Making a Motherboard to Stop E Waste

Big thanks to PCBWay, They helped me out with the PCB, Assembly, and Xray on this project. https://www.pcbway.com/ They sponsored this project by providing the PCB, assembly and X-ray inspection. This is an HP N40L MicroServer. After nearly 15 years, its slow processor, USB 2 ports and ageing hardware have finally lost the battle against obsolescence. I will not let it go ! So I built it a completely new motherboard. I take a Raspberry Pi Compute Module 5 IO Board Reference design and turn it into a custom motherboard made specifically for the N40L chassis. I go through the design process, component choices, mechanical measurements, high-speed PCB routing and manufacturing, before installing the finished board and seeing whether it actually works. The new motherboard adds gigabit Ethernet, USB 3, HDMI and NVMe storage, while retaining the original chassis, power supply and drive bays. Somehow, my first-ever motherboard also worked on the very first attempt!