Divarin
Veteran Member
I recently picked up a Gateway 2000 handbook. It did not come with a power supply. It did come with a floppy drive and the cable to attach that to the PC and two dead battery packs.
There was zero voltage on both batteries. I wanted to try to determine the polarity so I'd know which of the 4 terminals to connect my bench power supply to. Well I got stupid and attached them to the wrong ones and my bench P/S started limiting the current at 5 amps.
When I opened it up I saw that one cap had recently burst with some fresh electrolight at the base looking like guacamole. I pulled that off and cleaned it up with some white vinegar/ipa and didn't see any other obvious damage.
The battery pack was meant to supply 4.8 volts of power but I couldn't get the thing to boot up without at least 5.5 volts and wouldn't actually run properly without 6 volts. Based on the sticker on the bottom of the unit the power supply is 6 volts so it looks like that's what I need.
Anyway with a steady 6 volts going into the correct contacts, a replaced button-cell backup battery, and replaced 33uf capacitor (right now I'm using a 250volt one which is the only 33uf one I had lying around and is too big to fit in the unit closed up but I'll order a proper replacement later which will be a 33uf 50v aluminum smd) the pc seems to boot up and run.
But there are two issues that I noticed. One: the mouse (in windows 3.1) is really really slow, even if I bump up the speed in control panel to max (that didn't seem to make a difference) and Two: a much bigger issue is that some keys are not working including space, esc, left & down arrows. I don't see any damage to the flat-flex cables that connect the keyboard to the mobo so it could either be dirty contacts on the keys themselves or maybe there is damage or corrosion on those cables or the connector.
Anyway I was just wondering if anyone else on this forum has experience working inside of one of these and has any advice or specific things I should look out for?
There was zero voltage on both batteries. I wanted to try to determine the polarity so I'd know which of the 4 terminals to connect my bench power supply to. Well I got stupid and attached them to the wrong ones and my bench P/S started limiting the current at 5 amps.
When I opened it up I saw that one cap had recently burst with some fresh electrolight at the base looking like guacamole. I pulled that off and cleaned it up with some white vinegar/ipa and didn't see any other obvious damage.
The battery pack was meant to supply 4.8 volts of power but I couldn't get the thing to boot up without at least 5.5 volts and wouldn't actually run properly without 6 volts. Based on the sticker on the bottom of the unit the power supply is 6 volts so it looks like that's what I need.
Anyway with a steady 6 volts going into the correct contacts, a replaced button-cell backup battery, and replaced 33uf capacitor (right now I'm using a 250volt one which is the only 33uf one I had lying around and is too big to fit in the unit closed up but I'll order a proper replacement later which will be a 33uf 50v aluminum smd) the pc seems to boot up and run.
But there are two issues that I noticed. One: the mouse (in windows 3.1) is really really slow, even if I bump up the speed in control panel to max (that didn't seem to make a difference) and Two: a much bigger issue is that some keys are not working including space, esc, left & down arrows. I don't see any damage to the flat-flex cables that connect the keyboard to the mobo so it could either be dirty contacts on the keys themselves or maybe there is damage or corrosion on those cables or the connector.
Anyway I was just wondering if anyone else on this forum has experience working inside of one of these and has any advice or specific things I should look out for?