Pismo

I've got my Pismo PowerBook back together after three years down due to broken hinges and a busted power connector. I threw in some bigger RAM and a drive I had sitting around. Got 120GB HD (It doesn't see bigger drives) and a whole GB of RAM.

I'm going to let the batteries charge and hopefully it starts up. None of the three UFO power connectors that fit it or my Clamshell iBook fit tight, so I have to wait for a charge to build up in the battery(s). Hopefully that's all it needs since it didn't start right away. The port door on the back is catching on some wire inside, so it may have to come apart anyway if it doesn't.

I can't decide if it will get OS 9 or OS X 10.4 -- Maybe the iBook will get 9, and the PowerBook OS X. 10.4 would be reasonably useful since it still runs Firefox 3.5 and a reasonably modern version of Camino. The big problem with OS 9 is the lack of WPA, and I'm not sure how to resolve that yet.

I got the Pismo almost 10 years ago now, so it's an old friend, and it would be nice to see it working again. I have three batteries for it, and new they were 5 hours each, but I'm sure they're not so good after sitting for years. I had lots of accessories for the old laptop. It's also the best looking laptop ever made.

Next I need to fix the charging board in the iBook, a little more involved coming apart. I might try to put a couple of old CF cards in instead of the drive, maybe 2x 32 cards. It lasts 10 hours on a battery, and has a DVD drive. The screen is only 800x600 (Netbook resolution, but full size) but the hardware DVD decoder is nice, and it makes a nice portable DVD player.