Pimpin' my A1200

[Orcish75]

Pimpin’ my A1200

(This was inspired by Mfilos’ amazing A600 project http://www.amibay.com/showthread.php?t=5726 and by amiman99's slim CD drive mod http://eab.abime.net/showthread.php?t=48042)


Part one: Floppy drives and PS/2 mouse adapter

It all started when the original floppy drive in my A1200 died. My A1200 is my least favourite Amiga (don’t worry, I still love her) it’s just that it didn’t stir the emotions like my first A500 did, the A1200 just felt too little too late for me. When the floppy died, the ACA1230 had also just been released so that convinced me to pimp her out. I searched for some floppy drives, but all the PC drives I came across lacked the _READY signal. I couldn’t modify them either as the controller chips on the drives had no _READY pin on them. We had a few decommissioned Dell servers at the office with slim-line floppy drives in them and I wandered if they could be used on the Amiga. (Sorry for the poor quality pics, the camera on my Nokia 5800 Express isn’t the best)



After a bit of Googling, I found out that just about all the floppy drive manufacturers did indeed include the _READY signal on their slim floppy drives. The only problem with the slim-floppy drives is that they have a 26 pin FFC connector, rather than the standard 34 pin IDC connector. I would have to make a converter board of some sort to use these drives. The slim drives are exactly half the height of a regular PC floppy drive, which got me thinking: Can I put two slim drives in the space occupied by the old regular drive? After some measuring, they would fit perfectly but they would need some form of a bracket to do so.

With plenty of old blown PC power supplies lying around, I got out the ruler, pencil and tin snips. After a LOT of measuring and fiddling, I cut out two brackets in order to mount two drives.







Originally I had the drives perfectly one on top of the other, however when I put them in the A1200 case, it looked a bit odd due to the shape of the case. I decided to move the top drive back a bit to have a staggered appearance. This looked much better as it flowed with the lines on the case a lot better.



Next up was to interface the drives to the internal floppy connector. Unfortunately, the internal floppy connector lacks a couple of signals needed for two drives, these signals are _DRESET and _MTRX (Motor on X). I tapped these signals from the external floppy connector and soldered them to two unused pins on the internal floppy connector.

Edit: Sorry, the signal isn't _DS1 as I had previously. _DS1 is available on the internal connector. The signal is _DRESET to reset the flip-flop when the A1200 is reset or switched on.



However, _MTRX is not enough to control MO1 (Motor On 1) on the second drive, some extra logic is required to latch the signal with the DS1 signal to produce the MO1 signal. I’m not going to go into detail here, there are a lot explanations and circuit diagrams on Aminet should you wish to investigate further.

A friend of mine built a circuit board that can do everything in one, change the 34 pin IDC connector to two 26 pin FFC connectors, the necessary logic for the MO1 signal and power for the drives. (Thanks Murray!)





Next, I cut the case with a hacksaw and cleaned it up with a needle file in order for the drives to be properly exposed.



While I was sorting out the drives, I modified one of my PS/2 mouse adapters so that I could install it into the A1200 at the same time. I put some diodes on each signal to protect the PIC should the mouse and joystick be plugged in at the same time.



I drilled the case just under the floppy drives to mount the PS/2 adapter.







This is the final result with the drives and the PS/2 adapter.

[Orcish75]

Part two: Slim DVD drive

The old Dell servers also came with slim DVD drives, I just had to put one in my A1200! I thought a lot about how I would mount it securely in the A1200 and in the end decided to mount it to the keyboard on the underside.



Once again, I called upon the trusty blown PC power supplies to forge some brackets for the DVD drive. This was by far the most time consuming part of the whole project. I had to measure a million times to ensure that the holes I drilled lined up properly and that the drive lined up properly with the hole I cut in the case. Also the one bracket had to be bent in order to fit over the thin section of the DVD drive.



I attached the brackets and the JAE-50 to IDE converter to the DVD drive.



I used the screws that hold the keyboard together to mount the drive on the keyboard. 6 screws were used in total, 3 on each side.



Just to be sure that the power tracks on the motherboard don’t carry too much current with the two floppy drives and the DVD drive, I soldered some Molex connectors from one of the blown PC PSU’s directly on the motherboard where the Amiga PSU plugs in.



I then cut and filed a hole in the top of the case for the DVD drive.



DVD drive done!

[Orcish75]

Part 3: CF card reader and Indivision AGA MKII

The final part of my pimpin’ was to add a CF card reader and the Indivision AGA MKII. I bought one of these el-cheapo dual CF readers off EBay.



The reason why I bought a dual reader is that I can have one CF card permanently installed in the A1200 (master)and then have the second port (slave) exposed in order to transfer info from my other Amigas or PC. I originally bought a 16GB Transcend CF card but it would not cold boot when the ACA1230 was installed. When I pressed Ctrl -A-A to warm boot it, only then it would boot properly. The 8GB and 4GB cards would cold boot without problems.

The side with the 44pin IDC connector faced inside the A1200 with the opposite side exposed to the outside world. I bought the IDE-Fix97 from Mfilos off Amibay (Thanks Mfilos!) When using the IDE-Fix 97 software with CF cards that aren’t set to true IDE mode, you have to update the IDE-Fix 97 software or the card won’t work. Here is the link to Doobrey’s page with the fix. http://www.doobreynet.co.uk/amiga.html





The Indivision AGA 1200 MKII installed.



I drilled two holes at the bottom to securely mount the DVI connector from the Indivision. I know most people use the existing hole, but I wanted the DVI connector to be flush in the middle.



I then cut the small cover for the DVI connector.



Double checked that there’s enough space for my ACA1230-28 with the DVD installed. Had to cut away the lips on each side so that the ACA1230-28 would fit properly.





Everything in place before closing her up.



Finished!



I was worried about the heat generated by all the extra components, but I've been running her for hours at a time without a single hiccup, no graphics corruption or GURU's so I'm a happy man! The case feels warm to the touch, but certainly not hot. It's a 1D4 motherboard with the timing fixes applied and a modded 200W PC PSU giving her the juice.

All in all it took me nearly two years to do the mods. (Obviously not all in one sitting!) Whenever I had a spare moment between life and tinkering with my first love, my A2000, I'd do a little extra on the A1200. If you do decide to pimp out one of your Amigas, be patient! Especially when cutting out the case. It's very easy to slip and damage it permanently. Also wear an anti-static wrist band whenever handling any of the electronics.

I must say, I really enjoyed pimpin' out my A1200 and she gets a lot more attention now as a result!

[Jope]

Merged, one thread per project please.

Good job on the slimline floppy drives! :-)

[clauddio]

the double floppy drive...lol...I never seen a mod like that on the A1200
you have a good inventiveness

[fitzsteve]

Nice tidy mods, awesome work

[1time]

Nice mod..

[johnim]

great hacking there

[hooverphonique]

does that Murray guy work at a pcb fab company? looks like a pro job, but would otherwise be a bit expensive for a one-off -)

[Orcish75]

Merged, one thread per project please.

Sorry for that, I didn't know how to overcome the 15 pics per post limitation.

Nice tidy mods, awesome work

Thanks man! It did take a while, so I think it was worth it.

does that Murray guy work at a pcb fab company? looks like a pro job, but would otherwise be a bit expensive for a one-off

He doesn't work in a PCB factory, but he does a lot of PCB design. He had it made when he submitted a bunch of his prototypes. I'll see if we can get some boards made if anyone is interested.

[kriz]

Lookin good !!

[Jope]

Originally Posted by Orcish75

He doesn't work in a PCB factory, but he does a lot of PCB design. He had it made when he submitted a bunch of his prototypes. I'll see if we can get some boards made if anyone is interested.

Yup, please let us know. :-)

[Orcish75]

No problem, got 9 of these boards from Murray, he had to make a batch of 10. If there's any real demand I'll ask him if he'll give me the Gerber file to make it available to everyone so that they can make their own boards. I've just bought the surface mount TTL chips and 26-pin FFC connectors. Still waiting for the 34-pin IDC connectors. I'll build up these 9 boards for whoever wants some, I'll make it at cost, so it won't be expensive, guessing around 10-15 Euros to make.

Let me know who's interested!

[Hewitson]

That double floppy drive is the most unusual Amiga mod I've ever seen, but I think it's a brilliant idea. Maybe I should try to fit 2 drives in one bay on my A2000.

[Amiga1992]

Holy shi... that double floppy drive surely is the most unique thing I've seen in Amiga mods and the best thing in your Amiga. Great job!!!

[Orcish75]

That double floppy drive is the most unusual Amiga mod I've ever seen, but I think it's a brilliant idea. Maybe I should try to fit 2 drives in one bay on my A2000.

Holy shi... that double floppy drive surely is the most unique thing I've seen in Amiga mods and the best thing in your Amiga. Great job!!!

Thanks for the compliments!

If you want to do the mod for your A2000, just make sure jumper j301 is open as the TTL logic is on the board I made.

I going to make a ver 1.1 of this board so that it can also be used for PC's, ST's, CPC's etc. I've also seen that people with samplers and synths are looking desperately for floppy drives that have the READY signal, so this second board could help them out too.

I'm just struggling to find the 26pin FFC cables that have a 1mm pitch at a reasonable price. All the cables I've seen on EBay are 0.5mm pitch. Once I've found those, I'll offer the nine rev 1.0 boards I have to anyone who wants them.

[Methanoid]

Great mods.

Do the FDDs work fine with all games etc and other stuff thats a bit more demanding of an FDD (trackloaders and the like)?

Would like to see a pic from other angle on the FDDs to see the staggered mounting.

Do the bezels come off those FDDs? Would be nice if they were sprayed to match, likewise the DVD bezel.

I like the PS2 mouse mod a lot...

You should offer the twin FDD as a kit for sale with brackets etc...

[Orcish75]

Do the FDDs work fine with all games etc and other stuff thats a bit more demanding of an FDD (trackloaders and the like)?

Yup, the Teac slimline drives I've used here have the READY signal on pin 8, so all trackloaders and various games that require the READY signal work without issue. The only issues I've encountered are ocs/ecs floppy games that don't work on the A1200, but these didn't work on my original floppy drive either.

Would like to see a pic from other angle on the FDDs to see the staggered mounting.

Here are some pics: They don't match up perfectly due to the shape of the case, but still looks OK none the less.

Do the bezels come off those FDDs? Would be nice if they were sprayed to match, likewise the DVD bezel.

Yup, they do come off, I might spray them t a leter stage, but for now I'm happy with the result.

You should offer the twin FDD as a kit for sale with brackets etc...

I'd love to do that, however the brackets were a mission to make, I had to cut up a PC PSU with tin snips and do a whole lot of measurements to line everything up properly. It was very labour intensive and I don't have access to anyone who can punch them out of sheet metal, so for now I won't be making any brackets!

[Methanoid]

Looks really nice. The staggered layout works well. Pretty sure someone over at AmiBay has identified a car spray colour that is a perfect match for an A1200 if you do decide to do the spray later

Maybe EAB has somebody else with ninja metalworking skills?

Is the PS2 adapter you own design or someone elses modified?

[moijk]

Originally Posted by Methanoid

Looks really nice. The staggered layout works well. Pretty sure someone over at AmiBay has identified a car spray colour that is a perfect match for an A1200 if you do decide to do the spray later

I doubt the color of a typical a1200 is like the color of the next a1200. I would kept it black, given the chance of discoloration later on. plus chipping paint while swapping disks