I have posted the mod onto ebay. If you would like to visit the ebay page, please click here. If you don’t care to go visit the ebay listing, you can view a mirror of it below (sans auction goodies).

As recently seen on Engadget, Hackaday, Slashdot, Gizmodo and numerous other tech news websites, this Mod”book” (insert rimshot) is now up for auction. Featuring a 2 Ghz Intel Core Duo CPU, 1 GB RAM, and a 160 GB hard drive, this is an amazing machine for most things (sorry, Crysis). The machine contains everything that a standard Macbook of its generation would have, except for a Superdrive and obviously the Macbook case and LCD screen. As a bonus, the memory is upgraded from 512 MB and the hard drive is upgraded from 60 GB. The operating system that is currently installed is OS X 10.5 Leopard.

Details on the construction of the mod can be found at this page.

Sold as is, with the following:
- 2.0GHz Intel Core Duo
- 1GB RAM (667 Mhz)
- 160 GB hard drive (7200 RPM)
- 802.11g/b Airport wifi
- Bluetooth
- iSight webcam built into the front
- Microphone built into the front
- Magsafe 60W power adapter
- Mini DVI to VGA adapter
-Protection from Steve Jobs’ wrath NOT included

Thanks for reading the main macbook write up. In the following paragraphs, I’ll explain the nitty gritty of the mod and write it as a skilled grammarian would write. I have a comedic youtube video of the mod that I will post as well.

The parts I used were obtained primarily through ebay, while the hard drive (hdd) was scalped from newegg. My main goal was to get a working, genuine, mac for as cheap as possible.  As a commenter pointed out, most of the broken logic boards have problems with battery charging or a USB port not working or other hardware problems.

The parts list:
-Logic board – A1181, 13.3″ white, 2.0 Ghz macbook, horizontal configuration – $165 through ebay from hammerhead tech
-Horizontal heatsink (included a fan built into it) – Came with logic board
-Wireless WIFI Card AR5BXB6, A1181, 13.3 macbook – Came with logic board
-Wireless antenna (2) – $4 from ebay
-Magsafe DC connector for the logic board – Came with the logic board
-Magsafe 60W power adapter – $24 from ebay
-iSight/Mic with data cable A1181, 13.3 macbook – $5.95 from ebay
-BT 2.0 Bluetooth Board with antenna – $.99 from ebay
-1GB of DDR 667 Ram – My alter ego (best friend) had 2 spare 512MB sticks that he donated to the cause
-Fujitsu MHW2160BJ 160GB 7200 RPM 8MB Cache 2.5″ SATA 3.0Gb/s – $50 from newegg
-Hard drive cable – $.99 from ebay
-The keyboard portion of a 13.3″ A1181 white macbook – $11 from ebay
-Mini DVI to VGA adapter (I have a DVI adapter as well) – $14 from fry’s electronics
-Linksys Router (2) – Already had them
-Piece of Plexiglas – Already had it

The logic board is labeled surprisingly well, although I did look at a schematic a few times to verify that each slot was what its short acronym described it as. Most of the connectors would fit into only one socket, but better safe than sorry in this instance.

Do a test run with all the components hooked up and the keyboard plugged in. At this point, it is the closest it will be to its original form factor. You are going to need to connect the system to another mac and share the optical drive (unless you connected an optical drive to the board). The reason for this is that you need to get leopard onto the hdd. The method I used for this was firewire target disk mode (google should be able to help).

After you have OS X installed, you need to change one system setting before you can hack up the keyboard connector and make your custom power cable. Under power settings, “power up after power failure” needs to be set. Now you’ll need to clip off the other track pad connector and leave the smaller of the two. If you trace the leads from the power button on the top of the keyboard, you’ll see that it leads back to the fourth wire from ground. On the photo below, it is the fourth connector up from the bottom. You just need to solder a wire to this wire and then one to the jagged part (it’ll be ground) and then connect these to your switch. Once you have a good connection (the 4th pin connector is ridiculously small-break out your soldering compressor-removing the other pins is also helpful), then connect your magsafe to power and press your power button; your system should turn back on.  The final bit of advice is to never shut down, doing so will cause it to not boot up again unless you hook up another keyboard. So just stick to restarting and then pulling the magsafe connection and you’ll be fine. I will post more detailed pics in the morning. I’ll also post the video then as well.

Power ribbon

I hope this helps anyone who might be attempting a macbook mod of their own. Good luck with your mods.

And now the conclusion to the Macbook mod post. An inference can be drawn from the title of this post, and the previous post, as to the nature of the content. But let me continue the story of how the macbook came to be. From the initial idea of getting a macbook logic board and making it run again, my best friend and I had been toiling with several ways to display the *repaired* innards of an older macbook. If you would like to see the technical write up, please visit the next post: Macbook Mod III

My alter ego and I, always came back to one simple, yet amazing concept. Some of the possible ideas included: mounting the finished product like a billy the big mouth bass, trophy case style, another idea was to simply finish the plastic enclosure and have a plain, run of the mill, boring see through case, I also pondered mounting it on wood at one point, but it never really stuck. Our back and forth banter (discussions) always came back to enclosing it in an old linksys router case and so that is how this mod was finally finished. After a year of talking and discussing, it is finished and in working order.

snapping the back plate into place.

I started off this conquest with a parts run; I stalked ebay and trolled google for a few days weeks until I had figured out what I generally needed. I ended up using ‘buy it now’ from a place on ebay that turned out to only be a few hours away from where I live (what a small world). After the purchase, I emailed Hammerhead Technology and explained my plan for the mod and they sent me some cabling and a wifi card or bluetooth card (can’t remember which) and the fan/heatsink assembly as well as the logic board I had bought.

All the pieces of the pie.

I know there is a mess of sharpie on the plexiglas but let me explain. It was a pain to mark the mounting holes for the logic board. Besides holding the drill bit and hand turning it to mark where to drill, I couldn’t think of a better way to get the marks of where to drill. Plus the screws were a tad to big for the holes (i think they are like 1/32 and the threads made them just a fraction bigger. I circled the holes that were a hair off and then carefully edged them until everything was perfect.

The mounting base.

The severed power connector from the keyboard.

The picture below is of it turning on for the first time. Besides the end of the mod, this had to be the biggest build up; it actually turned on and was working. All I needed to do was load up OSX.  Thankfully I had a mac mini handy and a copy of leopard (an actual install disc) and a firewire cable. It took some googling to figure out how to push the install over (I had only been using OSX for a few weeks at this point), but it was all loaded and set.

The initial mounting and test start up.

Below are the two base’s and the front portion of the linksys cases. I took the original circuit boards out and was greeted with a set of two mounting holes on each base. The boards weren’t screwed in but they were ‘clicked’ into the base using a nib in each corner. The nib was attached to a riser (which by itself was the same height as the mounting holes in the middle of the plate), so all I had to do was cut off the nib. After I leveled out the risers, the plastic sheet fit firmly on the two base’s. After adding four holes for screws (and screws), it wasn’t going anywhere in a hurry.

The base plates lined up.

The mounting base on the case base.

The logic board mounted on the base.

I actually ended up drilling two sets of holes for the iSight/microphone. When I attempted to close the front of the case, the cabling was preventing it. The boardwalk property space in the front of the case is a hot commodity as the mounting base is jutted right up against both the front and back plates. Needless to say it was a close call in terms of space.

Drilling the mic and iSight holes.

Glueing the mic in place.

A nice top down view of the mod assembled.

A nice view of all the guts of the mod.

Below you can see the whole of the project. The little orange stick on the right is the bluetooth antenna, while the two white cables on the left are the wifi antennas.

The back with the bluetooth module installed.

Assembled in the shop.

Assembled on the desk.

Another pic of me putting the front sticker back on.

Below the finishing touches are added to my hidden network admin cam. It should allow the boss to check on the network babysitter, unless they are BOFH, then its game over.

Glueing the face plate back on.

The only light that was handy was from the little LED on my phone. I am checking to see the reflection from the iSight lens. I saw the sparkle/reflection that I was looking for and called it as done.

Checking alignment for the mic/iSight holes.

The boot up before being sealed up.

Front profile of the finished mod.

Side profile shot.

All done and booting up

Below you can see an upside down iSight shot of my alter ego/best friend as he is taking a picture of the mod working. I think he was attempting the never ending picture paradox.

My alter ego caught by iSight

If you would like to see the technical write up, please visit the next post: Macbook Mod III

This will be the beginning of the writeup for my macbook mod. It all began a year ago or so when I decided I wanted to start writing apps for the iPhone and iPod Touch. With this goal came a dilemma; I didn’t have a mac (at the time) to do any coding on and you need a mac to do any sort of development for the iPhone/iPod. To solve the problem, I decided I would buy a broken macbook and mod it into a new case and make it work again, although it would no longer be a laptop. I never really cared for laptops anyway, so it was no harm no foul, plus it would be pretty cool to get back into making things again.

A few weeks after I acquired all the parts and was beginning assembly, I came upon a mac mini from a friend, now partner. This was the kryptonite that nearly killed my beloved mod, as I had no reason to finish as I had a working mac. The months would go by and the mini would peddle away on top of my tower (oh yes, I should probably be using the really good computer I built last year-another expensive working paperweight) while the logic board of the mod would sit on my desk and stare back at me, the two chips staring back at me like a sad pair of eyes.

My best friend and I would occasionally talk about it and throw ideas back and forth because my original goal of modding it seemed like an extreme long shot. Another competing idea for how I would finish it would be the trophy mount; Billy the big mouth bass style, except less talking comedic fish and more super awesome logic board. The topic would be shelved for the time being and brought up. This back and forth banter happened for some time and all to many jokes were had on behalf of the wonder machine Steve J helped put together. The mod was all but dead in my heart though and I would always think about it.

Then one day it all changed and I decided to finish it. It was like a switch was flipped and all I could do was drill and dremel. That day was Sunday, November 23rd, 2009. My macbook mod is now complete and looks so impressive now that it is no longer a mass of exposed circuit boards and wiring.

I am going to finish the macbook mod this weekend. It is currently just attached to its plastic panel and sitting on my desk. The case shouldn’t be too hard to finish up (given enough plastic glue), so then i’ll drop it into the little case and give that old macbook a new life. I can’t wait to hack together the light panel in the front of the case, that is gonna be sweet indeed.

As this is one of my first formal posts in a while, I will just enter the disclaimer that i’ve been using twitter for too long and haven’t had a ballanced online posting experience. My coming posts will have more of a grammarian influence and will have a better form.

Thanks for reading,

Tyler