The Results (Continued):

I’ve finally found some time (and parts) to get this project moving, albeit a bit slowly. I obtained a power supply unit (PSU) with a noisy fan from an old machine. Since I had an old fan lying around, I decided to put the parts together (I’ll probably replace the fan with more efficient model later).

Once I took the PSU apart to replace the fan, I decided to experiment a little and cut the back plate of the CD player as little as possible to keep a nice, clean look.

Power supply unit, opened up and fan removed	PSU cut, preparing the back panel
Holes cut in back panel for PSU fan, switches and power cable	Fan, grille, switches test fit

I made a bracket to support the PSU to the back panel of the case and soldered the wires that I had to cut to remove the backside of the PSU:

Bracket to secure the PSU to the back of the case	Soldered and powered up without a hitch!

It powered up fine (the fan can be seen spinning in the second photo above). All that needs to be done now is a little filing and sanding and the PSU section of this build will be complete. Another hole needs to be cut for the motherboard’s I/O shield, and the back panel will be ready for finishing.

Not much room left inside	3.5" hole cut for a memory card reader

On the topic of finishing, there’s a lot of work to do on the front panel. Observant readers may have noticed the CD player’s missing buttons in addition to the rough cuts around the memory card reader face.

The card reader was chosen as an alternative to an optical drive. As can be seen in the photo of the inside of the case, there isn’t much room in there for a bulky DVD-ROM. Even a slim laptop drive would extend back too far for comfort, and there needs to be some room for airflow to keep this machine cool and quiet. An OS like Ubuntu has easy-to-use tools to create a bootable image on a USB flash drive with all of the files necessary to install the system. Media will be accessed via network, or, if need be, flash drive or memory card, of course.