PowerBook 180 Screen Problems

[ballistik]

Hi there! I purchased a PowerBook 180 from a guy on Craigslist here locally for only $15. The thing is, everything works great on it, except the screen likes to dim out on its own accord. Sometimes if I tap the side of the laptop or adjust the screen knobs on the bottom of the screen (the sliders) the screen will come back. Sometimes it will get really dark or really whited-out all on its own. How do you fix this? What kind of troubleshooting steps could I take? I really love this laptop, want to use it everyday like I use my Titanium PBook G3 and my new MacBook. Can anyone help? Any info on the net would be appreciated too (troubleshooting links, etc)?

Thanks so much for anyone's help!!

I am at my wits end but want to repair this laptop.

Oh, also... does anyone have a working copy of Norton Disc Doctor (Norton 4.0 for Mac) anywhere for d/l on the net?

-B-

 

[LSD]

Sounds like a loose connection somewhere in the backlight circuit. As to how you'd go about fixing that I haven't the slightest idea...

 

[ballistik]

Can anyone else offer more help than that? Surely there's something I can do...

-B-

 

[beachycove]

Take it apart and put it back together. Get hold of the pdf repair manual for assistance in so doing. That should cure any obvious loose connections, or rule out that as a possibility.

Apart from that, the early active matrix greyscale screens are not terribly reliable beasts. Your problems seem, however, to lie either in the circuitry controlling them, or in the ribbon connections and such that feed them and their controlling circuitry. A bad lcd is typically black at the edges after a few minutes, progressing to unreadability. The fact that you aren't reporting that is good, very good.

Soldier on!

 

[tomlee59]

Follow beachycove's advice. The 1xx 'books in particular suffer from flakiness in the LCD connectors. Simply pulling out and reinserting the flex connectors often fixes these sorts of problems (for a time, anyway). Just avoid touching the exposed traces.

 

[ballistik]

Thanks everyone for all your help!

Any idea where the pdf repair manual might be online? Apple.com support site?

-B-

 

[beachycove]

http://farrer.net/~rbf/files/docs/Apple

 

[The Macster]

http://farrer.net/~rbf/files/docs/Apple

8-o Urrgh, the amount of apostrophe abuse on that page makes me feel sick!