A600 Options

[fitzsteve]

Originally Posted by amigakit.com

PMail me the invoice number on which you originally ordered EasyADF from us, and I can check the version number that you were supplied.

PM Sent

[Allen1]

Hi there Steve,

my cables just arrived a few minutes ago and they work a treat, they are longer than needed for the job , but that is better than being too short


@alexh

Cheers Mate for confirming the cable only method you used, I have got a grin on my face since plugging this cable in and seeing it work that would make a Cheshire cat envious

All the best,
Allen

[alexh]

I wonder why your old cable didn't work?

Did if have two IDE connectors on it or something?

I was able to fold mine twice at 90' to make a sort of U shape. By making the two horizontal sections longer you should be able to make almost any length cable fit snuggly

     I
     D|-------|
     E        |
P             |
C             |
M<------------|
C
I
A

[Allen1]

Hi there alexh,


The cable was a single drive cable, I can only guess that at least 1 wire in the cable is maybe cut through when it has been made up and the connector pressed in place, although I do get a good reading using the multimeter on each connection, it could be that I am making the connection by means of handling the cable to probe the connections ie forcing the wire to make contact with its relevant pin by bending the connector while probing.

I think cutting off both ends and re-fitting them on the cable should do the trick, there is nothing to lose on that score as I don't know which end is faulty. This adaptation of an already great idea using a CF card as a hard drive, has got to be the best and most practical Amiga idea of all time, especially as it uses cheap off the shelf plug-in components to make it.

I just routed the cable as you describe and it works great that way, not too long at all

All the best,
Allen

[alexh]

To increase the height of the PCMCIA slot on the case I used a pencil to mark out how deep I wanted it, making sure it was very straight. Then used several metal files of different grades down to very fine. Took about an hour or so.

It is almost indistinguishable from a factory cut.

[Allen1]

Hi there alexh,

I just finished the 600 and it works fine. I have some very thin fibre glass circuit board which doesn't have any copper on it and I cut a piece to fit over the PCMCIA connector and fixed in place with some double sided sticky tape. My CF adapter has the pins from the 44 pin connector and the master/slave header sticking out so I raised the card on some old bits of PCB offcuts and stuck those onto the platform I already created to give a level seating. I then marked the casing in a similar manner to yours and then removed the electronics from the case and used my B&D Wizard to cut the long length with a cutting disk and then a diamond rotary file to cut from the open PCMCIA slot to meet the cut I just made, then finally filed the remainder by hand. I then used a hot glue gun to secure everything in place and tried it out and all OK.

Here is the finished product, the camera is fine I am just crap at photos

[fitzsteve]

Originally Posted by Allen1

Here is the finished product, the camera is fine I am just crap at photos

Nice work Allen!

[Allen1]

Cheers Steve,

thats Alfred Chicken working off the CF drive (WHDLoad) and the white thing sticking out is my 2MB SRAM card, I keep trying to put that in the wrong way as it is all white on the top surface, I should put a big arrow on it maybe

[Peter]

Great Work Allen!
The old A600 is getting a new lease of life around here - have to put some more pictures of mine up when I get some time.

[fitzsteve]

Originally Posted by Peter

Great Work Allen!
The old A600 is getting a new lease of life around here - have to put some more pictures of mine up when I get some time.

Yep the A600 is the way forward!

Loving mine, just hooked it up to the 40 inch LCD in the main longe

Thats the thing its small enough to do that...

WHDLoad's going well, most games I have tried work fine (although I have stuck to ones I know to be 1-2 disk mostly)

Its a great little machine.

[Allen1]

Cheers Peter,

I have just installed the other longer IDE cable on my 1200 too, I found the best place to exit the casing is just above the TV connector at the back. That method required a bit of filing on both halves of the casing although it could probably have been done with just the top being altered if I took a bit of time and thought it through a bit more.

Blimey I am still amazed at what these machines can do, my preference is the 1200 as I have a memory card in the trapdoor but the 600 is still a little Gem with an SRAM card fitted to allow WHDLoad games to run.

[Peter]

Have you guys checked this guys A600...

http://www.amiga600.net/index.htm

Apologies if this is old news...

[Allen1]

Originally Posted by Peter

Have you guys checked this guys A600...

http://www.amiga600.net/index.htm

Apologies if this is old news...

Hi there Peter,

A lot of information about web access via Voyager and other applications on that site are new to me and those screen shots showing them working are brilliant....

There are a few links that no longer work which is a shame but apart from that, the rest of the stuff is great. I have a Zappo PCMCIA cdrom and it is not liked by the 600, think it really needs the 1MB ram upgrade to work, it does work fine on my 1200 especially now since I have a 4GB memory expansion in it. I think if I was to add an external IDE device that I would fix an IDE male adapter socket to the actual Amiga casing to allow an external device to be connected when required or just use the Amiga as standard. The IDE connector I mean is the type you see on a motherboard, you can get that type that fits onto an IDE cable which is what I would maybe use.



Nice site and great find

[Peter]

There is always Zetr0's amazing A600+ project for inspiration...

Click here to view...

[amigakit.com]

@Allen1

You can thread this male to female cable between the top and bottom halves of the A600 or A1200 and secure it to the case lip just above the PCMCIA socket. You then have an external 40-pin IDE socket.

http://amigakit.leamancomputing.com/...roducts_id=550

[Allen1]

Originally Posted by amigakit.com

@Allen1

You can thread this male to female cable between the top and bottom halves of the A600 or A1200 and secure it to the case lip just above the PCMCIA socket. You then have an external 40-pin IDE socket.

http://amigakit.leamancomputing.com/...roducts_id=550

Hi there amigakit.com,

that is the type of cable that I refer to, good to see that you have ready made cables that fit the bill. I would probably secure the end to the base of the unit on the ledge at the back of the 600 or 1200 in the position Zetr0 fitted his slim line CD/DVD and like his mod, I would cut the top of the case to surround the socket. A simple bracket could be made similar to the idea below which allows for 2 screws/nuts and bolts to clamp the male end to the internal ledge at the top of the base as mentioned and maybe some hot glue to finish it off.


........___________________........................... ___________________......... my drawing is pretty poor
__ _|........................................... |_ __.......... __._|_: : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : :_|_.__ ignore the full stops used for padding
....I < ------ screws/etc ------ > I



I'm seriously considering this idea, but it won't be for a couple of months as there are too many birthdays in this month and March to buy the items needed ie cable and the buffered interface. I know where to go when I am ready, for around £25 or so delivered, it is a cheap method of using an external hard drive or CD rom etc or maybe even an IDE Zip drive.

One of the main reasons for the socket at the back is because I put the CF adapter on the 600 above the PCMCIA slot.

[amigakit.com]

One, further point: you cant see it in the picture on our webstore but our cables have two screw holes left / right of the header so you can screw it into the case.

[Allen1]

Originally Posted by Peter

There is always Zetr0's amazing A600+ project for inspiration...

Click here to view...

Hi there Peter,

that project is truly inspirational, it's also a lot neater finish than I could achieve, an excellent job both in terms of enhancement and design. I can't think of the right words at the moment but it is bloody fantastic

[fitzsteve]

Have you seen this Allen?

[Allen1]

Originally Posted by fitzsteve

Have you seen this Allen?

BLOODY HELL He was keen replacing a duff mouse socket or duff capacitors or dips on a circuit board is awkward enough never mind doing that I just haven't the bottle to think of something like that never mind actually doing it