Sunday, 8 December 2019

MEGA65 DevKit prototype assembly

Here are a bunch of pictures of a laser cut acrylic MEGA65 developer kit case with PCB R2 and the MEGA65 keyboard inside (plus a floppy drive). As you can see it is more compact than the original MEGA65 case fitting the floppy drive on the side and above the board. The kit was designed and cut by our partner plexi|laser based on a layout by the MEGA65 assembly team.






The DevKit is an option for people, especially developers, to get a MEGA65 before it is fully finished and be able to carve the machine together with us and to develop software for it before its release. The top shell is bent to give it a more slick look and to avoid hurting those precious developers hands.



As it is the first version of the DevKit case we found a couple of things that we want to improve, such as better and quicker access to the board for accessing in terms of programming/flashing the board and keyboard as well as access to the SD drive slots. The new revised parts are already in the mail so expect an update soon.


The final version of the case will sport an engraved MEGA65 logo and also a prominent DevKit serial number to make it a great collector‘s item as well. This should shorten the dreadful waiting time for the final machine to be available significantly. Other possibilities to shorten this time can be found on MEGA65.org.


Posted by at

8 comments:

  1. Stefano8 December 2019 at 07:15

    Would love to see an alternative consumer case in that more compact form, something more Amiga like. I think this might broaden the M65's appeal.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Pierpaolo8 December 2019 at 07:58

    Very Amigaish!
    Cool!
    Can't wait...

    ReplyDelete
  3. Anonymous9 December 2019 at 16:07

    Why not an SD card slot instead of a floppy drive? I know there's nostalgia with floppy drives, but just an idea.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Anonymous10 December 2019 at 23:24

    The compact case look very awesome and I hope that a mini-case without the floppy can be done.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Anonymous14 December 2019 at 06:21

    If this could be made with a beige case, it would be a bit like the Commodore C65 Classroom Prototype, mentioned last year. Could be just like that, without the floppy drive. That would be very nice!

    ReplyDelete
  6. Javier6 January 2020 at 11:09

    THIS design is BETTER and will make me BUY a Mega65: Please do not put an ugly floppy drive to the right.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Andrew9 January 2020 at 05:46

    The point is to make something as close to the Commodore 65 as possible, with modern improvements, for those of us who never got one and couldn't even begin to imagine affording one today. Keep the disk drive! I WILL buy!

    ReplyDelete
  8. Rufus9 January 2020 at 07:52

    I want the... what they said? "Ugly"? But for me it's looking beautiful, floppy disk drive on the fight, like the original c65

    ReplyDelete

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)