3 - Powerbook 100's None work.

Like the portable, try hitting both reset & programmer buttons at the same time. There is also a switch on the back that completely shuts down the battery. Check that and the fuse on the logic board. When in doubt, leave it plugged in overnight and try again.

Since I don't own one I can't provide any helpful tips. But I did come across this webpage that might be of some use: http://www.kevinomura.com/powerbooks/powerbook100/

I'll hijack this thread, then.

My PowerBook 100 also has problems.

It used to boot up to a ? Disk, but now, instead…



After some diagnostic tests, it appears it has to do with the Capacitors.

Ah, yes. If they don't chime, try plugging in a pair of headphones, the speaker shares an internal connector with the display.

Edit:

Forgot this link: http://www.vintage-computer.com/vcforum/showthread.php?37083-Powerbook-100-Restoration/page3

ok so, i guess i will start with a re-cap

by the way... FINK, its about time you got user on here....

< :-/ Hrmmm . . . pulls a pair of complete 100s off the PowerBookShelf . . . >

< . . . searches in vain for the three(?) PB 100 A/C adapters . . . >

< . . . remembers where he can find something similar . . . >

Looks like PB 100s can't run off a Luggable's A/C adapter any better than a Luggable.

Trash are you checking to see if your powerbook 100's work?

I have to admit…. I like the powerbook 100, It reminds me of my 85 Toyota Corolla AKA, Chevy NOVA,

It's really a pleasure to work on, getting my hands on the insides really gives off a precision feel.

nothing about it is cheesy or chintzy.

The screen … parts, and how they fit together have a good fit/feel.

This thing is growing on me

Yep, I'm going to be cleaning up tomorrow morning, hopefully I'll find an A/C adapter for the tests.

I think the only thing I don't like about the 100 is the plastic post that's the third support for the TrackBall. BabyPB was my first laptop love, she's in a project box with a 2300c LCD stuffed into her lid, awaiting completion of my reverse picture frame/BabyPB memorial display hack project.

Don't forget to recap the LCD panel as well. All SMD capacitors on the back of the panel are shot.

This will sort display issues like over- or under contrast and unstable screen.

The hard drive issues: Most stock powerbooks 100 I've seen have the Connor 20MB or 40MB hard drive. These suffer from stiction, the rubber around the magnet that keeps the heads in the parked position has degraded or liquified and keeps the heads in the parked position so you hear the drive spinning up and down when you try to boot it. This can be solved be disassembling the HDD and replacing the old rubber around the small magnet: be carefull not to loose the magnet as it's very tiny.

If you are giving the powerbook 100 a full service anyway, then remove the metal lever of the battery switch on the logic board and the 2x contacts from the logic board to the dead battery. This way it doesn't try to charge it anymore.

When it's repaired right, the fiddling with the reset/interrupt buttons is over.

Found the power adapter in the box at my feet, these babies need caps: bongs, screen lights up, but nada onscreen. :-/

yeah that is funny they used standard electrolytic caps on these.

i see alot of 10uf 16v ones… that might be tonight's project.

i will be replacing them with ceramic or tiny tants for sure.

When you recap, I'd appreciate pics and cap sizes, particularly of the LCD.

I also have 3 non-working PB100's I'd like to fix. I completely recapped one of the logic boards that chimes, but no display. There must be 60 caps on that thing, it took forever. Didn't help. There's a couple radial caps in the display that I had a difficult time locating replacements for that were short enough to fit back inside the case. Anyway, I haven't been able to revive mine, but will follow this with interest and possibly make another attempt at fixing them.

oh well that doesn't motivate me very much,

i hate spending time on something and not getting any results.

There's a couple radial caps in the display that I had a difficult time locating replacements for that were short enough to fit back inside the case.

Click to expand...

There are 2x rows of small radial caps at the back of the LCD panel that need to be replaced. It's a fiddling job as there's very little room.

If you have recapped the LCD and logic board but it still doesn't work, have a look at the PCB with the brightness/contrast pots.

I can't recall if there are capacitors on the interconnect board as well: I do know that I replaced every capacitor except for tantalums/ceramic one's in my 3x PB100 and they all revived.

Thanks much for that infusion of hope, comrade! :approve:

I am a little jelly that you guys have PowerBook 100's, working or not. I always wanted one, good luck getting them fixed!

I have to admit…. I like the powerbook 100, It reminds me of my 85 Toyota Corolla AKA, Chevy NOVA,
It's really a pleasure to work on, getting my hands on the insides really gives off a precision feel.

nothing about it is cheesy or chintzy.

Click to expand...

I had an '87 Nova, sounds like you had a better experience than me though. I hated that car. Trans blew up at around 140k, lost a head gasket at 160k which was when I got rid of it. There was always something broken and it was always expensive to fix it. Never buying another Toyota after that one!

Was your trans manual or automatic?

yes they had head gasket issues and timing belt issues. nice thing they are not an interference engine.

but this is when I bought them I had 4 nova's 85, 86 and 2 87's

I was buying them for 100 and 200 bucks

All of them the A/C always worked,

I could have the head off in like 40 min.

the gasket was 32 bucks, felpro… the timing belt was 12 bucks.

do those and they are good for another 80 to 120K miles depending on how bad you beat on er

I have some junk imac mainboards, looks like they are loaded with 10uf 16v Tantalum caps

tonight i am going to fire up the heat gun and sweat all the tant caps from this imac mainboard.

use those caps on the PB 100, that way I wont be pissed if it doesn't work, wasting my new stock.

By far the favorite of my vehicles was the '88 Nova Twin-Cam!

I'v only seen that twin cam version once

So did that second camshaft turn it into a rocket ship?

Heck, even the single cam version, I would stright-pipe the cat,

install a fresh set of NGK plugs, a full tank of Amoco Silver, and it would shitnget!!!!

Mine was an automatic. Started slipping really bad going up a hill, then BANG. Whatever broke inside it also cracked the transmission case, pretty violent ordeal.

I thought about putting a head gasket in it but some dude wanted to trade a sweet '73 Dodge motorhome for it and I said hell yes and never looked back. I was tired of dropping $200/month average on it for repairs.

by chance did you ever do a Transmission service on it?

New ATF fluid / New Filter?

Also were you BAJA'n it off road or in a farm field when it blew?

( lol )

real quick, what all did you have serviced on it? a 200/month bill seems pretty steep.

There are 2x rows of small radial caps at the back of the LCD panel that need to be replaced.

Click to expand...

Here's a picture of my disassembled LCD. The 2x4 row of black things are the radial caps. They seem to be 3.3uF 35V as best I can tell. Thanks for pointing those out, I didn't find them in my previous attempts. There are two radial caps on the center controller board, and that's all I could find. All the replacement radial caps I can find for those are too tall to reinstall the front bezel, so if anyone knows a replacement part for that, I'd appreciate knowing what it is. There's none on the brightness/contrast board or the cabling board.

That is odd, they look like leaking tantalums. but they are black and rectangular,

They're tin can radial electrolytics encased in a square plastic shell.

i would replace those with some tiny ceramics.

http://www.mouser.com/ProductDetail/TDK/CGA5L1X7R1V335K/?qs=%2fha2pyFadugyXufOATqO62iQWK4GMmnKyc1yBDpmzms%3d

here are some cheaper tantalum caps

http://www.mouser.com/ProductDetail/AVX/TAJB335M035RNJ/?qs=sGAEpiMZZMtZ1n0r9vR22cbTpViMZtapg8jqOYAn9BA%3d

If they are small enough you could lay them right across the pads,

I like the ceramics because you wont have to be concerned with polarity

by chance did you ever do a Transmission service on it?
New ATF fluid / New Filter?

Also were you BAJA'n it off road or in a farm field when it blew?

( lol )

real quick, what all did you have serviced on it? a 200/month bill seems pretty steep.

Click to expand...

Nope, nope, and no. Got it when I was 18, before I knew anything about cars. Don't think I ever checked the fluid, maybe that had something to do with it. I dunno. I got really deep into fixing my own stuff with that car... the $200/month was a lot of piddly small stuff, alternator, starter, front struts, CV axles, steering parts, brakes, tires, etc... never had that much stuff go wrong with a car at one time. Probably would have had to max out a couple credit cards if I didn't pick up some car repair skills along the way.

Don't think I ever checked the fluid

Click to expand...

lol yeah that is very bad with any automatic transmission, manuals are slightly more forgiving, but then you would be doing a clutch every 100k miles.

alternator, starter, front struts, CV axles, steering parts, brakes, tires

Click to expand...

well i took my starter apart and greased the bearings and replaced the brushes / filed down the solenoid pads, same with the Nippondenso Co. Ltd. 日本電装株式会社, alternator, greased and installed new brushes.

tie rods were like 17 bucks a piece, and struts... if you did them your self with the autozone loaner spring compressor they were only 45 bucks a piece.

yes those CV boots would dry rot and break... the key is to catch it before the CV's start knocking around turns. and hell even if they are slightly knocking they can still be saved, they sold a split boot at advance auto for 9 bucks, a couple outer boots and , some really good clean up job, cut the hunks of the bad ones off, grease / install split boots and your good to go.

Yup... keep in mind this was a decade ago and if I knew then, what I know now, about fixing stuff - none of that would have been an issue.

Also back then the only parts stores we had in town were NAPA and CarQuest...$$$

Sometimes I have to go to NAPA to get parts for my M35, but they are always expensive.

Autozone / Pep Boys / Advance Auto --- Those guys are great.... O'Reilly, has the accu-turn break lathe I like. Pep Boys has that old beater AMCO brake lathe, blah... they were good 60 years ago... when nothing better had been invented.

also tires.... i always call the tire places before I go out, and ask them if they have any like new sets(4) of used tires they want to sell me.

lotta times they will say no,,, or do not have anything in your size that is ok, you can call back a week later,

I will get a great set of 80 - 90% used tires installed for under 130 every time. ( Michelin / Goodyear / Pirelli )

I go back and forth between parts stores these days. CarQuest, without fail, has weird/obscure pieces for my older stuff. A lot of the time they've even had parts in stock for stuff built in the 60's. Very surprising.

I used to buy from O'Reilly exclusively but their MasterPro line of parts has gone WAAAAAAAY downhill in terms of quality, even to the point of being dangerous (think about polyurethane suspension bushings that explode when you torque the fasteners to spec.) I get most of what I need from AutoZone now, much better quality control, and I can sometimes get them to price match Rock Auto.

They're tin can radial electrolytics encased in a square plastic shell.

Click to expand...

Sega Game Gear handhelds have a bunch of those same capacitors, and they fail the same way as the more common vertical SMD 'lytics. I think they're somewhat common in Japanese portable electronics of the era.

As for Toyotas, the engines seem to be fairly bulletproof, at least the inline-4's I've dealt with. The manual transmissions are pretty good too, but the automatics I'm not so sure. There are a lot of turd automatic transmissions out there, especially up through the 80s. Usually the automatic was an afterthought for the USA market, shoehorned into a space intended for a manual gearbox. The Saab 900 was the posterchild of this. Neat car, but there is a reason there are very, very few auto tranny versions still on the road.

I replaced those caps on the back of the LCD with TDK CGA5L1X7R1V335K ceramics and it seems to work well. I replaced them on 2 of the displays and both are now working normally. I didn't recap the 3rd yet, it's delaminating .

I completely recapped all 3 logic boards. 2 chime, but only 1 actually displays anything and boots.

intersting… they seem like a fickle beast… just like the portable….. just like the se/30

The cap goo probably rots out some VIA's and Traces?

Crap..

ok so this is what i did.

i totally did the lazy mans re-cap, witch is fine as long as its mine and not anyones i am working on.

before this thing was completely dead.

now it boots up, runs great, all is well. dead internal hard drive, boots from zip 100 just fine

I replaced all the 1uf 16v caps with ceramic variants.

I replaced all the 10uf 16v caps with ceramic variants.

All the other caps had shiny pads and no signs of leakage.

I think I need to buy that re-cap kit, comrade.

Woo, brilliant... Maybe I'll get mine recapped...

Did you replace the LCD caps as well?

Is that pink blotch on the screen from LCD damage?

sure, no didn't do the screen, screen for the moment seems to be working good.

In the picture it came out pinkish, Its where someone pressed really hard on the screen, so there is some b&w LCD leakage.

The other 2 pb100's seem to have no damage to the LCD.

Usually the automatic was an afterthought for the USA market, shoehorned into a space intended for a manual gearbox. The Saab 900 was the posterchild of this. Neat car, but there is a reason there are very, very few auto tranny versions still on the road.

Click to expand...

I found the opposite, mostly just automatic 900s still around, the 5 speed manual in those, particularly in a Turbo is very failure prone. Even my mom's. 50k mi and second gear syncro started to go, bad because she's a super smooth gentle driver, doubt the turbo ever got a chance to spool up in that entire 50k mi :lol:

Personally I've had better luck with manuals, only issues I've had *knock on wood, because my current car's trans is making lots of interesting noises* broken clutch spring, with lots of wear material left, only guess is fatigue from age killed it('74 Karmann Ghia) and I bought a car cheep because the trans was dead, it had been run with no oil. Automatics on the other hand... I've had 75% failure rate(had 4, three had trans failures) so I just avoid them.

back on topic, replacing caps seems to fix almost everything

back on topic, replacing caps seems to fix almost everything

Click to expand...

Too bad they can't fix cars :lol:
c

I disagree, have you looked inside the 80's computers in vehicles, lots of capacitors. Even saw the dreaded cans in one in a junkyard.

Yeah, now that you mention it!

Our '06 Vibe had a recall of the PCM computer a year or two ago, apparently due to either bad capacitors or some other defect.

Now that I'm thinking, we have a '98 Ford Windstar minivan which behaves erratically at times, yet the computer always passes all tests with flying colors. I wonder if some bad caps are causing some sort of problem with reaction time (it will stall if you accelerate too quickly sometimes, even though the engine is mechanically perfect).

c

ford.... I owned one. Never again... Although I prefer it over a dodge which is what I own now. my old taurus had a shitload of bad caps in the pcm. the tranny would act strange and so would the engine, randomly stalling, misfiring, IAC errors, etc... recapping fixed all of it. until the tranny said im not working anymore (common problem with that POS).

so I got rid of that car for a dodge stratus. oh dont get me started with that thing. ugh. that was a bad investment. lol. since its a late 90s car, its been around a long time. already had to recap the BCM. it was failing, gauge cluster dropping out and doing stupid shit. Not anymore. but everything else is shot like the front-end. (common on that car)

Hmm!!!

Then maybe recapping our Windstar's PCM will fix it?

Neat!

Now, how to do it...

Time to look through the service manual!

c

EDIT: Also, will a PCM with bad caps still report that all is well when hooked up to a tester?

I think I need to buy that re-cap kit, comrade.

Click to expand...

sure man no problem!

jt. Should this be added to the re-cap thread?

pm me for that cap kit.

there is defiantly some $$ in repairing automotive ECUs too... have you seen how much a reman ECUs are!? GACK.

jt. Should this be added to the re-cap thread?

Click to expand...

It'll make a great troubleshooting intro link for the full workup if you get a chance to do one. I guess I can stick it in there as a temporary substitution of the Placeholder, but as long as this thread stays active, I don't see much point in not just waiting for the workup . . .

. . . a first ever LCD re-cap recap would be most definitely

I wouldn't want the liability of fixing an automotive ECU's

Better have a 10 million dollar insurance policy.

Opps, solder bridge caused air bags to deploy at 55mph.

...have you seen how much a reman ECUs are!? GACK.

Click to expand...

Well, considering the fate of the Romulan homeworld, and the fact that Reman items were unusual in the first place, I'm not surprised they command a premium in gold pressed latinum.

(Sorry, I couldn't help myself once I saw the word "Reman")

:lol: :lol: :lol:

c

I wouldn't want the liability of fixing an automotive ECU's
Better have a 10 million dollar insurance policy.

Opps, solder bridge caused air bags to deploy at 55mph.

Click to expand...

only if you're tinkering with the airbag system, not something I'd touch either. I'm talking engine ECU. people monkey with those all the time for performance upgrades.

I've repaired one, it was water damaged (clogged sunroof drain = water leaking directly onto the ECU) Owner got it covered under his insurance, I made $500 (reman ECU was $1500 for his car, and his was chipped so add another $500 on top of that, so the repair saved him a bundle too) |)

Hmm,

So, then it's conceivable that our Windstar's ECU has some bad caps in it, leading to it's occasional erratic behavior.

I checked, and a new re-manufactured ECU is $150 for this particular model, year and engine combination ('98 Limited with 3.8L V6), so I could try fixing it up, and if I goof (and I seriously hope I don't!), we only have to pay $150 for an essentially brand new replacement.

This might be a stretch for an old Mac forum, but would anybody be able or willing to help me in this endeavor?

By the way, we should probably continue this discussion in the Lounge or someplace where it's at least somewhat relevant .

c

I got my PB 100 working today!!

I made careful use of the hair dryer and I got it to boot off an external drive.

i just replaced the caps in my screen.

my screen is crap with liquid crystal issues, but i needed to get in there and do the re-cap just so i could get an idea of how it would go.

Basically I soldered on radials and bent them over so they all line up nicely.

As more of an FYI, with the 100 being the next in line after the Portable it was the next obvious culprit to fall to leaky caps and I've seen them dropping like flies for several years now as well to they point where they are now in line with the portable, SE/30 and IIci to be recapped on sight, no exceptions.

ok so this is my current status with my 3 powerbook 100's

I replaced only the 1uf and 10uf caps on Two

On the third one I noticed the (4) 47uf ones were leaking so i changed only those as well as the 1uf and 10uf caps.

All 3 had hard drives, one had 80mb IBM, The other one, Quantum GoDrive 80mb, Connor 20meg for the last one.

I was able to take apart and fix the Quantum hard drive, it was suffering from the Stiction issue, Used some Acetone and some paper towel to carefully clean up that liquified rubber goo, and lubricated the R/W arm bearing.

Made sure to blow off any specs of dust before i closed it up… and wow it works. MacOS 7.1 was installed.

I have one PB100 that is complete all together, /w Working HD. /w Re-capped screen, has Dime sided blotch on the LCD.

The other 2 PB100's

1 - Boots with quiet mac tone, gives no video.

1 - Doesn't turn on, just acts completely dead. Fuse is good.

( Even though it looks like none of the other caps are leaking, I should change them anyways at-least for these 2 troubled powerbooks.

All 3 LCD screens work, All 3 LCD Screens have roundish dime sized blotch in the upper middle of the screen, might be a common issue for these?

Is it in the approximate location of the trackball? its possible something VERY heavy was sat on it causing the screen to slam into the trackball.

yeah! man. well in that case, one day i would like to find a screen that is not all screwed up...

i dont know why the seller would have screwed up all 3 screens like that.!>!>!>!

Techknight, excellent thought, never would have come to mind if you hadn't mentioned that. I always wondered about trackballs and screen damage. Guess that answers that.

sure enough, the track ball is right in that same area.

I knew it was. Laws of physics usually dont lie ;-)

Only explanation is a crapload of weight was stacked on top. My guess, he probably had 20 or 30 laptops and those were on the bottom.

awesome ! haha

LOL. Well, i thought it sounded good.

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