Posts tagged "Capacitor replacement"

Despite popular opinion, not every fault with an old computer is solved by replacing old electrolytic capacitors. Sometimes it is, though.

thumbnail for "MZasters of the Universe"

MZasters of the Universe

This poor Japanese Z80 computer is literally screaming out for someone to come and fix it. With the some troubleshooting and a little luck, I got it back on the open seas and pumping out its fantastic chunky colour graphics once again.

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Flat Panels Aren't MultiSync 3D

While I adore my NEC PC-TV151, there is one monitor that NEC shipped to our shores that may be the ultimate CRT. This one was cheap, and this one is also very, very sick. Can I cure it so that I can enjoy CGA the way it was meant to be?

thumbnail for "The Floppy Flops (Travelling to Tokio, Part 2)"

The Floppy Flops (Travelling to Tokio, Part 2)

In the previous part of my adventure with the 386-based NEC PC-9801RA2, we covered the existence of Artdink’s game Tokio, talked briefly about clone PC-98s, bought two computers, and built a replacement power supply PCB for one of them. That was a lot of work! So now we finally get to play the game, right? Right?!

thumbnail for "The Case of the Dead Mini5SX"

The Case of the Dead Mini5SX

In order to get a copy of Tetris for the NEC mini5 series of word processors, I had to buy it along with a whole word processor set from the previous owner. This LCD-based mini5SX is sleek, attractive, surprisingly heavy, and broken. Very, very broken. Let’s see if we can fix up this grey beast, and dump its ROMs.

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Look, mom! X1's on TV!

One of the coolest selling points of the Sharp X1turbo is the built-in “telopper” board. With this board, you can superimpose computer graphics on live TV, and smear dithered-colour games across my tiny Sony CRT. Guess which of the two I’m planning on using it for?

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That name again is Mr.PC

Get ready to step into the cyberpunk future of the mid-late 1980s, and don’t forget to bring your boxed wine. NEC pulled out all the stops on this, their final PC-6001 computer. I have to pull out even more stops to get the disk drive to work.

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Recapping a Sequel

With all this discussion of budget Japanese computers and video game consoles lately, it’s easy to forget that I still like old Macs. This Classic II was picked up years ago, and it’s been on the shelf ever since I got it home and spotted the telltale sign of Simasimac. Now that I actually know how to fix it, let’s try to fix it.

thumbnail for "Reviving a Game Gear"

Reviving a Game Gear

With the recent success of the PC-9801NS/T capacitor replacement, I had chip-electrolytic capacitors on the brain. And like I said in this article, the easiest place to find more of those leaky little rectangles in my house was in the Game Gear I hadn’t bothered to repair for years.

thumbnail for "Ms. PC-9801 if you're NS/T"

Ms. PC-9801 if you're NS/T

I got ahold of a PC-98 laptop. Unfortunately, it has a lot of battery leakage and won’t power on. Come hang out and smell the vinegar with me for a little while.

thumbnail for "Fixing the Bad ADB Mac LC's power supply"

Fixing the Bad ADB Mac LC's power supply

Now that I know that the computer wasn’t horribly killed by my recap job and repair of all those broken traces in the ADB input system, let’s take a brief moment to recap that original Astec power supply from the “bad” LC. And fix the video!

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Recapping a Macintosh LC TDK power supply

While I was working on the bad ADB Mac LC, I tested it by using the “good” power supply from my childhood Mac LC. How good was that “good” power supply, though? Well, it smelled a little fishy.

thumbnail for "A "Practice" Mac LC"

A "Practice" Mac LC

My first real computer was a Macintosh LC. They’re not held in especially high esteem, and they haven’t been redeemed by history, either. It’s not hard to see why: a pitifully low RAM limit (10MB) introduced alongside a more RAM-hungry System 7, generally poor performance across the board, and cheap components. I still have mine, but this isn’t it.

thumbnail for "The circle of life - an NEC PC-6001 arrives, breaks, is fixed"

The circle of life - an NEC PC-6001 arrives, breaks, is fixed

Sure, I’ve got NEC PC-88s, I’ve got NEC PC-98s, but didn’t NEC make anything that was a little friendlier to the home user? By now, you should know better than to doubt our friends at the Electric Company. The NEC PC-6001 has a thriving homebrew scene around it in Japan to this very day, and is still fondly remembered. Let’s rip one open and stuff it with hot molten lead.