The air intake on the side is also supposed to act like an expansion port for the PCI port. (It's stuck to a removeble door)

I think that's a good idea for us still using CRTs. Just make sure you don't fall into the same trap as Commodore did. That should be a second floppy drive, not a RAM module. And Expansion slots go on the inside.

I realy hope you are kidding. Else look at pic 2 or compare the size of the floppydrive to the size of the case.

Richard Maudsley wrote:

Instead of trying to apply a design language intended for a much wider machine, why don't you try to create your own?

Because i love the A3000 design ? ;)

Richard Maudsley wrote:

If you're still intent on creating a pastiche of late 80s/early 90s computers, try and balance "retro" with something that would be acceptable for a modern product. The A3000 series was one of the better ones, but the colour did it no favors. Anyway:     The first is to try and hide the slot load dvdrom as much as possible. There is no reason for it to be sunk into the front panel so much, and would probably not only look cleaner flush against the front, but also free up a small amount of room inside the case. Every little helps.

I like it. It feels retro. I don't want an apple mac mini lookalike.
As for the color it's a bit of in those renders. It's supposed to be the same as a brand new A1200 case. An optional version would be CDTV black.

Richard Maudsley wrote:

Remember, the slot load drive was invented for one reason only: to minimise it's physical presence. surrounding it with a large bezel defeats the purpose.

As i said above i like the retro feel.
 

Richard Maudsley wrote:

The second suggestion is to centre both of the drives. Having the floppy drive on the right made sense on the A3000 to make room for a the second drive, and a large space for the A3000 logo.   Your case doesn't have this.

The plan was to have an Natami logo there. Never finished the design.

Richard Maudsley wrote:

A third suggestion is more practical than it is aesthetic, though it will help that too: Put the Floppy drive above the CDROM. It's easier to design a chassis that way. Check out the Walker, it should give you a rough idea of what's going on there even though it was barely a first prototype.

There is no room in the case for that. I use the empty space for a pico-psu.

Thanks again for the nice comments.
//Nickman

The X500 is still going but the keyboard supplier decided that they couldn't do orders for less than 1000 (before the economic crisis it was no problem) so I had to scrap the top part and start from scratch.

The keyboard was good and low profile it meant reduced height for hands. Now I have got something similar which is more affordable and could integrate with the design better.

Some more news soon.

EDIT: Thinking more about the idea of producing custom A1000 style faceplates... It's important to standardise on a case that will stay in production for long enough that we can still find them by the time the natami is out. Does anyone know the typical life cycle of a PC case, and how often do manufacturers change front panel fitment (screw holes, etc) ?

Valid. Slot load drives are a bit crap when it comes to reliabilty, but I suppose they are still good for other reasons.

Mr Graham Bartram wrote:

Secondly, a floppy drive? I was hoping to avoid one of them. Loose the floppy and give me a slimline tray DVD drive any day.

Nobody says you've got to use it. Natami has the header on the motherboard so having a case with no floppy bay would be daft.

You can always order with a blanking plate over it, but as far as I'm concerned floppies are still the easiest and cheapest way to sneakernet files to and from an amiga without physically removing the hard disk.

Mr Graham Bartram wrote:

To Be honest I'm not a fan of Amiga cases (I know, I know, I just blasphemed) but most computers from that era er.... lacked a certain aesthetic.

The 500/600/1200 I think look very good. The 1000 was very compromised but that's not to say you can't make a good pizzabox machine.

2000? Hideous. 3000 series had excellent styling but the case construction and colour choice was dire.

4000 Looked better if only because of the choice of pure white, 4000T is standard generic PC ugly.

Mr Graham Bartram wrote:

As for not wanting an Apple Mac Mini lookalike, I hate to say it but they do look rather nice.   Anyway, please don't feel offended by my comments, many people love the retro look and they are your customer base not me. I'll probably find a diddy little case that I can screw in place under my desk and never see. Even my PC has an external DVD drive so that the drive  can sit on my desk and I don't have a big box cluttering my view.

You can pull off a retro pastiche without copying the design flaws common to the time. I have a day off tomorrow, maybe I'll see what I could cook up using the 3000T as inspiration.

Would be a better colour than earwax beige though. I'm thinking matte black. Or blacker than that, if possible. I want it so black you can't make out a single detail. Almost.

Oh, sorry, i messed up with the propotions and dont aware of the Floppy-drive ;-D

A question in general concerning cases for the NatAmi:
Over the month and years various people here had various more or less great ideas and concepts for a case but what is the official plan in this point? Is there one yet?

Will the N-Team call a standard-case "official" Natami with a sticker on it or just sell the board and let the choice in users hands?

Or will someone from outside (third-party :-)) do one and sell it seperatly?

Doing a case is pretty expensive, especially when it should be that nice and unique.
Any ideas to bring a common "face" of this new, exiting Amiga to reality?

I dont really know, what i will use, maybe A500-Case...? :-)

I like that the CD is actually a slim drive bay and not a slot load only.

The Amiga like styling is really cool, and I agree the a3000/a4000 are really cool looking. The case is very small yet still allowing use of the PCI slot without an expensive L adapter. It doesn't have the incredibly ugly and cheap monster truck appearance of PC cases, nor does it require that I put it beside my monitor increasing the foot print on my desk.

Congrats on a design that is modern without looking like a hideous x86 PC.

I agree with the idea of two floppy drives, but most people probably won't want any floppy drive in a new computer.  Since the Natami is going to have the floppy drive controller on the motherboard, we might as well have at least one case design that takes advantage of it.

The person who did the A3000 like design did a good job of thinking it through and drawing it in 3D so it could accept the PCI cards and drives.  He might be able to fit a second floppy drive next to the first one and still make it work.  Then it really would be very similar to the original A3000 design.  Maybe he could even design it with a removable face plate for people that only wanted one floppy drive, or zero floppy drives.  Then that space could be used to install 3.5" hard drives, just like the original A3000 case design.

I was hoping for an A1000 case design with the keyboard garage, but it is probably too much to ask for and would be expensive in low quantities to make.