Convert a Vintage Apple Macintosh Computer Into a Raspberry Pi Desktop Computer

I was lucky enough to have someone give me a working vintage Apple Macintosh SE several years ago. They are neat machines, and were around when I was very young so somewhat nostalgic for me. While it was fun to have one, it's not a very useful computer in the modern age. I'd wanted to integrate a Raspberry Pi into the plastic enclosure as a desktop machine for my electronics bench for years, and was inspired by Pi Day and the Instructables contest to finally make my dream of an Apple Raspberry Pi come true as a Pi Day celebration!

1. An old Macintosh computer with a 9" display - SE is what I used, but some other models have a similar form factor and screen size
2. A Raspberry Pi - I used a version 4 model B, but pretty much any of them will work
3. A small HDMI screen - I used the PiMoroni 8" purchased from DigiKey but there are many other versions out there that you could source and fit using this Instructable and the associated files
4. HDMI cable
5. USB cable for your Raspberry Pi (depends on model year)
6. USB cable for your HDMI screen
7. 3mm acrylic plastic
8. Access to a laser cutter
9. 3D printer filament and access to a 3D printer
10. A small variety of hand tools and drivers, most notably a T15 torx driver to disassemble the Mac

Optional:

1. An old 3.5" disk to fit the Mac
2. A soldering iron or crimp tool

First, you'll need to track down an vintage Macintosh to take apart for this project. You might look at thrift stores and yard sales, but there appear to be a lot of them for not too much money on eBay. You only need the enclosure, so definitely look for sales that indicate "non-working" since you don't need the guts of the machine anyways. A Macintosh SE is what this project is designed around, but I believe that anything with a 9 inch display should work with the files I've included in TinkerCAD. I've used the Mactracker app for years to get info on all variety of Macs. You need to have one to operate the app but it is useful to get info all in one place on vintage and modern Mac computers to see what machines would have a 9" display compatible with this Instructable.

BE CAREFUL HERE! I take no responsibility for any injury you might incur when taking your machine apart. Be advised that old CRT screens have capacitors inside the machine that can literally kill you if you touch them in a way that they discharge into your body, whether the machine is plugged in or not. Search for ways to safely discharge a CRT monitor or watch this short video for what needs to be done before you start disassembly in earnest!

Now that that's out of the way, there are four bolts/screws you need to remove to get the machine apart, all requiring a T15 driver. Two bolts at the back of the machine by all of the ports, and two screws buried at the top where the handle is. These are a pain - I had to assemble my driver with some skinny extensions to get into them, and a T15 screwdriver is just too wide to turn, so expect to struggle with that for a bit!

Once those are removed, gently pry the seam at the front of the machine by the screen while pulling the back away, and the whole assembly slides apart. Set the back case aside for a while - we won't need it until reassembly.

Now, you just need to discharge the CRT as advised, and take out several more T15 and Phillips head screws. Remove everything for now, you'll need to access the front part of the machine where the screen was for the most part. Disassembly is very straightforward once you get the case apart. I plan to try and sell the old components on eBay for anyone who maintains these machines, but properly recycle yours if that's not your plan. You might keep the disk drive for the display controls as I did, see a later step for what that looks like.

I have to pause here and just marvel at the level of innovation we have seen over the last 40 years in technology. This computer from 1987 - which was still working - was revolutionary in its day. It seems outdated, but the technology inside was cutting edge then. The same size display in 2025 is 3mm thick and weighs almost nothing - when I took this apart, the bulk of the interior was electronics to support the CRT display, with the motherboard and hard drive being actually quite small. We have come such a long way in such a short time!

We are lucky to live in an era where there are so many folks willing to share amazing designs for niche projects like this! I found a 3D printable file that fits the screw pattern for the old CRT and fills the curved gap at the face of the machine to insert a flat HDMI screen. See Thingiverse here for a file from StephenLulz that I used, or the attached STL. Here is another one on Printables that might work for other models or larger screens.

I was going to 3D print in black, but didn't have any, so decided to do a loud teal color instead and am happy that I did.

This Instructable takes advantage of the amazing TinkerCAD feature to export 3D shapes as .svg files for laser cutting to dramatically reduce the amount of time to fiddle around with designing that portion. There are some great tutorials on Instructables that go deeper into this process, but basically TinkerCAD exports 2D SVG files that you can use to cut out vector shapes where any 3D object intersects the workplane. Keep in mind you will need a laser cutter or access to one for this portion - check your local makerspace, that is where I cut mine out!

If you are using a PiMoroni 8" LCD screen, simply cut out the attached .svg files and proceed. If not, you can modify my shared TinkerCAD files to fit your LCD and export them for laser cutting. There are three layers - the first one serves as a bezel to cover the non-display portion of the LCD, the second holds the LCD in place and centers the display portion to the first, and the third layer holds the LCD in place while also supporting the driver board where the HDMI and power come in.

For the exterior-facing bezel layer, I started by importing the CRT adapter for the outline, then simply filled in the blank center with a modified rectangle that had a radius close to the corners of the adapter. Using the "Align" tool to keep everything centered, I then created a hole that matched the display portion of the LCD - adjust this as necessary for yours, and maybe turn it on or look up the spec sheet to test that the display portion matches what you are creating here. Once everything looks good, make sure the object is touching the workplane and click "Export". Instead of exporting as a .stl like you would normally for 3D printing, export as a .svg - this will allow you to cut out on almost any laser cutter.

For the second inset layer, the process is similar so duplicate the first or use my TinkerCAD link. You'll need to make this layer the outside portion of your LCD so that the whole thing fits into the inset. Depending on the thickness of your display, you may need to use 1/4" acrylic, cut two layers, etc. The PiMoroni display I was using was almost exactly the thickness of 3mm acrylic, so it worked a treat! Keep in mind that yours - like mine - might have a border that is offset from center which you don't want to see. I simply moved the hole to account for this offset so that the display portion of the LCD was centered on the first bezel layer.

For the last layer, I created a few "sticks" that are held by the bolt which goes through all three layers, and also allow for the mounting of the LCD driver. The linked and attached .svg sticks are slotted because where the driver board lands is not exactly in the center, so the distance between the bolt holes on the mount and the board was pretty variable. You'll see in the photos that one of them is too short, I plan to cut one just a bit longer and install but 2 or 3 of these is all you really need to hold the screen and driver anyways! I tried some basic pieces for my first go-round, but these sticks do double duty to hold both the driver board in place and keep the LCD trapped.

I recommend partially assembling the other layers and getting a measurement from the corners to the bolt holes of the drivers board holes before cutting these if you are making your own - that way you can get a ballpark measurement and adjust the length of each, then use the slotted feature to allow it to land where it needs to be.

Once you've 3D printed and laser cut all of the layers, it's time to get your screen installed in the machine. I included 2mm holes in the LCD driver board holders, layer 3. I tapped these holes with a 3mm tap, and used 3mm bolts to thread into those threads to hold the board in place. If you don't have those tools, adjust the size of that hole to be a bit larger and get some low profile bolts to go through the back of the layer and put a nut on the other side. You will also need to source some different screws than what came out of the old CRT display mount - you are going through many more layers. Mine were about 1" long, make sure it's a pan head screw with a flat part where it meets the surface, not an angled one - that would likely crack the acrylic.

Start with the 3D printed layer, then move to the bezel, then your inset and LCD screen, and get one of the sticks in place with a screw on the corner. Once you get a single screw in place, it holds everything and you can get the others. I recommend not tightening these completely - leave some slack so you can get them all centered with the LCD screen bolt holes, then tighten everything down.

After getting everything installed, you are basically there! Run a power cable to the Raspberry Pi, and either power your LCD from one of the USB ports on the Raspi or include a second power cable for the LCD. Turn on both to ensure that they are working properly and everything is as expected. I left the protective sticker on the LCD for this process, then removed at the end to prevent scratches and fingerprint smudges.

The LCD I purchased has some buttons for power and screen settings. I could have just left these inside the machine, or made it so they are accessible through the disk drive slot with a screwdriver to push the buttons. Instead, I chose to make it look like there's a disk in this machine that has just been ejected. I removed the cable and hard drive that were attached to the disk drive, and used an old 3.5" disk that I had laying around (it came with a bunch of other ones with electronics pile that the Mac was also included with).

All I really did here was glue the LCD controller to the disk, then thread the control cable through the drive and front slot. I simply attached it there, shoved the disk in most of the way (it takes a little finagling but is doable), and connected the ribbon on the other side to the driver board.

I left the original speaker inside the machine, and cut up an old 3.5mm audio jack cable that I had laying around. I simply crimped some pins on the wires from the cable, plugged into the Raspi and put the pins into the connector still attached to the speaker. Keep in mind that the speaker is very, very quiet without amplification but I wanted to have this option for system sounds, etc. I generally use some Bluetooth headphones that the Raspi can pair with, but it's nice to have options and since the speaker was there and I had the cable I figured I might as well go for it! This would be a great way to reuse the cable portion of an old pair of earbuds. This step is entirely optional, I figured it was there so I might as well incorporate it but honestly the speaker isn't great and I have no intention of adding circuitry to make it more useful by being louder.

There is a lot of room inside the enclosure to do kinda whatever you want here. I plan to maybe mount my Raspberry Pi temporarily inside - I do some prototyping using the GPIO pins so want to keep my options open with accessing those. It's in a case so I tidied up the cables and left it sitting inside. Once all is ready, simply slide the screen portion back into the back enclosure and add the two bolts on the back.

Adafruit does make a GPIO ribbon to extend this, which would probably reach the old serial ports in the back of the computer for me to interact with. Speaking of the ports, there is ample room to run cables through those for keyboards, power, etc. - you will have no problem running whatever you need to the Raspi inside.

On my machine, I replaced the two bolts that hold things together in the back of the machine, but did not replace the screws that are located under the handle - the front portion snaps into the back, and this is sufficient to hold everything together. I wanted to be able to easily access the inside, and those two screws were truly a pain to get out.

This has made a great addition to my electronics workbench, and a way to mess around on the Raspberry Pi for a variety of projects related to electronics and 3D printing.

Enjoy your new Apple Raspberry Pi, and Happy Pi Day!