Make Your Own Front Panel Adapter

 

If you want to make your own, without ripping out your Dell ribbon as I did, you can use the kind of cables that go from a CD-ROM drive to the sound card. They come in a couple of shapes, but you want the ones with 4-pin connectors on each end, both the same size. There are some with a little connector on one end. That little connector won't work. Anyway, you need three 2-pin connectors to fit the headers on the board, and most all motherboards use a 3-pin connector for one of the circuits (seems like it's the power LED, but I can't remember). You will need to use a sharp pair of scissors or a box cutter to trim the plugs to the appropriate fit (cut off the extra circuits). You'll need two of the cables; when you cut them in half, you get 4 connectors, with wires. You'll need to strip off the wire on the cut end, and tin it with solder or otherwise find a way to stiffen it up so it'll fit in the Dell connector without falling out. Once you get the wires trimmed and tinned, and the motherboard ends cut to the appropriate size, use the diagram HERE to get it wired to the appropriate place. You'll have to move wires around in the connectors too. The cables come with three wires; you only need two per connection. You can get the idea from THIS PICTURE. I used an IDE cable to illustrate the principle, since I had thrown away my Dell connector. You might also consider using a wake-on-LAN cable, but you'll still need one connector with three circuits, three with two circuits. WOL cables are wired with two wires and two circuits. I'm pretty sure they'll fit the pins on the board. Good luck!

 

 

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