Casemod… Commodore-style

When you hear someone talk about “case modding” it is always related to some cool modification that has been done to the computer case (like adding an aquarium (!), adding some colour etc.) to the traditionally pale grey PC.

Indeed, casemodding can be traced back to the 90′s when computer geeks were overclocking their CPU’s to get more power out of their machines, which resulted in CPU’s running red hot, thus requiring additional cooling, which then resulted in PC cases being opened, extra coolers being added and in some cases, cooling windows to expose the internals of the computer and get a better airflow.

What we probably don’t realize, is that we can trace the origins of casemodding back to the early 80′s, but then the “mod” had nothing to do with cooling, but with giving the Commodore 64 a “PC look”.
You could actually send your C64 to a company (the “mods” were not produced by Commodore themselves) specialized in providing PC-like enclosures for your machine, along with all its peripherals and then got it back looking like a PC.
The C64-keyboard was put in new enclosure, looking more like a PC-keyboard, attached to a case holding your 1541-drive (or 2) and/or your modem.  On top of the case, you could then place your monitor.

I came accross this, while reading and old copy of the Dutch magazine ”Commodore Info” and it reminded me of something I came accross on the web not so long ago: a guy named Benjamin Heckendorn got to work on a special mod project back in 2006 by taking original Commodore hardware (like a C64c motherboard) and turn it into a fully functional Commodore laptop (he even named it the C64p =)  The result is really very cool and the information he gives on his webpage is very informative and makes you want to try it yourself.