Gregory's Servera new arrival: a Thinkpad 700C! words cannot convey how uhh sticky the soft-touch paint has gotten.
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the screw sizes are all wrong--this is for the 700 but there's no diagram for the 700C. they must have been a bit different. looks like an SCR crowbar circuit is firing. I think I'm going to have to reverse engineer this board so I know what's going on. @johnlogic good eye, it took me half an hour of inspection to notice that and prove that it was the SCR firing... i really love it when a board has designators all out of order. bad? no! it means it's in order on the (implied) schematic, modulo revisions. very useful information! looks like the only electrolytic capacitor on the board had leaked, and the electrolyte etched and broke 6 vias. let's see if my repair worked...    Therapist: So you have nightmares about electrolytic capacitors? Patient: Yes. Therapist: And they are following you around? Patient: Yes. Therapist: And you think they want to harm you? Patient: I know they do.   @tubetime I loved that thinkpad. such a solid machine! And the nipple mouse was super.  @tubetime Problems solved by whacking with hammer: *adds one to the tally*  @tubetime the one and only time I soldered directly to a coin cell it exploded in my face. Never again! @tubetime You need a small spot welder in your arsenal (and so do I) @tubetime I’m too scared to do that, so I use electrical tape to tape the wires to the cell (plus cover the whole thing with said tape so it looks similar to the original)  @tubetime You can just use a regular soldering iron for this and for the small parts you'll need a finer mesh, can find it on amazon https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0B3T3ZBSR . Holds much better than the glue  @tubetime @tubetime I have a headset with that soft touch paint on it and every time I pick it up I go "ewww, I'll deal with that later", put it back in the box of parts it lives in and it doesn't see daylight for a couple more years until the next time I repeat the process. No product should ever use that paint, but like batteries nothing ever goes through long term testing to see what will happen down the line  Ohhhh, the penny just dropped. 😡 My GF has a BMW and some of the touchy spots have transformed to sticky black goo. @tubetime - the sticky stuff is likely some type of plasticiser which has migrated to the surface over time. Note that many older plasticisers are no longer considered safe to use. Depending on the situation, I've dusted the surface with corn starch, rubbed it in a bit and vacuumed or just brushed it off. You have to make the call whether a liquid solvent or a fine powder can do more damage to the surroundings in your particular situation ;-) @tubetime Is there anything that can remove that? Once it goes sticky it’s really quite disgusting to touch. 🙁 I’ve had the misfortune of having to handle a few things like that over the years. @tubetime Is there any cure for that coat of sticky stuff? I have a couple of these stashed away. I scrounged them and a docking station to use as a desktop back in the day when I couldn't coax a computer out of the people at work.  @tubetime |
@tubetime Gods how I hate that stuff.