Lots of people have painted their cases, but not all of them have painted their drives and buttons. Well I'll show you how to do that too!

Boring beige drives

   First you need to remove the drive faces and drive doors. Each drive face is secured by a few clips that snap to the drive body. You need to find these and push the clips in so you can remove the drive faces. On some of the newer drives these clips are only accessible through small pinholes. Make sure you find them all, or they may get broken off when you remove the drive faces. The doors (i.e. floppy and zip drives) need to be removed from the drive faces before painting. And be careful not to lose the tiny spring that acts as the closer for the drive door. They are very hard to find if you loose them! Also remove any LED covers and buttons, or mask them off if they can't be removed. If you don't they will probably not work after you paint them.

Drive faces ready for paint

   Now you can sand and paint each piece. You will not want to primer these because they will not fit back together if you put too many layers of primer, paint, and clear coat on them. You need to sand each piece with 400 grit sandpaper to rough it up. Then, using the laying system described earlier, apply enough layers to cover the pieces. Let the pieces sit for about 24 hours so the paint can bond properly.