Project: MacImposter - 06/07/04 **Large Update** (56k LOL)

I wasnt expecting them to shoot it to be honest , so I hadnt made the IO plate I was going to.

 

Thought you'd like this:

 

Been a busy bee the last day or two and i've got quite alot done on the case, i managed to bodge together a tempory drive cage out of a drive cage form one of my old cases:





*Notice the large gash out of my index finger! Moddin injuries **

Its very badly bended and put together but it works and its only in there for a while whilst i source down a proper G3 drive cage.



And here it is inside the case

Unfortunately when i attempted to close the door with the motherboard and the drive cage fitted the capacitors rub up against the side of the drive cage and sits pretty much 'on' the Cd-rom side. Now the drive cage issue will hopefully be solved when i get a proepr drive cage that doesnt have random prutruding puts of metal on it, however will the capacitors be ok sitting so close (pretty much touching) the cd-rom case?


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Next is the motherboard tray, i sliced off the old standoffs using my trusty dremel and then drilled some 5mm holes ready for some M4 25mm bolts:



As the bolts wernt in the stock positions i had to 'adjust' the plastic tray which acts as the spring for the door my dremeling some holes which allow movement around the new bolts.



A test fit shows the motherboard sitting perfectly on the motherboard tray using the 2 bolts i added aswell as a few plastic 'things' which sit in the motherboard holes and just sit on top of the motherboard tray giving it some support.

Here is everything fitted in the case and as it currently stands:



Next on the Agenda is the ATX Extension cable which is in the post.
An I/O port which i'm gonna try to make out of perspex to see how it goes, if not then ill fab one out of Alu.
Fitting the drive cage and hoping to god it doesnt get in the way of the capacitors.
Somehow get the front button to power the pc and display the HDD status aswell as fitting the power LED and restart button. (more on this below)
General tidying up + sleeving all of the cables within the case.

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The buttons on the front of the case normally operate a quite complex circuit (for my lack of electronics knowledge anyway), so i took that out and im left with 3 buttons, power, restart and another button which i dont know what it used to do but im planning on leaving it.

I have come up with the idea of using the existing circuit holder (metal thingy that sits over the buttons and holds the circuit in the right place) and drilling some holes in the back to line up some momentary switches + LEDs and then using a mixture of hot glue and luck to get the whole thing to work. I havent really thought about it much until now but im not really one to plan, i just generally do stuff then complain when it doesnt work lol.

Here are the buttons:



And that is the end of this update!

Ideas and criticisms are always welcome!

 

nobody cares :\

 

We're watching... some of us just don't post much

If I were going to convert an Apple over, I'd try to made damn sure it looked totally like an Apple once I'd finished (ok except for the back panel ) Looks like your doing it right, although I'd probably have a little patience and not let that drive cage near it if I were you.

Perhaps that third button would make a good 'mute' button?

I always reckon this sort of mod is a bit of an 'anti-mod'... much work goes into it, but it looks like (a good conversion) nothing has been done

 

I have done the power button but the Apple one on the front of the case doesnt push very far so it doesnt actually turn it on cause it doesnt push the sp switch far enough, gonna have to make a trip to maplins to pick one up that doesnt require much button depth!

 

Ok some insite here... from a mac person and a modder...

The G3 blue and white powermac case (B&W) has the holders as you have seen in the pic that was provided. I would have made a bracket like the one that came from apple instead of the way you did it but that is ok. The HDDs screw down into those removable trays with special thin screws that also came with the B&W when new. Any normal hdd screw should work in this case.

The bracket is to hold 2 hard disks in one rack, I am therefore assuming that your case is a revision 2 B&W then because the original could only support one HDD per ide channel (ATA66). I do not know what all the fuss is with the cdrom not working because the powermac will take normal cdroms, I even but a pioneer dvd-rw in mine a while back.

I will be watching this to see how it goes... someone who uses a mac case for a pc should do it right not to disgrace the mac case...

Oh ya Project Name :: Project Mac Impostor...

 

The cd-rom fits fine, its the motherboard thats an issue because there are some capacitors that hit the cd-rom when the door is closed.