Hi all.

Recently I remembered about an old laptop and decided to start it up; for about 5 years it just sat there and before that it worked well, played Duke Nuke on it.

But now when I turned it on I saw that the screen was flickering in a strange way. You can barely see what's written there at all.

I took it apart, vacuumed it, put it back together - no results. What could be the reason, I need to buy a new screen?

Help anyone who has encountered this.

And one more question.

How to connect monitor, i have rgb but, what cable i need to buy to connect it?

oim37 wrote on 2023-11-02, 23:54:

And one more question.

How to connect monitor, i have rgb but, what cable i need to buy to connect it?

I believe that this RGB output is a EGA on the T5100. I can't say, as i havent tried it, but there are more or less simple converters out there, starting with this: https://www.pccables.com/Products/VGA-EGA-Mon … -to-CARD-HD15-M

oim37 wrote on 2023-11-02, 23:38:

Hi all. […]
Show full quote

Hi all.

Recently I remembered about an old laptop and decided to start it up; for about 5 years it just sat there and before that it worked well, played Duke Nuke on it.

But now when I turned it on I saw that the screen was flickering in a strange way. You can barely see what's written there at all.

I took it apart, vacuumed it, put it back together - no results. What could be the reason, I need to buy a new screen?

Help anyone who has encountered this.

um ohm ...is that what happened to my powerbook-japaneze(forgot the brand) screen?

people say : did it ever receive a shock (or a screwdriver in the screen) during it's life? (if it did , it just gave out - broke)
my Powerbook screen was in broken in a way like that , no one touched it I keepe'd it for years in my closet.
One day I wanted to use it and found out the liquid crystal in between the panels let go.... now I have a gigantic stain in middle of the screen.
other people say it my be because of hot summers , cold winters and temperature difference + weight on top of it
I seen stuff on youtube , but I don't know what to think , dose it smell of vinegar?(if it has nonspecific smell the liquid in between panels went away of the past.)

omi the cable is EGA /CGA you can gerryrig a VGA via a com adapter to use it , find the schematics for EGA/CGA and VGA , you only need to use *up2- 16 colors anyways (that's why it has less pins vs the vga).

ediflorianUS wrote on 2023-11-03, 22:31:

omi the cable is EGA /CGA you can gerryrig a VGA via a com adapter to use it , find the schematics for EGA/CGA and VGA , you only need to use *up2- 16 colors anyways (that's why it has less pins vs the vga).

Can I buy a ready-made cable or adapter or do I have to solder it myself?

Or this must be work https://www.pccables.com/Products/6FT-NEC-MUL … 15-Male-Monitor ?

oim37 wrote on 2023-11-08, 10:52:

Or this must be work https://www.pccables.com/Products/6FT-NEC-MUL … 15-Male-Monitor ?

I think it's fine , just recheck the pins and pin orders and evrything if it's not working you have to "edit" it.
*EGA

big thank you to IanB for posting the info on using a PC floppy with this machine. I bought a T5200 at a local flea market last weekend and everything seems to work (including hard drive and monitor) but the floppy would not. I made the cable from page 1 of this thread and had to try a few drives, but found one that works!

oim37 wrote on 2023-11-02, 23:38:

Hi all. […]
Show full quote

Hi all.

Recently I remembered about an old laptop and decided to start it up; for about 5 years it just sat there and before that it worked well, played Duke Nuke on it.

But now when I turned it on I saw that the screen was flickering in a strange way. You can barely see what's written there at all.

I took it apart, vacuumed it, put it back together - no results. What could be the reason, I need to buy a new screen?

Help anyone who has encountered this.

I think there is something wrong with the plasma screens high voltages. You could check (or just replace) electrolytic capacitors on the controller board at the back of the display, also there might be a defective zener diode or some power resistors connected to this zener (that was the problem on a plasma display with similar "output" i once repaired).

good luck. and be careful: there are about 200V on this circuit!

😀

My Toshiba T5200 started smelling really bad few months ago but works fully anyway. Maybe some RIFAs...

Hi everyone. I recently got a Toshiba T5200/100 which I'm trying to restore. Unfortunately the gas-plasma screen (the reason I bought this computer for my vintage collection) has broken on the way here. I have ordered another screen and waiting for it to arrive. Until then, I am trying to connect the computer to an external monitor but I don't get any video signal on the monitor. I tried two different external LCD monitors, and two different VGA cables. The computer seems to start up, after the first beep, I hit F1 and I hear the hard drive working (and LED flashing). But no signal whatsoever on the external monitor. I took the video card out and reseated it (the expansion port and the video card itself). There's no evident capacitor leakage. Any ideas? Can you only connect an old CRT screen as an external VGA monitor (I doubt it)?

Hi tedcy,

you wouldn't happen to know what BIOS version it has by any chance (not sure if it matters imho). I was thinking that the T5200 selects the output from bios (internal/external) and even if you can't see the screen, perhaps you would be able to navigate in the "dark" (if the "press XXX to enter bios is there" at least). I was thinking F1 + cr down, down, down, left, esc, F10 or something similar (i need to try this on my own machine imho). Would it be feasible?

I don't recall that it needs some boot-disk to do it, a la IBM L40-SX or similar.

Hi All,

I am still searching everywhere for 40 pin simm memory modules but as already known… impossible to find and my soldering skills are not good enough to attempt to solder memory directly to board.
Any tips and hints are very welcome.

Friendly greeetings

Kevin

tedcy wrote on 2024-01-21, 17:11:

Hi everyone. I recently got a Toshiba T5200/100 which I'm trying to restore. Unfortunately the gas-plasma screen (the reason I bought this computer for my vintage collection) has broken on the way here. I have ordered another screen and waiting for it to arrive. Until then, I am trying to connect the computer to an external monitor but I don't get any video signal on the monitor. I tried two different external LCD monitors, and two different VGA cables. The computer seems to start up, after the first beep, I hit F1 and I hear the hard drive working (and LED flashing). But no signal whatsoever on the external monitor. I took the video card out and reseated it (the expansion port and the video card itself). There's no evident capacitor leakage. Any ideas? Can you only connect an old CRT screen as an external VGA monitor (I doubt it)?

I'm having exactly the same issue with one I bought that the Post Office shuffled around for two weeks, banging it up en route.

Things I've tried that didn't work:
-The maintenance manual says to press Ctrl+Home if there's no display and the CRT light is active. I don't see any CRT light and the key combo doesn't seem to do anythiing.
-There's a pressure switch inside under the right hinge that's pushed in when the display is fully open, intended to disable the display for safety when the lid is closed. It can get flaky. Pushing it in and out didn't do anything for me though.
-Switching external monitor to an old CRT just in case. You're right, it doesn't seem to matter.

Where did you find a new display for it though? I saw some panels searching but they were definitely expensive.

Edit:

Good news! Display is still busted but some online documentation let me blind-fumble through the BIOS settings. When it warning beeped (Dead battery) I hit F2, down 6 times, right once, End, F10, Ctrl+Alt+Delete and it rebooted with external display active. I imagine I'll need to replace the battery to make those settings stick. And it sounds like there were two BIOS revisions with different screens so yours might behave differently.

Sorry everyone else if basic troubleshooting is outside the scope of the modding/upgrading thread. I just signed up and replied when I saw someone with my exact problem. But I'm hoping to tune it up once I get things further sorted.

Killer robot wrote on 2024-02-08, 01:02:

I'm having exactly the same issue with one I bought that the Post Office shuffled around for two weeks, banging it up en route. […]
Show full quote

tedcy wrote on 2024-01-21, 17:11:

Hi everyone. I recently got a Toshiba T5200/100 which I'm trying to restore. Unfortunately the gas-plasma screen (the reason I bought this computer for my vintage collection) has broken on the way here. I have ordered another screen and waiting for it to arrive. Until then, I am trying to connect the computer to an external monitor but I don't get any video signal on the monitor. I tried two different external LCD monitors, and two different VGA cables. The computer seems to start up, after the first beep, I hit F1 and I hear the hard drive working (and LED flashing). But no signal whatsoever on the external monitor. I took the video card out and reseated it (the expansion port and the video card itself). There's no evident capacitor leakage. Any ideas? Can you only connect an old CRT screen as an external VGA monitor (I doubt it)?

I'm having exactly the same issue with one I bought that the Post Office shuffled around for two weeks, banging it up en route.

Things I've tried that didn't work:
-The maintenance manual says to press Ctrl+Home if there's no display and the CRT light is active. I don't see any CRT light and the key combo doesn't seem to do anythiing.
-There's a pressure switch inside under the right hinge that's pushed in when the display is fully open, intended to disable the display for safety when the lid is closed. It can get flaky. Pushing it in and out didn't do anything for me though.
-Switching external monitor to an old CRT just in case. You're right, it doesn't seem to matter.

Where did you find a new display for it though? I saw some panels searching but they were definitely expensive.

Edit:

Good news! Display is still busted but some online documentation let me blind-fumble through the BIOS settings. When it warning beeped (Dead battery) I hit F2, down 6 times, right once, End, F10, Ctrl+Alt+Delete and it rebooted with external display active. I imagine I'll need to replace the battery to make those settings stick. And it sounds like there were two BIOS revisions with different screens so yours might behave differently.

Sorry everyone else if basic troubleshooting is outside the scope of the modding/upgrading thread. I just signed up and replied when I saw someone with my exact problem. But I'm hoping to tune it up once I get things further sorted.

Thanks for the reply. I got the new screen from Ebay (someone was selling a T5200 for parts and was kind enough to send me only the screen). Once I got it connected I was able to navigate in the BIOS, saved the changes with F10 and now both the lovely gas-plasma and the external LCD are working. I installed a new lithium 3.7V battery as well which is working fine. The next challenge is the dead Floppy drive. I replaced the two obvious leaking electrolytic capacitors with tantalum ones, but still no luck. When I try to read from A: the red light goes on, but no sound of trying to read the diskette (side switch is on PRT) and eventually gives the Abort or Retry error. Will keep investigating. Any help from anyone would be appreciated.

Hey everyone. Is there any modded BIOS (with XTIDE) for T5100? I would really really like to put some CF or DOM in mine.
Any other mods possible for T5100?

0xDEADBEEF wrote on 2024-04-22, 03:51:

Hey everyone. Is there any modded BIOS (with XTIDE) for T5100? I would really really like to put some CF or DOM in mine.
Any other mods possible for T5100?

That would be great! I have the T5100 with a dead Connor drive and the only option I have is to use 3inOneEnder card (which is awesome BTW - check conventionalmemories.com - I used it in my T1200 and it work like a charm, though it out of stock till August). The other option I'm thinking of is to make an XT-IDE bios adapter board and solder it to the modem in a proprietary Toshiba slot (which is an ISA bus in a different connector). Anyway, XT-IDE patched T5100 bios is the more elegant and easier to implement solution I am highly interested in.

Yeah, I am definitely interested in 3inOneEnder but August is a long time to wait.

oim37 wrote on 2023-11-02, 23:54:

And one more question.

How to connect monitor, i have rgb but, what cable i need to buy to connect it?

Hey! I believe that better late than never - so here's my experience with your Q - this machine has an EGA output (TTL digital signal) to connect it to the "modern" VGA (which is analog) or HDMI monitor you need an adapter. You can buy one - https://www.serdashop.com/MCE2HDMI or make it yourself https://github.com/necroware/mce-adapter/tree/main/shim
There's a brilliant video about the topic from the author of that MCE (stands for MDA, CGA, EGA) adapter, Necroware - https://youtu.be/7c3yLX52ZEs?si=MJjmUUchBmBc8mUY
Now I'm working on the solution for how to install an iPad 1 display in T5100, will share updates when I get the parts from China.

0xDEADBEEF wrote on 2024-04-22, 03:51:

Hey everyone. Is there any modded BIOS (with XTIDE) for T5100? I would really really like to put some CF or DOM in mine.
Any other mods possible for T5100?

Re: Toshiba T5200 mods and upgrades