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Macintosh 2004 Case Mod

Posted by timothy on from the sincerest-form-of-modding dept.

NOTD665 writes "'On January 24 [1984], Apple Computer will introduce Macintosh. And you'll see why 1984 won't be like "1984."' This was the pronouncement at the end of Apple's commercial, which TV Guide magazine would later deem the greatest commercial of all time. Aired during the 1983 Super Bowl, the now famous Apple Macintosh '1984' commercial informed the world that the age of modern, home PCs was coming. Get ready. Here comes the Mac... Finally, one fateful day in December, the Mac's slumber was awoken yet again. It was time for the Mac to be reborn." Too bad it doesn't run Mac OS X.

43 of 378 comments (clear)

  1. Sacrilege! by mr.henry · · Score: 5, Funny
    -AMD Athlon XP 2500+ Barton CPU
    -MSI KM400 Socket A mATX Motherboard (Model KM4M-L)
    -Kingston HyperX PC2700 512MB (2x256)
    -Sapphire Radeon 9600 256MB
    -Western Digital WD800JB 80GB Hard Drive
    -Lite-On LDW-411S 4x DVD-RW Drive
    -Sparkle 350W FSP350-60BT Powersupply
    -Thermalright AX-7 Heatsink with AOC Aluminum 80mm Fan
    -3 (1 red, 1 blue, 1 green) LazerLED's

    This guy defiled the Mac case with PC components!

    1. Re:Sacrilege! by bc90021 · · Score: 5, Funny

      And I suppose you think that running Unix on a Mac is sacrilege too? ;)

      --
      libertarianswag.com
    2. Re:Sacrilege! by adrianbaugh · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Not only that, but the finished project looks butt-ugly too.

      It would have been far cooler if he'd fitted a TFT screen instead of his window. Come to think of it, it would have been better all round if he'd got a modern mac, taken it apart and fitted the gubbins inside the old case.

      --
      "'I pass the test,' she said. 'I will diminish, and go into the West, and remain Galadriel.'"
      - JRR Tolkien.
    3. Re:Sacrilege! by NanoGator · · Score: 4, Funny

      "This guy defiled the Mac case with PC components!"

      On the plus side, it'll be the first time a Mac ever saw GTA!

      --
      "Derp de derp."
    4. Re:Sacrilege! by lindsayt · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Right on. When I saw the headline on slashdot, I expected somebody had disassembled perhaps an iMac G4 (little round motherboard) and packed it inside the old case, with a small tft screen. Now *that* would be kewl. This, this is just butt-ugly and pointless:

      (1) It uses the all-in-one computer as just a simple case;

      (2) It cuts big ugly holes not just in the back (where it's acceptable) but in the front as well, where it destroys the look;

      and

      (3) It's *NOT A MAC*!!!!!

      I mean, okay, I might forgive them if they at least had something like Executor running a MacOS in full-screen mode within their PC hardware, but even that would be pretty big stretch.

      Really lame, I wish I hadn't wasted my time reading about it. This is the moral equivalent of taking a 1984 Honda Accord and packing the engine and transmission from a 2004 Kia Rio into it - pointless in all aspects.

      --
      I did not design this game/I did not name the stakes/I just happen to like apples/And I am not afraid of snakes-AniD
    5. Re:Sacrilege! by Awptimus+Prime · · Score: 4, Insightful

      It would have been far cooler if he'd fitted a TFT screen instead of his window.

      That's what I expected to see when I began my downward scroll towards the final product.

      I don't really think this case mod deserves a /. headline, personally. It doesn't look very good, but that is my opinion.

      My system looks almost like a G4 with the aluminum case and G4 keyboard. Perhaps I could take some pictures, talk about how I spent 4 hours making a bezel and get slashdotted..

      Speaking of which.. 4 hours to make a custom bezel?! My god man. I think a paraplegic could do it faster. I did a plastic one in less than an hour with a dremel and plastic cement. Looked perfect. I used a dremel to cut an aluminum one for the last game system in about 45 minutes. Maybe he was high? No, I was high when I did both of mine. Hmm

  2. This is SO WRONG by Rick+Zeman · · Score: 3, Funny

    This is SO WRONG on SO MANY different levels. Ay corrumba.

    1. Re:This is SO WRONG by ydrol · · Score: 5, Informative

      No this is

    2. Re:This is SO WRONG by Alan+Partridge · · Score: 3, Funny

      Christ on a bike!

      Just one more reason to be ashamed to be born an Englishman, what would Oliver Cromwell make of modern Britain?

      --
      That was classic intercourse!
  3. When? by imnoteddy · · Score: 4, Informative
    Aired during the 1983 Super Bowl

    Sorry, the "1984" ad was aired during the 1984 Super Bowl. Duh.

    --
    No electrons were harmed creating this post, though some may have been subjected to electrical and/or magnetic fields.
  4. Kinda sad... by dnahelix · · Score: 3, Insightful

    To see a Mac busted up like that.

    --
    Slashdot Eds Link Anonymous Posts With Logged Posts
    They Are Vermin Feeding On Each Other's Feces.
    I Hate \.
    1. Re:Kinda sad... by Yorrike · · Score: 4, Interesting
      Yeah. The least he could have done is sourced a small LCD screen and put that in place of the original screen.

      Add a dual head AGP card to the mix and you can run your own sized screen and get the mac case to be a virtual fish tank or actually use it in the mix, or whatever takes your fancy. I'd be impressed with that, but this is just bleh.

      --

      Looks can be deceiving. Or CAN they?

    2. Re:Kinda sad... by calyphus · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Should just have gutted a Cube, swapped the vid (would have to be PCI) and add a 1.4 GHz processor upgrade and it would be a fitting rebuild. But this is a travesty. I'd rather see a fishtank than to have a Mac defiled in this manner.

      --


      The potato it is uninformed.
    3. Re:Kinda sad... by Endive4Ever · · Score: 3, Funny

      I kept looking at the pages as the project moved foward for when he was going to install the small color VGA monitor, but he never did. Lame project. To be cool he needed to incorporate the screen of the Mac, not just use it as a crummy plastic clone case that required an external monitor.

      My SE/30 thumbs it's nose at the whole mess.

      --
      ---
  5. Slashdotted Already by Atticu5 · · Score: 5, Funny

    His webserver must be powered by the original "1984" Macintosh too, since the site is already /.ted!

    1. Re:Slashdotted Already by LocoSpitz · · Score: 5, Funny

      Pale-skinned slashdotters getting off on case porn? Hell, I would be if the damn thing weren't down already.

  6. A bit perverse, but cool by ScottSpeaks! · · Score: 4, Insightful
    OK, let's skip all the "Why would he waste all his time converting his Mac into a Windows PC? He needs to get a life!" comments and go straight to the "Wow, that's a cool piece of work!" remarks. It is. Beats my gradual conversion of similar-vintage PCs Limited Turbo XT into a Pentium/150 Linux web server, hands down.

    Still, I'd give him more points if A) he'd instead transplanted the guts of an iLamp, an iBook, or a MacCube into it, so it would still be a Mac, and/or B) found an LCD to mount in place of the window.

    And to be honest, if I ever get the nerve to eviscerate my Mac SE, I think I'd rather turn it into an aquarium.

    1. Re:A bit perverse, but cool by Omega996 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      so why did you put PC parts in it again? I'm not making the link here...

    2. Re:A bit perverse, but cool by danamania · · Score: 5, Interesting

      The best hack I'd seen was on a colour classic, where an LCD was found to just fit its display, a slot loading DVDrom was mounted an inch below the display, with a slot cut out freshly, and shaped to perfectly match the floppy drive slot on a quadra of the day, and a 6500 motherboard with 500MHz G3 installed were all fit inside the case. It was -very- well done.

      applefritter has the thread about it but unfortunately all the pics are now down.

      A japanese fellow has done a nice tidy conversion too.

      Personally, I have no problem just pixelling up the completely fake ones :)

    3. Re:A bit perverse, but cool by ScottSpeaks! · · Score: 4, Insightful
      that statement makes exactly zero sense.

      I've been thinking about it, and it makes a bit more sense if you forget about the branding and platform identity. What he did was to take the case of the first "modern home PC" (which by his definition happens to be the original Apple Macintosh, and yeah he got the wrong model) and update into a current "modern home PC". It may not be a direct descent, but a WinXP system is one of the heirs of Macintosh.

      His mistake was to emphasize the Apple logo in his updated version, which may honor the company that made the first, but misidentifies the theme of his current construction.

  7. I'll be impressed by spun · · Score: 4, Interesting

    When somebody mods a present day Mac into one of those old cases, including color screen. Ought to be easy, if you're willing to sacrifice a powerbook.

    --
    - None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
  8. Original hardware... by i.r.id10t · · Score: 3, Funny

    A coworker has two of the old original macs sitting on her desk for posterity. I keep trying to get her to convert one to a fish tank :)

    --
    Don't blame me, I voted for Kodos
    1. Re:Original hardware... by gobbo · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I have a 512ke right here. Have thought about modding it several times over the years, especially when the kids convinced me to buy a fish ;-)

      I can't bring myself to do it. It boots in 17 seconds (System 1) and runs MS Word v.3 (hanging indents, columns, drop caps, woo!) offa one floppy - documents go on the other. The other system disk I have has Daleks and Kidpix on it. It doesn't crash, feels faster than it should. Dammit, it's still getting used, 19 years later! The desktop gui really hasn't changed all that much. My concern is the longevity of the few remaining 800k floppies I've scrounged.

      I can get it networked via LocalTalk with some hijinks and a System 4 disk I have buried somewhere. Rest assured that if I do find webserving software that'll run on it, I won't tell /. the URL. Any webserver suggestions for system 4, oldtimers?

      --
      Damn those pesky terrorists
  9. Apple's new Superbowl Ad. by russotto · · Score: 5, Funny

    This year's Super Bowl, Apple is skipping the product ad and going political. It's going to be a remake of the 1984 ad, only with a different face on the screen. And this time, the babe gets caught by security before smashing the screen. At the end, the head of the security forces pulls off his helmet to reveal:

    "John Ashcroft. Why 2004 WILL be like _1984_"

  10. Was she really wearing an ipod? by VValdo · · Score: 5, Funny

    I tell ya, Jobs was more of a visionary than any of us thought.

    W

    --
    -------------------
    This is my SIG. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
    1. Re:Was she really wearing an ipod? by PotPieMan · · Score: 4, Informative

      Yes.

    2. Re:Was she really wearing an ipod? by UserGoogol · · Score: 5, Funny

      The original ad contained the iPod. Apple is allied with IBM. Apple is at war with Microsoft. Apple has always been at war with Microsoft.

      --
      "Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity." -- Hanlon's Razor
  11. Three points... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    1. It looks like crap.
    2. It's a PC.
    3. It looks like crap.

  12. woowoo... by TWX · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Somehow I'm a little less than impressed. Not necessarily with the workmanship, mind you, but with the concept design and ultimate implementation.

    Someone in the past modified a Color Classic to have a G3 in it, and maintained the look and feel of the original Classic, complete with color 512x384 display. I think that they made some mods to the video display circuitry so it could do 640x480, but the original tube was used. All of the components fit inside of the case.

    If they were dead-set on converting that Mac to a PC platform, they could have use a Mini-ITX motherboard and mounted it in the bottom, like the shuttle PCs. They could have also used an undersized power supply like HP, eMachines, and shuttle PCs used, so that it would also fit nicely. They would have had to find someone to design and build the necessary hardware to run the display that was there, or they could have bought a Fujitsu 8" colour monitor that are commonly used at cash register systems. That would have allowed them to keep the monitor inside.

    At least they got practice with a Dremel. Hopefully they'll come up with something a little less rough next time.

    --
    Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
  13. I want to do one too by standsolid · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I have a mac classic sitting in my garage waiting for me to do something to it.

    I want to annoy my friends (yeah... ok... friend) by making a boot floppy for my Mac Classic that just shows a linux penguin (i put linux on everything i can), or maybe a Mac Logo, for a tribute. How would one go about doing that? I think it would be more of an honor than raping this poor machine and putting an AMD inside :)

    --
    WTPOUAWYHTTOTWPA
    What's the point of using acronyms when you have to type out the whole phrase anyways?
  14. weak by seanadams.com · · Score: 4, Insightful

    This is a really weak case mod. Step 1: find square box. step 2: stuff a pc in said square box.

    It would have been interesting if it had incorporated some kind of technical/artistic/nostalgic trick. For example: using modern mac parts (g4 cube maybe) and fitting a new display in place of the original. Or better yet, figure out how to get the old display working on a new machine. Or neatly fit new connectors (usb, firewire, ethernet) in place of the old, etc. This is just a motherboard in a different box - there is nothing interesting or clever about it.

    1. Re:weak by twitter · · Score: 4, Insightful
      Agreed. It would have been better had they crammed a LCD into it. The whole point of the original was that it was easy to use and lug around. Additionally, the addition of the DVD was pointless without a screen and not really much use with one. A network card is all you need to get useful infomration on and off any computer, why screw up a face for a soon to be obsolete media? It would have looked much nicer with a screen. A picture of the sigs on the back of the empty box would hae made the perfect wallpaper for a computer that could stand on it's own again. If the built in screen is too small to be usefull, run an X server and tie into it with another computer that has a reasonable screen.

      Of course, it's not too late for them to do something like that. The disk drive bay is gone forever, but they could rig up a screen.

      --

      Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.

  15. Wait a min! by Doogie5526 · · Score: 5, Funny

    That's a Mac Plus (circa 1986) not the origional Mac (128k). He's 2 years early.

  16. Re:Jan. 22, 1984 by DavidinAla · · Score: 4, Informative

    The spot aired on Jan. 22, 1984, the date of that year's Super Bowl.

  17. Bah! by forkazoo · · Score: 5, Interesting

    For the record, I recently got a SCSI ethernet adapter for my Macintosh. Yes, that's Macintosh. No "Plus." Model M0001. And, no, the SCSI wasn't a stock item at that point... :) I haven't quite managed to get it running as a web server. (The original macintosh has no MMU, so don't bother to suggest Linux), but It is still perfectly capable of doing lots of things without being gutted. For shame! And, once I get it running as a server on my DSL line, I fully intend to proudly put on my business cards that I am operating one of the oldest (though, certainly not the oldest) servers on the internet!

  18. Mirror by phalse+phace · · Score: 5, Informative

    Since the page seems to be loading slow, I've mirrored it here.

  19. Re:The original Macintosh had no SCSI port. by One+Louder · · Score: 4, Informative

    A couple of third-party vendors popped up back in those days that managed to retrofit a SCSI port into old pre-Plus Macs using little daughterboards that fit in the ROM sockets. You'd move the ROMS onto the daughterboard. I know this because I was one of those vendors.

  20. Re:The original Macintosh had no SCSI port. by One+Louder · · Score: 3, Informative
    The connector was usually routed out through either the external floppy hole or the battery compartment using a ribbon cable - it wasn't pretty.

    The SCSI port has the same hardware addresses as the one in the Plus, and Plus ROMS were available as an upgrade for older Macs, so no special drivers were required - any SCSI drive that worked on the Plus would work on these cards.

    Many of the memory upgrades of the day for the older Macs included a SCSI ports. A few vendors didn't route the cable out of the box and instead provided an internal drive - the GCC HyperDrive and Levco Prodigy did this.

  21. OMG - it has a FAN! by snStarter · · Score: 3, Funny

    This is just so wrong. In so many ways. It's like...it's like...taking a Linux system and proudly replacing it with Windows in order to get worms.

    Shuddering...

  22. Stay tuned! by gerardrj · · Score: 5, Funny

    For his next "mod", he'll gut a 1947 Ferrari 125 and replace all the parts with those from a 2004 Buick Regal.

    Why is this news, and why is it on the front page? Is there no end to these "look! I stuffed a PC system in to a different box" stories?

    --
    Article X: The powers not delegated... by the Constitution...are reserved...to the people
  23. Re:iPod commercial as well? by Delphix · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Though not mentioned on Apple's site, that's not the original commerical. It was modified for the 20th anniversary and was first shown at Mac World this year. What you're looking at has been CGI enhanced... The iPod insertion is almost flawless.

    See http://maccentral.macworld.com/news/2004/01/07/198 4/

    Welcome to the down side of digital editing and CGI. You can re-write history. ;-)

  24. But it's a PC! by PhunkySchtuff · · Score: 3, Interesting

    What would have been more impressive is if he got, say, the guts of an LCD iMac or eMac, and fitted a small, high-res LCD in place of the original monitor, keeping it a real mac and also keeping it an all-in-one form-factor...
    - k

    --
    Specialist Mac support for creative pros, Melbourne
  25. 1984 history books repaced with 2004 editions by AHumbleOpinion · · Score: 4, Funny

    And I suppose you think that running Unix on a Mac is sacrilege too?

    Those who posses a history book from 1984 should immediately contact the Ministry of Information. The following typographical errors have been corrected since then:
    - Replace references to IBM as "evil empire" with "valued PowerPC partner".
    - Replace references to Microsoft as "valued third party software developer" with "evil empire".

    Ministry of Information agents will collect incorrect history book and provide corrected versions. The agent will also collect the book "Unix Haters Handbook" as it contains numerous typos, including the title. A corrected version, "Unix Lovers Handbook", will be provided.