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I made a little video about my efforts to combine three PowerBook 1400s into one ultra-1400
Posted by: CircuitBored on 2021-07-13 08:29:27 Hi all! I've rebooted my YouTube channel and the first video is about one of my favourite Apple laptops: the PowerBook 1400 series! Here's a little backstory on the machines in the video: The first, nice-condition 1400cs was purchased off eBay around five years ago for something like £4.50. It's the 166MHz model and I always liked it but felt it was severely let down by the awful active-matrix screen. I put it in its bag and forgot about it for several years until the next 1400cs came along. That one was much more exciting. I bought it from my old place of work after first eyeing it up almost a decade ago. Inside I found some exciting upgrades. That's a NUPowr G3, video output card, and 64MB of RAM! Score! But then I was left in an even more frustrating situation: one 1400cs in great shape and one 1400cs in less-nice condition but containing pretty much the best upgrades you can get for this model. The obvious solution? Buy a scrappy 1400c and steal the screen from it! So a few days later one came in the post. Look at those lovely colours! No awful motion blur either! Then began the lengthy process of disassembling all three machines and selecting the best bits from each one so I could build the omega-1400. A 1400c with a G3 and maxed-out RAM. I threw in an SD-IDE adapter for good measure. Along the way I learned that the 1400c actually has a very slightly different bezel to the 1400cs – the top and bottom edges are lower down. Now that it's all finished I have built myself an extremely nice example of a 1400c. It's about as good as you could hope for! Up next for this machine will be a battery rebuild and a power supply recap. I hope you enjoyed the video.
Posted by: CircuitBored on 2021-07-13 08:48:04 P.S. I would love to hear your feedback on the video! It's been a long time since I uploaded anything and I've gone for a slightly different style this time around.
Posted by: LaPorta on 2021-07-13 09:21:19 Just to loop all of this together, I just did a recap of the PSU and repair of one that was burnt. I also rebuilt the battery. I need to get the thread back up that I lost, and we can link it all together.
Posted by: Fizzbinn on 2021-07-13 09:24:55 That was great! The humor was nice change of pace from some other more clinical retro computing videos but I'd say don't go to much further or you may cross the line from evoking chuckles to cringes. Looking forward to your future videos!
Posted by: CircuitBored on 2021-07-13 09:32:21 That was great! The humor was nice change of pace from some other more clinical retro computing videos but I'd say don't go to much further or you may cross the line from evoking chuckles to cringes. Looking forward to your future videos! Thank you! I tried really hard to cultivate a more relaxed style of video than some of the "all numbers"-types out there. You're definitely right regarding the humour; it's always a fine line between funny and cringeworthy. A lot of my older videos sadly went deep into cringe territory. I need to get the thread back up that I lost, and we can link it all together. That would be so great! I'll definitely credit your thread in the recap/battery rebuild video.
Posted by: Rick Dangerous on 2021-07-13 09:42:00 Really nice work...i'm green with envy. I have two 1400's that i need to do the same thing with!
Posted by: CircuitBored on 2021-07-13 10:23:54 Really nice work...i'm green with envy. Thanks Rick! Good luck with your PowerBooks. Do you have a G3 accelerator too? I'd be interested to hear your experiences with it if so.
Posted by: Rick Dangerous on 2021-07-14 07:50:35 No; but i'd certainly snag one if i could find one, and for my 3400c as well. I've heard they can create some bugs/issue here and there with the 1400 (can't remember exactly what at the moment, but i do recall hearing about a few potential items), but i'd be willing to take the risk and experiment and see what works and what doesn't.
Posted by: joshc on 2021-07-14 08:11:11 I liked your video, you kept the length about right and it had a good balance of silly and interesting. Well done 🙂
Posted by: CircuitBored on 2021-07-14 10:03:11 I liked your video, you kept the length about right and it had a good balance of silly and interesting. Thanks Josh! I'm trying to keep my videos shorter and more to the point so that's great to hear.
Posted by: nickpunt on 2022-08-27 04:42:30 @CircuitBored was poking around for 1400 info and stumbled upon your video and thought it was quite funny and informative, as were the others of yours I saw. The tone was just right. Keep it up!
Posted by: CircuitBored on 2022-08-27 05:22:03 @CircuitBored was poking around for 1400 info and stumbled upon your video and thought it was quite funny and informative, as were the others of yours I saw. The tone was just right. Keep it up! Thank you very much! Quite funny and informative is exactly the tone I strive for so that is great to hear. Sadly my video-making has been slowed down by my personal life over the past year but I do have some fun stuff in the works. Next up is a video about the venerable Pismo.
Posted by: CircuitBored on 2022-08-27 05:23:13 was severely let down by the awful active-matrix screen I just noticed this typo, more than a year later. Gah! I meant "passive-matrix", as it was a 1400cs.
Posted by: cheesestraws on 2022-08-27 05:28:03 passive matrix I just though 'pactive' and 'assive' matrix. The latter being appropriate, I'm not sure what a pactive-matrix screen is though. Suggestions welcome. Maybe this can be our new tech startup.
Posted by: Phipli on 2022-08-27 05:36:35 I just though 'pactive' and 'assive' matrix. The latter being appropriate, I'm not sure what a pactive-matrix screen is though. Suggestions welcome. Maybe this can be our new tech startup. The refresh is led by a yellow puck. Wak-a-wak-a-wak-a Row by row, from left to right 🙂
Posted by: CircuitBored on 2022-08-27 05:37:45 I just though 'pactive' and 'assive' matrix. The latter being appropriate, I'm not sure what a pactive-matrix screen is though. Suggestions welcome. Maybe this can be our new tech startup. Pactive-matrix should be a "proactive-matrix". It's an LCD that uses neural net technology to preempt the next frame. Sadly, Apple's experiments resulted in text only being displayed in Aramaic and severe nosebleeds for the user so the project was abandoned.
Posted by: cheesestraws on 2022-08-27 05:39:40 Pactive-matrix should be a "proactive-matrix". It's an LCD that uses neural net technology to preempt the next frame. Sadly, Apple's experiments resulted in text only being displayed in Aramaic and severe nosebleeds for the user so the project was abandoned. This kind of thing feels relevant to @Danamania 's interests
Posted by: CircuitBored on 2022-08-27 05:48:51 This kind of thing feels relevant to @Danamania 's interests The pactive-matrix' sister project, the supermassive-matrix was deemed impractical due to the galactic-scale energy requirements.
Posted by: Trash80toHP_Mini on 2022-08-27 20:34:08 I'd seen this or another of your videos previously and found them very entertaining and helpful. Great job. One nit to pick though: the only reason to remove the Daughterboard/PCMCIA Card Cage Assy would be for replacement. It seemed like you were indicating it as a step in the logic board removal process?
Posted by: ried on 2022-08-29 20:53:35 I identify with this video so much.
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