I didn't know I was making a mod, but I guess this qualifies.
In 1993 I made a sort of AMIGA NAS in a desk.
I had an Amiga 1200 with an upgraded 68020 and more RAM.
It required a bigger power supply that was almost the same as a PC-AT PSU.
When I bought a 20MB SCSI hard drive, I got to modding.
I was using an IKEA typewriter desk. It was about 3 feet wide with plywood sides, back, a knee shelf and had caster wheels. I bought a dead IBM PC, the 1st one, and gutted it for the case. I mounted the Amiga PSU, Amiga SCSI controller, SCSI HD and floppy drive in the IBM case. The Amiga expansion port was on the left side of the keyboard/case. The SCSI drive I had was supposed to pop onto the side of the Amiga. I took it apart for the controller and got an Amiga extension ribbon cable. I screwed the PC to the left side of the IKEA desk. I ran the SCSI ribbon out from the side of the PC, up the desk and bent it into the Amiga.
Next Stoopid Mod
My girl friend has a lame Lenovo M58 that I am upgrading with a Geforce 730 and 4GB RAM.
The Industrial Design of the compact case is very nice and it's not a bad PC as long as you never upgrade it. The PSU is only 280W and can't be changed. The PCI slots are backwards to normal motherboards and most 2-slot GPU's wont fit.
I got the diabolical thought I could build a mini ITX system in the case. I want to do it but only if she helps pay for it. The stock 2.8Ghz Core 2 Duo is fast enough for her, but the lack of 4-cores and a GPU make me nuts. Putting $400 of new parts in an old $100 computer just re-use the hard-to-work-in but beautiful case doesn't seem to make sense, but that is why I plan carefully.
Parts:
Intel Core i3-4170 Dual-Core 3.7 GHz LGA 1150 Desktop Processor
ASRock H81M-ITX/WIFI LGA 1150 Intel Mini ITX Intel Motherboard
Mushkin Enhanced ECO2 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3 1600 Memory
MSI GeForce GTX 750 Ti 2GB Video Card
EVGA 500W 80 PLUS Power Supply
Mod Planning:
The main issue with the Lenovo case is the power supply. It is currently where the GPU has to go. And the rear I/O has the PCI slots on the left with the PSU on the right. I would have to leave the new PSU outside the case and run the cables in through the 2 card slot openings.
To mount the GPU I would remove the card slot bracket so it could fit behind the old PSU grille. Somehow I would secure the card to the grille. There is a serial port knockout in the case on the right. I would run the new GPU's VGA ribbon cable over to the serial hole.
What was your 1st mod?
. What was your favorite mod?
. . What will you mod next?
