Not my post/video. Link to mastodon.social post which then links to YouTube video.

Poster bought an old firewall hardware:

  1. saw unpopulated footprints on the circuit board,
  2. analyzed the chips,
  3. found the serial comm to access BIOS (blocked by password),
  4. dumped the SPI flash memory,
  5. obtained supervisor password,
  6. accessed the BIOS from serial comm,
  7. enabled the video display in BIOS,
  8. soldered the HDMI port,
  9. soldered the SATA power and data ports and the associated components,
  10. connected a SATA SSD,
  11. checked that the SSD is being recognized in BIOS,
  12. made modifications to firewall circuit board to mechanically secure the SSD, and to face plate to facilitate the HDMI port,
  13. installed FreeDOS and used it as a retro gaming PC.