Oh, I've already torn one apart, 2 or 3 times. I'm tired of doing it, which is why I was looking for SSD suggestions lol. I have no interest in putting it back together.
I managed to get a lot of 7 of them for $150 from someone who had them locally. I'm keeping one for myself, giving a couple to friends (after fixing/cleaning them up) and the others I'm still up in the air about. I really don't want to replace the drives in all of them because it would A) cost quite a bit and B) it's a royal pain in the rear. I'm really surprised that Apple thought the interior design was a good idea.
Agreed that the tear-down required - removal of the screen and then that damn EMI shield to get down to the HD, is a real pain in the derriere.
To facilitate future changes of HD, one can cut a piece out of that EMI shield - a neat & tidy little mod. I've done this on one of my Clamshells. See following photos:
If/when dismantling down to remove the logic board, the task I most dislike is the removal of the DC-In board. The iFixit step for this task makes it sounds so simple. But "bruv, it 'aint!" There is just not enough clearance between the location orifice of the lower case and the DC-In receptacle to remove it without a struggle, and fear of damaging the lower case plastic rim - which must be pulled outwards in an attempt to gain clearance - whilst pushing down on the logic board at the same time. See photos below:
I currently have a clamshell completely dissembled to perform some troubleshooting in order to assure satisfactory operation prior to shipping to 'LightBulbFun' for his G4 7410 processor project. Again I struggled to remove the DC-In receptacle board.
Just done a check on another 2 Clamshells and note that due to extremely tight tolerances on these iBooks, there is virtually no clearance between lower case/DC-In receptacle. I was unable to insert even a 0.002" feeler gauge. This obviously makes disassembly/re-assembly somewhat of a nightmare. I think I'll open out at that location by a few thou, hopefully to ease re-assembly.
Whilst on the subject of iBook Clamshells, does anyone have a CD drive cover and/or leaf motif in
KEY LIME that they may wish to dispose of? Or are these too like gold to find? Willing to pay the necessary premium for both.
