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Upgrading iBook Clamshell Display?

AEChadwick

Well-known member
thank you for this write-up! i just installed a strip with the modifications, and it already looks fantastic.

In lieu of toothpicks, i modeled a LED-strip holder based on the existing brass piece. It uses the existing screws & holes, and slides right into the channel. It holds the LED strip slightly to the back, to keep it edge-on to the glass (just like the CCFL-holder). i wrapped a piece of foil tape along the top edge to seal it in.
 

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davidg5678

Well-known member
thank you for this write-up! i just installed a strip with the modifications, and it already looks fantastic.

In lieu of toothpicks, i modeled a LED-strip holder based on the existing brass piece. It uses the existing screws & holes, and slides right into the channel. It holds the LED strip slightly to the back, to keep it edge-on to the glass (just like the CCFL-holder). i wrapped a piece of foil tape along the top edge to seal it in.
I'm glad this information was useful! Thank for the 3D model --that looks like a very nice solution (I bet that it's much more repeatable for others compared to toothpicks).

I've discovered a minor flickering problem with the backlight controller modifications I detailed in the previous post, but I think that the solution may be to make a wider cut between the sides of the enable trace. I'm also going to try pulling it low somehow, as it almost behaves it's floating, but I'm still working on this fix.

Please let me know if the display brightness works for you once the computer is back together -I'd love to hear if the mods I made are repeatable.
 

AEChadwick

Well-known member
with that tip in hand, i dremyl’d away a little more of the trace before sealing it up; will update with results.

related, here is a quick diagram of the wiring inside a tangerine iBook (slightly different colors than the Blueberry at “Brian’s Retreat”)
 

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davidg5678

Well-known member
I recently overclocked my Clamshell's CPU to run at 400MHz (and the bus at 100MHz), and the ~20% speed boost means it's now barely fast enough to use on a few parts of the internet. I had to take a picture of it displaying this same thread on the 68kMLA forum. :)

The backlight modifications I made seem to be holding up well so far, albeit with the quirks described above. I decided to remove the transistor I added to the LED controller board, but there has been no negative change in functionality. The laptop has been running for many hours without issues. I did need to replace the supercapacitor on the logic board, as I was having some PMU-related problems, but this was more of a general maintenance task than an LED mod-related one. Next up: finish the battery pack rebuild project I started a few years ago (this time with greater safety and functionality.)
 

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3lectr1cPPC

Well-known member
CCFL replacement? Yes if it’s the right size and type. You need a special cable or an adapter to perform an XGA mod though. Also, 768MHz? There was no such model as far as I know.
 

lazd

New member
Success! I just did the LED backlight mod on the IBM panel in this Tangerine iBook, and wow, it’s bright! WAY brighter than my XGA-modded Indigo, and as bright as my M2 MacBook!

I did not need to shim the backlight, I simply used the rubber that previously held the CFL and it fit perfectly. The backlighting is even and did I mention it’s bright?!

As expected, brightness control was backwards out of the gate, so I did the trace cuts with a nice wide cut and added the wire bodge. I have the same quirks, using the brightness buttons in Mac OS X results in:
  • 1-4 are dim but brightness does increase slightly
  • 5 is medium brightness, but the screen is flickery
  • 6-8 are almost full brightness
  • 9 is dim
  • 10-11 are very dim
  • 12 is almost full brightness
  • 13-16 are full brightness
I do see flickering sometimes after waking from sleep at anything but 13-16, so that’s interesting.

I did notice that touching the board tweaks the brightness a little. I wonder if we can put a resistor on the signal wire or something to make it behave as expected… In the meantime, this looks amazing, thanks documenting your efforts and the fix for inverted brightness!

IMG_3876.jpeg
 

AEChadwick

Well-known member
hey team, i spent a while really digging though the DF6113 and figured out another idea for a mod. I have used it in several powerbooks that had the "inverted output" problem, and so far it works great. I am not smart enough to explain it... i just kept pushing around data sheet, dismantled a couple controller boards, used google translate to dig through a russian guy's website, and then just started pulling off caps and bodging parts around. This mod is purely to the board, no other wiring tricks or anything; i have tried it with the blue boards, too, the components have different IDs but their location is almost identical.

here is the mod i devised, plus a movie showing the success. (the iphone auto-adjusts the brightness, but i think its still apparent.)

let me know if you try it yourself:MODS.jpeg good luck and godspeed.
 

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davidg5678

Well-known member
Great work! I'll have to play around with this at some point!

Two questions: Does this version of the mod fix the issue where the brightness gets sort of "jumpy" as you go between the levels?

I remember my mod idea from 2021 wasn't perfect because the brightness would sometimes increase even when the decrease brightness key was pressed.
The only catch is that the dimming adjustment is not constant for some reason: halfway through adjusting the dimming slider, the screen gets brighter again, but by the end, it goes dim.

Also, does this fix the issue that @lazd described where touching the board would make the brightness twitch? I remember having that issue myself as well.
 

AEChadwick

Well-known member
Two questions: Does this version of the mod fix the issue where the brightness gets sort of "jumpy" as you go between the levels?

Also, does this fix the issue that @lazd described where touching the board would make the brightness twitch? I remember having that issue myself as well.

the brightness goes smooth up and down, with no jumps or regressions, just up-down brighter-darker.

i manhandled the boards vigorously (wire, start iBook, good, shutdown, mount board, start iBook, good, shutdown) and never encountered any twitchiness.
 

davidg5678

Well-known member
the brightness goes smooth up and down, with no jumps or regressions, just up-down brighter-darker.

i manhandled the boards vigorously (wire, start iBook, good, shutdown, mount board, start iBook, good, shutdown) and never encountered any twitchiness.
Fantastic! I look forward to trying this out!
 

lazd

New member
I gave this mod a try today on a board with blue PCB and am happy to report it works perfectly! Brightness steps smoothly in the correct direction between dark and light with no jumps or dark spots like before. Bravo for figuring it out, @AEChadwick, thank you for sharing!

@davidg5678 I didn't try poking it while it was connected this time, but once it's all nicely mounted into the lid with double sided tape, I haven't noticed any flickering.
 

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davidg5678

Well-known member
I gave this mod a try today on a board with blue PCB and am happy to report it works perfectly! Brightness steps smoothly in the correct direction between dark and light with no jumps or dark spots like before. Bravo for figuring it out, @AEChadwick, thank you for sharing!

@davidg5678 I didn't try poking it while it was connected this time, but once it's all nicely mounted into the lid with double sided tape, I haven't noticed any flickering.
This is excellent! I haven't given this new version of the mod a shot yet because my iBook is still recovering from a partially finished XGA mod. BTW, I saw your post on another forum about the fully upgraded iBook you've built and I'm very impressed! I hope to get my clamshell to a similar place eventually!

(I'm trying to get a Blueberry iBook to do XGA, but I haven't gotten it to work yet. I'm still on the lookout for a spare Indigo/FireWire iBook logic board to swap in, as I'm trying to figure out what makes the later revisions of iBooks XGA capable. The dream for me is an XGA modded iBook Clamshell with a G4 CPU upgrade. Perhaps also a transplant of the FireWire hardware as well and maybe an upgraded Ethernet controller IC swap too!)
 

davidg5678

Well-known member
I just took my old LED driver board mod apart and reconfigured it to match the plans posted by @AEChadwick. So far, so good! It all seems to be working perfectly --much better than the previous mod revision, with seemingly none of the old drawbacks. A big thank you to @AEChadwick for sharing all of the LED backlight experiments they have been working on this past year!

My iBook is still in a state of semi-disrepair from XGA modding experiments that are still in progress. If I find out anything useful about this new mod, I'll be sure to report back though.
 

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