Apple Newton Gets Rebuilt Battery Pack

December 13, 2024 by Bryan Cockfield 14 Comments

We all carry touch screen computers around in our pockets these days, but before the smartphone revolution, there was the personal digital assistant (PDA). While it wasn’t a commercial success, one of the first devices in this category was the Apple Newton. Today they’re sought after by collectors, although most of the ones surviving to this day need a bit of rework to the battery pack. Luckily, as [Robert’s Retro] shows, it’s possible to rebuild the pack with modern cells.

By modern standards, the most surprising thing about these battery packs is both that they’re removable and that they’re a standard size, matching that of AA batteries. The Newton battery pack uses four cells, so replacing them with modern rechargeable AA batteries should be pretty straightforward, provided they can be accessed. This isn’t as easy, though. In true Apple fashion the case is glued shut, and prying it apart can damage it badly enough so it won’t fit back in the tablet after repair is complete. The current solution is to cut a hatch into the top instead and then slowly work on replacing the cells while being careful to preserve the electronics inside.

[Robert’s Retro] also demonstrates how to spot weld these new AA batteries together to prepare them for their new home in the Newton case. With the two rows fastened together with nickel strips they can be quickly attached to the existing electrical leads in the battery pack, and from there it’s just a matter of snapping the batteries into the case and sliding it back into the tablet. If you’re looking for something a bit more modern, though, we’d recommend this Apple tablet-laptop combo, but it’s not particularly easy on the wallet.

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Ruined 1993 ThinkPad Tablet Brought Back From The Brink

November 18, 2024 by Lewin Day 10 Comments

Collecting retrocomputers is fun, especially when you find fully-functional examples that you can plug in, switch on, and start playing with. Meanwhile, others prefer to find the damaged examples and nurse them back to health. [polymatt] can count himself in that category, as evidenced by his heroic rescue of an 1993 IBM ThinkPad Tablet.

The tablet came to [polymatt] in truly awful condition. Having been dropped at least once, the LCD screen was cracked, the case battered, and all the plastics were very much the worse for wear. Many of us would consider it too far gone, especially considering that replacement parts for such an item are virtually unobtainable. And yet, [polymatt] took on the challenge nonetheless.

Despite its condition, there were some signs of life in the machine. The pen-based touch display seemed to respond to the pen itself, and the backlight sort of worked, too. Still, with the LCD so badly damaged, it had to be replaced. Boggling the mind, [polymatt] was actually able to find a 9.4″ dual-scan monochrome LCD that was close enough to sort-of fit, size-wise. To make it work, though, it needed a completely custom mount to fit with the original case and electromagnetic digitizes sheet. From there, there was plenty more to do—recapping, recabling, fixing the batteries, and repairing the enclosure including a fresh set of nice decals.

The fact is, 1993 IBM ThinkPad Tablets just don’t come along every day. These rare specimens are absolutely worth this sort of heroic restoration effort if you do happen to score one on the retro market. Video after the break.

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Donated Atari Mega ST Gives A Peek At Game Development History

October 25, 2024 by Donald Papp 9 Comments

[Neil] from The Cave, a computer and console gaming museum in the UK, has a treat for vintage computing and computer gaming enthusiasts. They received an important piece of game dev history from [Richard Costello], who coded ports of Gauntlet 2, Mortal Kombat, and Primal Rage for Atari ST and Amiga home computers. [Richard] brought them his non-functional Atari Mega ST in the hopes that they could get it working again, and demonstrate to visitors how game development was done back in the 80s — but sadly the hardware is not in the best shape.

The Atari ST flagged deleted files for overwriting but didn’t actively wipe them, allowing an undelete utility to work.

That doesn’t stop [Neil], however. The real goal is seeing if it’s possible to re-create the development environment and access the game assets on the SCSI hard drive, and it’s not necessary to revive every part of the hardware to do that. The solution is to back up the drive using a BlueSCSI board which can act as a host, scan the SCSI bus, and dump any device it finds to an SD card. The drive didn’t spin up originally, but some light percussive maintenance solved that.

With the files pulled off the drive, it was time to boot it up using an emulator (which begins at the 16:12 mark). There are multiple partitions, but not a lot of files. There was one more trick up [Neil]’s sleeve. Suspecting that deleting everything was the last thing [Richard] did before turning the machine off decades ago, he fired up a file recovery utility. The Atari ST “deleted” files by marking them to be overwritten by replacing the first letter of the filename with a ‘bomb’ character but otherwise leaving contents intact. Lo and behold, directories and files were available to be undeleted!

[Neil] found some fascinating stuff such as mixed game and concept assets as well as what appears to be a copy of Ramrod, a never-released game. It’s an ongoing process, but with any luck, the tools and environment a game developer used in the 80s will be made available for visitors to experience.

Of course, modern retro gaming enthusiasts don’t need to create games the classic way; tools like GB Studio make development much easier. And speaking of hidden cleverness in old games, did you know the original DOOM actually had multi-monitor support hidden under the hood?

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Braun TS2 Radio Turns 68, Gets Makeover

October 9, 2024 by Al Williams 7 Comments

The Braun TS2 radio was a state-of-the art tube set in 1956. Today it still looks great, but unsurprisingly, the one that [Manuel Caldeier] has needed a little tender loving care. The table radio had a distinct style for its day and push-buttons. However, the dial glass and the speaker grill needed replacement. Even more interesting, the radio has a troublesome selenium rectifier, giving him the perfect chance to try out his new selenium rectifier solid-state replacement.

The radio is as good-looking inside as it is outside. You can tell that this isn’t his first restoration, as he has several tricks to test things at different stages of the project.

While the radio looked good, it smelled of smoke, which required a big effort to clean. The dial glass was intact enough for him to duplicate it in a graphic program and print it on a transparent adhesive sticker. With a deep breath, he removed the original markings from the glass so he could add the sticker to it. That didn’t work because the label needed cutouts. So now he is waiting for a piece of acrylic that will have the art UV printed on it.

We want to see the next part as we imagine the radio sounds as good as it looks when it is working. If you want to know more about the rectifier replacement, we covered that earlier. Even years later, Braun would have a clean aesthetic.

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Curing CRT Cataracts Freshens Up Retro Roundy TVs

September 29, 2024 by Dan Maloney 12 Comments

It’s been a long time since the family TV has had a CRT in it, and even longer since that it was using what was basically an overgrown oscilloscope tube. But “roundies” were once a thing, and even back in the early 80s you’d still find them in living rooms on TV repair calls, usually sporting a characteristic and unsightly bullseye discoloration.

Fast-forward a few decades, and roundy TVs have become collectible enough that curing their CRT cataracts is necessary for restorationists like [shango066], a skill he demonstrates in the video below. The defect comes from the composite construction of CRTs — a safety feature added by television manufacturers wisely concerned with the safety aspects of putting a particle accelerator with the twin hazards of high vacuum and high voltage in the family home. The phosphor-covered face of the tube was covered by a secondary glass cover, often tinted and frosted to improve the admittedly marginal viewing experience. This cover was often glued in place with an epoxy resin that eventually oxidized from the edges in, making the bullseye pattern.

The remedy for this problem? According to [shango066], it’s heat, and plenty of it. After liberating the tube from the remarkably clean TV chassis, he took advantage of a warm summer’s day and got the tube face cooking under a black plastic wrap. Once things were warmed up, more heat was added to really soften the glue; you can easily see the softening progress across the face of the tube in the video below. Once softened, gentle prying with wooden chopsticks completes the job of freeing the safety lens, also in remarkably good shape.

With the adhesive peeled off in an oddly satisfying manner, all that’s left is a thorough cleaning and gluing the lens back on with a little silicone sealant around the edges. We’d love to see the restored TV in operation, but that’s left to a promised future video. In the meantime, please enjoy a look at the retro necessities TV owners depended on in the good old days, which really weren’t all that good when you get down to it.

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Steel Reinforcement Toughens Cracked Vintage Knobs

September 21, 2024 by Dan Maloney 8 Comments

Nothing can ruin a restoration project faster than broken knobs. Sure, that old “boat anchor” ham rig will work just fine with some modern knobs, but few and far between are the vintage electronics buffs that will settle for such aesthetic affrontery. But with new old stock knobs commanding dear prices, what’s the budget-conscious restorationist to do? Why, fix the cracked knobs yourself, of course.

At least that’s what [Level UP EE Lab] tried with his vintage Heahkit DX60 ham transmitter, with pretty impressive results. The knobs on this early-60s radio had all cracked thanks to years of over-tightening the set screws. To strengthen the knobs, he found some shaft collars with a 1/4″ inside diameter and an appropriate set screw. The backside of the knob was milled out to make room for the insert, which was then glued firmly in place with everyone’s go-to adhesive, JB Weld. [Level UP] chose the “Plastibonder” product, which turns out not to be an epoxy but rather a two-part urethane resin, which despite some initial difficulties flowed nicely around the shaft collar and filled the milled-out space inside the knob. The resin also flowed into the channels milled into the outside diameter of the shaft collars, which are intended to grip the hardened resin better and prevent future knob spinning.

It’s a pretty straightforward repair if a bit fussy, but the result is knobs that perfectly match the radio and still have the patina of 60-plus years of use. We’ll keep this technique in mind for our next restoration, or even just an everyday repair. Of course, for less demanding applications, there are always 3D printed knobs.

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For years, the first Air Force One sat neglected and forgotten in an open field at Arizona’s Marana Regional Airport. (Credit: Dynamic Aviation)

The First Air Force One And How It Was Nearly Lost Forever

August 17, 2024 by Maya Posch 14 Comments

Although the designation ‘Air Force One’ is now commonly known to refer to the airplane used by the President of the United States, it wasn’t until Eisenhower that the US President would make significant use of a dedicated airplane. He would have a Lockheed VC-121A kitted out to act as his office as commander-in-chief. Called the Columbine II after the Colorado columbine flower, it served a crucial role during the Korean War and would result the coining of the ‘Air Force One’ designation following a near-disaster in 1954.

This involved a mix-up between Eastern Air Lines 8610 and Air Force 8610 (the VC-121A). After the Columbine II was replaced with a VC-121E model (Columbine III), the Columbine II was mistakenly sold to a private owner, and got pretty close to being scrapped.

In 2016, the plane made a “somewhat scary and extremely precarious” 2,000-plus-mile journey to Bridgewater, Virginia, to undergo a complete restoration. (Credit: Dynamic Aviation)

Although nobody is really sure how this mistake happened, it resulted in the private owner stripping the airplane for parts to keep other Lockheed C-121s and compatible airplanes flying. Shortly before scrapping the airplane, he received a call from the Smithsonian Institution, informing him that this particular airplane was Eisenhower’s first presidential airplane and the first ever Air Force One. This led to him instead fixing up the airplane and trying to sell it off. Ultimately the CEO of the airplane maintenance company Dynamic Aviation, [Karl D. Stoltzfus] bought the partially restored airplane after it had spent another few years baking in the unrelenting sun.

Although in a sorry state at this point, [Stoltzfus] put a team led by mechanic [Brian Miklos] to work who got the airplane in a flying condition by 2016 after a year of work, so that they could fly the airplane over to Dynamic Aviation facilities for a complete restoration. At this point the ‘nuts and bolts’ restoration is mostly complete after a lot of improvisation and manufacturing of parts for the 80 year old airplane, with restoration of the Eisenhower-era interior and exterior now in progress. This should take another few years and another $12 million or so, but would result in a fully restored and flight-worthy Columbine II, exactly as it would have looked in 1953, plus a few modern-day safety upgrades.

Although [Stoltzfus] recently passed away unexpectedly before being able to see the final result, his legacy will live on in the restored airplane, which will after so many years be able to meet up again with the Columbine III, which is on display at the National Museum of the USAF.