G3 Upgrading my Japanese PowerBook 2400c

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Last year, I finally got my absolute holy grail PowerBook - a working 2400c! When I took it apart to clean it and upgrade it, I found the absolute carnage of an exploded PRAM battery. After cleaning it up and reassembling... it never booted again :(
Well, now I bought a second, also-broken PowerBook 2400c - from Japan! Can I combine these two into one working machine, and then upgrade the heck out of it with a G3 accelerator?
Let's find out!
LINKS:
🍎 Original Video: • Pushing a PowerBook 24...
🍎 RaSCSI: github.com/aku...
(Amazon links are affiliated links)
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#PowerMac #RTX #GPUJune

[@Chrs2021]

Amazing deep reference to "Are you afraid of the dark?" - bravo 👏

[@tsalikaki]

Your evolution as a creator is a marvel to behold. Being one of the earliest subscribers, from far far away Greece. Keep up the good work!

[@ActionRetro]

Thank you!!

[@Jordan4Ibanez]

@@ActionRetro It's always very special when one of your first subscribers comments on your video

[@soberlife]

I love the whiteboard shenanigans.

[@JohnSmith-xq1pz]

I think whiteboard guy needs a hug lol

[@Francois_L_7933]

You might want to send it to Adrian's Digital Basement, he's used to installing bodge wires to fix broken ports. BTW, when I need to open the clips on a laptop, I always use a thin guitar pick. Works wonders and doesn't risk damaging a thing.

[@Squonk06]

This is the kind of collaboration I'd like to see. Adrian was the first person I thought of when Sean revealed what happened.

[@ncc74656m]

Excellent Are You Afraid of the Dark reference there. Brought back deep 80s kid memories.

[@AnotherFreakingDude]

If you got the time, the usual way to fix corroded connectors is to check continuity between the IDE connector and their test pads or other contact points. Then you can get a better idea of where's the broken link. Anyways, always love to see good ol' computers come back to life, good work!

[@realbenactually]

Best skit you’ve ever done. Bring this stuff back.

[@warderjack]

13:51 anybody else would be swearing up a storm, but Sean, even at his most irate "that's unfortunate". I admire your approach and willingness to press on even when things aren't going so well.

[@QUANTUMJOKER]

I performed a similar procedure with my Lombard Powerbook G3 a few weeks ago. I'd broken my Lombard a couple of weeks before through a misguided experiment with a PC card and mains power - this must have burned out something on the motherboard, as the Lombard would no longer reliably boot - but while walking home one day I remembered that I had a Lombard without a screen under my bed. I transferred the (hopefully) working parts from the broken Lombard - processor, RAM, CF adapter, hard-drive cable, PRAM battery, optical drive - to the screenless Lombard, and tested the rig through our television. The screenless Lombard booted completely fine, so I transplanted the screen from the broken Lombard to the screenless working Lombard. I'm so happy and relieved that I restored my Lombard back from the dead, and this "spare-parts" Lombard is even in significantly better condition than the original broken Lombard.

[@cadensnyder195]

your videos are getting better and better! really love the "are you afraid of the dark" skit

[@tobiwonkanogy2975]

A major fan of the Afraid of the Dark "remake"/homage. Great tale ahahaha.

[@GalenlevyPhoto]

For some reason you said something about the battery reminded me of the PowerBook 5300. A huge recall of battery issues at the time. Altho I never owned it. I had a PowerBook G3 Pismo and the PowerBook clamshell. I got them cheap at a computer recycling store in Seattle. I loved that store.

[@fsfs555]

None of the 2400cs had CardBus support from stock; they were all required to be modified, though the procedure differs depending on which version of the logic board you had (either cut some wires on the early one or remove a couple SMD caps on the later one). Like the Maxells in desktop Macs, it's the green Varta-branded PRAM batteries that are notorious for leaking like that, and they're used in basically all of the 2400s, 3400s, and Kanga G3s. So if you have one of these, disassemble it and remove that thing NOW. The bad screen has "vinegar syndrome." It's pretty common in any LCD-equipped electronics (not just Macs) from hot, humid areas, and usually also accompanies batteries that have leaked severely.

[@jorgeconstanza136]

OMG the speed!!! Great video Sean! 😀

[@DavidStahlOLDHAPPyMACs]

Glad to see you have it running Sean very nice G3 upgrade

[@mediocrefunkybeat]

It's your utter passion and joy that keeps bringing me back to your channel, Sean. It's just wonderful.

[@raphaelbruegger]

Sean aka the man with the plan! Dude, your videos are just effin astonishing! 💯🔝

[@JakeR0bH]

Hey Sean, I've been following your channel since the Cursed Mac series! It's great to see you're having fun with your content and I hope you continue on with your passion! I watch your vids almost as soon as they come out (Sat late PM in the UK) and they're a joy to look forward to. Here's to many more to come!

[@rickyt11010]

Man it has been so fun watching your skills grow while at the same time growing mine. Wish I was still able to be a patreon supporter because your content is some of the only stuff I watch deserving of it.

[@tndabone]

Did you bother neutralizing the battery base with vinegar or lemon juice? You need to inactivate the remaining chemicals on the board, and then clean off the acid (Vinegar) with isopropyl alcohol. Then start tracking the traces and make sure none are eaten away.

[@SockyNoob]

Hopefully

[@alexthemorgan]

Use an acid that isnt full of sugar. Vinegar is a much better idea than Lemon Juice

[@richfiles]

@Ron Jerome Baking soda is a base, not an acid. It won't neutralize the basic alkaline corrosion.

[@ste76539]

You haven't said, so it's fair to assume you've only done half the job here - as many others have mentioned, it isn't enough just to clean off the blue gunk - that's only what you can see. What you can't see is the battery juice itself (which is alkaline by the way, not an acid. If it were an acid, putting more acid on there wouldn't work now would it?) which is still all over the board, slowly eating away at the copper tracks, chip legs and so on. After cleaning the worst of the blue gunk away you need to deactivate the alkaline by thoroughly putting a weak acid such as vinegar or lemon juice on the board and allowing it to do it's job (you'll see it bubbling away) before thoroughly cleaning it with IPA followed by a proper bath in soapy water (if you have hard water, use distilled water) and several days to properly dry off before you reassemble and test. If you don't do this, the board will fail again, it's just a matter of time. Clearly, there is damage left on the board anyway or the hard drive would work could be broken traces, could be damaged chips/components and needs properly investigating/fixing.

[@richfiles]

His last video mentioned the use of vinegar. He may have done the same, but omitted mention, on the grounds of keeping the repair portion shorter, and allowing more time to show actually using the machine.

[@marcischneider9093]

the quality of your videos is getting exponentially better! good job

[@orestes1984]

I would be almost certain that what has happened is that the battery acid has corroded the IDE adapter which means you're going to have to get someone who is good at micro soldering to find that particular IDE chip and connector and solder a new one onto your mostly working board.

[@MrDDawson]

you dont need the cute moments dude. deliver yourself as you do it. it rocks (the fire was great)

[@AnonymousFreakYT]

Recently got a good condition 2400c of my own. Amazingly, no leaked battery! (It actually looks like someone replaced it in the past, the plastics have a *SLIGHT* discoloring to them that leads me to believe someone previous swapped out the battery *JUST* as it was failing.) Mine arrived with "GLOD" issues, too; but in my case, it was just that the connections between the boards inside had loosened during shipping. But man, I'd love to have a G3 card, or even that 240 MHz card! (The 240 MHz was only offered in Japan.)

[@boneske]

This channel makes me excited for Saturday mornings. Great video, keep up the great work.

[@kramerdesign9443]

The fireside horror story setup genuinely made me laugh - great work man!

[@TheBasementChannel]

Very well done Sean! What a satisfying feeling to rectify your last errors 😅 I know that feeling well. Thanks for taking us on the journey. I’ve now got three of these little macs, 1 is working, the other two are dead, but after watching this maybe there is hope for them yet.

[@osgeld]

white vinegar is great for cleaning that stuff up, you can get large bottle of "cleaning vinegar" at dollar tree, its the same stuff its just not processed in a food grade factory just keep in mind its got a lot of water in it so dry well and use some high octane iso to drive off moisture... but it works great I use it all the time on battery contacts and cleaning up bios battery goo and rusty screws, it removes rust eventually

[@notanimposter]

Your channel has really found a unique vibe. Very cool.

[@emmabentley7945]

I am loving these videos. ❤️❤️ For me my holy grail machine is a PowerBook 5300. As its first machine I loved from Independence Day and has a big position in my heart 💓

[@GarthBeagle]

Glad to see you finally got a (mostly) working system. If it works that well, I suspect the IDE issue is some relatively simple thing, here's hope 🤞

[@mountainmanmcbeachfront5296]

Glad it worked out, I was kinda worried it looked like a smurf got shot inside of there lol

[@michaelhill6453]

Another great video. I'd really like to see the finished project. One day.

[@rchltmedia]

your videos are getting more and more innovative & funnier 😂

[@jessepatterson8897]

the 2400c is the grail, i knew so many techs that used it with the g3 upgrade, even tho the bus really limited the upgrade. The second those came up they would get snapped up internally. 2300c duo's were amazing for the time too.

[@SenileOtaku]

Ah hes, finally getting hold of one of your long-desired classic machines, then proceeding to hamfistedly break it. I did that to an IBM PS/2 P70. Found one someone was disposing of, and tried upgrading the memory. Broke a memory slot, and it never worked again. Thing is, I probably could have fixed it when I was working in the zSeries test lab (using their board-repair equipment) or at least found someone else who could fix it. But that was probably 25 years ago, and I gave the machine away a long time ago.

[@bobfromsoireegames4309]

Great little laptop, this. Treat her well!

[@thoraldshib4393]

videos just keep getting better!, keep up the good work!

[@NavJack27gaming]

hahaha i appreciate the dramatic scary are you afraid of the dark skit.

[@2048Megabytes.]

This guy is literally the best vintage computer KZbinr I've ever seen!!!

[@varno]

I can see some of the blue on one of the pins leading to a card slot. You also want to neutralise the electrolyte, rinsing with vinegar, flux remover then water then isopropynol would probably be a good idea.

[@onigvd77]

Nice vid Sean, I guess you have the set now, 1400, 2400, 3400. I have two of each of the easy to find models, no 2400 but I, like you, have always wanted one. The closest i got is a Duo 2300.

[@Stryder_The_Nite_Owl]

Love the shirt! The 2400c is an interesting beast.

[@electricmiragemedia]

This laptop was my workhorse growing up for several years! I played Quake 2 and Unreal on that tiny screen. Quake 2 ran great at 320 x 240 in software, unreal struggled a bit :D

[@recademedia]

I’d run both boards through the ultrasonic if you get your hands on one. Also, the vinegar idea seems like a great idea as well. Love the content!

[@Zeem4]

Great work! The only downside is that it reminded me of the Powerbook 190 I built out of leftover parts, which I later broke while trying to fix a keyboard problem. I still have it somewhere, only I never went back to it because I was so annoyed with myself.

[@zerocks88]

"I don't have either of those two things" WELL WELL WELL, are you not in the right place then! Please start a campaign to get them so I can donate Love your work

[@sundeviltech]

I would call that a win bud, thx for the interesting content and have a great day.

[@JayJay-88]

Scary PRAM story, is it halloween already? Great video so far! 😊

[@50ShadesOfBeige]

Microscope? Hey Steve84.... Action Boy needs your help. He's gone and done a Javier!!

[@timsenecal1727]

congratulations on getting this unicorn running.

[@joncrawford3485]

Varta! A name that scares the shenanigans out of any retro restorer... (Had to use the word shenanigans cos, you know...)

[@shiningprince]

Sean, you referenced an ultrasonic cleaning in your video, and I like what ste76539 said below about giving it a good cleaning (and his proposed methods which don't involve ultrasonic) but it seems to me that the most thorough cleaning you can give it would be an ultrasonic cleaning that would get all unreachable places. If after a thorough cleaning it doesn't do the job, then you can consider the IDE re-solder or new IDE chip and solder.

[@thecorruptedbit5585]

I found one of these in my friend's attic! A 2400c/180. Can't seem to find a power adapter, though, and I was dissapointed to find out that they were the model right *after* the duo series! And no internal drives. I still can't wait to install Linux on it though

[@tipsofme]

Still on the dream machine list with a TAM. I have everything else I want but this one haunts me...

[@elmariachi5133]

This looks like by capillary action the acid has travelled through the cables to the other side. You should make sure to swap these cables out.

[@akaJughead]

You can try to reflow the solder on the first board, and see if that brings it back to life.

[@smallmoneysalvia]

Please keep making your videos more ridiculous, this is wonderful and I love it

[@minty_Joe]

Nice reference to Nickelodeon's "Are You Afraid of the Dark?".

[@SuperDavidEF]

You said you went through a bunch of q-tips, but did you actually use anything to neutralize the electrolyte? I watch Necroware channel, and he always uses white vinegar to neutralize that blue gunk. You can actually see it fizzing when he applies the vinegar.

[@theabhominal8131]

nowi am going to have nightmares tonight about batteries and blue gunk... darn you

[@cheater00]

You're having too much fun with this.

[@sficlassic]

Just getting into your channel. I watched your video on the G3 beige upgrade. Will that work for the mini tower ?

[@JohnSmith-xq1pz]

Attempted redemption story arc Edit I loved Are you afraid of the dark?

[@mrarmstrong1000]

I absolutely love his overdramatized battery situation. How hilariously halloween of him 👻

[@christopherwilliams9418]

I've come across a 240 model that had that exact same weird ripple effect going on with the screen, wonder if it was just a bad batch of panels in those later revisions or something? In most of my window shopping for a 2400c I don't think I've seen a 180 with the ripple.

[@dialupdave6276]

why is it that I always manage to be one of the first people to watch your videoes. I guess KZbin just really likes them.

[@eMorphized]

My computing dream is compiling Darwin and GNUStep for a Raptor Blackbird or Talos II and with some finagling, creating the Powerbook G9.

[@stitchfinger7678]

"...through the magic of buying two of them..."

[@pseudotasuki]

Here's the weird thing. A CompactFlash card in a PCMCIA adapter should be communicating using ATA. So I don't think the issue is the controller.

[@eDoc2020]

The card will be communicating through the PCMCIA controller instead of the hard drive controller.

[@pseudotasuki]

@@eDoc2020 Well that makes sense.

[@IanC14]

Is there a dead pixel on your camera? Edit - or is it a mark on your wall?

[@blackcoffeegarage]

at 10:45 the frame is magnesium not plastic :)

[@fsfs555]

No, it's definitely plastic. It has a conductive coating sprayed on it, which the battery electrolyte tends to eat off, leaving the yellowish plastic visible. The only PowerBook I've seen with a magnesium frame is the 500 series, and electrolyte on those tends to create a white, powdery mess.

[@bad_collector]

When do we get to see the TAM?!

[@ActionRetro]

Sooooooon!

[@ericbauer4559]

I would call that a success!

[@zaxchannel2834]

1:54 Oh shi-, this is serious business

[@jba2048]

Looks like a job for Louis Rossmann. Dah dah dah daaaaaaahhhhjh!

[@pentiummmx2294]

i have a powerbook with a dead LCD panel, it does chime though and sounds like its booting

[@mndlessdrwer]

The CF card might legitimately be faster and more reliable than whatever HDD you could put in the thing. I just don't know what the bus speed of the PC Card slot is on those machines, nor the interrupt priority that device gets, so it may not be as good as using an adapter for an internal IDE drive or something.

[@BilisNegra]

That boot from PC card came as such a surprise. I've never thought about booting any kind of laptop that way, pardon my ignorance but, has that been common for "Wintel" laptops at any historical point?

[@oddball6996]

Did you ever figure out the issue with the IDE? Or get it fixed?

[@ActionRetro]

Nope :( I’ve just been booting it from pcmcia

[@brendanhoffmann8402]

This is mighty good entertainment at least!

[@cmantac6588]

How do you feel about the 3400c? I see an amazing one currently with a lot of goodies on ebay, definitely drooling over it lol

[@davidbowne122]

Possible to boot the Mac in Linux?, and once in Linux you should be able to see if the IDE bus is being picked up by the OS. In Linux you may also be able to do some diagnostics of the IDE bus.

[@bosshog4025]

love “plays the mac song”

[@Anaerin]

This! Is! VARTA!

[@segaboy9894]

The real shame of these videos is that they never show how awesome Microsoft Word is on it.

[@mesterak]

What is the model of the PC Card to CF card? Nice video btw 👍

[@paulmurgatroyd6372]

Upgradeable Macs? What were those lunatics thinking? 😆

[@paulwilliams4274]

@action retro will you attempt to install OSX on it?

[@allalphazerobeta8643]

Please tell me that's the QuickTime fire effect at 1:44

[@treyparker8303]

I prefer actual IBM laptops, or other bands. That was great thought! I use a 2007 MacBook like!

[@sadmac356]

I've gotten invested in *not upgraded* hunks of 90s plastics and silicon

[@KellyNorman-wu6qr]

That battery leaked bad, and the other screen looks like it was scratched

[@parastie]

I hit thumbs-up the moment you said Midnight Society!

[@plattcriceta1719]

You should throw stuff at whiteboardguy for fun! :D

[@zigenstern]

what a TRULY horrifying tale

[@Chris_403]

Never change, Sean. Never change. #Spooky

[@s6edge7]

Sean then Clint huh? Interesting ....

[@Jordan4Ibanez]

You could put in some kind of modern mac book or raspberry pi into the dead one and just create something horrific