PLEASE NOTE IF YOU JUST WANT TO SKIP THE STORY AND SEE THE PHOTOS AND VIDEO THEN SKIP DOWN TO BOTTOM FOR THE LINKS!

This is my second custom PC I’ve now built. The first being based on a 1991 Apple Macintosh Classic which incidently is now my main gaming PC, but that’s a story for another time.

I’ve thought, for several years now why manufacturers ditched the idea of a computer based around a keyboard case i.e. a case featuring a built in keyboard, as was popular in the 80’s and very early 90’s. Since I purchased my first PC (or should I say my parents did) back in 1998 I’ve always enjoyed old school LAN parties with my friends (a somewhat larger friend group back then as I was was at College). It’s something I still do to this day. Going over to a friends house, taking your PC and playing PC games either via the internet or over the LAN. You can’t beat the banter face to face and laughs you experience at a LAN event. It’s not something I get to do very often these days but when I do it’s always a great laugh to reminisce and play games whilst having a beer or two. I’d looked about extensively on the internet to see if anyone had tried something similar to the extent I was planning but came up empty. I figured either no one either had thought about it. Thought it was worth the effort or just not thought it would be possible to squeeze PC components inside capable of modern gaming. So I knew once again I was going into uncharted waters and that my initial thoughts may not prove successful. But there’s no fun in never trying to see if it’s possible!

Some time back I used to haul either a big custom built PC using an off the shelf case or an Apple Mac Pro which I’d upgraded. Just the thought of lugging these beasts around, first needing unplug, unravel or anything else needed to free the computer from the cable nest party it somehow ended up amongst was an arduous task, especially once I’d started “hiding” the computer away to appease the other half of the sight of it’s “many wires”.

This lead to me wanting to build something more portable which in mid 2018 I constructed with the Mac Classic gaming PC. Something that is easily transported and I’m able to carry with it’s handle just behind the screen. But I digress….we’re here to talk about the Atari ST right?!

So for some time I’d pondered the thought of fitting a fully fledged gaming PC into an Atari ST shell (some might wonder why I didn’t choose an Amiga 500/1200 – but I preferred the ‘look’ of the ST). So it was around October 2018 when I hopped on EBay and found a nice fellow called Jay (https://www.ataristsales.co.uk) whom was selling various Atari spares. I asked if he had an empty Atart ST case (of any variant) including the keyboard which he was kind enough to sort out for me (520 STFM). The case arrived, was in good condition for the age, I opened it up, had a look inside, screwed it back together and stuck it in the cupboard under the stairs. I then started buying the odd few bits to start the project including the PSU which after some further research and consideration I figured I couldn’t use even the extremely compact Corsair SFX series of PSU’s which I’d used before. However I knew there wouldn’t be the room in the case that I’d need so it would have to be powered by an external power brick (Dell/Alienware DA330PM111) with an HDPlex 400w Hi-Fi DC-Atx Power Supply located inside the case.

The main issue was finding some way of hooking up the keyboard to a PC motherboard. Fortunately after an hour or two of searching I managed to find a Atari ST USB keyboard kit by Tynemouth Software (http://blog.tynemouthsoftware.co.uk/2015/12/day-21-atari-st-usb-keyboard-kit.html). I knew that this PC had to be capable of modern games so I knew I’d need to side mount the GPU, for which I’d need a PCI-E riser extension cable for so I picked up a SilverStone RC03 PCIe x16 riser ribbon cable 220mm in length. It was at this point any progress with the project stopped dead in it’s tracks. Christmas 2018 was coming up and I couldn’t think of buying a suitable GPU/Motherboard/CPU/RAM so I shelved the project to resume in the summer of 2019.

So Summer 2019 came and went and it was Christmas once again. Each and every time I opened the under-stairs cupboard to switch on my main PC I’d see the Atari case stood up next to my PC looking sorry for itself. January 2020 came and I knew I had to resume the project. I had another LAN (4 day beer session) booked in, in late February at my friends house and saw it as the perfect time to get the ball rolling with starting and finishing it in time.

By this point I’d since upgraded my main gaming PC and an EVGA GTX 1060 6GB SC Mini graphics card had become surplus to requirements so it was ideal for the ST. I’d already ran this card without it’s factory fitted fan but using a larger case fan instead to cool it and I had a reasonably good idea it would fit into the Atari case when laid on it’s side. Although at this point I had no clue how it would fit in with the other components i.e. where it would be located within the case. Due to space constraints the motherboard had to be no bigger than a mini-ITX board so it was onto EBay again to acquire something suitable. I ended up settling on an ASUS Z170i Pro Gaming ITX (I utilised the M.2 slot under the motherboard for a Corsair 240GB M.2 drive). I wanted the Atari to have decent CPU grunt in games so I went with an Intel i5 7600K. I knew height clearance was a big issue within the ST case so fortunately a Zalman CNPS2X fit the bill with its extremely low height heatsink and fan. The big stumbling block in putting anything larger like an Noctua low profile heatsink and fan for example is that it’s just not low enough and fouls on the angle of how the keyboard sits underneath (which I found out when I tried it so stuck with the Zalman). Hoping there was enough room for a separate SSD hard drive for games/data I went with a standard SATA 3 Crucial BX500 480GB SSD drive.

So with all the main parts purchased it was time to start cutting sections of the case and it’s internal fixings which meant there was no going back from this point. They did however need to be removed to make space for all the components so it was continue on at that point or give up. The back i/o section of the case also needed to make way for the motherboard i/o plate, PSU DC plug and GPU outputs. Fortunately I had access to a 3D printer so all of the covers/caps etc I designed using 3D Builder software that comes with Windows 10 (because I’ve zero experience in this field so I needed something easy to use) which was simple enough to manipulate basic shapes into the desired dimensions I needed. I did several test fits of the parts/fans etc before I settled on a location I was happy with. Once I was confident with how things fitted into the case I stripped everything back out again and worked on the cosmetics. Several parts of the case needed filler applying which then required sanding down afterwards. The question was what to use. After a bit of research I settled on Milliput Epoxy Putty which I can’t recommend enough for what I needed it for. The putty is pliable up to about 15 minutes after mixing the 2 compounds together and dries hard after about 4 hours and solid after 24. It can be sanded, drilled or screwed into so it was perfect for the job. You’ll see in the photographs that follow that the case then needed a good sand down before painting but it was worth the effort.

Now the case I had, although was in good condition it had suffered the usual discolouration fate of plastics of that era. I had thought about leaving it original at the very start of the project but plugging up the floppy drive and the midi port locations on the case with 3D prints and filler put paid to that idea. The question was do I pick a totally different colour or use a colour as close to the original case shade of grey as possible. A web search brought up a link to the Atari forums where someone had already sprayed their ST to give it a refresh and found that Rust-oleum Painters Touch Stone Grey was as close to the original colour as possible. Following this I decided I wanted to keep it cosmetically as close to an original ST as possible so purchased 2 cans of stone grey as recommended. It turned out I only really needed about half a can after applying several coats of paint on the internal and external plastics. Whilst it’s not a perfect “factory” finish I’m pretty happy with how it turned out and fundamentally looks the part as well as performs it.

I’m writing all this 1 day before the LAN party (Friday 21st), just finishing the ST today Thursday 20th. I hope that it may inspire others to do the same. Think out of the box. Ditch the usual mould of using an off the shelf PC case and push the boundaries of what might be possible to game with. Yes it’s easy to go the tried and tested route but there is joy and satisfaction in finishing a project that at the beginning was nothing more than thoughts of “I wonder if it’s even possible”. I’ve just shown that it’s possible and at the time of writing I’m confident there’s not one like it to this degree anywhere in the world.

So it’s Friday morning, and I intend to go over to my friends house tonight. So whilst I’m preloading games I thought I’d run a few 3D Mark Advanced Edition tests to check the power usage of the ST. I’m happy to say, given everything running in the case I didn’t see the watt meter go past 190watts. Hovering around 170ish and spiking up to 187. Idling around 40watts, up to 60-70 when browsing the internet. I can say I’m pretty happy with how it’s turned out and the custom fan tuning I’ve done using the Asus fan software is keeping all the temperatures within acceptable ranges.

But what is to become of the Atari 520 STFM….. whilst I’ve enjoyed thinking of the ideas, doing the research, sourcing the parts, designing and putting it all together and finishing it to a standard I’m happy with the ST needs to go to a good home. Someone who will use it as a show piece and/or want it as a cool and rare novelty. So after it’s had it’s thorough 4 day test the Atari will be going up for sale. I’ve put a deposit down on a car which is currently en-route on a ship from Japan, arriving in April so I’m trying to gather funds together to go towards paying for it. So anything over what I’ve spent on the parts for the project will be a bonus, ensuring that I’m not paying the car off for the maximum next 5 years that I’ve got the loan over to pay for it.

OK. I’ve rambled on enough……time for the photographs……

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