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would it be possible to use an old AT tower case for a sleeeper PC

D

dosbox

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Would it be possible to use an old AT tower case for a sleeper PC? I don't have an AT case myself, but I know I can buy a custom made AT tower case on eBay.

Sorry if this is in the wrong section, but I put it here considering an AT tower case is technically vintage.
 
Hello neighbor.

I don't see why not. You can put anything that fits in any box it fits in. Don't expect holes in the case to work without cutting.
 
There were some tower cases that were "either". They could take an ATX I/O shield or a special one to fit the AT connector layout. I have one such.
 
Chuck(G) said:
There were some tower cases that were "either". They could take an ATX I/O shield or a special one to fit the AT connector layout. I have one such.
Click to expand...
I've got one of those with 4 5¼" and 3 3½" (1 hidden) drive bays.

Anybody want it? It's got both I/O shields.
 
The other main difference is the power supply. An AT case will be designed to take an AT power supply, which will have a mains voltage on/off power switch. If you want to put an ATX-type motherboard in there, you'll either need to:

* Keep the AT power supply and find an adaptor to connect it to the ATX motherboard's power connector (checking that it provides the required voltage and current, of course). You'd also need to wire the ATX 'power switch' connector to another button on the case, such as 'reset'.
* Replace the AT power supply with an ATX power supply. Either replace the guts of the AT power switch with a momentary switch, or use another button on the case as above.
 
Depends on how new you want it to be...There were at least two PII AT motherboards made - I have one of them, the Tyan S1830. It's a slot 1 board, and would actually take 100MHz FSB PIII's, though mine ran the legendary SL2W8 stepping PII-300 at 450MHz. I always wanted to put a 1GHz slot 1 100MHz FSB chip in it...or the Powerleap modified Tualatin PIII-1.4GHz...but they were always too expensive. Ran the PII in it until I upgraded to a P4.

Wesley
 
Chuck(G) said:
Many ATX motherboards work just fine with no connection to the power button terminals. Just apply power and you're good.
Click to expand...

This is only possible if "Restore/reboot from power loss" is set to always on in the BIOS.
 
its really just as simple as replacing the ac power switch with a pushbutton switch that fits though the hole and behind the faceplate
 
Osgeld said:
its really just as simple as replacing the ac power switch with a pushbutton switch that fits though the hole and behind the faceplate
Click to expand...
Many of the dual-purpose AT/ATX cases came with both switches and an AT backplate; I have a couple of rackmount cases that were shipped that way.

There were several Slot1/socket 370 boards for AT form-factor; I have at least five in various states of disrepair and a couple that were working when last powered up. One of the 'was working' boards is early Socket 370 with a Celery^Hon 400 (prior to the 'FC-PGA' packaging of later P3 S370 and later Celeron), and the other is slot 1 with a PowerLeap board and Celeron 1.2 Tualatin. Not the fastest possible AT board, but close; I have one of those specialized Socket 370 or Socket 370 adapters that is supposed to let you use Tualatin in a Coppermine-only board, but I've never pulled it out of its packaging, since I never needed it. Not sure if it would help me with the old Celeron 400 S370 board, as that thing is probably limited to a 66MHz FSB, and the Tualatin-256-based Celeron 1.4 needs a 100MHz bus. If there were any AT boards with a 133MHz FSB, then the Pentium III-S at 1.4GHz would be the fastest non-overclocked 'sleeper' you could get.
 
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