exxos's Atari, Amiga & retro forum

I recently bought a WIP RPi Pico HDD from Exxos for my MegaST4

https://exxosforum.co.uk/forum/viewtopi ... =13&t=5913

And I was thinking about a case for it. Some plexiglass or a box case.

And then I had a crazy idea followed by a late night bid on eBay I thought i'd never win and I accidentally bought this.


Yes it's the most disgusting Megafile ever. (It was very very very cheap, a fraction of any I've ever seen sold)

The idea is to clean the case up. Remove the internals. Pop in the Pico and either a PSU or a USB port.

Crazy idea?

I think it's rather large, if I were to do something with a megafile I'd put multiple devices in it, maybe an ICD device for SCSI, put PiSCSI inside, an ACSI hard drive too, maybe a real cd ROM. Or turn it completely into an emulated Atari with a Pi inside, or an FPGA.

For just the Pi HDD id wanna source an old external Atari floppy drive and use that housing I reckon. Just my thoughts.

Will you crank it up and try to see if it actually works before you pull it apart?

mrbombermillzy wrote: 01 Jul 2023 20:06 Will you crank it up and try to see if it actually works before you pull it apart?

I'm also wondering what you plan to do with the existing innards afterwards? :D

Steve wrote: 01 Jul 2023 12:05 I think it's rather large. For just the Pi HDD id wanna source an old external Atari floppy drive

It's going under (or on top?) a MegaST. It's the perfect shape and size. That classic look and it raises the SC1224 to the right height

mrbombermillzy wrote: 01 Jul 2023 20:06 Will you crank it up and try to see if it actually works before you pull it apart?

I don't think I have a DMA cable. All the cables I thought were DMA cakes are actually ACSI->SCSI cables (e.g. Link/Link2)

JezC wrote: 01 Jul 2023 21:43 I'm also wondering what you plan to do with the existing innards afterwards? :D

Probably offer it for spares. WEE it at work if no one wants it. We'll see

I say go for it. :dualthumbup:

Looks like a non-destructive mod.

Mine lives in this old RasPi box :lol:

Nice One! :D
What is the consensus on a case for this? It was designed to have a cable connection so the User can place it wherever they want (within cable restrictions of course). My preference is to sit it on top of the case. Someone mentioned sitting the board within two pieces of plastic - I like that idea - simple and neat, but doesn't plastic generate static?

Looking for ideas...

dad664npc wrote: 02 Jul 2023 08:52 Looking for ideas...

Anyone have any experience of folded/pressed metal enclosures? Are they expensive to fabricate?

alexh wrote: 01 Jul 2023 22:51 Probably offer it for spares. WEE it at work if no one wants it. We'll see

Bring it to Northampton in October? :D

I have an ACSI to megafile lead at hand:


I can bring it to the show and we can test the internals if you want. (As long as someone brings an ST to the show :lol: )

I would *ALWAYS* recommend passing it on if it works. Please don't dump a working ST HDD! :)

If it works, I'm sure the parts can be re-cased into something practical.

alexh wrote: 01 Jul 2023 22:51 Probably offer it for spares. WEE it at work if no one wants it. We'll see

I'll second the comment from @mrbombermillzy - I have a Megafile 30 & Mageafile 60 which are bound to succumb to age at some point...though quite possibly after I do :lol: :roll: