American vs European XL case

[ijor]

I guess everybody knew this already, except me. I just found out that the XL boxes are not universal, as I thought. I tried to put an American motherboard in an European case, and obviously it doesn't fit. The main culprit seems to be the lack of the hole for the TV channel switch. Anything else? I mean, if I remove the switch, it would fit nicely?

 

 

[vitoco]

I did it in the other way with success: I put a PAL motherboard with some mods in a NTSC box/case. I used the extra hole to install my own switch to turn on and off both the embeded Bluetooth mod and the modded ROM for the SIO2BT addon.

 

I think you can drill the missing hole or remove the TV channel switch if you only use A/V connector and not RF signal.

 

[erichenneke]

32 minutes ago, vitoco said:

I did it in the other way with success: I put a PAL motherboard with some mods in a NTSC box/case. 

 

I did the same (pal into ntsc case) and it never seemed to quite come together perfectly.  I mean, it is fine and after a little wiggling to get the board into the best possible position, and the chassis parts into just the right place, then I was able to get screws in, in just the right order and torqing some while loosening others, and, well... you get my point!  It was anything but a natural fit with the pal board inside the ntsc case. But in the end, it can fit.

 

I always thought I just had a chassis or a board that was just slightly out of spec tolerances, or perhaps both chassis and board are at the opposite edges of their tolerance specs and the stack up was just too tight.  But reading this makes me feel like it is probably normal and just due to some actual, albeit small, differences between the pal vs ntsc measurements. Interesting.

 

Eric

[Rybags]

NTSC 600XL doesn't have the monitor port so you'd get a similar problem putting a PAL motherboard into that case.

 

NTSC 1-bit RAM type 65XE (or is it all of them) lack the ECI port.

[Peri Noid]

7 hours ago, Rybags said:

NTSC 1-bit RAM type 65XE (or is it all of them) lack the ECI port.

Some PAL as well, especially these sold here in Poland. Then there were PAL versions with an ECI port. And later there was only a 130XE board not fully populated and sold as 65XE and 800XE. 

Edited June 21, 2022 by Peri Noid

[Mclaneinc]

Altirra fits in to its case perfectly, no matter what model I use

 

Sorry people, dremel time for you..

[vitoco]

@Rybags and @Peri Noid have a point... I assumed that @ijor was talking about the 800XL, which it was the most common computer in my country.

 

@Mclaneinc Altirra also fits in an 800XL case, just check this project: one PC inside one Atari

 

[Mclaneinc]

22 minutes ago, vitoco said:

 

@Mclaneinc Altirra also fits in an 800XL case, just check this project: one PC inside one Atari

 

Wow, that was a hell of a lot of work, I personally would not go that extreme, but as a challenge it was epic...

[Sikor]

I think, that is nevermind NTSC<>PAL version (of course without chanel switch), but valid is time of production and country (China/Taiwan/maybe Mexico, i don't know there was produce XL or XE only?) and PCB type (with Freddy or without it).