Re: Need Help: Using an Apple ][ GS case to house new hardware.

[supertimer@aol.com (Supertimer)]

cornelio <cornelio@san.rr.com> wrote:

>daniel@vgparadise.net (Daniel Tharp) wrote:
>
>> Hi, I'm a newcomer to this group but I'm sure somebody here can help.
>> My high school has four Apple 2 GS computers, with monitors, disk
>> drives and peripherals, none of which have been so much as turned on
>> in at least 5 years. I'm 15 (as are the computers), and I'm the local
>> computer wiz, so I figure it's expected of me to make an offer on the
>> computers. To my surprise (or on second thought, maybe not) I was
>> offered them at no charge. I'm not quite so dedicated as to find
>> software and hardware required to utilize them as-is, so I thought of
>> an alternative: removing all the innards, mounting a new motherboard,
>> and placing new hardware inside it. I've seen people mod the cases of
>> NES' so I'm sure it'd be a breeze compared to that, but I lack the
>> specs and dimensions of the cases. Any and all help will be greatly
>> valued, and if all goes well I'll have some pictures of it too.
>
>hey I think if you SAVE one & get ot runnin & have fun then sure - do a 
>MOD on the other - it is a cooler thing than tossing it in the dumpster, 
>where most of them end up. :(

I agree.  Preserve one first, then mod the other.  When I
posted of my plan to mod a IIGS into a Stealth PC, I
received some shocked replies.  But what people did
not realize was that I already had two IIGS computers
that functioned as IIGSes, one a decked out ROM 3
unit in the stock case and the other a ROM 01 unit in
a PC tower case.  It only seemed fair to save the IIGS
case from the one that was towerized and turn it into
a Stealth PC.

What you need for your project is one of the small
form factor computers that have a small power supply
and motherboard inside.  The Shuttle XPC or like
will do.  Just remove the hardware, drill new mounting
holes in the IIGS case, and install the motherboard
and power supply.  Be careful not to drill the holes
too big.  You have one shot because the case is
plastic, not metal.

I would choose the Shuttle XPC model with the
nForce2 chipset and Athlon XP support rather than
the P4 version simply because the nForce2 chipset
supports more built in features.  Note: The IIGS
case's height is not sufficient to accomodate add-in
PC cards, so it is important that all the features
you want are integrated onto the motherboard.
nForce2 has Firewire, the Soundstorm audio
processor (Dolby Digital surround and excellent
audio quality rivaling the Audigy), USB 2.0,
networking, and Geforce4 MX440 graphics.