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Portable with changeable control panels - Complete (More or less)
Hawkweber:
Got some more work done. Cut out the fan area in the back - so long nice starburst pattern, hello hole. :'(
But then added the new fan grille, so it is not so bad. :)
Did the same thing for the side intake fan:
I need to grind down a bit of the inside of the side fan hole as the fan blades are touching the mdf, but that is no biggie.
The big clunky behemoth of a cpu fan went bye-bye as it sounded like it was going to tear itself apart. Bought a slimline one from newegg and installed it - much quieter now.
If you didn't notice the "wallplate" panel on the back next to the fan, that is where the external video and audio connections will go. Used a Leviton QuickPort plate. The top insert is for the composite video out. Cut out some of the plate for the vga out. The idea on that was to cut a vga cable down to size to reduce weight and clutter in the case and solder the wire ends to the female d-sub connector. Well, after tearing apart the end of a vga cable (not an easy job, actually), I don't think this is going to work as the number of wires I expected are not there. So, I may just have to use a full size cable and figure out a better way to have it go through the panel. This is what it looks like from the inside:
The other two slots will be for an external s-video connection (waiting on that panel-mount part to arrive) and external 3.5mm audio connection (which will be used when I eventually build a "home" for the portable) but I just haven't drilled out the hole in a blank insert yet.
The other major bit of electrical work (and something that took way too much of my time) was the USB connectors. Since the panels will be connecting to this using cat 5 cable and rj45 connectors set in a 4-gang box, I needed a way to get the 2 USB devices (trackball and spinner) to connect nicely. First I was going to try to mount a dual usb connector in the box, but 1) it would fit very well and 2) the height of everything with the USB plugs inserted would interfere with the control panel. So, after a LOT of cutting, splicing, testing, and cursing, I finally ended up with using a piece of pcb board to connect the 8 USB pinout lines from the motherboard connector cable to 8 cat5 cable wires and terminated that in an RJ45 quickport insert:
Then, I hacked apart (desoldered) 2 USB ports from an old USB expansion card that came with a previous motherboard and soldered them to another piece of pcb board along with the 8 wires on another piece of cat5 cable and terminated that with an rj45 modular plug.:
Tested and it works! Yay!
The fan on the power supply stopped working so I had to replace it with another one I had lying around. Problem here is that this one doesn't have the nice "flange" on it that would allow me to secure it to the bottom of the case. Does anyone have an idea on the best way to secure this power supply to the base (keeping in mind that it is MDF)?
Now, enough of this electrical crap for now - I want to put the darn case together! So, next step is to glue it all together, sand it nice and even, then work on getting the changeable panel lock-downs installed and figure out what size hinges I will need for the top admin panel.
Hawkweber:
I thought it would be enough of the electrical crap for now, but I read online that you can make long vga extension runs using cat5 cables. I figure if it can be done for long runs, then a short 1.5' or so cable can be done too. Using 2 cat5 cables I was able to put this together:
and here's a closeup of one end (sorry for the blur):
Plugged into the video card and monitor and it worked! By doing it this way, I am able to bend the cable closer to the motherboard, so less space is needed on the side.
Since the soldering iron was still hot, I decided to continue with the panel mount audio connector and the new s-video panel mount I got (this one uses screw terminals):
After completing the soldering, I used a hot-glue gun to coat the connectors to prevent possible short-circuits as well as to strengthen the hold.
(Still trying to find thin enough bolts/nuts to secure the vga and s-video panel mounts to the external plate - everything I have it either a tad bit too wide or will be too small in length.)
I was on a roll, so I finished up with punching down the cat5 cables to their quick-port jacks (that will be used for the control panel attachments).
These cables will run to the key-wiz encoder and one goes to the usb connector on the motherboard.
These are the ports for the connections. Top white - 2 joysticks, top blue - Player 1 buttons (7) and ground, bottom black - Player 2 buttons (6) and secondary ground, bottom white - USB controls (Trackball and spinner).
Then I took 7 lengths of cat5 and crimped on rj45 plugs - these get attached to the control panels. Plug end goes in to the above modular block. Other end gets wired onto a european terminal block on the underside of the control panel and the buttons and joysticks will be wired into those blocks, except for the USB cables as they get plugged into the custom 2-port pcb connector I previously made.
njay:
Nice cable work !
Hawkweber:
--- Quote ---Nice cable work !
--- End quote ---
Thanks! I just hope I can do as good a wiring job on the control panel side.
wilno45:
Very good cable work.
:applaud: