Trash80toHP_Mini
NIGHT STALKER
A couple of years ago, I decided to do a hack that'd be what I thought of as a Mac Mini. I eBayed a 12" MacBook Top Panel to test its suitability for the side panels. I wanted to have White-Light-Logos on the sides or a spot to make a pair of Rainbow Logos. Everything looked good, so I got another lid for the other side panel.
I found a ComPaq Presario SR1000Z sitting next to the compactor fairly recently and snagged it. The front panel and drives . . . heck, the whole thing was in great shape, but it wasn't really something I wanted to use. After a while I noticed how nicely the curve of the front bezel's top could be made concentric with the curve on the corners of the 12" MacBook lids. I finally realized that I could lop the grille off the bottom, lop the front bezel off just below the rounded A/V Bezel at the bottom of the I/O Stack and use a strip of clear Plexi as a spacer in between. With drive access LEDs lined up behind the clear plexi spacer should make it look like it was designed to be that way.
Unfortunately, there's not nearly enough room for my Micro-ATX ATOM NetTop board, but the Silver Sides and Gloss/Matte Black front bezel will make this a perfectly styled expansion chassis for HP-Maxi, the 3g HP Pavilion dm1 that's my main machine for the nonce. Who knows, maybe I'll wind up with a Hackintoshable MoBo that'll fit in there some day.
Meanwhile, a few IDE/ATAPI <-> USB2 adapters for the Zip & Opticals, a FireWire bridge for the HDD, Powered Hubs and a PSU to run the thing and it'll be really useful without a Proc on board. [}] ]'>
It's just roughed out for now, lots of tooling scars to clean up after the rest of the hackin' is done. The rest is pretty straight-forward metal and plastics fabrication work, other than widening the FDD opening in the glossy bezel, but I may be able to pull that off. Polishing plastic isn't something I enjoy unless it can be done with flames! [] ]'>
I'll post some better pics as soon as I can lop off the extra sheet metal at the bottom and get it standing on its own four feets.
I found a ComPaq Presario SR1000Z sitting next to the compactor fairly recently and snagged it. The front panel and drives . . . heck, the whole thing was in great shape, but it wasn't really something I wanted to use. After a while I noticed how nicely the curve of the front bezel's top could be made concentric with the curve on the corners of the 12" MacBook lids. I finally realized that I could lop the grille off the bottom, lop the front bezel off just below the rounded A/V Bezel at the bottom of the I/O Stack and use a strip of clear Plexi as a spacer in between. With drive access LEDs lined up behind the clear plexi spacer should make it look like it was designed to be that way.
Unfortunately, there's not nearly enough room for my Micro-ATX ATOM NetTop board, but the Silver Sides and Gloss/Matte Black front bezel will make this a perfectly styled expansion chassis for HP-Maxi, the 3g HP Pavilion dm1 that's my main machine for the nonce. Who knows, maybe I'll wind up with a Hackintoshable MoBo that'll fit in there some day.
Meanwhile, a few IDE/ATAPI <-> USB2 adapters for the Zip & Opticals, a FireWire bridge for the HDD, Powered Hubs and a PSU to run the thing and it'll be really useful without a Proc on board. [}] ]'>
It's just roughed out for now, lots of tooling scars to clean up after the rest of the hackin' is done. The rest is pretty straight-forward metal and plastics fabrication work, other than widening the FDD opening in the glossy bezel, but I may be able to pull that off. Polishing plastic isn't something I enjoy unless it can be done with flames! [] ]'>
I'll post some better pics as soon as I can lop off the extra sheet metal at the bottom and get it standing on its own four feets.