My Raspberry Pi Modded Apple IIe

edmaul69

I am finally posting pics as i am mostly done with it.
@ortsac @mediamogul i am tagging you guys.

first off is the inside of the cpu.

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here you can see i chopped off part of the motherboard to reuse. i had to replace the 2 tape headphone jacks with ones that will work with stereo audio.

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this is the back of the cpu. i had already modded my apple iie joystick a couple years before i built this, so i use a 2600-daptor for my joystick. option8 retroconnector makes an apple iie joystick adapter if you wanted to keep it original.

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next is my external hard drive. i built it inside an apple 300 baud modem. it has a db9 to usb adapter cable to power it.

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next is my duo superdrive. i gutted the floppy drives and added two apple superdrives. i wired up the leds and the usb cables to the 25 pin connector. it has a 25 pin to 2x usb connectors for power.

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next is my extension cables and adapter cables. i wanted to make my own ribbon cables instead of using pre-made extension cables to keep the 1980 vibe.

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next is lcd screen. i removed the guts from a 9" green phosphor monitor and replaced it with a 15" lcd tv.

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and the finished product. i didn't mention it, but i also have a macintosh m0110a keyboard that i use as well as the original apple iie's built in keyboard. there is an adapter inside the cpu and it has a plug on the back to plug it in. i even bought a new school desk to use for my apple iie. on the side of the monitor there is a knob that was originally for adjusting the crt that i now use as a volume knob.

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caver01

@edmaul69 nicely done! I love all of the vintage components made to serve a function!

edmaul69

@caver01 thanks. This one took a long time to get to where it is today.

ortsac

Wow!!! Very impressive indeed. I could see there are a lot of tech/electronic modifications, done with a lot thought and planning. Nice work.

That must be a "Mac" or "Apple][gs" Theme on the last picture hosted on a Retropie. Nice touch. Thanks for sharing this.

edmaul69

@ortsac i made a theme replicating a program called apple ii desktop. It had a checkerboard background and my theme had it, but at 1024x768 the checkerboard was a little hard on the eyes so i just made it gray. I also have a video splashscreen that replicates booting an apple iie enhanced.

mediamogul

@edmaul69

This is really amazing and rivals any build out there. What's most impressive is that everything has a purpose for being there and there's no wasted utility with any of the components. Do you have any personal acquaintances or family members that are into retro-computing at all? If so, what was their reaction when they sat down with it?

Capeman

That is awesome, you must have some free time on your hands, haha! I almost didnt realize that was an ES theme, very authentic!

edmaul69

@Capeman thank you. The theme was based off of @Rookervik 's awesome amiga desktop theme. After i saw it i realized i could turn it into the apple ii desktop theme.

edmaul69

@mediamogul Thank you. I have no friends or family here that play retro games. I have a friend in north carolina who has seen it, but i built him a pc the same way with an apple iie before i built mine, so it wasnt much of a surprise to him to see it. :) i spent a lot of time building this to the way i wanted. Unfortuanately since i built all the usb stuff before i got the hub, i have to shorten all the wires to clean it up a lot. I am just waiting for the new usb tips to arrive since i used my last 9 i had on this build. I just wanted to finally get this posted.

edmaul69

@mediamogul speaking about everything having a purpose, i forgot to show the purpose of reusing the 19 pin connector on the gpio. my external real time clock.

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mediamogul

@edmaul69

i forgot to show the purpose of reusing the 19 pin connector on the gpio. my external real time clock.

OK, that's definitely the most inspired addition!

i spent a lot of time building this to the way i wanted.

It's funny how this hobby different for everyone involved, but there are direct parallels. I have a friend who is a retro game collector and spends all his free time working on his game room. He's constantly perfecting everything to his liking, from his immediate collection, to the posters on the wall and the carpet on the floor. Projects like this really boil that whole idea down to an experience that can fit onto a grade school desk, which is another inspired choice, by the way.

edmaul69

@mediamogul i do have a friend who collects video game stuff and movies. He has a pretty big collection. The most complete is probably most peoples least complete. He has every u.s. gamecube game plus every japanese game that wasn't released in the u.s. He also has quite a few gamecube models including a hanshin tigers gamecube and a panasonic q. He doesnt collect anything pre nintendo though. But he does have several japanese consoles like famicoms and pc engines. He has a few obscure and rare systems as well. His pc engine/ tg-16 collection is pretty awesome and probably my favorite of his collection.

ExarKunIv

My god.

that is amazing, nicely done.

edmaul69

@ExarKunIv thank you.

mediamogul

@edmaul69

His collection sounds very similar in content to my friend's. I enjoy dipping into his Famicom collection the most. We actually had a great time one night playing the word scramble game 'Cryptologic' of all things on his Odyssey². To make things even more bizarre, we were playing alongside his teenage son and several of his friends. It really amazed me how into this simple word game everyone was. Of course, the words being chosen to unscramble were a major factor too. Kids do say the darndest things.

edmaul69

Thanks to changes in emulationstation i can make my theme look how i want it to. I really want it to be monochrome green. @Rookervik how would i turn grayscale images to green colors so i can make my consoles match a monochrome green theme?

edmaul69

mediamogul

@edmaul69

Very nice! I'd love to see it in motion.

ExarKunIv

@edmaul69

and here i think im good that i can put a LED on mine, then i see things like this.

im not worthy. lol

it is beautiful, it being back so many memory's of me playing on my dads Apple.

edmaul69

@ExarKunIv thank you. I have many fond memories of my apple iie as a kid. I have done tons of modded consoles and arcades and always dreamed about modifying an apple iie. So when i got the chance to mod one into a modern pc for my buddy, i was inspired to finally do one for myself, but with a raspberry pi.