Homemade Mini Case for G4 Sawtooth

[markyb86]

This may fit a G3 B&W, I'll have to test when I get that far.

I recently gutted my G4 Sawtooth for another project. Needing a new home for the internals, I've been thinking about building a case. Riding the coattails of bigmessowires Mini LC case, Here's what I've come up with so far.


I've drawn the entire case so far, after using the http://www.makercase.com/generator. The dimensions are loosely based on the Quadra 700.

I have to measure the ports still, but this is where I am at while planning.

I'm going to use a Pico PSU, and a ATX -> Mac conversion cable. 

I would like to get a low profile PC ATI Rage 128 flashed to Mac firmware to save some space. 

I will forego the CD Rom drive as I will use networking or zip disks to transfer data. If CD data is desperately needed I'll figure something out in the future. 

The zip drive will be mounted where the Quadra's floppy sits. It will sit over the G4's RAM slots. The IDE hard disk will be mounted directly above it so they can share one ribbon cable. 

An 80mm fan will be mounted on the back of the case, and a 120mm fan will sit against the front of the case pushing air over the heatsink and out the back.

I will wire some tact switches to the factory power board so that they can fit small buttons on the outside of the front of the case where the Quadra's were.

Since my power board already had an LED extension wired in to illuminate the apple logo on the G4 case, I'll use that wiring for the LED above the Zip drive.

I might get an IDE>CF adapter but I'm not really concerned about it yet.

The attached files have no port holes in the back yet. I might have the lines for the sides engraved as well. I was thinking more of holes in the bottom however. Not sure yet.

QuadraG41.0.zip

 

[bigmessowires]

Looks like a good start! The Pico PSU doesn't have a -5V output. Does the G4 Sawtooth need one?

How do you plan on attaching the case pieces together?

 

[markyb86]

If this pinout is correct (AGP G4), I should be ok without -5V. However I might need to split a 5V and drop it to 3.3V. 

I'll be getting this in opaque Ivory acrylic if I go that route (Looks like 80$). I think ill glue 5/6 sides together, and glue some blocks inside so I can screw the left side of the case on. I might do the whole thing in MDF depending on budget though.

 

[Trash80toHP_Mini]

Love it! How big is the board/dimensions of the case?

I bought a cute little buck converter for stepping 5V down to 3.3V. It's amazingly versatile, stepping just about any DC input voltage down to whatever voltage is needed. I was wondering if the same deal might be available for stepping -12V down (up?) to -5V?

 

[bigmessowires]

If you do need -5V, here's a small and cheap solution using an LM2662: https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1PCS-LM2662-Negative-Voltage-Converter-Module-5V-5V-Negative-Power-Supply-Module/32788133879.html

I like the idea of gluing 5 sides and then gluing blocks for screw holes for the 6th. I wish I'd thought of that! My tabs and slots are kind of a pain to deal with.  

 

[Trash80toHP_Mini]

Nice little unit there! That'll be going into my IIsi case enabling use of a harvested PSU.

marky, add a slot to your case wherever it's convenient to install an adapted slot loader from a Power/Mac/iBook whenever you get around to it.

Consider backpainting clear plexi parts for your preferred color scheme, with detailing! [] ]'>

 

[markyb86]

so the board is 10 inches front to back, and 11 5/8 inches long. it needs almost a half inch under it as well. total of about 5 inches are needed to clear everything with the drives mounted.

I have the case dimensions at 11 x 6 x 14". With the extra space I might be able to put two fans aiming down to blast air out the bottom. The factory case had a fan mounted on the side vertically, but it pushed air into the wall and it was going out a few half-penny sized slots.

The idea for gluing the case came from the only other box I ever built, for a subwoofer. Lol

Edit: jt, we posted exactly the same minute haha. I have thought of what I would do with an optical drive. a slim drive might work facing the rear of the case actually....

 

[Trash80toHP_Mini]

LOL! Under the top of your tower, CubeStyling!

Can you run a DTG3 without the useless personality card? That board is just begging for a minimalist micro tower build. I've got a three slot 2U Rackmount PCI Riser Card that should reduce the required cubic considerably. It's the one I skuggested earlier. It's not quite as short as the low profile VidCard you're planning to flash, but it might work even better?

 

[markyb86]

That's one hell of an option. The only reason I'm going with the lopro ATI card is this logic board has AGP graphics which might be a percentage or two faster than a PCI graphics card. My G3 has a lopro PCI graphics card but it can keep it  

Looking over my drawing again it's actually 12.25" tall x 6" wide by 14" long. I printed just the front out on two pieces of letter paper taped together haha. I'm going to see how this works on cardboard as well I think.

 

[Trash80toHP_Mini]

Noggin->Paper->Paper spraymented to Cardboard->Plexi prototyping is my process.***

Lose the finger joints entirely and have front bezel and backplane only lasercut to save beaucoups greenbacks.

score and snap the other four sides or have them cut to size from a Plexi sheet at Lowe's.

If you can live with fancy heads on four to six 4-40 machine screws or capscrews displayed on the frontspiece, definitely have clear parts cut for backpainting.

*** Luckily I only build a small percentage of the stuff I prototype in 3D. For me the real fun's in process of figuring out how to do something that seems highly improbable as a hobby, trying to do the impossible is my addiction. Long ago I learned that virtual builds translated into paper mockups rock. Limiting the number of builds IRL is hard for me, but has to be done or I'd wind up in a Maker/Modder's Hoarder House. :-/

 

[Trash80toHP_Mini]

That's one hell of an option.

Yeppers, may turn out to be really useful!

< TLDR tangent mode>

Looks like it might find its way into another homemade case thread for at some point:

Just tested the Beige G3DT without its personality card. So far so good and the two addressing jumper cable/cards are in hand. Now I need to find the card itself to test feasibility of a reduced profile, 2UBG3 mini bridge machine build. Stretching it out to fill a laser cut 19" rackmount case might be interesting. That's where finger jointing would come in very handy. Chemically welding the interlocking connections will add a tremendous amount of strength/rigidity. The backplane for the Mobo/PSU drawer would be pre-nested inside the framing members on the backside

ISTR something about adding a second NIC for somethingorother? Dunno, exploring possibilities for the little box's applications depends upon further successful testing, it may wind up being a bridge too far. Onto the backburner for that silly notion. Does the BG3 do PhoneNet/AppleTalk? Random question time!

I bought this very cool bit of Chinese jewelry to develop a high pin count/multiple connection (USB, HDMI etc.) backplane/breadboard interconnect for my OrangePi laptop build. It's the plug in connector for the Pi filling for the removable FDD enclosure. Sure am glad I haven't started desoldering connectors for hardwiring jumpers cables!

< /TLDR tangent mode>

The only reason I'm going with the lopro ATI card is this logic board has AGP graphics which might be a percentage or two faster than a PCI graphics card. My G3 has a lopro PCI graphics card but it can keep it

Very cool, I didn't know that board had built in video, learn something new every day!