Commodore 1541 Disk Drive PC mod – Part II

After a trip to Maplins to pick up a few spare parts I started rewiring for the PC power/reset switch, HDD LED and Power LED header connections.

Reusing front panel header cable/pin block from a spare PC I wrote down the the connections and resoldered the original 1541 case LED’s.

Also from Maplins,  I brought a new on/off switch and fitted this where the original on/off switch was located. I was going to use the original switch but after cutting a section out of the case it wouldn’t fit any more 😦

Since removing the original floppy drive unit there isn’t  anything to affix the front panel to so I super-glued it to the lower half of the 1541 case. I’ve used cable ties to secure some of the cables however I didn’t bother with the ATX cables as these would be exchanged for a PICO psu at a later date.

I connected the PSU and flipped the on button and the original green power led lit up. I bet it’s been some years since this was lit!

I ran the PC for a few hours with the the case lid attached and the temperature didn’t really increase any. However, as I intend to use it as a NAS drive and potentially running 24/7 I though fitting a fan might be best after all.

I opted for a silent 80cm Akasa case fan which emits  blue light when spinning and looks really cool when the light shines through the case top vent.

Here’s a close up

..and here’s how everything looks inside so far. The fan sits loose on the top of the board but I’ve since super-glued it to the top half of the 1541 case.

As it is, the PC is quite usable although I still have a list of things to do –

• Swap out the MATX for a Pico PSU/ external laptop mains adapter
• Replace the flat/ugly grey IDE ribbon with a new thinner cable (I have one in my spare box but it’s a double IDE cable therefore way to much cable for my liking.
• Change the 3.5″ for a 2.5″ – I only have a spare 30mb 2.5″ drive so capacity wise, not really big enough to be useful.
• Test to see if the PC will boot from Compact Flash cartridge.
• Possibly fit a spare slimline CD Rom drive. I tested this earlier today and if i remove the CD front bezel, there’s just enough room to eject a CD through the original 1541 front bezel. I just need to figure out where to put the eject button.

Now…what else can I transform into a PC….our mantle clock looks big enough 🙂