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G-series laptop restoration and modding

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The first post of this thread is a WikiPost and can be edited by anyone with the appropiate permissions. Your edits will be public.
lepidotós said:
@Amethyst1
I wouldn't be surprised, though I can't help but feel almost disappointed considering Apple at least is known for having good displays.​
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Well… I remember the display in my Early 2008 white MacBook being horrible beyond words. Uneven backlight, washed-out and yellow-tinted colours.

MacBook Pros generally had better displays than MacBooks though. And they better had!
 
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So does anyone know if there's a way to unstretch metal? Considering how badly I just dented Benbridge, I might need the knowledge during the restoration.​
 
lepidotós said:
So does anyone know if there's a way to unstretch metal? Considering how badly I just dented Benbridge, I might need the knowledge during the restoration.​
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The only way I know of is to super-cool the stretched area, which can cause it to "snap" back into its original shape, provided the stretching is not too severe. But I doubt this will work with aluminum.

Professional automobile body repair shops sometimes use a technique involving dry ice to pop out small shallow dents, such as would result from a hail storm. They only use this because these small dents don't respond to suction, which is often used on larger dents. But in these cases the metal is steel, which is far more rigid than aluminum and tends to "snap" back into place. Aluminum is probably too pliable, which is why it stretched so easily in the first place. And, I can't imagine how you would employ the dry ice technique on something like a PowerBook chassis, the area involved is too small to work with.

I suppose you could throw the whole thing in the freezer, but I can't see that working. My understanding is that cooling only the area of the dent so quickly that it overwhelms the metal's ability to conduct the cold away, results in a differential between the cooled and uncooled areas that essentially pulls the dent out. But aluminum has a much greater conductivity than steel, so again - probably won't work.

Sorry, I think you're stuck with it. But on the bright side, it adds character!
 
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Amethyst1 said:
  • Can the 12.1” 1400×1050 screen PowerBooks can be upgraded with be installed in iBooks?
  • Can the 14.1” 1400×1050 screen available from the ThinkPad T21 to the T61 be installed in iBooks?
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My experience:

I did get a panel that was listed in the "upgrade the 12" PB display" threads about 2 or 3 years ago.

It installed fin in the 1.33GHz 12" iBook but on powering on the cable got super hot.
The iBook ist still working with it's original screen.

So:
- Did I get the wrong panel?
- Did I get a broken panel?
- Is the pinout different between iBooks and PowerBooks?
 
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Bug-Creator said:
- Is the pinout different between iBooks and PowerBooks?
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Within the same screen vendor, the pinouts are the same.

For most of the 12-inch PowerBooks, if not all of them, displays were supplied by LG. For iBook G4s, I believe the pinouts were also all LG displays, but for iBook G3s — especially so the clamshell units — the displays were supplied by LG, Samsung, and IBM; each of these vendors used different pinouts (and Apple cables) to connect to the logic board.

As for the BOE-Hydis 1400x1050p displays sourced from a particular ThinkPad series, I am fairly certain, based on step-by-step upgrades posted online, that the LVDS cable used for it are the same pinouts as on the LG displays.
 
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Do the 1440x960 screens work on the 1GHz TiBooks? I'm wondering if it might be a bit much for the Radeon 9000, but the fact it can push both 1280x854 and 2048x1536 simultaneously seems to suggest it should be fine. Now it's a question of if the cables are pin compatible.​
 
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lepidotós said:
Do the 1440x960 screens work on the 1GHz TiBooks? I'm wondering if it might be a bit much for the Radeon 9000, but the fact it can push both 1280x854 and 2048x1536 simultaneously seems to suggest it should be fine. Now it's a question of if the cables are pin compatible.​
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The 1440x960p displays are a 1.5:1 ratio, whereas the 1152x864 displays of the Titanium series are 1.33:1. Although the GPU might be able to drive it, the LCD wouldn’t fit, as-is, inside a Titanium bezel.
 
Amethyst1 said:
The Titanium uses 1152×768 or 1280×854 LCDs, the former being perfect 3:2. :)
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Fair point, although their dimensions are different — with the Titanium models a 15.2-inch display, and the Aluminium models with a 15.0-inch display. Consequently, the Titanium models have slightly wider bezels, physically so, to accommodate. Unless I’m missing something crucial here?
 
B S Magnet said:
Fair point, although their dimensions are different — with the Titanium models a 15.2-inch display, and the Aluminium models with a 15.0-inch display.
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Panelook only lists 15.2-inch panels with a resolution of 1280×854 or 1440×960. And Mactracker confirms all mid-size AlBooks to have 15.2-inch panels.
 
Amethyst1 said:
Panelook only lists 15.2-inch panels with a resolution of 1280×854 or 1440×960. And Mactracker confirms all mid-size AlBooks to have 15.2-inch panels.
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I had to break out my dead, 400MHz Ti and a ruler to measure it, diagonally, followed by the same for the 1.67GHz 15-inch running SL-PPC. Indeed, the diagonal measurement is 38.75cm on the Ti and 38.7cm on the Al. I guess there’s an optical illusion to the design of the Ti case, as in having them side-by-side, the Ti still appears wider. Huh. Interesting. My bad!
 
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B S Magnet said:
I had to break out my dead, 400MHz Ti and a ruler to measure it, diagonally, followed by the same for the 1.67GHz 15-inch running SL-PPC. Indeed, the diagonal measurement is 38.75cm on the Ti and 38.7cm on the Al. I guess there’s an optical illusion to the design of the Ti case, as in having them side-by-side, the Ti still appears wider. Huh. Interesting. My bad!
Click to expand...

The AlBook case has the thin darker plastic ring around the frame that may give the illusion the bezels are thinner.
 
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Randomly I've started wondering if a 1GHz board would fit in a 667. It should, looking at pictures of them... if so, a dead 667 may be in the cards.​
 
GMShadow said:
The AlBook case has the thin darker plastic ring around the frame that may give the illusion the bezels are thinner.
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Good observation.

Since posting, I’ve been thinking about what led my brain to perceive the Ti G4 as having a wider ratio display than the Al G4. I think it’s, oddly, the way the top case configuration varies between the two models.

The Ti G4’s visually lighter, thick plastic bezel around the top case, coupled with the thinner speaker grilles, evokes an optical illusory effect, as does the palm rest and style of trackpad. On the Ti G4, these are interrupted by changes in textures/brightness, while with the Al G4, wider speaker grilles and a trackpad which meets the aluminium without a lip doesn’t give the eye a sense of visual “widening”. Another effect could be the way the Ti G4’s keyboard, being dark and adjacent to the thinner grilles, leads the eye to “think” the case is somehow wider than with the Al G4.

Whatever it is, I still find the end effect on optical illusion fascinating.
 
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Amethyst1 said:
I find the TiBook’s thin bezels around the LCD and its thinness fascinating, making the machine appear smaller than it actually is. Most other 15” laptops of the time were flippin’ huge.
Click to expand...

That was probably the idea when they committed to working with a hard metal shell in lieu of various polycarbonates with magnesium frames.
 
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You know, I'd love to see a 12" TiBook. :D I don't think 12.1" widescreen LCDs were available before about 2005 though.
 
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B S Magnet said:
Since posting, I’ve been thinking about what led my brain to perceive the Ti G4 as having a wider ratio display than the Al G4. I think it’s, oddly, the way the top case configuration varies between the two models.

[...]
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You know, I often find myself having the opposite problem. Because the display hinge on the Aluminiums are on the back, as opposed to on the top of the Titanium, I keep thinking that the Titanium's display is taller, when in reality it's just that the Aluminium's display is lower when opened! :D
 
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Now that we are talking about restorations, has anyone here tried to fix the apple logo white led/light? In my DLSD 17 PB it isnt as good looking as it once was, haven’t found a guide on how to fix that, (potential grammar error) nor any documentation about how to fix the clips that get the laptop closed when you, well, for the lack of a better term, close your laptop, anyone here ever tried to fit a Full HD display on one of these PB?.

The other topic I would like to discuss is your experiences on batteries restorations on models that, well, doesn’t have any new spare replacements available.
 
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The Apple logo is lit up by the display’s CCFL backlight — the higher you crank up the backlight, the brighter the logo gets. So if it has dimmed, the backlight also has.
And yep, a WUXGA display can be retrofitted.
 
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