It's been a bit of a weird year the last 12 months with the Covid19 Coronavirus causing many of us to go in to periodic isolation. Despite these shenanigans I have managed to do one thing - I've moved house!
I now have a dedicated room that has now become the new Retro Computing Grotto. I've barely moved boxes in (let alone unbox and sort things out) so the short YouTube video below shows you the Grottos current state and is a sign of things to come...
Monday, 23 November 2020
Way before the Covid19 Pandemic came to light I picked up a job-lot of laptops from a car boot sale and I'm slowly starting to refurbish them!
In this YouTube video I will show you how I use my 8 Steps To Refurbishment to get the laptop back up and running!
Changing/resetting/removing the BIOS password of a HP/Compaq nc6100 series laptop is a relatively easy thing to do - but there is one thing that you must not do with the main system battery or it wont work! Watch this short video to find out how to do it:
Refurbished and Second Hand ARE NOT THE SAME THING! In this video I will use a HP nc6120 I got as part of a 'Tech Job Lot' on eBay the other week and show you how to properly refurbish a laptop and how different the process is compared to 'Second Hand' where in most cases it has not even been cleaned!
I’ve had been waiting a couple of weeks for this item to turn up from eBay and it was definitely worth the wait! The Contour ShuttlePRO V2 is a multimedia controller used for editing video and audio and the like.
As you may have noticed from the handwritten labels on the buttons, it is fully customisable so you can pretty much get it to work with any program you like from VLC to PowerDirector!
Once you’ve got the buttons set up how you like, not only does it make editing quicker and easier but it allows you to be more accurate as the jog wheels/dials are way better than just a standard mouse.
This is not the first Contour Shuttle device I’ve owned as just a few weeks ago I purchased the Shuttle Xpress as I didn’t want to splash out on the pro in case I didn’t get on with it.
When I saw that I could get one from CeX for half the new price and that I could sell it eBay for the same it was a no brainier as it meant I could try it out and if I liked it I could sell it on eBay and get the Pro version - which is exactly what I’ve done!
If you'd like to see the unboxing video I did then take a look here:
My iPAQ collection isnt massive (that's what she said) but it does have a couple of interesing items in it; namely a Targus Stoway keyboard and a Nexicam Digital Camera addon and in this video I will not only test them but show you how to install them - assuming they all work that is!... It was a bit of a faff at times as I don't have a working battery on the iPAQs that I have as they are very expensive to get hold of and with zero power, when you disconnect the power you lose everything on the iPAQ and have to keep starting again from scratch...
I've sped up the installation sequences so if you have a go at installing the software shown in this video yourselves it will take a bit longer than shown!
Here's another one of the sub-£2 laptops I picked up earlier on in the year, namely an IBM ThinkPad 380Z.
As you can see the lid is dirty and there's a great big scratch on the screen completely and utterly ruining it :(
On top of that theres a crack in the corner of the screens bezel and there's something nasty and disgusting on a couple of the keys.
There are also some very strange markings and dents on parts of the laptop but I have no idea what they are.
After gathering up my laptop cleaning gear, I got down to giving this latop a thorough cleaning...
One thing I have learnt from doing this video is that going forward, even if I'm not making a YouTube video, I shall start recording anyway as for those of you who have seen the video will know that whilst air dusting the laptop a spring shot off across the screen that basically stopped the power button working! Luckily I spotted this whilst I was editing the video and found the spring under my screwdriver set and it's now safely in a small plastic bag and Sellotaped to the laptop!
As you will see from the photos below, it's a hell of a lot cleaner than when I started but the weird and wonderfull markings and dents are still there - looks like something acidic has touched the laptop but no idea what.
Because it has no Hard Disk Drive or HDD Caddy, it's covered in scratches and strange dents and has a few cracks in the case I have labelled this one up as Spares and Repairs - you can't win them all, beside for £1.90 it's well worth it for the parts in case I get another one of these that requires a floppy disk drive or CD-ROM drive :)
