[rescue] Sparcstation 4 CD-ROM bracket (and CD-audio)

[Ville Laustela]

Hi folks.

I have a Sun Sparcstation 4, one of the earlier type (I believe chassis type 340-2915), the one with purple bezels and which uses the slimmer (not-full height) CD-ROM drives.

The machine came without a CD-drive (but had the Audio Module and the CD-audio cable), now years later I’ve been able to get a Toshiba XM-4101B drive which is the correct height (and according to pics online, seems to be the exact drive that Sun used). And once I finally bought the missing internal SCSI-cable as well, I am now almost getting these to fit together.

The drive came with a full-height bracket which of course didn’t work in the SSP4, but I used it as a model and 3D-printed myself and new bracket that fills the gap between the chassis and the drive. It doesn’t look too bad, especially the next version where the indent will actually match the drive :) I am not sure if the correct SS4 bracket would have the slim top-part, or just side pieces (as some pics online show).

Pics: https://postimg.cc/gallery/CBYdB63

I am still missing the bracket and the grommets that would allow the drive to slot nicely into the drive bay. (For now the drive is held in place by stick-on rubber-feets on selected corners; it works but I’d prefer a more solid solution :) Basically something like seen in here (https://www.ebay.com/itm/166791650901), a metal bracket that screws to the sides and where the rubber grommets attach. If I am reading this (https://shrubbery.net/~heas/sun-feh-2_1/Systems/4m-System/4mSYSTEM_Sstation_4.html) correctly, the part numbers would be 340-3046 (mounting bracket) and 330-1748 (mounting grommet) but I am not 100% sure.

I was wondering if somebody could provide pictures and measurements of the correct SS4 slimline CD-drive brackets? I was hoping to attempt 3D modeling and printing those. (Of course, I’d be happy to buy a set of originals as well if somebody has extras).

The drive and cables do work; I can mount disks under NeXTStep, and under Solaris I was able to play audio-cds too. Anyone know if there are any utilities for NeXTStep to control the audio mixing? Solaris’ Audio recorder utility has input/output selection and I can get CD audio to play (with Workman CD-player) into either built-in speaker or line-out, but I haven’t been able to do that under NeXTStep (it only plays thru the internal speaker and I can’t get CD-audio to play). Or is the Audio Module simply not supported under NS?

Regards,
Ville Laustela