Ah I see how two of them are closer together than the other ones. That solves it for me, thanks. It is an ATX board after all.

The blank shields are used for JBOD servers.
They are a current product at many server supplies and often cost less than $3.
That doesn't take care of the hole though. That would be DIY.

mothergoose729 wrote:

Sure, I would buy that.

It would also be nice to be able to have the cutouts and threaded screw holes for serial ports and the other headers you see on old boards.

I don't think it would be possible to have the cutouts for other ports on the io shield. Pretty sure if you mounted the ports there that they would interfere with the motherboard but I can double check. I'm not sure where I would get punches for other ports anyway.

The other ports - serial, parallel, ps2, etc - are usually mounted on special holes on the case itself or on a expansion slot cover.

cyclone3d wrote:

mothergoose729 wrote:

I'm not sure where I would get punches for other ports anyway.

The other punches are hard to find and not cheap. Most I've seen are over $200 each.

PCBONEZ wrote:

The blank shields are used for JBOD servers.
They are a current product at many server supplies and often cost less than $3.
That doesn't take care of the hole though. That would be DIY.

Yeah, the hole is the problem. What is the general shipping charge for a single plate without a hole?
From SuperMicro, they want $9.83 for shipping for a single shield.
Tekmentum wants $7.99 shipping.
TigerDirect only wants $2.99 shipping + .54 tax.
Deltatech wants $9.32 shipping.
You can get them from China for about $3 a piece shipped without a hole.

From my supplier, I can get them for $1.69 each shipped.
I would have to buy the hydraulic punch tool which isn't cheap and then I am guessing shipping would cost about $2 for USPS first class mail.. maybe less. If I ship a single one in a regular envelope, looks like shipping would be less than $1.

I could probably do a single one shipped for $6 if I had 20 people wanting them.

30 pieces would drop it to $5 for a single one shipped.

40 pieces would drop it to $4.50 for a single one shipped.

Anyway, I am just trying to help out... if I can get enough people wanting one or more.

You're talking 20pc not singles.
But my point was it's not an obsolete item. They are still making them.
.

cyclone3d wrote:

mothergoose729 wrote:

Sure, I would buy that.

It would also be nice to be able to have the cutouts and threaded screw holes for serial ports and the other headers you see on old boards.

I don't think it would be possible to have the cutouts for other ports on the io shield. Pretty sure if you mounted the ports there that they would interfere with the motherboard but I can double check. I'm not sure where I would get punches for other ports anyway.

The other ports - serial, parallel, ps2, etc - are usually mounted on special holes on the case itself or on a expansion slot cover.

Price is probably the object. I found at least one shield that has them positioned that way, and on my board it would work fine. My motherboard only extends about a inch further than the AT port.

The socket 7 boards I have seen with AT ports are also oriented the same way.

https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/p3cAAOSwUuFWutxe/s-l500.jpg

PCBONEZ wrote:

You're talking 20pc not singles.
But my point was it's not an obsolete item. They are still making them.
.

Right, they are still making the blank shields. The whole problem is making the keyboard hole and making it look good. Just drilling it is not going to work as the metal is so thin that the drill-bit will catch and tear the shield. Although it might be possible to drill IF you clamped the plate in between two pieces of wood.

I've just never had a real good experience trying to drill out that large of a hole without it messing up the surrounding metal.

mothergoose729 wrote:

Price is probably the object. I found at least one shield that has them positioned that way, and on my board it would work fine. My motherboard only extends about a inch further than the AT port.

The socket 7 boards I have seen with AT ports are also oriented the same way.

https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/p3cAAOSwUuFWutxe/s-l500.jpg

1. Would the standard thin ATX case style shield be strong enough to hold the ports properly? I'm guessing the shield itself would also not stay popped in place as it is usually held in by the ports on the motherboard.
2. Looking at prices for those types of punches, Grainger sells them for over $600 a piece. If I could find some used ones for cheap it would be more feasable.

cyclone3d wrote:

PCBONEZ wrote:

You're talking 20pc not singles.
But my point was it's not an obsolete item. They are still making them.
.

Right, they are still making the blank shields. The whole problem is making the keyboard hole and making it look good. Just drilling it is not going to work as the metal is so thin that the drill-bit will catch and tear the shield. Although it might be possible to drill IF you clamped the plate in between two pieces of wood.

I've just never had a real good experience trying to drill out that large of a hole without it messing up the surrounding metal.

How I've done it is to use the two pieces of wood but I precut the holes into the wood with a hole saw.
I then use the hole in the wood as a drill guide and switch the bit to an abrasive type (vs tooth) hole saw.
Works well to locate fan holes too but there you don't always need the abrasive bit. Depends on the metal.
.

cyclone3d wrote:

Grainger sells them for over $600 a piece. If I could find some used ones for cheap it would be more feasable.

Grainger is far from being the cheapest place for anything but you'd still be hard put to find any for under $200.
They will work but they (most of them) aren't intended for metal that thin.
They are made to handle thick sheet metal (like in old cases) and making them that heavy duty drives the cost up.
.

You don't need a hydraulic punch or multiple hole saws. A step drill bit will cleanly cut through sheet metal.

OOohh a hydraulic one! That would be nice too.

In my sheet metal experience (and I have a lot. used to build street rods on the side) step drills are difficult to get on center and with metal that thin they tend to leave rough holes with burs all over the place. That's if the teeth don't grab the work and whip it around in circles or rip a tear.
Not my choice but if it works well for you then be happy.
.

Small pilot hole takes care of the centering. Any time you are drilling loose sheet metal it should be clamped down. Simply flip the piece over and drill from the other side to remove any burs.

Plasma wrote:

Small pilot hole takes care of the centering. Any time you are drilling loose sheet metal it should be clamped down. Simply flip the piece over and drill from the other side to remove any burs.

Ah, yeah. I know all about pilot holes.
In metal that thin call yourself lucky if the pilot bit doesn't grab and tear the hole or spin off to the side. Bye bye centering.

It's unlikely you can come up with anything I haven't tried with metals multiple times.
Further I was a QA inspector for several years and my duties included inspecting the work of welders and machinists.

If I still had all my metal working equipment building cases from scratch would not be an issue for me.
Welding it would not be a problem either although I'd probably go with rivets.
Soldering in the fashion that makes lead sleds lead would work great for a case project too.
For that matter fiberglass front bezels wouldn't be an issue for me either.
But I sold all that stuff off 20 years ago after customizing cars since the early 70's.
.
If step drills make you happy then use them.
I don't like them for this.
.

Well alot of newer cases don't have the holes for a BabyAT board anymore, and with the cutouts some of them have plastic spacers dont work either. You could easily get around the lack of standoff placement by tapping your own hole, but missing metal is a whole nother issue.

candle_86 wrote:

Well alot of newer cases don't have the holes for a BabyAT board anymore, and with the cutouts some of them have plastic spacers dont work either.

There are "spacers" aka Standoffs that have a pad instead of a pin that goes through the mobo pan.
They just sit on the pan, they don't go through it. No hole required.

They don't hold-down but they do limit board flex when installing RAM or add-in cards.
For hold-down the standoffs that do line up are sufficient.
Use metal standoffs and screws in those locations so the board is properly grounded to the case.

In a pinch you can cut the pins off the more common nylon standoffs which turns them into the pad type.
Been doing this since the 90's. It works great.

Also works for parts testing boards that will never see a case.
Keeps all the solder joints on the back of the board off your work surface.
.

candle_86 wrote:

You could easily get around the lack of standoff placement by tapping your own hole, but missing metal is a whole nother issue.

There are some workarounds for metal not thick enough for threads.

You can use threaded nut-rivets. (aka rivet-nuts and some trade names.)
If using for mobo standoffs you either need a recessed hole or to shorten the standoff to compensate for the thickness of the rivet head.

Using soldering equipment intended for working with copper/brass pipe works fine on most alloys of mild steel so long as you remove any zinc coating (galvanizing) and/or paint first.
The soldering gear intended for auto body work is better but the stuff for plumbing works well enough for putting nuts on thin metal.
Using that you can solder brass nuts on the back side of the mobo pan.
To hold the nut in place for the soldering drill the hole and put in a screw.
Be careful not to solder the screw into the nut. That's no fun.

The soldering techniques work well for custom brackets/mounts too.
.

mothergoose729 wrote:

This is the board

https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/9aMAAOSwM79aqsOW/s-l500.jpg

Parke I think you're right. The manual says something about a shared PCI/ISA slot.

You don't have 8 slots. You have only 7. The ISA and PCI slots in the middle is "shared", you can use only one of them, not both at the same time. And most of the ATX cases has 7 slots, by design.

Sorry, I jumped before reading the whole tread 😊