Upgraded LCD in Gigabit PowerBook

[Hrududu]

Hey gang, I just acquired another TiBook. This is one I have been waiting for, a 667MHz Gigabit Ethernet model. My excitement was immediately dampened when after powering on it was clear the LCD panel has got a bad connection or bad cable inside the display housing. Now this of course is the last of the VGA models that spotted the 1152x768 resolution screen. Since I am tasked with replacing the screen anyways, I was wondering if anyone has ever successfully upgraded the screen by installing one of the 1280x854 models from the later DVI PowerBooks. Since this model sports the Mobile Radeon with 16MB of VRAM vs the 8MB Rage Pro from the previous generation, I feel like the extra pixels shouldn’t stress this thing much. I recall @eyoungren has gone the OTHER way, installing a lower res display in a DVI Ti, so let me know what you guys think!

 

[weckart]

The A1025 TiBooks sport 32MB of VRAM for the 867MHz model and 64MB for the 1GHz, so the 16MB is already cutting it fine in OSX. I think the tricky thing is trying to find a panel in the first place.

 

[swamprock]

The A1025 TiBooks sport 32MB of VRAM for the 867MHz model and 64MB for the 1GHz, so the 16MB is already cutting it fine in OSX. I think the tricky thing is trying to find a panel in the first place.

So tricky, in fact, that I'm considering taking the three broken displays that I have apart so that I can practice rebuilding a TiBook display. I have a display from an A1001 on my A1025, which works fine with the later model (both are higher resolution), but the assembly itself is damaged. I have a good display assembly from an A1025, but the hinge posts are snapped off. I've just been putting this off due to the difficulty involved, but I'll get to it... eventually.

 

[AphoticD]

I can't answer about the display compatibility, however I recently completed a hinge replacement on a Mercury 400Mhz TiBook, which was a bit of an ordeal.

The best price for the replacement hinge was from the seller 'tonyzz' on eBay, who also offered a discount on the intl shipping cost for me. The disassembly required me to strip the TiBook completely down to the bones, removing the logic board and inner frame, which then allowed access to remove the display assy. The display bezel was glued on one side, so I needed to crack the existing glue to separate the front and back, then to remove the broken hinge, I used a blade to cut most of the existing epoxy out before separating the hinge from the frame. I then installed the new hinge with a Versachem 5-minute set 2-part clear epoxy. Glued it into the display frame then glued the display bezel back together and re-assembled. I used the epoxy to also glue together areas of the top case which had separated from the outer (beige) frame, as well as a couple of cracks in the frame.

Overall it was a success and the TiBook feels solid, with smooth hinge operation. However, it became a non-booter. I was able to identify the fault to be caused by the exhausted PRAM battery. I can boot by unplugging the PRAM battery lead from the PMU board. But, to properly fix it, I now have 4x VL2330 cells on order to rebuild the battery pack and finish the job. These are the same cells as found in the Pismo's PRAM pack, so at least I have some prior experience doing this.