PC in an Amiga Project - I'm ready to have a hack!

[Bloodwych]

I love my original A1200, but I would love one of these just as much:

http://images.arianchen.de/?x=a500pc
http://eab.abime.net/showthread.php?t=57636

A500 and A1200 with PC innards. Some would cry sacrilege, but there are a load of spare Amiga cases with dead motherboards so why not put them to good use?

It's possible to boot directly into WinUAE, or use it as am emulation machine.

Or just grab the newest version of the Zero footprint PC, which has been posted about many times: http://www.cybernetman.com/en/all-in-one-pc/Keyboard-pc/ZPC-D5

It's actually pretty nice looking and of course oldschool at the same time. Just don't spill your lunch on it! :D

[Harrison]

I've also been thinking of doing this for years, ever since I first starting reading about mini-itx motherboard projects.

And with the Keyrar available it makes interfacing the original Amiga keyboard, and also providing working Amiga joystick ports, really easy. Would definitely make a great emulation PC. I actually have a spare A1200 and A600 cases, and a spare A600 keyboard, so that is some way towards it.

The biggest question though is which motherboard to use as there are now so many available. I think it would need a bit of power, so a desktop CPU like a Core2Duo or if possible an i3, would be much preferred to an Atom or similar network CPU.

I would take it further than the A1200 project you linked to though. I would add a slot loading DVD-RW and look into the possibility of utilising the floppy drive location for a floppy drive, connected to either a CatWeasel or a KryoFlux. There are some mini-ITX board with a single PCI slow, and 90 degree PCI adapters so a CatWeasel could be mounted next to the motherboard in the case to make it fit.

[Tiago]

... in one way ,it's cool, in the other hand... it's like a knife on the back... PC inside the Miggy????

[Harrison]

Except if you have a spare case and keyboard, but no Amiga motherboard, then I think it is perfectly acceptable. But, people who actually rip out the guts of a working Amiga to do this need to just be shot!

[Tiago]

In that case...

[Tiago]

I was thinking about it.... i do have a spare case and keyboard...
you could use a micro-atx or a laptop m.board....
with a laptop board, you can use it's own power supply, but what about micro-atx, will you put a small one inside, or use an external PSU ?

[Harrison]

Obviously the best solution would be to mount the PSU inside the case. You can get Pico PSUs that would easily fit and can be used with Mini-ITX boards that often only need 12V power.

[Tiago]

Obviously the best solution would be to mount the PSU inside the case. You can get Pico PSUs that would easily fit and can be used with Mini-ITX boards that often only need 12V power.

This ones ?
http://www.logicsupply.eu/power-supplies/dc-converters?gclid=CPv4prSBi6oCFZQNfAodDAyt0Q

you put that thing in mother micro-atx mboard and then connect to a laptop PSU ?
If this is what you are talking abuot, .... 27 euros for this adapter plus 19 for the PSU ... total +/- 46 euos ... just for power.....
then there is the mboard.... omg the project will be expensive....
the best choice maybe is getting a laptop mboard with it's own psu ....

[Harrison]

There are loads of different combinations of motherboard and PSU for such projects. None are going to be really cheap though. You could probably build a more powerful full PC setup for less, but then you are buying components to fit into a restricted space, that require less heat dissipation and run a lot quieter.

[Tiago]

i looked for micro-atx, but i think a laptop motherboard should be the best. And i have a friend that will give me one for free... That's great.
So:
- I have the A1200 case and keys
- i will have the laptop motherboard with PSU
- I have 1 IDE to compact-flash adapter to use as HD
- i will have to get the keyboard adapter from amigakit or vesalia
- i will have to get some usb extentions and ports, to adapt them to the 1200 case.

Now a question:
Any IDE to compact-flash adapter will work as HD? there are type I and II but will they both work?
what about installing the OS, will it recognize the compact-flash as an HD?

[Harrison]

Any IDE to CF adapter should work fine. I personally would stick with a conventional HDD though. CF cards a silent and in older systems faster, but most CF cards can only transfer at 30MB/s, whereas the final IDE version has a 133MB/s speed and most of the recent IDE HDDs support that and can maintain 66MB/s+ so are a lot faster than a CF card. Also as this is going to be a PC it will probably be running Windows? Windows needs a HDD cache and this will keep writing to the HD, and with a CF card it does have a finite number of write operations, so this could end up being an issue. Also if you are considering Windows 7 then a 100GB+ system partition is recommended, although you could probably get away with 50GB for a while. With XP you can live with 10-20GB for some time.

You can also buy cheap 2.5" IDE or SATA laptop HDDs for around £35 these days so now expensive.

How will you be altering the ports on the back of the case? I've seen most people cut a large single hole and then use a sheet of metal to make a backplate for the actual ports. With a Laptop motherboard you might be able to reuse the existing backplate from the laptop shield.

The other issue is display. How will you be running the display? Normally laptop GPUs output their main display to the internal LCD via a ribbon cable, with many having a second output via a VGA or HDMI port. However these extra outputs normally need setting in the bios and software before they will becoming active and work as the default output, so remember to check this before you dismantle the laptop.

[Tiago]

Thank for the info Harrison, i will keep the HD. compact-flash would be a cool thing, noise reduction... but in this project, no more advantages then that... space should not be a problem.

OS? XP or linux... i didn't try UAE in linux yet, but if it works nice, i would go for it.

the ports in the Back? I will avoid making a single hole... i hope i can use the 1200 holes. i will try to create backplates.
For display i will use the vga connector port (must check first if bios allow it, thanks for remind it)
I will do every test before opening the laptop, i now for pervious experience that removing all components in a laptop is one thing, but putting them together is another completly different thing.

You were talking about the internal LCD, in this case it is not working the LCD, but the vga output is (as my friend said, must check that when i get the laptop), anyway, can i use the ribbon cable and make a convertion to use it externally?

[Tiago]

Hi, about the project PC inside Amiga
i friend just gave me a Laptop Dell 630, the case is in bad shape, but it all works nice.
I did a Windows fresh setup, put winuae in it, OS39 with Picasso96 drivers, and i now have a nice Amiga "system"

I remove the wnidows logo at startup, and will remove the logon/logoff messages.
I did try the command line for winuae to automaticly load a configuration and i will put windows to start winuae in boot.

i am ready for disassemble the laptop to put the M. Board inside the A1200 case, but i still miss the Keyrah adaptor (need to buy it).
I still dont know what to do with the laptop PSU, if gets to hot to put inside the A1200 case, so i should put it externaly.
Also about the HD, should i put a compact-flash or keep a real HD?

[Harrison]

As you are running a PC I would keep the real HDD as a CF card isn't really up to the requirements of Windows. Fine for older retro systems though.

Regarding the PSU, it might be worth looking at PICO PC PSUs to see if any would work with your laptop motherboard. You would then be able to locate the PSU inside the A1200 case to make it nice and neat.

[Tiago]

yes i guess that would be great, but they are a bit expensive, and i allready have to buy keyrah... i don't want to expend to much.
the laptop was free, so so far i didn't buy anything, just need keyrah, and then a few cables, usb ports, and some other stuff, but cheap components.

the compact flash should be better to forget as you say, this dell latittude 630 is not very fast, so i need all the extra power. winuae with os39/picasso is a bit resorce eater...

[Harrison]

What are the laptops specs? If you want to gain extra speed it might be worth considering some of the custom Windows XP setups that are available. I forget their names at the moment, but can find them for you later and give you the links. They are called things like miniXP. Their developers have removed all non-essential stuff from XP and really optimised what is left to produce a much more lightweight version of XP that runs much faster and requires less ram. Ideal for an emulation system.