The Trademe find that started it all
This is what started this project, a $38 trademe buy for an AdvanTech 486 on a Card. Listed as Untested with a 486DX2 and 8MB of ram, how could I go wrong. I had a DOS machine already but I liked the idea of an ultra compact but real hardware DOS machine. The idea was to get the smallest backplane I could find and put a Gotek and CF Card in it with a Pico Power Supply. I opted for a 6 spot ISA backplane from AliExpress with a real ATX power Connector.
What am I going to put this in?
I had the left over motherboard tray from my test bench build that would be perfect for this, all I had to do was chop it up. I paired this up with some Rimu wood leftovers I had sitting around and ordered some switches, a gotek and a the CF Adapter. I later had to order a few Molex and Sata Power splitters to get everything powered up off the Pico Power Supply as it didn’t have many outputs. But I got it all going, the only tricky part was lining all the switches up and cutting the hole for the floppy drive so it was straight.
How it turned out and future updates
Painted it black and stained the wood and it turned out really well. I put in a Vibra16 and a totally overkill 64mb single ram stick along with my ultimate DOS image.
In the future I would like to add or try a PC104 sound card as well as intergrating an MT32PI inside it as well as adding a couple of small fans to the rear panel with a 3D printed bracket.
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