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The Mac Mini Faceplate Mod
We have all seen the Mac mini’s. Having one on your desk is already a focal point. It’s a powerful computer in a small package. In the past few years I think Apple’s designs for all their computers have been a step above the ordinary PC, especially now with the Mac mini, eMac, iMac, and Power Mac. To me there’s only one thing missing, personal customization with the Mac mini. I mean, the iPod mini has 4 different colors, the normal iPod has the U2 edition along with the standard white. But when you buy a Mac mini, that’s it, that’s what you have, an attractive machine, but everyone who has one has the EXACT same looking one as you. When this happens my brain goes to work, I don’t like being like everyone else so this is where my new project got its start.
My first problem, “How am I going to tastefully mod such a small machine and make this stand out at the same time?” Well after a couple of days of being distracted at work by not knowing what to do with my project it came to me. I wanted it to glow somehow. As my idea progressed, I revised it to include a pushbutton ON switch up top, then have the ON switch be the apple, and for that apple to glow with a different color than the rest of the case.
Overall my project had no bad problems. The only problem I can think of is that Ihad to buy a 500 resistor assortment pack, just so I could get the 5 (51ohm) ones I needed out of it.
Well, lets start
Parts
Mac mini
1/8” plexiglass
(4) 3mm blue led’s
(1) 3mm red led
(5) 51 ohm resistors
(1) 3-5 foot USB cable (one side needs to be male A)
Materials
Dremel
Needle nose pliers
Wire strippers
Electrical tape
Putty knife
Sand paper
Goo gone
soldering gun and solder
Here’s the Mac mini before its facelift, literally.
Step 1: Now you need your putty knife to separate the computer from the outer shell. First turn over the Mac mini, place it on a soft surface, a towel is good, then insert the putty knife where the silver meets the white (shown in Image 1 below). Tilt the knife until you hear a pop-like sound and it pops up a bit. Yes it doesn’t sound great but you have to do it. Next do the other side. After both sides are popped, grab the aluminum above the ports and those same ports. Move them in opposite directions to finalize the opening of the case.
Image 1: Putty knife opening the Mac mini.
Step 2:
After you open the Mac mini, flip over the shell and look at all four corners, as shown below. The silver tape in all those corners has to be cut, (Image 2 below)
Image 2: Inside of the Mac mini shell.
Step 3: After you have cut the tape, just push the metal shielding out. You should be left with the hollow shell and the top plate with the metal shielding attached. (Images 3A & 3B)
Image 3A: Mac mini shell.
Image 3B: Mac mini faceplate.
Step 4: Now the top plate is attached to the metal shielding, this step is not required, but I wanted the option to put the “old” face back on. To get the face off the shielding, just stick the putty knife in and use it to cut the clue all around it, this takes some time, but eventually you will be left with some glue in the center and from there it is easy to pry the pieces apart. Now you will be left with the top face, but with a really sticky residue. To remove this you need adhesive remover, I used goo gone, and a blade. Pour the goo gone on the side with the residue and scrape it off, its that easy. It might take a few passes but it works well. You will be left with the piece below, both sides shown (Images 4A & 4B)
Image 4A: Metal shielding.
Image 4B: Other side of metal shielding.
Step 5: Image 5A below is the sheet of plexiglass I bought. I measured (2) 6 3/16 inch squares. I measured and outlined the squares, and started cutting it with my dremel (far right side). After I started the project I found out that places that sell this, will laser cut pieces for you, for an extra fee. So if you can find a place by you that will do this, I would recommend it, it would save a lot of time. Image 5B is the square I cut. Now that you have the square comes the tedious part, hand sanding the edges. I found it was easier to do this by hand, but if you’re skilled with a dremel you can try that. Have the outer case shell handy, you will need it to test fit your new face piece. Tip: Take your time
Image 5A: Sheet of plexiglass.
Image 5B: The 6 3/16 square.
Step 6: Test fit the new plexi face. (Images 6A & 6B below)
Image 6A: The plexi on its new home, I know you cant really see it, so see the next pic.
Image 6B: You can see the shadow of the xbox controller.
Step 7: Now we're going to take a break from the dremeling and work on the wiring for the LED's/relocation of the power switch. You need to get your needle nose pliers out. Locate the power button in the back. Follow the cord to the motherboard. Carefully remove it, keeping note which way this plugs in, when you reinstall it you dont want to put it in the wrong way. Location of this point is Image 7. Take those pliers and pry the button assembly out. Its only held there by glue. Be careful though, you may have to bend some of the metal shielding from around this point to remove the attached wire safely.
Image 7: Power button point on motherboard.
Step 8: Once this is removed, look at the back, as shown in Image 8, take your needle nose pliers again and pinch the 3 points of plastic. This is all that is keeping this assembly together. Once you do this, the chip should come loose from the push button.
Image 8: Back of the power pushbutton assembly.
Step 9: The reason we took this off is because the pushbutton power switch will now be on the top of the Mac mini. The only problem is that it wont reach its home on the motherboard as it is now. We now need to extend those wires. Desolder them keeping note on which wire is where. You may want to mark it with a piece of tape and a mark on the small chip. After that is done take your USB cord and cut off the side that isn't male A. We need this side to plug into the back of the Mac mini later. Strip about 4-5 inches. Take the red and black wires and use them as the extension pieces. Solder the red and black to the chip, and the origional to these wires. End result should look like Image 9C.
Image 9A: USB male A (dont cut this off).
Image 9B: Part of the USB that should be cut off.
Image 9C: Power button wires extended.
Step 10: Installing the LED's. Insert the cut end of the USB cable through the hole left by the Power switch, Image 10A. Connect the + side of the LED's to the red wire. Connect resistors to the - side of the LED, and connect the other leg of the resistor to the black wire. To calculate what type of resistor you need, use this formula. Resistance(Ohms) = (Supply Voltage - Forward V of LED)/ Current (A). When you get your LED's, they should come with this information; Forward Voltage and Continuous Foward Current. Forward Voltage is given in V, and Continuous Foward Current is given in mA. As you see the formula wants it in Amps (A). Take the number you got in mA and move the decimal place over 3 places to the left. Here's an example. 30mA = 0.03A. When you use USB, your supply voltage is 5v. So now you have all the numbers needed to figure out your resistance. So for me this formula was (5v - 3.5v)/0.03(A)=50ohms, so i need a 50ohm resistor. When you can't find a resistor with the exact number you got (which you usually don't), go higher, not lower. This is the reason I went with a 51ohm resistor. Images 10C-10G are the LED points.
Image 10A: Back of Mac mini, Power switch removed.
Image 10B: LED array diagram
Image 10C: Blue LED #1
Image 10D: Blue LED #2
Image 10E: Blue LED #3
Image 10F: Blue LED #4
Image 10G: Red LED and Power ON switch.
Step 11: Test it out, plug in the USB, and turn it on. If everything is done right, you should get something like Image 11, depending of corse on what color LED's you used. You can stop here if you like it this way, or continue on to create a red Powerbutton switch with an etched window.
Image 11: LED's working, clear faceplate on.
Step 12: Back to the dremeling. My vision was to have the perimeter blue and the apple in the middle glow red, while the apple being the Power button too. So now for what I think was the hardest part, cutting an apple from the middle with the dremel and cutting a matching replacement from the space pieces; Image 12A. We do this because since this is now the Power On switch there has to be some give to it, the plain sheet will not bend enough to activate the Power button. After you cut the apple, or whatever logo you want on your mod, you should sand the bottom of both the faceplate and the apple. This is only if you chose a clear piece, it helps refract the light of the LED's; Image 12B.
Image 12A: Apple cut out
Image 12B: LED's on, sanded faceplate, apple logo cut out.
Step 13: Crazy glue the apple to underside of the switch, just a dot is needed. The switch should have the white part, shown in Image 12B facing downward, not upward like shown (I flipped it and glue the underside since that picture.) The glue should be on the chip side of that switch.
Step 14: Clean up the wires (I put a line of electrical tape to the center to make it look neater, unlike Image 12B above (all scattered about) You can kind of see the line of tape in Image 14A and 14B below. Any points that have exposed metal (like the solder points along your LED array should be covered with heatshrink or electrical tape. Use some electrical tape and have it around the perimeter of the apple, this prevents the blue and red light from mixing. After this reassemble the Mac mini and place your new faceplate on.
Final Product
Image 14A: Close up of the apple.
Image 14B: Full view of the finished Mac mini Faceplate Mod
Sorry about these final pics, my camera doesnt seem to like bright lights, its much smoother and the apple is more defined in person
So that is it. The total time this mod took was 3 weeks, most of this time waiting for my 3mm LED's to be shipped. Other than that, the concept, guide, and making of the faceplates took around 14 hours. Again I chose this color combo, you can choose one of the infinite amount of others or pick multiple ones to switch out like me. I'm actually having a gloss black faceplate laser cut, and I will switch that along with other combo's I think of. So this way I'll have the glossy black top and a glowing red apple; I think that would look pretty cool. I called this a faceplate mod because these are interchangable and not permanent. You can have different ones for different moods, family members, days, I don't know let your imagination run with it. Plexiglass is made in a variety of colors, so you don't even really need to install LED's, although the glow is pretty sweet. The great thing about the silver aluminum base is that it goes with pretty much any other color.
Any questions PM me or AIM me, im glad to help anyone who wants it. I hope you liked my mod, I have a couple other concepts in the making, so they will be submitted when they're done (probably a few months from now). Thanks for looking
-OffTheEdge
Revision: I got a piece of black plexi and decided to pop that on, I sanded the perimeter so the blue LED lights could shine through. I still have to cut out the apple, so I might have that done later today if I have time.
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