Ye Olde World Charm

The Solitaire brings us a link to Datamancer, where Richard R. Nagy shows off his Steampunk Laptop. The attention to detail and the creative style, which includes a copper-plated keyboard and speakers shaped like violin f-holes, make this an impressive case mod. From Datamancer: "This may look like a Victorian music box, but inside this intricately hand-crafted wooden case lives a Hewlett-Packard ZT1000 laptop that runs both Windows XP and Ubuntu Linux. It features an elaborate display of clockworks under glass, engraved brass accents, claw feet, an antiqued copper keyboard and mouse, leather wrist pads, and customized wireless network card. The machine turns on with an antique clock-winding key by way of a custom-built ratcheting switch made from old clock parts."

The Fossil Computer

[PIPBoy3000]

Years ago, before I had my second kid, I created a Fossil computer [archive.org] that was Victorian themed in brass, wood, and had an old fish fossil mounted where the tag went. It took a huge amount of time, but was one of those great father-son bonding experiences (he has a full machine shop, so he did most of the work). I loved the look and still feel I should turn it into a Media PC and stick it in our living room.

It seems a little sad that it's now my daughter's computer, sitting on the floor. The most excitement it gets these days is to play online Barbie or NickJr games.

Too bad about the cover

[Goaway]

It really is a shame to put that much effort into making something, and then totally ruining it with that cover, that just screams that the creator knows nothing about how clockwork actually works. It really is kind of an eyesore on an otherwise beautiful piece of work.

Re:The Fossil Computer

[ScrewMaster]

Nice job. Personally I've always liked the idea of a computer system simply disappearing into the background as just another piece of furniture (never really understood the case modders that put electroluminescent tape and UV tubes inside their machines. But hey, whatever floats your boat ... no accounting for taste.) Quite some years ago, strictly as an experiment, I took my regular tower case and covered it in mahogany-grained contact paper: the front was already black so they went well together. People would look at my keyboard and display and ask me where the computer was. It was right there on the floor in front of them, but since it was almost a perfect match for my desk it blended right in and they didn't see it. I dunno, must've thought it was a wastebasket or something

I loved the look and still feel I should turn it into a Media PC and stick it in our living room.

You know, you should do that: put together another system for her, and return your wooden gem to its former glory. I have an old Compaq desktop enclosure that I use in our living room as a media PC: it fits nicely in the entertainment center and that's all well and good. However, if I were to do what you did and turn it into furniture, I'd buy myself a lot of brownie points. Well, and now you've gone and made me think about my next winter project ...

Re:The Fossil Computer

[Windom Earle]

That's right. Fashion may come and go, but the nixie-tube digital voltmeter on my bench just keeps on measuring.

IOW some of us sat and watch it come and go. The excellent gear sticks around, though. I fired up an old Superior Instruments CR Bridge (with 'eye-tube' indicator) last week that probably hadn't been powered in two decades. Yep, it still works, and now it will be useful. I keep saying that someday I will put my vacuum tube random noise generator online to share it as a source of randomness with the world, but haven't done that yet.

It breaks my heart to see people putting current ITC boards (obsolete before the glue hardens) into cool but gutted vintage gear, when the original gear still had a long useful life ahead. To be ironic, if I had a bunch of money, I would order the latest new Dell box, gut it, and install a MicroVAX in the enclosure. (preserving the enclosure and hardware from the orignal, so it could be put back together after a few milliseconds when the cleverness wore off)

Re:Ugly

[Windom Earle]

It's the kind of thing my grandpa would have found at the dump, brought home, and converted into something useful.

I think I caught 'the bug' from him. He once turned an old wind-up phonograph mechanism into a jig to make his spearfishing lure rotate out in the ice house on the lak.

Re:Too bad about the cover

[Lemmy Caution]

And you are correct. It is hard to explain aesthetic insights like this to people who don't have a background in it, but it's true: adding the faux gearwork moves the work from the evocative to the connotative - from evoking the aesthetics of the Victorian era to simply referring to it, and that acts to diminish the effect of the piece (just like dressing as Batman for Halloween is less effective when you are wearing a shirt that says "Batman!" on it, instead of being the shirt that Batman wore, to use an example as far removed from the language of normal aesthetic judgment as I can think of.)