Replacing the LCD on a Macintosh Powerbook

A day after I purchased my PowerBook on eBay, it began to develop black lines along the bottom of my screen. I could literally watch a new row of pixels slowly blink out, sometimes forming an alternating pattern before becoming a solid line.

The lines continued to fill up the lower inch of the screen, though it seemed, that it would only be a matter of time before I lost an inch of the 9.8" screen. The solution to repair this was to simply replace the LCD screen. 

Taking apart the casing of the PowerBook's display housing is not a difficult task. It requires removing two screws using a T-8 torx driver. Then pulling down and away the display bezel.

Then four more screws need to be removed to detach the LCD display.

The trickiest part of this process is to remove the ribbon cable from the LCD display. It's a rather delicate ribbon, and removing it from the connector and the adhesive holding it to the LCD display must be exercised with care.

Disconnecting the inverter cable is the last operation before the LCD panel can be completely removed.

The most difficult operation for me in reassembling the unit was reattaching the ribbon cable back into the connector. 

It took multiple attempts to push the ribbon into the connector and slide the locking tabs back. 

Macintosh Powerbook 145

The Macintosh Powerbook was the first series of laptops manufactured by Apple. The Powerbook 145 was introduced on August 3, 1992. It's a mid-range system between the 100 and 170 line, featuiring a 9.8" monochrome passive-matrix display and a 68030 processor. Basically a Macintosh SE\30 with an LCD screen.

I've been looking for a 140 or 145 on eBay and found a good deal for the 145. To sweeten the deal, the owner had recently replaced the caps and the bios battery and included the System 7.1 OS disks,  manuals, and paper work for this model.

Unfortunately, a day after I got it, black lines started to appear at the lower end of the LCD screen. I contacted the seller and he offered to send me another 145 to use for parts. The next blog entry will cover how the LCD screen was replaced.

Here are the specifications for the PowerBook 145:

Requires System 7.0.1 to 7.6.1 (will not run on System 6 or earlier)
CPU: 25 MHz 68030
FPU: none
Performance: 3.8, relative to SE; 0.41, Speedometer 4
ROM: 1 MB
RAM: 2 MB RAM, expandable to 8 MB using a special 100ns pseudostatic RAM card
display: 9.8″ 1-bit 640 x 400 77 ppi passive matrix
ADB slots: 1 port for keyboard and mouse
serial ports: 2 DIN-8 RS-422 ports on back of computer
SCSI ports: HDI30 connector on back of computer
Hard drive: 40 or 80 MB
proprietary modem slot
Gestalt ID: 54
Size (HxWxD): 2.25″ x 11.25″ x 9.3″
Weight: 6.8 pounds

In November 1992, an ad has the PowerBook 145 selling for 2409 USD. That's $3,517.52 in today's dollars.

Replacing the Mac SE CRT monitor

The CRT monitor on my Mac SE was damaged during a floppy drive install. The only way to fix it was to replace it. Fortunately, I have a non-working Macintosh Classic II that I've kept around for parts, so I decided to use it's CRT as a replacement.

Keep in mind that there is a potential of high voltage discharge while working with these components. Be careful!

Opening up the SE is quite simple. There are four screws that need to be removed using a Torx driver.

Once opened, there are a number of cables that need to be disconnected.

Then the logic board, disc drives and power supply panel need to be removed.

Once all of these components are removed, the CRT is the primary component left.

There is still an attached yoke and anode connector that must be removed.

These areas are potential high voltage discharge areas. ABSOLUTE care must be exercised at your own risk. Removing the yoke requires loosening the clamp screw at the yoke's end. The yoke can then be pulled off.

To remove the anode, the rubber body must be squeezed and then removed by rocking the contacts back and forth until it releases.

Now the CRT can be removed by removing four screws.

Basically the CRT on the Mac SE is identical to the Macintosh Classic II. However, the connectors for the yoke are not. The SE has a larger 4 pin connector.

The Macintosh Classic has a smaller connector. 

In addition, if you were to swap out the connectors, the yoke is not tuned correctly for the SE. The image develops an unfocusable overlap on the image side. So be sure not to damage the SE's yoke.

Once the new CRT replacement is made and all of the removed components have been replaced, the system needs to be turned on so that the image can be adjusted. The first adjustment should be the tilt. It's very unlikely that you have replaced yoke in it's correct orientation.

This adjustment is made by slowly revolving the yoke around the CRT neck until the proper image is obtained.

Next is the vertical and horizontal adjustments. These are made by adjusting the potentiometers on the SE's power supply board.

Next the focus and luminosity can be adjusted by similar potentiometers in the same area.

Everything should work well now. In this case one more adjustment could be made.

The image is not quite centered in the CRT. This can be adjusted by moving the centering rings on the yoke.

Macintosh SE

The Macintosh SE was introduced on March 2, 1987. It has the same iconic form factor as the original Macintosh, but with slightly different styling and color. This model has significant improvements over it's predecessor, the Mac Plus. It's most notable feature being the installed hard drive.

I picked up an inexpensive unit on eBay. They can generally be found for a reasonable price (under $100). However, the SE shouldn't be confused with the SE\30 which was introduced on January 1989. These models will sell for considerably more. Though I owned a SE\30 along time ago, I had considered picking one up for nostalgic reasons, but the collector's demand for them are too high for my taste. 

Here are the specifications for the SE:

Processor: Motorola 68000, 8 MHz

System Bus Speed: 8 MHz

ROM Size: 256 kB

Data Path: 16-bit Level 1

RAM Type: 150 ns 30-pin SIMM

VRAM Type: Built-in

Standard RAM: 1 MB

Maximum RAM: 4 MB

RAM Slots: 4 (in pairs)

Standard Hard Drive: 20 MB

Int. Hard Drive Type: SCSI

Standard Disk: 3.5 in, 800 kB, 800 kB x 2 (auto)

Exp. Slots: SE PDS

Battery Type: 3.6 V lithium

Display: 512x342 9 inches (23 cm) monochrome[2][6]

Video memory: 512x384x1

Supported Mac OS: 3.3–7.5.1, 7.5.3–7.5.5

Avg. Weight: 17.0 lb/7.7 kg

An advertisement in MacWorld Nov 1987 has the SE selling with a 20MB hard drive, keyboard and mouse for 3319 USD. That's $7,036.89 in today's dollars!

Hard Drive Installation and Setup on a Quadra 700

Installing a new hard drive on a Quadra 700 is a fairly easy task. The side cover (or top, depends on your Mac orientation preference) is attached by a slotted end towards the front face and then released by pulling up two tabs at the rear.

There are two flexible rubber feet that can be pulled away, allowing the cover to be removed.

Once opened, the hard drive can be easily located on the side next to the power supply. All of the components (including the power supply) can be removed as separate modular systems.

The hard drive is removed by squeezing both sides of the two metal tabs of the hard drive caddy. Removing the ribbon and power cable to finalize the release. 

The hard drive replacement is a Maxtor 7345SR 345MB 50-Pin 3.5" SCSI Hard Drive. However, not all SCSI connections are the same. This unit requires a 50 pin double row SCSI connection with the larger 4 pin molex power connector.

The hard drive is attached to the caddy by four screws. Remove them to attach the new drive and then reinstall the caddy back into it's place and connect the cables.

This is an easy install, however... it was not quite so easy getting the Macintosh Quadra to recognize the hard drive!

A Macintosh computer has a special utility called Apple HD SC Setup. This utility can be found in the Tools Disk. Running this utility should "find" the hard drive and set it up, However... not in this case. 

This problem had to be solved with a third party utility by FBW Hard Disk Toolkit.

FWB Hard Disk Toolkit PE v1.6 can be found at http://macintoshgarden.org/apps/fwb-hard-disk-toolkit-v16-v163-update . This will make a bootable disk with the hard drive utility called RAID Toolkit. Booting this diskette, will bring up a menu with the following information. The installed Maxtor hard drive can now be seen. 

To make the Quadra "see" this hard drive, it needs to be mounted. The tab is located on the far right of the RAID Toolkit GUI. After mounting, I made the choice to partition the drive as two equal parts.

Everything seems to be solved, BUT... the oddities still continue. Installing the Mac system 7.1 disks will not boot the Quadra. The Computer has to be booted with the Disk Tools diskete and then the System Finder has to be copied to the new hard drive. 

The Quadra is rebooted (Disk Tools disk removed) and then the installation disks are installed.

Everything seems fine, but a run of the Apple HD SC Setup, still shows that the Mac Quadra does not have an attached SCSI device!