More old Powerbooks

[martinws]

Hi all,

I've just received a lovely working Powerbook 170 from ebay, the ebayer claimed it kept switching off, luckily it was a loose connection in the Power Adaptor which was easily fixed by using a spare.

Currently waiting on a Powerbook 500 with PPC and (my second) Powerbook 190cs both won on ebay later in the week (I won both for 99p each + P&P). Down side is they do not have harddrives.

 

[MacMan]

Good show, I've heard that the screens on the 170s are amazing compared to the passive matrix displays of the early PowerBooks.

 

[Strimkind]

They are much better screens but they are prone to 'tunneling' after being on for a length of time.

 

[martinws]

Good show, I've heard that the screens on the 170s are amazing compared to the passive matrix displays of the early PowerBooks.

It certainly looks sharper with much less 'bleed' than the Powerbook 100 I have. But I just put that down to the PB 100 not being too well...

 

[Bunsen]

Down side is they do not have harddrives.

Upside is the 190 takes IDE drives [] ]'>

 

[martinws]

Down side is they do not have harddrives.

Upside is the 190 takes IDE drives [] ]'>

Luckily I have one from a very dead (though flame free) 5300 I'm hoping will fit

As for getting a SCSI HD for the PB 500, here's hoping someone will come out with a SCSI to compact flash adapter or something...

 

[porter]

They are much better screens but they are prone to 'tunneling' after being on for a length of time.

What? They form an escape committee, desparate to get away from StalagLaptop-III?

 

[register]

… here's hoping someone will come out with a SCSI to compact flash adapter or something...

Choose one of those. A mini IDE solid state disk or CF-IDE adapter combined with a 2,5" IDE-SCSI bridge should do well. 1,8" to 2,5" IDE adapters are also available. Even a CF-SCSI adapter in 2,5" hdd form factor is available at times.
edit: today I tested a Stratos CF PowerMonster for the first time. Now a Color Classic happily boots from a tiny CF card

Results are provided in the wiki page Flash Drive Test Results.

2nd edit: now I tried that same CF PowerMonster to boot a Power Book 180 and it works great. Even the very old CF (32 MB) card I used in combination with the SCSI-CF bridge reads much faster than the 500 MB HDD (which usually lives inside my PB180).

 

[MacMan]

Choose one of those. A mini IDE solid state disk or CF-IDE adapter combined with a 2,5" IDE-SCSI bridge should do well. 1,8" to 2,5" IDE adapters are also available. Even a CF-SCSI adapter in 2,5" hdd form factor is available at times.
edit: today I tested a Stratos CF PowerMonster for the first time. Now a Color Classic happily boots from a tiny CF card

Results are provided in the wiki page Flash Drive Test Results.

Those are good but the main problem lies in the price - they are too expensive for most people to justify buying. Many old Macs are aquired for free or very cheap so to spend £60 or £70 on drive adaptors doesn't seem right. It would be good if such adaptors fell to around a quarter of their current price, then I reckon more people would buy them and in greater quantities.

 

[Bunsen]

There is a homebrew SCSI to PCMCIA adapter floating about that could be miniaturised and adapted to CF

 

[register]

Those are good but the main problem lies in the price - they are too expensive for most people to justify buying. Many old Macs are aquired for free or very cheap so to spend £60 or £70 on drive adaptors doesn't seem right. It would be good if such adaptors fell to around a quarter of their current price, then I reckon more people would buy them and in greater quantities.

Yes, I agree, the adaptors are quite expensive compared to the price of nearly any used PowerBook. In comparison to the price once to be paid for a new 2,5" SCSI harddisk it seems pretty affordable, like a fifths of the price for ten times the storage capacity with even improved performance. A do-it-yourself solution like the homebrewn adaptor Bunsen suggested is more suitable for a time millionaire. Usually it is difficult to build such thing cheaper from scratch than to buy the same thing from an industrial supplier (as long as you do not take the fun factor into account, as a bonus
The high shipping rate is another problem one could deal with. How about bundling the overseas shipping to a location in your own country and distributing single adaptors to their final destination in the same country for the cost of a local ground service? At least USD 10 should easily be saved per unit. Probably the original supplier will give some discount in case of a bigger order. Do not underestimate the hassle of picking up things at the custom office, collecting the money and shipping things to customers. This should be organised professionally, preferably by someone already running a business. In the end the price cut might be neglegible, however.

 

[martinws]

… here's hoping someone will come out with a SCSI to compact flash adapter or something...

Choose one of those. A mini IDE solid state disk or CF-IDE adapter combined with a 2,5" IDE-SCSI bridge should do well. 1,8" to 2,5" IDE adapters are also available. Even a CF-SCSI adapter in 2,5" hdd form factor is available at times.
2nd edit: now I tried that same CF PowerMonster to boot a Power Book 180 and it works great. Even the very old CF (32 MB) card I used in combination with the SCSI-CF bridge reads much faster than the 500 MB HDD (which usually lives inside my PB180).

That's really good and useful news, I'll have to start saving my pennies and get a couple of them. My Powerbook 100 needs a SCSI harddrive replacement as well.