FINISHED! Front Panel Indicators + Indicator Bracket
I love that F word. Finished that is... This should really be a huge juicy update, but it isn't. There was a TON of work done behind the scenes to make the "blinken' lights" happen. In addition to the repairs need to the 3rd (starting on the left) key's backlight (which really only took about 45 minutes), there were several other mods that had to happen to make this all possible:
1.) Modified dual-port gigabit Ethernet card for external link/activity LEDs & combined speed LED.
-link/act lights when there is an established link
-link/act blinks off when there is activity
-there are two link/act lights, 1 for each Ethernet port on the card
-the combined speed LED lights RED in the case of either card not having a link @ 1Gb/s.
2.) Modified Yamaha CDRW-F1 for external LEDs and & eject switch
- disc in/act lights when there is media in the drive
- disc in/act blinks off when there is activity
3.) Another eight custom cables to run the front panels, sleeved, and heatshrunk (for quality!)
- SCSI LED (white)
- HDD LED (white)
- CD/RW Writing (red)
- CD/RW Reading (white)
- DVD Reading (blue)
- NIC 1 Activity (white)
- NIC 1/2 Low Speed (red)
- NIC 2 Activity (blue)
We now rejoin our regularly scheduled program, already in progress...
Finished bracket-bracket & LED bracket.
The backside w\ the LEDs mounted & legs trimmed. I'm using .100" spaced connectors on the cables that go to the devices. The devices take care of the current limiting for the LEDs, keeping these compact.
indicator panel installed in the case. Note that I had to move it up from the last time you saw it... I didn't like the LED indicators so close to the touch keys... it looked crowded. This is better.
Wider angle of same thing. And I <3 the photoshop Lens Correction filter! It's how I got this one perfectly straight.
DVD Hanging out. You can barely make out the mesh behind the smoked plexi...it's a neat effect. The VFD isn't installed yet as I didn't feel like hauling my laptop down to the basement (Yeah, I'm lazy, an IBM T43 is so heavy, NOT) to drive the screen.
Labels are good. The ">" indicates which direction the connector should face, so the polarity on the LEDs is right should I ever have to disassemble everything. This is only 3 of the eight cables, though.
Yikes... A shot from the top with the door closed, with the wiring for the touch keys and the indicators below it.
Money shot!
MONEY VIDEO 
(1.2MB, DivX)
The first thing I point at is the activity LED for the CDRW drive, note that it lights up as soon as the drive registers that there is a CD in the drive, stays on as long as there is a CD, and blinks off for the activity. The second thing I point at is the same thing for the Pioneer slotload DVD-ROM... which normally stays off and blinks on for activity... that was a fun mod to come up with.
From left to right, the indicators are:
- SCSI LED (white)
- HDD LED (white) - not lit in video at all
- CD/RW Writing (red) - not lit in video at all
- CD/RW Reading (white)
- DVD Reading (blue)
- NIC 1 Activity (white)
- NIC 1/2 Low Speed (red) - not lit in video at all
- NIC 2 Activity (blue)