VOGONS


My Laptop showcase thread.

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First post, by Vipersan

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Been meaning to start this thread for a while..but figured I'd make a start since I have enough refurbs to begin.
All laptops will be at least functional insofaras they are complete but often with dead batteries.
I'll start with the older thick square Toshibas which are a favourite of mine.
These have new OS appropriate to their age..
It was my objective to rebuild as many as possible from each time period and install a suitable operating system.
I have many more to come ..including later Toshibas..
Dells and HP laptops.
I only have one old Compaq ..an Armada 1592DT ..which is almost complete.
So more photos to follow as I complete the lappy and/or photograph it.
rgds
VS
First up A Toshiba T4500C ..
added a working floppy ..
repaired the invertor ...new RTC battery ..and much corrosion removed.
Windows 3.1 and DOS

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Reply 1 of 25, by Vipersan

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Next up ..
a pair of T4900CT
Both needed replacement floppy drives ..
One of them has a rebuilt battery pack.
New RTC batteries both.and upgraded the 810mb hard drives to something larger ..
The Win95plus is using a CF ..whereas the basic Win95 is using a standard hard drive approx 6gb
my thanks to JZ for all his help regarding these units ..both obtaining spares and helping with floppy drives.

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Last edited by Vipersan on 2018-04-08, 15:13. Edited 1 time in total.

Reply 2 of 25, by Vipersan

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Next a Toshiba Tecra510CDT..
Had to buy a Floppy caddy for this one ..and fit a suitable drive.
Again much corrosion particularly around the RTC battery plug ..
The plug and socket was removed ..and the replacement RTC hard wired to the motherboard.
There are 2 blown pixels ..permanently lit but all in all ..a very nice unit ..and has a built in PSU ..so no charger needed.
Sadly the battery only holds a charge for 10 minutes ..
Fitted with a 10gb mechanical HD ..and win98SE

More to come ..but is my intention to have at least one Lappy with appropriate OS
Win3.1 95 98SE ME XP NT4 2000 XP Vista & win7

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Reply 3 of 25, by Vipersan

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Next my Dell Inspiron 2500
I consider this one a general workhorse ..as it has been fitted with a DVD drive rather than CD ..
I also has a built in working floppy..
This is the unit I used to create a windows 95 22 disk floppy install set ..
Currently installed win98SE but will likely end up running ME
As I have Win98 on the 510CDT ..and intend to install it also on the Armada 1592DT.
That said it carries a lable saying ..designed for XP

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Reply 4 of 25, by bmwsvsu

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I also have a Toshiba T4900CT - great retro laptop! Scored mine 4 or 5 years ago for something like $30, and it is in great shape.

I upgraded mine to an 8 GB industrial SSD - cut the boot time for Windows 95 in half compared to the old mechanical drive that was installed. Also upgraded the internal RAM card to a 32MB card (was a royal pain to find one of these), giving it 40 megs of ram total with the 8 MB onboard. Added a PCMCIA SD-reader which works great in Windows 95 and a PCMCIA Cisco networking card. Managed to do some VERY basic internet browsing but it was practically unusable online. Lastly I found a brand-new keyboard for it a few years back on ebay.

Two questions - was the floppy drive easy to locate for purchase? Mine doesn't work and I've been tempted to replace it, though not sure I would ever have a need for it.

Also how did the battery pack rebuild go? My battery is dead, I tore it apart and it has been sitting for a few years waiting to be rebuilt but I've never gotten around to actually doing it. What size of batteries did you use? It looks like I could use 10x of the 4/3AF battery size?

Reply 5 of 25, by Vipersan

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bmwsvsu wrote:
I also have a Toshiba T4900CT - great retro laptop! Scored mine 4 or 5 years ago for something like $30, and it is in great sha […]
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I also have a Toshiba T4900CT - great retro laptop! Scored mine 4 or 5 years ago for something like $30, and it is in great shape.

I upgraded mine to an 8 GB industrial SSD - cut the boot time for Windows 95 in half compared to the old mechanical drive that was installed. Also upgraded the internal RAM card to a 32MB card (was a royal pain to find one of these), giving it 40 megs of ram total with the 8 MB onboard. Added a PCMCIA SD-reader which works great in Windows 95 and a PCMCIA Cisco networking card. Managed to do some VERY basic internet browsing but it was practically unusable online. Lastly I found a brand-new keyboard for it a few years back on ebay.

Two questions - was the floppy drive easy to locate for purchase? Mine doesn't work and I've been tempted to replace it, though not sure I would ever have a need for it.

Also how did the battery pack rebuild go? My battery is dead, I tore it apart and it has been sitting for a few years waiting to be rebuilt but I've never gotten around to actually doing it. What size of batteries did you use? It looks like I could use 10x of the 4/3AF battery size?

If you take a read at my 'A couple of retros I'm working on' thread ..all the info you need regarding floppy drives is on there ..
I'm not using the original drive or direct replacement..but in actual fact I fitted a totally different unit..
Usable types are covered in my thread.
rgds
VS

Last edited by Vipersan on 2018-04-09, 10:06. Edited 2 times in total.

Reply 6 of 25, by Vipersan

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For Windows 2000 I chose a Compaq NC6000 ..
mainly because this one hd a 2000 key on it's base ...and a sticker which says ..designed for windows 2K ..
It was a real tricky build mainly on account of obtaining drivers..
Most NC6000 came with XP and the 2k drivers were not only difficult to find ..but often didn't work and blue screened on install.
Persistance paid off and eventually I got it built.
I also had to fit a replacement power switch board ...and also installed a wireless card...which it had never had.
The hard drive size chosen was 10gb ..and ram upped to 520mb
..and SP4
Pic below ..
rgds
VS

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Reply 7 of 25, by Vipersan

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Vista was an easy choice for me on account the only laptop I had which had a genuine Vista key was an HP Compaq NX7400 ...which still had the 'factory restore' partition intact ..
So a full re-install to delete the previous owners data..
rgds
VS

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Reply 8 of 25, by Vipersan

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For XP I have several choices ..
2 x Toshiba Tecra M5 ..one of which needs a new Keyboard..
1 x Toshiba Tecra M2
and a very nice refurbished Dell Latitude D505 ..
I have another D505 in pieces atm ..but hopefully will also be restored..
Though only 1 working set of batteries and one working Disc drive atm.
rgds
VS

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Reply 9 of 25, by Vipersan

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Other laptops waiting for restoration include an Compaq EVO N800C ..
and a second NC6000 (also in bits)
My Win7 laptop is a DELL Latitude corei7 E6430 (64 bit)
A very nice lappy indeed..
..and no ..I'm not at all interested in Windows 8 or Windows 10 (spit !!)
Microsoft really did shoot themselves in the foot with the latter ...and windows 8 was a finger swiping pile of pants..
imo
😀

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Reply 10 of 25, by KCompRoom2000

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This is a pretty interesting thread. Well done. I'm particularly fond of the Dell laptops and the Compaq NC6000 shown here, your Inspiron 2500 looks a lot like my Inspiron 8100.

Vipersan wrote:

More to come ..but is my intention to have at least one Lappy with appropriate OS
Win3.1 95 98SE ME XP NT4 2000 XP Vista & win7

I've been working on a similar approach to yours for years now, there are some OS gaps in my laptop collection as it currently stands, but part of the fun is testing out different operating system versions to see which one fits your needs.

Reply 11 of 25, by Vipersan

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KCompRoom2000 wrote:

This is a pretty interesting thread. Well done. I'm particularly fond of the Dell laptops and the Compaq NC6000 shown here, your Inspiron 2500 looks a lot like my Inspiron 8100.

Vipersan wrote:

More to come ..but is my intention to have at least one Lappy with appropriate OS
Win3.1 95 98SE ME XP NT4 2000 XP Vista & win7

I've been working on a similar approach to yours for years now, there are some OS gaps in my laptop collection as it currently stands, but part of the fun is testing out different operating system versions to see which one fits your needs.

Cheers m8..
thanks for the feedback.
There is something I really want for my early laptops.
A PCMCIA gameport card/adapter..
I know they once existed but dont appear on ebay any more.
I have been watching for a while but nothing doing.
cest la vie

Reply 12 of 25, by bmwsvsu

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Vipersan wrote:
There is something I really want for my early laptops. A PCMCIA gameport card/adapter.. I know they once existed but dont appear […]
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There is something I really want for my early laptops.
A PCMCIA gameport card/adapter..
I know they once existed but dont appear on ebay any more.
I have been watching for a while but nothing doing.
cest la vie

Someone on ebay a few years back had a substantial number of these:

8499174040_b8d964499f_n.jpg

I snatched up TWO of them at the time (one for my T4900CT actually). I think I paid like $8 each. And yeah, they're impossible to find now.

Reply 13 of 25, by Vipersan

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bmwsvsu wrote:
Someone on ebay a few years back had a substantial number of these: […]
Show full quote
Vipersan wrote:
There is something I really want for my early laptops. A PCMCIA gameport card/adapter.. I know they once existed but dont appear […]
Show full quote

There is something I really want for my early laptops.
A PCMCIA gameport card/adapter..
I know they once existed but dont appear on ebay any more.
I have been watching for a while but nothing doing.
cest la vie

Someone on ebay a few years back had a substantial number of these:

8499174040_b8d964499f_n.jpg

I snatched up TWO of them at the time (one for my T4900CT actually). I think I paid like $8 each. And yeah, they're impossible to find now.

Yes indeed thats the very one I saw ..
but never seen them in UK ..and not in the US these days..
If anyone has a spare one of these going begging ..please PM me..

Reply 14 of 25, by Vipersan

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Just completed the total stripdown and rebuild of my second Dell Latitude D505 ..
Repaired some small damage to the case..
replaced Mobo and CPU ..
BIOS refused to recognise the CPU ..which a bios update from version 02 which the replacement mobo came with ..to version 11 fixed.
Replaced LCD screen backlight invertor (dead)
I'm using the Hard drive borrowed from the working D505 atm.
I have the caddy and the 44 pin HD adapter..
What I dont have is a working battery spare...nor a CD/DVD drive..
This too is borrowed from the worker
and a bios rtc battery..
I also replaced the USB sockets ..as some clown had butchered the contacts ..snapped of and missing or bent double.
So ..up to now has cost me around £15 for parts ..but the lappy itself cost nothing..
it was a gift rescued from a skip.
I do love rescuing and resurrecting classic hardware..
rgds
VS

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Reply 16 of 25, by Vipersan

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Someone has got to stop me ..
Am I an addict ?
can you get addicted to laptops ??? 🤣
Just saw 2 x 600X IBM thinkpads (job lot) on fleabay ..and no one was bidding so snapped em up for £26 delivered..
A fair price ..but no hard drives ..
which is understandable and sensible..
fingers crossed the caddies are still present though.
If I can get at least one of these working ..then I suspect it will fill the Windows ME gap in my collection.
..and then I will try and find an external floppy at a non rip-off price.
rgds
VS

Last edited by Vipersan on 2018-05-02, 14:38. Edited 1 time in total.

Reply 17 of 25, by Vipersan

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I had lots of help with this lovely bit of Retro..
A Compaq Armada 1592DT

Replaced broken screen ..
fitted a floppy drive ..
Amazing the main battery is still good and holds a good charge ..
The hard drive has been upgraded from 3.2gb to 10 gb ..and the original OS transfered accross ..as well as a new 12mb hidden setup partition created.
I will be maxing the RAM asap..but another Win98se for my collection..and works very well.
rgds
VS

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Reply 18 of 25, by Vipersan

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No Idea how long this one will last ..
HP Compaq 6735S GW694AV
Reflows are rarely 100% successful ..
nonetheless ..it cost me nothing ...so worth a shot.
Did a reflow on the Graphics chip ..and got it to boot ..
running win7 and dual booted with a version of Linux
Zorin
So ..
Doesn't belong in my retro list really ..but thought it worth a mention.

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Reply 19 of 25, by Vipersan

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Something new to play with ..
The 2 x IBM thinkpads arrived ..
unpacked them (very nicely packaged) ...not powering them up until this evening.
A quick inspection revealed both had Hard Drive caddies ...and both fitted with floppy drives ..
I have a cd drive somewhere ..so hopefully I will be able to install the operating systems soon.
and bonus ..
the package also contained 2 genuine IBM power bricks/chargers.
No physicall damage and all IO doors intact.
Fingers crossed ..I got a bargain.
😁

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