mac-cellar
Active member
Took a trip to my local thrift store a few months ago as I usually do a couple of Saturdays a month. Their electronics section usually good for something interesting, though not as much these days as that they no longer accept computers. On this particular day, the shelves were pretty bare except for a rack of vintage-looking Sansui and Kenwood stereo receivers sitting on a lone rack at the end of one of the aisles. As I was walking away toward their book section, I happened to look back at that rack of stereo receivers and notice a black laptop bag shoved into the bottom shelf. I was in need of one at the time, and since the store usually sells them for between $3 and $10, I doubled back. I pulled the bag out from the bottom shelf and quickly realized that it had something in it.
When I pulled open the zippers, I was floored to find a Powerbook 1400cs is beautiful shape complete with the AC adapter, power cable, floppy drive, CD drive (with an intact plastic drive door, no less), the clear plastic bookcover, disk tools floppy and the original manuals/paperwork. The price? $25 with the case. I practically ran to the register to pay.
When I got it home and fired it up, I quickly surmised that this old gent was VERY lightly used. It looked like it had come out of a time capsule. The case and screen were in pristine condition, there was no wear or even shine on the keyboard, and the AC adapter didn't even have scratches on it! Over the next few hours I discovered that while it was a stock configuration of RAM and HD, both the PRAM battery and the rechargeable battery still worked! After a few hours of charging, I booted without AC power and happily clicked around (I even watched the Powerbook 1400 demo video) for about 45 minutes before the low battery warning popped up.
In the months since my discovery, I've been scanning eBay madly for parts and upgrades. I've added a 10GB IBM Travelstar hard drive (yes, 10GB is a bit of overkill, but the drive was only $6). I found someone selling a dead 1400 for a song that had the internal ethernet card installed and included the drivers on floppy! The internal card has been a disappointment, but I've gathered that these things are somewhat rare, so I'll keep it.
So what am I doing with this Powerbook? Well, I've used it to introduce my 10 year old son to Civilization II. One of my favorites, and still stands up to any later version of the game. My son loves history and I thought the game might interest him, but I wasn't sure how he would react to an old game played on old hardware, especially when he's used to the Wii, XBOX, Nintendo DS and Minecraft. Long story short - he absolutely loved it.
So there you have it.
When I pulled open the zippers, I was floored to find a Powerbook 1400cs is beautiful shape complete with the AC adapter, power cable, floppy drive, CD drive (with an intact plastic drive door, no less), the clear plastic bookcover, disk tools floppy and the original manuals/paperwork. The price? $25 with the case. I practically ran to the register to pay.
When I got it home and fired it up, I quickly surmised that this old gent was VERY lightly used. It looked like it had come out of a time capsule. The case and screen were in pristine condition, there was no wear or even shine on the keyboard, and the AC adapter didn't even have scratches on it! Over the next few hours I discovered that while it was a stock configuration of RAM and HD, both the PRAM battery and the rechargeable battery still worked! After a few hours of charging, I booted without AC power and happily clicked around (I even watched the Powerbook 1400 demo video) for about 45 minutes before the low battery warning popped up.
In the months since my discovery, I've been scanning eBay madly for parts and upgrades. I've added a 10GB IBM Travelstar hard drive (yes, 10GB is a bit of overkill, but the drive was only $6). I found someone selling a dead 1400 for a song that had the internal ethernet card installed and included the drivers on floppy! The internal card has been a disappointment, but I've gathered that these things are somewhat rare, so I'll keep it.
So what am I doing with this Powerbook? Well, I've used it to introduce my 10 year old son to Civilization II. One of my favorites, and still stands up to any later version of the game. My son loves history and I thought the game might interest him, but I wasn't sure how he would react to an old game played on old hardware, especially when he's used to the Wii, XBOX, Nintendo DS and Minecraft. Long story short - he absolutely loved it.
So there you have it.