PowerBook Lombard wifi OS9

April 17th, 2012

 

I have an old PowerBook Lombard, which is not in use, since I setup an eMac for my parents. The Lombard is an interesting machine, because it is almost the top of the line G3 processor PowerBook (which the Pismo is), but unfortunately it does not have a slot for AirPort wifi (which the Pismo has).

So the options are either pcmcia or usb (the Lombard has 2x usb 1.1).

 

The Lombard runs Mac OS 9.2.2, so 54Mbs wifi is out of questions due to lack of drivers.

Luckily I have some devices to test and try. Two pcmcia wifi cards, one ZoomAir, and an AirWay, plus one usb wifi device, a Belkin 802.11b, F5D6050.

I knew that the Belkin must work with Mac OS 9.2.2, because Belkin has official drivers for it. It turned out that it was easy, just a metter of installing the OS 9.2 drivers, setup the network, and off to go surfing.

They even have a User Manual for OS 9.2, just perfect service and support for such an old device.

(Just for the record, they also have OSX drivers up to Panter, and obviously Windows drivers as well).

 

The Mac OS 9.2 driver is dated from 2003, but it does not matter, just works fine.

But… It is not nice to use a laptop with a long(ish) cable and a bulky usb device, so I tried my luck with the pcmcia cards as well.

The Lombard has a cardbus pcmcia slot (only one, though), so 32-bit cards can be used too, not like in older PowerBooks, where only 16-bit cards accepted.

After some Goggle searching, I found the ioXperts site, they have OS8 and OS9 drivers for webcams and wifi cards. The list of supported cards is long, and did not include the AirWay, but the ZoomAir only. The only “problem” with this driver that it is a commercial product and the price is USD 19.95. Nevertheless I tried it, because they offer a free trial download, which allows to use it for 30 minutes (then one need to reboot).

After installing the ioXperts driver the ZoomAir pcmcia card worked. I had a control panel item in the ribbon and everything seemed fine. Except, that upon start it asked me to purchase the driver, then after 30 minutes, it gave me a warning that the demo is over, and I need to reboot. Still it is a solution.

I though, that there must be a better way, because these cards are based on the (once) widely used orinoco chipset, which is (was) very well supported.

So off to search the web again.

I found some sites for older PowerBooks dealing with pcmcia wifi. 1400s, 5300s, and some others. The most valuable was from a site penmachine.com and a PoserBook 1400, with plenty of information.

I got to know, that they are native Orinoco drivers for Mac OS 7 to OS 9, which was an excellent news. The only problem was that most of the links to those drivers were dead already.

Again some searching and using the Internet Archive Wayback Machine, I did found the drivers. All together 3 different versions. Version 7.2 supposed to work between OS 8.6 and OS 9.2.2, for older systems there are version 6.3 and even older 6.00.4

Just to cut it short, v7.2 works just fine in OS 9.2.2 with the AirWay wireless pcmcia card (for some reason the ZoomAir, while recognised by the driver, does not get IP address). It is identified as an Orinoco 8 Bronze card, so no WEP security.

The Orinoco Mac OS drivers are still available from here.

 

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eMac – Zalman Fanmate 2

February 27th, 2012

As a final mod for the eMac, I installed a Zalman Fanmate 2 to make the computer a little less loud.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I found some instructions for the fanmate version 2, as I knew the small device needs to be rewired, and the male/female connectors also needs to be swapped.

Honestly, I did not start the mod, until I was fully confident, that it will work.

Finally I found two instructions with same wire structure and some success stories, so I was confident enough to start

(I even registered on the german site just to see the pictures on the site)

So I had the rewire instructions, I started my adventure in soldering land, then attached the plugs (I had to shave them a bit to fit), organised the cables of the Fanmate2, so the actual device was outside of the computer, then assembled the eMac, powerd it up, and prayed.

It started up as usual, same high noise of the fan (I turned the Fanmate2 to max previously). Once it went to desktop, I started to adjust the power on the Fanmate… and… yes, the fan started to run with lower speed, hence its noise was lower. Nice!

I played a bit with different levels, I could actually made the eMac virtually silent in the lowest position of the Fanmate2.

Finally I settled in a lower level, but still audible noise, taking into account that hot summer is still to come.

Since the eMac has only Hard Drive temp sensor, that is the only one I can monitor, but it looks like settled in between 30-40 C.

The eMac is now a perfect machine. It does not have high noise from the fan, it has 1.25 GHz G4 cpu, 2 GB memory, a new DVD burner, and fresh Leopard installed.

Two pictures to make it clear how the wires needs to be adjusted:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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eMac 1.25 upgrade

February 24th, 2012

I recently upgraded my parents eMac 1.25GHz computer with some more memory, and also replaced the non-functioning DVD drive.

It already had 1 GB RAM (luckily one module), and I searched for some suitable 1GB module to max out to 2GB.

I found a low-densitiy 1GB module for USD 25, which was reasonable, and it turned out it just works perfectly. The module is a Kingston KVR400X64C3A/1G, if anyone wants to know the type.

The DVD burner I used is an oldish Pioneer DVR-106DB, which I had long time ago, and never used really.

Taking apart the eMac, was not an easy task, but I found some tutorials, and following a MacWorld article from 2005 it was doable.

I am not sure if the machine is faster after the memory upgrade, but it just feels right to max out the memory on a computer, doesn’t it.

So, the trusted eMac probably got another year or two to serve.

The eMac runs Leopard 10.5.8, and it delivers a decent performance for browsing (no flash), and wordprocessing.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Vodafone 845 – Android Land

November 13th, 2010

Android is an open source operating system, started by Google. Amazing as it sounds after 3 years Android powered mobile phones became the best selling mobile devices (2010).

android_vector

I have to admit that I love the iPhone, but since I also do like Linux, as such I had to try an Android based mobile phone.

To minimise cost, I opted for a second hand Vodafone 845 device.

I thought, I could get to know a little bit the Android.

vodafone_845_n8

It is a low end touchscreen mobile phone powered by Android OS 2.1

240 x 320 pixels, 2.8 inches screen,

512 MB storage, 128 MB RAM, optional SD card

Not too bad, but I had no idea how it would perform. So I got a used one.

I upgraded the ROM to Vodafone 845 Mr Edition v1.9.5 following this guide at xda-developers.com

Also installed LauncherPro (US 2.99).

Then I applied a Sense like them, just because I like it.

And after some hours I ended up with this Home Screen:

845_sense

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Upgrading wifi on Thinkpad X31

April 7th, 2010

I have an “oldish” Thinkpad X31, which I started to use for Haiku software development (nothing big, just some hobby, really).

It originally came with an IBM ip2100 wifi card, which is “b” only, and since my shiny Apple router supports “g” (and “n”), I decided to upgrade the wifi card for at least a “g” standard  card.

After some reading and googling I found out the an IBM ipw2200ABG card would be a good fit, so I went out shopping and got one for less then 20 USD.

Disassembling the X31 was easy, practically 4 screws at the bottom, and the keyboard was easy to remove, underneath there was the minipci slot with the wifi card. I quickly replaced it (do not forget to remove the battery beforehand), and started the laptop, then the nasty surprise came.

1802: Unauthorized network card is plugged in - Power off and remove the miniPCI network card.

Well. Something is not good. I found the page dedicated to this problem. Basically IBM has a whitelist in their BIOS, which limits the wifi cards work in their machines. Not nice.

There are 3 soultions.

1. get an IBM approved wifi card (difficult to get one, and more expensive)

2. hack the BIOS to enable all minipci cards

3. hack the CMOS to enable minipci cards other than the ones on the whitelist

I decided to take the 3rd option as the least risky one.

I found a site, which offer solution to this. A bootable CD (or floppy), which has a small utility, called no-1802. Downloaded the CD, booted up the machine with no wifi card inserted, and issued the command at the prompt, no-1802. Reboot.

When I restarted the machine (with the ipw2200 wifi card inserted), I had no error message, so I hoped that it works.

And indeed it does work. I confirmed it with an Ubuntu live CD, connected to my home wifi network, and tested with some internet pages. Nice.

So, it is recommended to do, while there are two drawbacks.

1. the small led (which shows the wifi activity) does not work. It is a known problem.

2. second, unfortunately Haiku does not like the 2200 wifi card for some reason. it should work, but it refuse to load, if the card is installed and the firmware is extracted. But again, it is confirmed within Ubuntu that the cards performs just fine.

UPDATE (22/07/2010): the 2200 wifi does work in Haiku, but the wired lan needs to be disabled!

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Reviving IBM Thinkpad 600X

March 2nd, 2010

tp600xI have an old (by old, I mean ancient for IT standards, more than 10 years old) laptops, an IBM Thinkpad 600x. It used to be the king of laptops, back in 1999. It served well for business, then survived various Linux distributions on the hardware (starting with Debian 2.2, that was some time ago).

This is the grandpa of the laptops, still a beauty:

I have not used it for a long time, but now, that Haiku OS is maturing fast, I decided to clean the dust from the machine and give it a try.

After switching it on, it greeted me with error 161 and 163, which after some goggling, turns out to be the error code for a dead cmos battery. Where one can buy – especially in an Eastern-European country – a cmos battery for a more than ten years old laptop? For a reasonable price, of course.

At the local Tesco! What? Yes! :)

I found some sites, where people discuss the very same problem, and there is a brilliant and simple solution – involves some light hacking.

The cmos battery in the Thinkpad 600x resides in the compartment, where the ram is located. Only one screw and easy to take it out.

TP600x cmos battery

It turns out that the cmos battery is nothing, but a standard, so called cr2025, 3 volts battery, available just every shop selling batteries. It has some special connectors, but thats all, as seen in the picture.

Nice! I picked up two cr2025 batteries for a mere 2 USD at the local store and started the surgery process.

I had to cut away the yellow, plastic coating, then the two electrical leads were stamped onto the surface of the battery. Not so difficult to remove it all.

I took the brand new battery, inserted the leads carefully (red goes to positive), used some electrical tape to fix them to both surfaces, than used som more to make sure that I isolate the little thing totally.

Putting it back was a breeze, and then switched the laptop on, which literally had a new pacemaker now. :)

First boot of course for setting date and time, then reboot, twice and then… no more error 161, 163 nonsense. Yeah!

So, reviving and old IBM Thinkpad 600x with a consumer battery is unexpected, but turns out to be rather easy.

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Wii softmod 4.2

January 14th, 2010

I have an ancient Wii, and I have to admit that I haven’t used it for at least two years (not because I have my XBOX360 or PSP for that matter). Many times said, that the Wii hardware is not up to the competition (true), but also that the game experience is somewhat higher with the Wii, due to its controllers.

Wii

Anyway, since I bumped into some Wii related sites, I got to know that hard modding (aka chipping) is not in fashion anymore for consoles. Wow! Softmod is the new word. :)

Well, I had to try it! Because it is doable. :)

The instructions came from the brilliant wiihacks.com, where I found a complete tutorial.

As mentioned my Wii has not been used for at least two years, so the first problem came from this. Nope, it is not the dust on the machine, but the old system version (2.0e), because practically all of the guides worked from 3.1 onwards.

If you have system version between 3.1 and 4.1, then there is a guide here.

There is also a guide for those already updated to the current (as of January 2010) 4.2

Since I had 2.0e, I updated my system on the Wii via internet (it was offered automatically when I configured the wifi on the Wii). After having 4.2, I stated following the steps in the guide.

Complete tutorial for softmod the Wii with 4.2

It was not easy (the guide for 4.2 is more difficult than the one for 3.1-4.1), but after all it worked.

I made one more little hack, to load games from an usb drive (rather than DVDs).

After those two, I poped in the Wii Sports DVD, ripped it onto the connected usb drive, an voila, started playing from the usb disk. Nice!

Wii Sports

For historical reasons (should the forums with the excellent guide disappears), here is a local copy of the tutorial.

Credit for the work goes to the people at wiihack.com! Thanks!

WiiHacks.com

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Snow Leopard (OSX) on the Sony UX490N

November 30th, 2009

The Sony UX490N used to be the king of all ultra portable devices, its a shame that Sony decided to discontinue the product line.

I got one from a fried, who barely used it (its a two years old device, and he powered it on just a couple of times).

Apart from the really small screen (4.5″) it is a nice machine, but I have to admit, that using it for just surfing the net, a bit expensive. An iPhone or an iTouch would do exactly the same.

But it runs a full OS, so it is a nice gadget to play with.

UX490N

UX490N

It is a sexy little machine, and the specs are not bad either:

- Core Solo 1.2 GHz CPU

- 4,5″ 1024×600 screen

- 48 GB SSD

- wifi, bluetooth, fingerprint reader, GPRS/EDGE, keyboard, etc…

When I got it (used), it came with WISTA, so I immediately decided to hack OSX onto the little machine.

There is an OSX dedicated forum (not so vibrant, I have to admit) with lots of information about various OSX versions on the Sony UX series.

Recently, with the Snow Leopard release, the biggest question was how this machine plays with Snow Leopard.

The answer is simple. Lots of feature do not work, but basically it could be configured as a more or less usable portable device with OSX.

UX490N OSX Install

UX490N OSX Install

The instruction came from the very same forum and basically contains 3 steps.

1. Create USB install media, make it bootable for the UX.

2. Install OS

3. Fix screen, mouse, etc…

The installation itself takes around 30 minutes. After that Snow Leopard boots nicely (the first boot takes a bit longer, though).

Unfortunately a number of features do not work:

- wifi (needs to be swapped to an AirPort compatible on, e.g., Dell 1390)

- sleep/hibernate

- camera

- touchscreen (there is a driver)

- some special function keys

Other then those above, screen resolution is fine, boots quickly, and apart from having a small 4,5″ screen, it is a nice little machine. Battery life is almost 2 hrs with the standard battery, and over 3 with the extended one.

Is it any better than running XP or VISTA on it? Probably not (due to the missing features). Why should you try OSX on it? Because you can. :)

Enjoy!

EDIT (01/12/2009): The touchscreen works as mentioned and I tried the driver from Touch-Base. The needed drover is the Gunze New:

Touchscreen Driver

Touchscreen Driver

It is a demo (100 clicks, after a new calibration is needed), but appears to be working just fine.

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PSP (slim) 5.50 GEN-D upgrade

November 24th, 2009

Well, I hate to use UMD discs on my PSP, and anyways, playing backup games (iso or cso) is far more convenient (3-4 games easily fit on the card), so I hacked my PSP some time ago. It used to have firmware version 3.40-oe (also a custom fw), but playing the latest games needs an upgrade, so I searched for a solution (FIFA 10 was the game triggered the action).

The upgrade contains two parts. First to update to 5.00 m33-6, then to 5.50 GEN-D

I. Upgrade to 5.00 m33-6

I found a nice tutorial at pspslimhacks.com:

It practically has 3 steps:

1. install 5.03 official firmware

2. install an run a so called ChickHEN exploit

3. install 5.00 M33-4 custom firmware

There is also a nice tutorial video included.

My biggest problem was with step 2 (running ChickHEN), so I followed some steps found in one of the comments

2.1. format memory card in the PSP

2.2. put the ChickHEN onto the memory card

2.3. restore default system settings

2.4, disable UMD auto on and UMD cache

2.5. after my 2nd attempt, ChickHEN was finally loaded (previously I tried it like 30 times, with no success)

So it was quite easy to upgrade, but games still did not start. (error 80020321)

I had to boot into recovery mode (holding R during boot), changed the UMD mode, not to require a disc to be inserted. All fine.

Discovered that there is a small update 5.00 m33-6 available, so I installed this as well.

II. Upgrade to 5.50 GEN-D

I followed the information at this thread.

Basically the announcement and steps for 5.50 GEN-D. Easy.

5.50 GEN-D

5.50 GEN-D

Actually there is and update for 5.50 GEN-D2, but I skipped it.

Time to play… :)

FIFA 10 on PSP

FIFA 10 on PSP

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Region Free Sony RDR-GX3 DVD Player/Recorder

November 22nd, 2009

The Sony RDR-GX3 DVD Player and Recorder:

RDR-GX3

RDR-GX3

I purchased this device some years ago for recording content from TV onto DVDs. I have to admit that I have not used a lot, but still it serves as it should.

I do have a large collection of DVDs bought from Amazon.com, hence they are Region 1 discs (Europe uses Region 2).

I searched for a Region Free hack and apparently found one.

According to this I need a universal remote or a Palm device, which I don’t have. Luckily someone also had success with a Symbian mobile phone, and since I still had my trusty old Nokia E51, I tried with it.

1. Downloaded and installed the irRemote software for s60 devices (I only downloaded the trial).

2. Downloaded a custom config for the DVD device from here.

3. Went to the config page of irRemote and uploaded the above config file.

4. Went through the config process, and configured for TV device the first 5 numeric buttons:

Remote config

Remote config

5. Gave a name to the config (one to remember!), and skipped the IMEI and other details.

6. Started the irRemote app on the E51, and followed Add Device, TV, refresh (from internet), and found the config I named as above, then loaded the config and started.

7. Pushed buttons in this order: 1, 5, 4, 3, 2

8. The DVD resumed from standby, when I pushed 1, then after completing the numbers, the DVD beeped.

9. I switched off the device, then on again.

After this my DVD player/recorder plays nicely both Region 1 and Region 2 discs.

Amazing, isn’t it? Credit goes to those who actually found the way, I only searched for the solution applied it, and documented.

(Mirror for the needed files, with all instructions included)

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