bottom plate for easy access to "innards".

Foot print, about the MacMini. Height: A bit taller than the mac mini since it'll have to fit at least one PCI/AGP card.

[arnljot]

Darrin wrote:
Strange, I get paid in US$ and I seem OK.  ;-)

Yup, just couldn't help my self. I'm not doing so okay, because US ebay and Amazon is getting more and more tempting with their offers due to the current exchange rate...

[TheDaddy]

>>I'm more worried about people saying things like "does that $135 include the motherboard, PSU and an SD card?"

AARGH!
 :laughing:

I then re-direct them to ACube, Vesalia, Amigakit! :-)

What would make me happy would be seeing the compatibility issues sorted and writing to ADFs to save a game position.

I would be quite happy with that. I am having so much fun playing the classic games from the Minimig, it sits nicely on the desk, stick the card in and off you go...nice :-)

[arnljot]

TheDaddy wrote:
Cool! I have got a pre-order from Dennis...

You have mail

[Darrin]

arnljot wrote:

And I sympatize with them, But a new wedgie for the A1200 doesn't make sense. Either you have a working A1200 in a Tower or a wedgie, or you have a broken A1200 in a wedgie or a tower. Either way you do not need a new custom case for it. You might want one, but you do not need one...

I've got 2 A1200 Towers and I have to say that I would like a case were I can house the A1200 mobo, mount a CD ROM drive and a couple of hard drives to my FastATA, access all the ports and still have it in a "wedge-like" design.  In other words, either a thicker (taller) wedge case design to mount the drives below or above the mobo or some sort of "shelf" behind the keyboard.

Unless you're using a Mediator or similar (or you have a fetish for hard drives), the typical A1200 tower has a lot of wasted space that will never be used.

[TheDaddy]

>>And I sympatize with them, But a new wedgie for the A1200 doesn't make sense. Either you have a working A1200 in a Tower or a wedgie, or you have a broken A1200 in a wedgie or a tower. Either way you do not need a new custom case for it. You might want one, but you do not need one...

It's mostly because of the yellowing and some would like a bit more space, enought for an internal CD-ROM.

>>ViaITX, Via PicoITX, Jetway ITX, Efika and SAM users are the one who needs cases.

Roger! :-)

>>I've contemplated building my own from plexi. But cost of materials and tools, and lack of skills are holding me back.

I agree with that, plexi is fine but try and make 50+! Argh!

>>Requirements for a kick ass case for the Amiga users, with appeal to any ITX buyer:

- Plastic case. Three colors: White (pearl), Red (crimson), blue (midnight).
- Decals: Aros cat, morphos butterfly, amikit eye or your linux distro
- Roomy for cards: one AGP or PCI paralell to the motherboard (could be problem with samflex?) Also some Amiga people would like to have two cards: GPU and Catweasel.
- Room inside: 2.5" disk and slimline CD rom
- External front: One USB, on/off/read write led.
- External bacl: Power plug and cutout to i/o shield backplate. Backplates for Efika or sam included.
- No screws design. Itx card "snaps into place", and top can be removed from bottom plate for easy access to "innards".

Foot print, about the MacMini. Height: A bit taller than the mac mini since it'll have to fit at least one PCI/AGP card.


Taking notes...
 :-D

[Darrin]

arnljot wrote:

Yup, just couldn't help my self. I'm not doing so okay, because US ebay and Amazon is getting more and more tempting with their offers due to the current exchange rate...

I know what you mean.  My brother lives in England and he ordered a Laptop for one of his sons from a USA website as it was about a third of the price it would have been in the UK at the current exchange rate.  He had it delivered to my house and I said I'd mail it to him.  UPS charged me $217 to mail it to him ("We have a special on today sir, and you get 10% off!") and then he was charged 85 quid when he received it for importation tax.  It still worked out a couple of hundred pounds cheaper for him.