Thread

Getting a Macintosh Portable back to live.....

68kMLA Hardware 26 posts Apr 11, 2015 to Jun 27, 2015

#1 Sat, 11 Apr 2015 - 13:11 68kMLA

I recently acquired a Macintosh Portable M5120. See my posting in Conquest:

https://68kmla.org/forums/index.php?/topic/25152-macintosh-portable/

Now I'm starting to see if I can get it running.

Battery is off course stone dead. I have no replacement at this moment. I have 6V adapter, but only with 1A output.

Today I dismantled the Portable and started to test. I will add some pictures.

With the power adapter alone I could see something happening. No start up sound but some buzzing in the loudspeaker.

The screen will flicker and I see a Sad Mac.

0000000F

00000019

Is underneath. Anyone knows what this means and how to proceed?

Some more pictures:

#2 Sat, 11 Apr 2015 - 13:17 68kMLA

I had exactly the same thing until I recapped it.

#3 Sat, 11 Apr 2015 - 20:03 68kMLA

Sad Mac is gone. But no floppy. Se some action. I'm pushing sometimes on the keys or the reset/program buttons.

#4 Sat, 11 Apr 2015 - 20:08 68kMLA

I would stop powering it up. You are possibly frying components. First rule of any vintage mobo that can leak caps is to clean the conductive stuff off. You have cap liquid all over the board. Two of my boards had these wet spots too. Wash well first. It will need a re-cap no matter what, but washing can help.

This is a pic from yours, I cropped it down to show.

#5 Sat, 11 Apr 2015 - 21:55 68kMLA

Ok. I will stop powering up the board. I will get the board from the monitor too. I guess they both will need to be recapped.

#6 Sat, 11 Apr 2015 - 23:43 68kMLA

Display board probably does not need a recap, just the main board.

#7 Thu, 14 May 2015 - 22:35 68kMLA

i think unity is right, i think he may have fried the screen. i sent him a working replacement, he said it boots up and works now etc. but it has the same image on the screen as in his above youtube video.

#8 Thu, 14 May 2015 - 22:37 68kMLA

also what hodge podge alligator clip mess you got there to power this up?

you CANT Run a mac portable from its power adaptor... you need a 6.7 volt AGM lead acid battery installed.

#9 Wed, 27 May 2015 - 14:09 68kMLA

... but you can run a portable by using an AC adaptor from Powerbook 100 series (7.5V / 2A)

Simply take out the dead battery and switch it on. It even runs without the 9V PRAM battery.

#10 Wed, 27 May 2015 - 14:37 68kMLA

#11 Wed, 27 May 2015 - 14:38 68kMLA

that is the worst advice ever

#12 Wed, 27 May 2015 - 15:54 68kMLA

^ agreed, NEVER EVER use a PB charger for the Portable. Yes it lets you start the machine but it will eventually fry the beast.

#13 Wed, 27 May 2015 - 16:46 68kMLA

Concur, just don't . . . ever.

#14 Wed, 27 May 2015 - 18:58 68kMLA

And I get stuck with the aftermath. So.. No....

#15 Wed, 27 May 2015 - 19:16 68kMLA

^-------------- lol

#16 Fri, 29 May 2015 - 18:01 68kMLA

Hi guys,

sorry I gave such very bad advice

Could please somebody tell me why it would fry the thing?

From the tecnical perspective it shouldn't.

It's the same voltage ...

Tnx,Gerd

#17 Fri, 29 May 2015 - 18:08 68kMLA

well gerd. for starters the portable charger circuit is designed to re-charge the installed 6v AGM/SLA battery only. And the circuit was only designed for 1500ma or 1.5a(MAX). It was not designed, or was ever intended to run the system. Also the System was not designed to run with out a battery. The system needs that 6.8v battery to be installed... if you want more information why... you can do some searches, all this information has been beat up before across many threads on this forum.

#18 Fri, 29 May 2015 - 18:50 68kMLA

Listen to Uni and Techknight... They know the portable better than the original designers... lol!!! NEVER USE A PB100 or ANY OTHER KIND OF ADAPTER.. AND NEVER WITHOUT THE BATTERY..

#19 Tue, 23 Jun 2015 - 21:00 68kMLA

Got myself an other (non functional) Portable and transplanted the screen.

WORKS! b:

Thanks you all for your help and advise. I now have a working 5120. Hard disk is working and floppy drive too.

I will have to transplant the inner part of the screen because of a ugly sticker on the screen.....I will look into this and come back to the forum if I need help.

#20 Tue, 23 Jun 2015 - 21:35 68kMLA

beautiful!

#21 Wed, 24 Jun 2015 - 03:00 68kMLA

So either the cable is bad, or the screen itself is bad then.

Glad it works though.

#22 Sat, 27 Jun 2015 - 07:14 68kMLA

Opened the old screen. It is the cable! It is broken. Just a little, but that is enough.

I switches the good cable to the "dead" screen and it works perfect!

I wonder.....are these cables somewhere for sale? In that case I could maybe restore the second one too.

#23 Sat, 27 Jun 2015 - 13:28 68kMLA

If it is a non-backlit cable... You can make a new one pretty easily using an old ultra-ATA cable, cut it down, and re-crimp back onto the connectors.

I did this once already.

#24 Sat, 27 Jun 2015 - 14:56 68kMLA

OK! But I have seen that the second one has a non working motherboard. Probably needs to be recapped. It is doing something, but not complete.

#25 Sat, 27 Jun 2015 - 16:00 68kMLA

yup

#26 Sat, 27 Jun 2015 - 18:23 68kMLA

I mentioned this earlier in this thread, but it'd be wonderful if someone would make new cables for the backlit Portables (M5126). Mine has a good picture, but no backlight, due to a rip in the cable :-/

c