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#1
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standard cdrom activity lights
Is there a way to make the cdrom activity light go elsewhere easily?
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#2
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standard cdrom activity lights
On Wed, 28 Dec 2005 02:51:03 GMT, "bgd"
wrote: Is there a way to make the cdrom activity light go elsewhere easily? Yes. eject the drive tray and pull the tray plate off (if it has one) Press in the plastic tabs on the sides or bottom to remove the remainder of the drive faceplate Take the cover off the drive... usually 4 or 6 screws. Pull out the circuit board- might be another 2 or 4 screws and two or three ribbon connectors, a couple of 2 pin drive plugs to unplug too. Whole thing disconnects and pulls out. you'll see on the front of the board, the led is just a (typically 3mm but rarely 5mm) bi-pin LED bent at a right angle. Just desolder it and take a pair of wires, solder thse to the spot on the PCB. Decide where to take the wire out of the casing... that dictates how to proceed from here. Supposing you want the LED power to control a 50 Megawatt laser cannon pointed at your neighbor's house, you'd probably want to take the two wires out the bottom left-hand corner (looking at rear of drive), so it was nearer the right side of the case (looking at front of case), so it was the shorter distance to the laser. I suggest positioning the laser on the right side of the case, since ATX usually has left side panel removable. Thus you retain access to the system without having to move the laser canon. If you have BTX or another form factor, your needs may differ. Next decide if you want an optical coupling between the laser canon control circuit and the optical drive (reusing same or similar enough LED) or to forego the LED for a more direct electrical coupling. If you can accept LED, it stays more modular, it is easier to swap out the laser canon should the need arise, even put it on a drop-down elevator for safe storage in the basement should you fail to eliminate any witnesses. So you have the pair of wires coming out, and supposing the optical connection, just solder on the LED, and you're done... after reassembing the drive of course. You might find it necessary to drill a hole in the rear of the optical drive casing, and preferribly put in a rubber grommet to help keep the wire from wearing against the sharp corners of the casing. If you felt like filing down the corners and putting a piece of heat-shrink tubing over that portion of the wire, you could probably do without the rubber grommet. Another option would be the typical grommet with a lock-tab, similar to that seen on AC exit, switch wires on the older AT style power supplies or many appliances with an unremovable cord. If you find you need more (or less, which is doubtful) current than the original LED driving circuit supplied, you'll have to trace back that subcircuit on the optical drive PCB till you hit the current limiting resistor, and either put another one in parallel or take out the original and replace with another of suitable value. Online LED resistor calculators will help you find the right value resistor, or pair of them if you want to leave the original in place. Naturally you'd also have to take the voltage reading pre-resistor to determine how much current you're trying to drop, and unless you're comfortable fudging the led forward drop voltage, you'll need the spec sheet for that as well... or you could just aim low and meaure the current, figuring it should be somewhere in the 10-30mA range most often. Reassemble whole thing, call your neighbors on the phone and tell them to look out their window, then turn the system on. |
#3
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standard cdrom activity lights
ty. I was hoping for a standard pugin on back of cdroms to ride the led, i
guess not. The plugins in question disable, enable udma. they are the same size pinout as my mb led indicator plugs. I should have been more specific. "kony" wrote in message ... On Wed, 28 Dec 2005 02:51:03 GMT, "bgd" wrote: Is there a way to make the cdrom activity light go elsewhere easily? Yes. eject the drive tray and pull the tray plate off (if it has one) Press in the plastic tabs on the sides or bottom to remove the remainder of the drive faceplate Take the cover off the drive... usually 4 or 6 screws. Pull out the circuit board- might be another 2 or 4 screws and two or three ribbon connectors, a couple of 2 pin drive plugs to unplug too. Whole thing disconnects and pulls out. you'll see on the front of the board, the led is just a (typically 3mm but rarely 5mm) bi-pin LED bent at a right angle. Just desolder it and take a pair of wires, solder thse to the spot on the PCB. Decide where to take the wire out of the casing... that dictates how to proceed from here. Supposing you want the LED power to control a 50 Megawatt laser cannon pointed at your neighbor's house, you'd probably want to take the two wires out the bottom left-hand corner (looking at rear of drive), so it was nearer the right side of the case (looking at front of case), so it was the shorter distance to the laser. I suggest positioning the laser on the right side of the case, since ATX usually has left side panel removable. Thus you retain access to the system without having to move the laser canon. If you have BTX or another form factor, your needs may differ. Next decide if you want an optical coupling between the laser canon control circuit and the optical drive (reusing same or similar enough LED) or to forego the LED for a more direct electrical coupling. If you can accept LED, it stays more modular, it is easier to swap out the laser canon should the need arise, even put it on a drop-down elevator for safe storage in the basement should you fail to eliminate any witnesses. So you have the pair of wires coming out, and supposing the optical connection, just solder on the LED, and you're done... after reassembing the drive of course. You might find it necessary to drill a hole in the rear of the optical drive casing, and preferribly put in a rubber grommet to help keep the wire from wearing against the sharp corners of the casing. If you felt like filing down the corners and putting a piece of heat-shrink tubing over that portion of the wire, you could probably do without the rubber grommet. Another option would be the typical grommet with a lock-tab, similar to that seen on AC exit, switch wires on the older AT style power supplies or many appliances with an unremovable cord. If you find you need more (or less, which is doubtful) current than the original LED driving circuit supplied, you'll have to trace back that subcircuit on the optical drive PCB till you hit the current limiting resistor, and either put another one in parallel or take out the original and replace with another of suitable value. Online LED resistor calculators will help you find the right value resistor, or pair of them if you want to leave the original in place. Naturally you'd also have to take the voltage reading pre-resistor to determine how much current you're trying to drop, and unless you're comfortable fudging the led forward drop voltage, you'll need the spec sheet for that as well... or you could just aim low and meaure the current, figuring it should be somewhere in the 10-30mA range most often. Reassemble whole thing, call your neighbors on the phone and tell them to look out their window, then turn the system on. |
#4
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standard cdrom activity lights
Reassemble whole thing, call your neighbors on the phone and
tell them to look out their window, then turn the system on. That's brilliant. Cheers, kony. CK |
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