I just found your channel. My old C64 has sat dormant in my garage for nearly 30 years. I've been wanting to resurrect it for about a month now. Thanks to your advice from your C64 videos, it's now back up and running!
The fails lead to diagnostics that lead to understanding and insights that lead to wins. This type of video is great to see. Now I'm anxiously awaiting the diagnostic and repair video!
Adrian, I just picked up a Model II myself a few weeks ago and stumbled across this series. It's been super informative (especially the last video) as I try to get my machine booting again. I picked up my machine from a friend of a friend who had it sitting in his barn for the last few decades, and it's in mint condition! After reseating a few connectors, the machine came right on! I've been using the last video you made as guidance to get a bootable floppy made, but I've had no luck with getting my DOS machine to write to the 8" disk yet. I'm excited to see the process as you get your machine running again!
I always enjoy your methodical approach to the repair process. The fact that the computer didn’t work means we will get another enjoyable video in the future.
I worked for the Radio Shack Computer Center in Omaha, NE in the mid 80's and the tech's always had one or two open on the benches. Brought back a lot of memories. Even then we were selling 386 and 486 machines but Model II and 16's were still used.
Take your time and bring it back to life, it's so satisfying to watch a repaired machine up and running. In the last ten months I watched CuriousMarc's videos where he repaird his vintage HP 9825 Desktop "calculator" after the failing power supply damaged several components. I was really happy when I saw it working again.
I too hate that first powerup moment. Prior to this the machine is Schroedinger's puzzle, you can put weeks into restoring and cleaning and things and it could be working perfectly at that point. Stuff can go wrong so very quickly when you hit the switch for the first time though. I recently worked on the only known Positron 9000 (1982, 6809 CPU) in existence after it had lived in a wet shed for decades and been chewed by rodents - some of the chips had disintegrated. Much cleaning, socket replacement, chip replacement, new PSU. Heart was in my mouth when I powered it up for the first time and..... nothing. Excellent video, thankyou for showing this hobby isn't all success :) Cheers, Adrian (Binary Dinosaurs)
I learned programming on a Model 1 & a Model 3 back in high school. Great to see that some of these old machines still survive. I just cleaned up my slightly newer C-128. Great thinking on the connector reflow. I used to work on 14" HDDs back at Unisys in the late '80s, and those Molex connector joints were a huge problem... we routinely re-flowed them every time.
I have No Idea how any of this stuff works....but I am hopelessly addicted to Your channel. Even in Your "Failure".... I LOVE Your attitude, and content. Great Job Sir.
back in 1986 i was working on the Model 2 selling it for office use to chimney sweeps in Germany, We sold some 200 of them until switching to IBM pc/at. loved the all-in-one design. will check my garage if i still have some of this stuff. hope you get your machine running soon !!
Like you, I wouldn't worry about the cosmetic stuff inside - preventing further degradation and saving it from the land fill is more important. Good to see the progress on this machine! Even if it's not working (yet), it's closer than it was when you got it
I'm really enjoying your journey with the Model II. I did have a model 1 many years ago and the Model II was a "pie in the sky" super-machine I could never afford.
Nice work getting this far on such a complicated machine. Honestly, while I am pretty confident working on most home computers from the late 80's and onwards, the TRS-80 would just confuse the hell out of me. Rather than trying to replace all those chips that look a bit dodgy off the bat I would try sanding down the legs and using de-oxit for a start and then maybe replacing the sockets if they are looking bad. It's the kind of thing that can't hurt at this stage as if they don't work with that, you were going to replace them anyway.
You passed the smoke test, and now you have confidence that stuff does actually work for diagnostic purposes. This was a fun ride so far, I look forward to where we go next
For the next time you encounter surface rust on the big steal parts that have that greenish gold finish, goto a marine shop, I’m sure their are plenty in Portland, and grab some Zinc Chromate Primer ;-)
That chassis is cadmium plated, which means sanding and sandblasting is a health hazard. Usually to remove cadmium plating, the parts are submerged in an ammonium nitrate solution but i have no idea if this is something you can do safely at home.
How can one see whether it is cadmium plated or not? The metal looks a little like ordinary brass to me (if that's the English word for mässing), and certainly like materials I have drilled into!
@@herrbonk3635 Brass is a solid colour, cadmium plating is a yelllow/pinkish type colour, with an almost rainbow sheen to it. I'd recommend just looking up photos of cadmium plating on google images for a better idea of what it looks like, but in person you wouldn't mistake brass for cadmium plating.
@@Morinaka25 Ok, thanks! I belive that material is pretty common in computers, isn't it? I think I understand what you mean by rainbow sheen. But still, how do you really know for sure it's kadmium, and not just a little more zink (less copper) in the alloy? I mean, that kind of brass is usually more yellow.
@@Morinaka25 (Perhaps the simple answer is that brass is never used in computers and electronics chassis? But another natural question would be, why toxic cadmium on the surface?)
Beautiful restoration on that PSU and mount. Dang that unit has got some weight to it, can see how a drop would be hard on it even though it's so sturdy. Also the editing on this video is really tight and well paced. Interesting project, the vintage stuff sure is specific often, absolutely no slack for any deviation from spec.
Getting it all powered on without any smoke is a great payoff already from the care and testing you've put into it. Great progress, and I'm proud of you!
Excellent video! It's fascinating seeing the curvy, curly, hand-drawn traces when you're so used to angular, computer-done ones. Connectors are especially prone to breaking... my wacom art tablet kinda regurgitated its USB Mini B port a little while ago. And of course it took the solder pads and contacts with it so it can't be fixed... found a workaround, I can charge the battery using a separate device so I can still get art done, but it was very alarming when it wouldn't connect/charge and when I unplugged it it just... came out with the cable.
Is there perhaps room for a panel-mount port? If not, a last-resort repair could potentially be made by running jumper wires from a new PCB-mount port to the _other_ end of the traces, then epoxying the port to the board.
Is it possible the absence of the reset switch is holding the machine in a reset state (as in its an NC switch, and pressing it interrupts a pullup circuit which normally holds it out of reset. Thus you have an open circuit on the "run" signal)
Glad that PSU was okay! Having worked on SMPSUs for years, I’m still fearful when switching on early types. I was tensed up when you flicked that switch!
I've got a funny feeling about that +12 rail and the video board. I think the service manual for the Model 2 says that if you see life in the CRT when checking the +12 rail then the issue will likely be the video board itself if you're not getting your sync signals.
I scrapped one of these 20+ years ago. It appeared to be 'printer's ink', like we used on the PRC77 military radios at the factory. It is a very thick ink used to mark paper boxes, or for printing presses. We applied it with a syringe, with a blunt needle to secure screw heads on modules that had to be opened. It holds well, but cracks easily to show that something was tampered with.
I had the same bad solder joints on my PSU as well. If I recall correctly, you have the older style PSU, which may not be beefy enough if you want to add a MC68000 subsystem and run Xenix.
Adrian, it's great to see the Model 2 getting some love. It and the subsequent Models in the line always seem to get less attention that the Model 1, 3 or 4. Great to see it torn down and built back up stage by stage. Looking forward to the next video in the series.
Thanks for the video! With the test equipment you have, you have a good chance of chasing down what is wrong. Just getting those 8 inch drives working was great, great to see.
Looking forward to your further troubleshooting... it's a lot harder when you don't have a working machine to swap boards with. You need a bus extender card to give you access for testing (I think).
This will be a fun series to watch if you keep going with it, hope you do. On thing I hate about troubleshooting any type of vintage electronics that use multiple cards stacked like that is that you cant access the boards easily for proper probing without having some type of extender card to bring to board out where you can access everything. Can be a pain
I was a radio shack repair tech back in the early 80s and worked on model II s . Just from experience I remember video problems were mostly caused by a failure of the video boards. The CRT ( cathode ray tubes) were very reliable and almost never failed . Earlier comment concerning the bad reset switch is also a possibility
Man, those things were built like a tank but that explains why they were so expensive back in the day. Things have been massively miniaturized and simplified in pretty much every way you can imagine nowadays.
As usual a great and fun retro-work video! Also, the grass soda made my skin crawl! I love the smell of fresh-cut grass but I can't imagine drinking it. *Mr Yuck Face*. In any case, thanks again Adrian!
Great video series. Fun to watch the diagnostic process and the repair techniques used. Also fascinating to me because I was a TRS-80 user, Model I and Model 4. Back in 1980 I bought the base Model I (16K, cassette storage) because, frankly, it was almost half the price of the Apple ][ that I was looking at -- though the Apple ][ had color output and expansion capability in their base model, unlike the Model I. Eventually I got the Model I expansion module to bring the computer up to 48K (I think... memory is fuzzy) along with a pair of 5.25 inch floppies to round out the setup (much more usable than the cassette interface!!). Funny thing, that fancy configuration made the Model I pretty close to the same cost as a similarly configured Apple ][! The TRS-80 was a good, capable machine and there was enough technical info available for it that I was able to learn quite a bit about computer technology from using it, as well as write many useful BASIC programs to automate my life. Eventually I sold the Model I to buy Model 4P with the integrated floppy drives which could run CP/M as well as TRSDOS. Although the 4P was nominally portable, it was rather more a "luggable" like many of its contemporaries. All in all solid computers, great for learning (though I must admit, the Apple ][ would have been the better investment in the long run LOL).
22:40 - when I'm dealing with exposed high voltage stuff I never use the device, I plug it in into an extension cord with a switch on it set to the off position. I turn on the device, keep my hands away and turn the extension's switch on. If there's anything wrong I just quickly turn off the extension. But maybe it's different here in Europe because we don't have polarity on the mains, ideally the switch switches and cuts both at the same time. Don't worry, this was exciting :) Looking forward the rest of it!
yeah for non grounded stuff (2 pin plugs) they are polarized so neutral should always be neutral. You can't totally rely on that though as the outlet may be wired incorrectly. (Mine are not, I have tested them all.) This machine is earthed and it's using a SMPS, so the chassis isn't live .. unlike many of these old TVs I work on.
@@adriansdigitalbasement I really appreciate your knowledge of CRTs and sharing safety issues. There are lots of vintage computer restoration videos on RUclips, but few of them go into CRTs, I'm sure many don't have the knowledge. CRT repair is surely a dying art.
Cool seeing other Astec parts. They are moderately known for making RF modulators parts in old gaming consoles (example: Intellivision gaming console).
Looking forward to the debug on this when you get to it Adrian! That thing is such a beast, and a temperamental beast at that, so I'm eager to see it working at some point in the future.
Quick suggestion: get a set of cheap remote controlled outlets to plug computers, monitors, isolation transformers, etc into. It makes me feel much better powering up old equipment when I can stand a few feet back with a fire extinguisher or whatever when I turn it on. I can also very quickly shut it off if I need to, even if I would normally have to reach over live power cords or bare wires to unplug it. I've also created a mini foot-pedal that allows me to hit the "off" button on the remote with my foot if something goes wrong, also very useful (especially when hands are full with the fire extinguisher).
hmmm... I would rather install an emergency button, which shout down the complete power in the room. And be careful with the fire extinguisher - there are different kind, especially when high voltage electronics (like crts) are involved. I this case maybe other factors could be interesting, for example a basement with small windows. Or you want to use something that damage the stuff there at least as possible.
I like that Power Connector, aesthetically (and logically)... It's keyed in a nice way (2 flats on one side and 1 on the other) ...And I like the shape of the 5 by 3 arrangement :-) edit* Forgot to mention... Nice Video again @Adrian :-)
Hey, I've got some of those black and transparent amber looking nut and screw drivers. Got them in a tool set from a high street store here in the UK back in the 90's.
Great video and keep the faith, you'll get it up and running, Im sure if it and I'll be really interested to see the journey. This has definitely inspired me to take a look at my poorly Acorn Electron which I need to see if it's power supply board works, thanks!
You can likely get off the shelf replacements for those card edge connectors since they are non-keyed. Likely is, of course, not a certainty, but you could try contacting some electronics supply catalogues.
The top slot connector might be warped without being broken. If you can find a replacement connector you can use a solder sucker to remove it and replace it.
A solution to being able to test the power supply in isolation without having a spare connector: find a metal tube of the appropriate diameter to press over the male pins in the connector, and then you can just clip an alligator lead to the other end, longitudinally. At hobby/craft stores they sell packs of small, thin metal tubes in aluminum and brass for model-making, and they often come in assorted diameters. (They can be easily cut to length with a small hack saw.) To find the right size you can either go by feel, or you can insert the butt-end of a drill bit into the female end of the connector, increasing the size until you find the largest diameter that inserts without too much resistance. If the pins are neighbors in the connector and you're worried about shorting, you can just throw tape at the problem. Or, you can order female pins of the right size and just soldier or crimp wires and use them without having the plastic shell. They will still insert and hold for testing, and again if shorting is an issue tape will work, or heat shrink if you want a slightly more reusable tool. It's all temporary anyway. For the inverse situation (female connector), you can find a nail of the appropriate diameter and do the same thing.
I’ve caught up with the videos in this series now. This is now like waiting for the next Star Wars movie! 🍿🤩 Some day soon I will be watching a video where this 1979 computer has been fully resurrected and lives again!
You need to add the Pinecil to your list of “tools” on the videos now. I saw you using it here. I’d been reading about the Pinecil but it was one of your midweek mail call videos that eventually convinced me to order one. It should be here in a few days! (I got the red case as well so I can make mine look like yours. I agree that colour combination is nice!) Great video btw. I’m a TRS-80 person but never worked on a Model II before. Cheers!
@@tspawn35 I also purchased and have just received a wall socket 65W GaN USB-C PD power supply from Amazon. This power supply claims to provide a full 65W and I think it will work beautifully with the Pinecil. I’m looking forward to my Pinecil arrive as well. I have some small projects waiting for me to solder up and I know this will be better than what I currently have as well. Hope all goes well for you too! :-)
awww - I was also hoping you'd fix it! Great video as usual though. Looking forward to the next chapter. One thing about the isolation transformer: I'm just concerned someone may think that isolation transformer = total safety. If I understand correctly, it's not. If you touch ONE cable at the time, indeed it provides isolation and safety. But if by any chance you end up grabbing BOTH neutral and phase, you get electrocuted. And the sad thing is that the house RCD won't cut the power. So it's a bit of a mixed feeling on that - and don't get me wrong, I use it myself. (Happy to be corrected if I am mistaken)
Can you run a fuse/rcd after the isolation transformer - how would you wire it - have incoming mains distribution board - fixed isloation transformer - separate new distribution board for your electrical play room - variac into glow blub to the socket for the articles under test ?
@@highpath4776 I've always wondered if I could connect an RCD AFTER the isolation transformer - would that work? I have a separate distribution board in my garage, a variac (which I never use) and my isolation transformer which feeds the lightbulbs (current limiters) and eventually the device under test. From my limited understanding on how an RCD works, installing one after the isolation tranformer should work. But I'm not 100% sure.
This is a great restoration, i try to keep my machines as original as possible, but also so they can be used as this, maybe if it has been something extremly special, like the only one in existance it had been different, but honestly all my machines are in reality less than 100$ market value and where made in large series so using rustremover and automotive protecting paint is not a problem here and will do perfect for presvering the machines for the future.
My first concern would have been the RIFA, but that's already been replaced. Also, a note on the absence of a -5v, I don't recall any Tandy I've ever seen that had a -5v rail off the power supply, and not all of them even had it on the system bus either. At least the Tandy 1000 RSX, and probably the rest of the 1000 R series has a 7905 to provide -5v to the system bus, but so far as I know, none of the XT systems had it at all.
I remember debugging an Intel 8086-based computer (not PC compatible) many years ago. I hooked a logic analyzer to the bus and could see the instructions being executed. Luckily I had the appropriate software for the LA so I could see the instructions as assembler mnemonics rather than hex codes. Anyway I realized the machine was stuck in a loop. Looking at the code I saw that it was waiting for the screen blank signal. So I checked that signal and while it appeared on the bus, it didn't show on the I/O chip pin. So with the machine powered up I connected the pin to the bus and I heard the disk drive head moving as the machine was trying to boot. Where I am getting at is that the repair may not be as complicated as it looks. You'll need an oscilloscope for sure and a logic analyzer would be a plus.
Interesting that those Fujitsu chips might be problematic. I was just looking at picking up some 4164 type chips, so I'll keep in mind to steer clear of those Fujitsu ones too.
If the Fujitsu chips are transceivers you should just be able to breadboard them (if you can find a datasheet) and see if you can make some LEDs light up through the chip.
I've seen Astec PSUs in other microcomputers with those orange capacitors. They can leak in an odd way, the electrolyte melts the rubber boot and glues the capacitor to the board. Looks fine from the outside, only when you remove one do you find the failure.
A good suggestion for powering up unknown electricals and electronics is using a variac, that way you can slowly crank up the volts to ensure damage limitation, aswell as letting caps charge slowly so they don't end up causing a current spike that could blow other components in the process... :)
I’ve never seen grass soda before, but I picked up a bottle of grass vodka in Poland on a business trip a few years back that was actually made with grass rather than flavored with it. I don’t remember it tasting much different to normal vodka.
Na Zdrowie! vodka is basically meant to be tasteless. Which makes "high-end" luxury brands a complete joke. Although, I might pick Grey Goose over Grass Vodka!
Just wanted to let you know that the gold coloration on the sheet metal is often a cadmium plating for corrosion inhibition. So always wear a mask when you sand it.
Yep, cadmium is awful stuff, it has mutagenic properties. Skin contact isn't even a great idea. When cadmium coatings corrode you wind up with cadmium salts which have very high bioavailibilty and can be absorbed through contact with skin moisture.
I have had access to electronic recycling waste for a very long time, but I have nowhere near the knowledge like you when it comes to electronic. I found computers from the 70s, tube radios from the 40s and anything in between. Nearly all of my equipment is from recycling center current amplifier I use is a 60s kenwood ka-6100. All equipment I found I just fired up up from the get go if they were dry and not wet from rain. Guess what?? 99.9999% of the time it just works. This amp I am using now has been on 24/7 for years and even bulbs works. I have just never come across something except maybe one "modern" ampilifer that failed because of a capacitor. Even had a osbourne 1 at a time with a bunch of working software, but sadly I was dumb enough to trade it away back a long time ago.
This is so damn nostalgic for me. I learned BASIC on a Model 4. (If you held down the little red button at boot it would boot into BASIC from ROM). If the issue is the disk drive board, I wonder if removing it and trying to boot to ROM would be possible. (I know the model 3 could do it, but don't know about the model 2.) Speaking of nostalgia, I love the modular design of those early Z80 computers with the backplane and cards like that, there was a project I found in the 2000s where someone had documented building their own Z80 PC like that, writing and burning a custom BIOS, and running CP/M and DOS on it. Though, I bet the design might make it hard to repair without replacement cards to swap in. If you want to use your logic analyzer on a card while it's running, I wonder if you can get a card edge extension cable, so that you can have the card flat on your bench while you probe it. If the custom chips are bad maybe you could do a collab with a hardware designer on youtube and get a replacement board made. I also wonder if the fan noise would improve if you added some silicone grease in there to lubricate it. I think the sanding and spray paint to prevent corrosion is totally fine. Though if you ever do get it working, you should paint your signature and the date, so that when it's repaired again in 50 years, there will be a history to the piece. Love your content Adrian, you rock!
They were wave soldered. That's one of the reasons the solder around connector pins crack. They conduct heat away too quickly, so there is less solder at those points. This also applies to pis or heavy copper leads on inductors and transformers.
Good work but my primary concern would be lack of HT on the CRT that should be running regardless of the 'computer' unless its a very weird setup I look forward to more on this.....cheers.
An 8" floppy disk has the power to make an adult look the size of a hobbit. It even works if the disk is offscreen; I saw Elijah Wood demonstrate it in a bonus feature on my The Fellowship of the Ring DVD.
I just found your channel. My old C64 has sat dormant in my garage for nearly 30 years. I've been wanting to resurrect it for about a month now. Thanks to your advice from your C64 videos, it's now back up and running!
The fails lead to diagnostics that lead to understanding and insights that lead to wins. This type of video is great to see. Now I'm anxiously awaiting the diagnostic and repair video!
Ditto!
Time to whip out the logic analyzer and see if anybody's home.
5:12 Never noticed before - multimeter model "121GW". Great Scott!
Yes, I have the same one. Many youtubers bought it from Dave Jones like Adrian. It's a really great multimeter.
Adrian, I just picked up a Model II myself a few weeks ago and stumbled across this series. It's been super informative (especially the last video) as I try to get my machine booting again. I picked up my machine from a friend of a friend who had it sitting in his barn for the last few decades, and it's in mint condition! After reseating a few connectors, the machine came right on! I've been using the last video you made as guidance to get a bootable floppy made, but I've had no luck with getting my DOS machine to write to the 8" disk yet. I'm excited to see the process as you get your machine running again!
26:30 It's this level of understanding and diagnosis that makes watching Adrian work so fulfilling.
You are so much more patient than I am -- If something looks okay after a quick visual I usually plug it right in and just watch for smoke, haha.
Retired Variac liked this comment.
Run it up on a Variac without any load
I always enjoy your methodical approach to the repair process. The fact that the computer didn’t work means we will get another enjoyable video in the future.
I worked for the Radio Shack Computer Center in Omaha, NE in the mid 80's and the tech's always had one or two open on the benches. Brought back a lot of memories. Even then we were selling 386 and 486 machines but Model II and 16's were still used.
Take your time and bring it back to life, it's so satisfying to watch a repaired machine up and running. In the last ten months I watched CuriousMarc's videos where he repaird his vintage HP 9825 Desktop "calculator" after the failing power supply damaged several components. I was really happy when I saw it working again.
I love the idea of the food items as "breaks" in the middle of videos. It feels like a natural way to get the food items in there.
I too hate that first powerup moment. Prior to this the machine is Schroedinger's puzzle, you can put weeks into restoring and cleaning and things and it could be working perfectly at that point. Stuff can go wrong so very quickly when you hit the switch for the first time though.
I recently worked on the only known Positron 9000 (1982, 6809 CPU) in existence after it had lived in a wet shed for decades and been chewed by rodents - some of the chips had disintegrated. Much cleaning, socket replacement, chip replacement, new PSU. Heart was in my mouth when I powered it up for the first time and..... nothing. Excellent video, thankyou for showing this hobby isn't all success :) Cheers, Adrian (Binary Dinosaurs)
I would love to see something on this system. The progress you make etc
I learned programming on a Model 1 & a Model 3 back in high school. Great to see that some of these old machines still survive. I just cleaned up my slightly newer C-128.
Great thinking on the connector reflow. I used to work on 14" HDDs back at Unisys in the late '80s, and those Molex connector joints were a huge problem... we routinely re-flowed them every time.
Given your track record on tricky issues I have no doubt we'll soon learn that IT FREAKING WORKS!
I have No Idea how any of this stuff works....but I am hopelessly addicted to Your channel. Even in Your "Failure".... I LOVE Your attitude, and content. Great Job Sir.
back in 1986 i was working on the Model 2 selling it for office use to chimney sweeps in Germany, We sold some 200 of them until switching to IBM pc/at. loved the all-in-one design. will check my garage if i still have some of this stuff. hope you get your machine running soon !!
27:53 is where the old socketed chip chiropractic session starts. Enjoy! 😁😁😁
Like you, I wouldn't worry about the cosmetic stuff inside - preventing further degradation and saving it from the land fill is more important.
Good to see the progress on this machine! Even if it's not working (yet), it's closer than it was when you got it
I'm really enjoying your journey with the Model II. I did have a model 1 many years ago and the Model II was a "pie in the sky" super-machine I could never afford.
Nice work getting this far on such a complicated machine. Honestly, while I am pretty confident working on most home computers from the late 80's and onwards, the TRS-80 would just confuse the hell out of me. Rather than trying to replace all those chips that look a bit dodgy off the bat I would try sanding down the legs and using de-oxit for a start and then maybe replacing the sockets if they are looking bad. It's the kind of thing that can't hurt at this stage as if they don't work with that, you were going to replace them anyway.
You passed the smoke test, and now you have confidence that stuff does actually work for diagnostic purposes. This was a fun ride so far, I look forward to where we go next
For the next time you encounter surface rust on the big steal parts that have that greenish gold finish, goto a marine shop, I’m sure their are plenty in Portland, and grab some Zinc Chromate Primer ;-)
That chassis is cadmium plated, which means sanding and sandblasting is a health hazard. Usually to remove cadmium plating, the parts are submerged in an ammonium nitrate solution but i have no idea if this is something you can do safely at home.
I was to comment this as well when i saw it, cadmium is extreme toxic, you do not want to be sanding this and inhaling it or getting it on your skin.
How can one see whether it is cadmium plated or not? The metal looks a little like ordinary brass to me (if that's the English word for mässing), and certainly like materials I have drilled into!
@@herrbonk3635 Brass is a solid colour, cadmium plating is a yelllow/pinkish type colour, with an almost rainbow sheen to it. I'd recommend just looking up photos of cadmium plating on google images for a better idea of what it looks like, but in person you wouldn't mistake brass for cadmium plating.
@@Morinaka25 Ok, thanks! I belive that material is pretty common in computers, isn't it? I think I understand what you mean by rainbow sheen. But still, how do you really know for sure it's kadmium, and not just a little more zink (less copper) in the alloy? I mean, that kind of brass is usually more yellow.
@@Morinaka25 (Perhaps the simple answer is that brass is never used in computers and electronics chassis? But another natural question would be, why toxic cadmium on the surface?)
Beautiful restoration on that PSU and mount. Dang that unit has got some weight to it, can see how a drop would be hard on it even though it's so sturdy. Also the editing on this video is really tight and well paced. Interesting project, the vintage stuff sure is specific often, absolutely no slack for any deviation from spec.
Getting it all powered on without any smoke is a great payoff already from the care and testing you've put into it. Great progress, and I'm proud of you!
Excellent video! It's fascinating seeing the curvy, curly, hand-drawn traces when you're so used to angular, computer-done ones.
Connectors are especially prone to breaking... my wacom art tablet kinda regurgitated its USB Mini B port a little while ago. And of course it took the solder pads and contacts with it so it can't be fixed... found a workaround, I can charge the battery using a separate device so I can still get art done, but it was very alarming when it wouldn't connect/charge and when I unplugged it it just... came out with the cable.
Is there perhaps room for a panel-mount port?
If not, a last-resort repair could potentially be made by running jumper wires from a new PCB-mount port to the _other_ end of the traces, then epoxying the port to the board.
Is it possible the absence of the reset switch is holding the machine in a reset state (as in its an NC switch, and pressing it interrupts a pullup circuit which normally holds it out of reset. Thus you have an open circuit on the "run" signal)
My thoughts too, old computers and embedded systems ran like this either to save money or to fail safe, i.e. no control panel = no run time!
Glad that PSU was okay! Having worked on SMPSUs for years, I’m still fearful when switching on early types. I was tensed up when you flicked that switch!
I've got a funny feeling about that +12 rail and the video board. I think the service manual for the Model 2 says that if you see life in the CRT when checking the +12 rail then the issue will likely be the video board itself if you're not getting your sync signals.
27:57 Doctor, come quick, Adrian’s having his bubble wrap delusion again!
Because of the vibrations from the 8" drive, those glue tacked mounting bolts, and how hard they were to get out, I suspect they used Loctite on them.
Adrian should put a dab of hot glue or something
I scrapped one of these 20+ years ago. It appeared to be 'printer's ink', like we used on the PRC77 military radios at the factory. It is a very thick ink used to mark paper boxes, or for printing presses. We applied it with a syringe, with a blunt needle to secure screw heads on modules that had to be opened. It holds well, but cracks easily to show that something was tampered with.
@@Nas_Atlas or use Loctite
I can't imagine the feeling when you turned it on. This Model II journey has been great. So want to see where it ends up. Thanks ADB!
I had the same bad solder joints on my PSU as well. If I recall correctly, you have the older style PSU, which may not be beefy enough if you want to add a MC68000 subsystem and run Xenix.
Adrian, it's great to see the Model 2 getting some love. It and the subsequent Models in the line always seem to get less attention that the Model 1, 3 or 4. Great to see it torn down and built back up stage by stage. Looking forward to the next video in the series.
Thanks for the video! With the test equipment you have, you have a good chance of chasing down what is wrong. Just getting those 8 inch drives working was great, great to see.
2:20 it is called a common mode choke. It cancels out interference that comes in on both the hot and neutral.
Looking forward to your further troubleshooting... it's a lot harder when you don't have a working machine to swap boards with. You need a bus extender card to give you access for testing (I think).
8:15 I had a bad mains filter capacitor on an Epson XP-55 printer. It blew the chopper transistor.
Rarely youtubers post their failures. Thanks that you did
This will be a fun series to watch if you keep going with it, hope you do. On thing I hate about troubleshooting any type of vintage electronics that use multiple cards stacked like that is that you cant access the boards easily for proper probing without having some type of extender card to bring to board out where you can access everything. Can be a pain
This has been an interesting journey - looking forward to the next part!
I was a radio shack repair tech back in the early 80s and worked on model II s . Just from experience I remember video problems were mostly caused by a failure of the video boards. The CRT ( cathode ray tubes) were very reliable and almost never failed .
Earlier comment concerning the bad reset switch is also a possibility
Man, those things were built like a tank but that explains why they were so expensive back in the day. Things have been massively miniaturized and simplified in pretty much every way you can imagine nowadays.
Have been looking forward to part II of what is bound to be a quite a series. Coffee in hand.
As usual a great and fun retro-work video! Also, the grass soda made my skin crawl! I love the smell of fresh-cut grass but I can't imagine drinking it. *Mr Yuck Face*. In any case, thanks again Adrian!
It was shockingly better than it seemed!
Great video series. Fun to watch the diagnostic process and the repair techniques used. Also fascinating to me because I was a TRS-80 user, Model I and Model 4. Back in 1980 I bought the base Model I (16K, cassette storage) because, frankly, it was almost half the price of the Apple ][ that I was looking at -- though the Apple ][ had color output and expansion capability in their base model, unlike the Model I. Eventually I got the Model I expansion module to bring the computer up to 48K (I think... memory is fuzzy) along with a pair of 5.25 inch floppies to round out the setup (much more usable than the cassette interface!!). Funny thing, that fancy configuration made the Model I pretty close to the same cost as a similarly configured Apple ][! The TRS-80 was a good, capable machine and there was enough technical info available for it that I was able to learn quite a bit about computer technology from using it, as well as write many useful BASIC programs to automate my life. Eventually I sold the Model I to buy Model 4P with the integrated floppy drives which could run CP/M as well as TRSDOS. Although the 4P was nominally portable, it was rather more a "luggable" like many of its contemporaries. All in all solid computers, great for learning (though I must admit, the Apple ][ would have been the better investment in the long run LOL).
My roots dont stretch quite this far. What a relic.
22:40 - when I'm dealing with exposed high voltage stuff I never use the device, I plug it in into an extension cord with a switch on it set to the off position. I turn on the device, keep my hands away and turn the extension's switch on. If there's anything wrong I just quickly turn off the extension. But maybe it's different here in Europe because we don't have polarity on the mains, ideally the switch switches and cuts both at the same time.
Don't worry, this was exciting :) Looking forward the rest of it!
yeah for non grounded stuff (2 pin plugs) they are polarized so neutral should always be neutral. You can't totally rely on that though as the outlet may be wired incorrectly. (Mine are not, I have tested them all.) This machine is earthed and it's using a SMPS, so the chassis isn't live .. unlike many of these old TVs I work on.
@@adriansdigitalbasement I really appreciate your knowledge of CRTs and sharing safety issues. There are lots of vintage computer restoration videos on RUclips, but few of them go into CRTs, I'm sure many don't have the knowledge. CRT repair is surely a dying art.
Cool seeing other Astec parts. They are moderately known for making RF modulators parts in old gaming consoles (example: Intellivision gaming console).
Looking forward to the debug on this when you get to it Adrian! That thing is such a beast, and a temperamental beast at that, so I'm eager to see it working at some point in the future.
Quick suggestion: get a set of cheap remote controlled outlets to plug computers, monitors, isolation transformers, etc into. It makes me feel much better powering up old equipment when I can stand a few feet back with a fire extinguisher or whatever when I turn it on. I can also very quickly shut it off if I need to, even if I would normally have to reach over live power cords or bare wires to unplug it. I've also created a mini foot-pedal that allows me to hit the "off" button on the remote with my foot if something goes wrong, also very useful (especially when hands are full with the fire extinguisher).
hmmm... I would rather install an emergency button, which shout down the complete power in the room. And be careful with the fire extinguisher - there are different kind, especially when high voltage electronics (like crts) are involved. I this case maybe other factors could be interesting, for example a basement with small windows. Or you want to use something that damage the stuff there at least as possible.
Maybe add some clear sheet acrylic (Plexiglas, Perspex) over the mains connector block. Great video!
Amazing job cleaning the whole machine, great progress overall, just the small matter of the logic board!
I like that Power Connector, aesthetically (and logically)... It's keyed in a nice way (2 flats on one side and 1 on the other) ...And I like the shape of the 5 by 3 arrangement :-)
edit*
Forgot to mention... Nice Video again @Adrian :-)
Hey, I've got some of those black and transparent amber looking nut and screw drivers. Got them in a tool set from a high street store here in the UK back in the 90's.
I am always amazed that these computers can be assembled cost effectively in the factory!
Great video and keep the faith, you'll get it up and running, Im sure if it and I'll be really interested to see the journey. This has definitely inspired me to take a look at my poorly Acorn Electron which I need to see if it's power supply board works, thanks!
You can likely get off the shelf replacements for those card edge connectors since they are non-keyed.
Likely is, of course, not a certainty, but you could try contacting some electronics supply catalogues.
The top slot connector might be warped without being broken. If you can find a replacement connector you can use a solder sucker to remove it and replace it.
A solution to being able to test the power supply in isolation without having a spare connector: find a metal tube of the appropriate diameter to press over the male pins in the connector, and then you can just clip an alligator lead to the other end, longitudinally. At hobby/craft stores they sell packs of small, thin metal tubes in aluminum and brass for model-making, and they often come in assorted diameters. (They can be easily cut to length with a small hack saw.) To find the right size you can either go by feel, or you can insert the butt-end of a drill bit into the female end of the connector, increasing the size until you find the largest diameter that inserts without too much resistance. If the pins are neighbors in the connector and you're worried about shorting, you can just throw tape at the problem.
Or, you can order female pins of the right size and just soldier or crimp wires and use them without having the plastic shell. They will still insert and hold for testing, and again if shorting is an issue tape will work, or heat shrink if you want a slightly more reusable tool. It's all temporary anyway. For the inverse situation (female connector), you can find a nail of the appropriate diameter and do the same thing.
I’ve caught up with the videos in this series now. This is now like waiting for the next Star Wars movie! 🍿🤩 Some day soon I will be watching a video where this 1979 computer has been fully resurrected and lives again!
You need to add the Pinecil to your list of “tools” on the videos now. I saw you using it here. I’d been reading about the Pinecil but it was one of your midweek mail call videos that eventually convinced me to order one. It should be here in a few days! (I got the red case as well so I can make mine look like yours. I agree that colour combination is nice!) Great video btw. I’m a TRS-80 person but never worked on a Model II before. Cheers!
@@tspawn35 I also purchased and have just received a wall socket 65W GaN USB-C PD power supply from Amazon. This power supply claims to provide a full 65W and I think it will work beautifully with the Pinecil. I’m looking forward to my Pinecil arrive as well. I have some small projects waiting for me to solder up and I know this will be better than what I currently have as well. Hope all goes well for you too! :-)
Wow it's ancient! Just one step short of a real mini. At 40 years plus I'd expect all kinds of failures from it, that's a big restoration job.
awww - I was also hoping you'd fix it! Great video as usual though. Looking forward to the next chapter.
One thing about the isolation transformer: I'm just concerned someone may think that isolation transformer = total safety. If I understand correctly, it's not. If you touch ONE cable at the time, indeed it provides isolation and safety. But if by any chance you end up grabbing BOTH neutral and phase, you get electrocuted. And the sad thing is that the house RCD won't cut the power. So it's a bit of a mixed feeling on that - and don't get me wrong, I use it myself. (Happy to be corrected if I am mistaken)
Can you run a fuse/rcd after the isolation transformer - how would you wire it - have incoming mains distribution board - fixed isloation transformer - separate new distribution board for your electrical play room - variac into glow blub to the socket for the articles under test ?
@@highpath4776 I've always wondered if I could connect an RCD AFTER the isolation transformer - would that work? I have a separate distribution board in my garage, a variac (which I never use) and my isolation transformer which feeds the lightbulbs (current limiters) and eventually the device under test. From my limited understanding on how an RCD works, installing one after the isolation tranformer should work. But I'm not 100% sure.
I think the fact that Adrian is even attempting to service this monster of a computer is insane.
This is a great restoration, i try to keep my machines as original as possible, but also so they can be used as this, maybe if it has been something extremly special, like the only one in existance it had been different, but honestly all my machines are in reality less than 100$ market value and where made in large series so using rustremover and automotive protecting paint is not a problem here and will do perfect for presvering the machines for the future.
My first concern would have been the RIFA, but that's already been replaced.
Also, a note on the absence of a -5v, I don't recall any Tandy I've ever seen that had a -5v rail off the power supply, and not all of them even had it on the system bus either. At least the Tandy 1000 RSX, and probably the rest of the 1000 R series has a 7905 to provide -5v to the system bus, but so far as I know, none of the XT systems had it at all.
I remember debugging an Intel 8086-based computer (not PC compatible) many years ago. I hooked a logic analyzer to the bus and could see the instructions being executed. Luckily I had the appropriate software for the LA so I could see the instructions as assembler mnemonics rather than hex codes. Anyway I realized the machine was stuck in a loop. Looking at the code I saw that it was waiting for the screen blank signal. So I checked that signal and while it appeared on the bus, it didn't show on the I/O chip pin. So with the machine powered up I connected the pin to the bus and I heard the disk drive head moving as the machine was trying to boot. Where I am getting at is that the repair may not be as complicated as it looks. You'll need an oscilloscope for sure and a logic analyzer would be a plus.
Grass soda actually sounds nice and quirky at the same time!
It's kind of nice to see a project result more typical of my own results, lol!
vintage electronics were death traps, hot chassis, non polarised mains inputs, exposed external b+ terminals, no fuses, asbestos heat shields etc etc
Interesting that those Fujitsu chips might be problematic. I was just looking at picking up some 4164 type chips, so I'll keep in mind to steer clear of those Fujitsu ones too.
If the Fujitsu chips are transceivers you should just be able to breadboard them (if you can find a datasheet) and see if you can make some LEDs light up through the chip.
I've seen Astec PSUs in other microcomputers with those orange capacitors.
They can leak in an odd way, the electrolyte melts the rubber boot and glues the capacitor to the board.
Looks fine from the outside, only when you remove one do you find the failure.
A good suggestion for powering up unknown electricals and electronics is using a variac, that way you can slowly crank up the volts to ensure damage limitation, aswell as letting caps charge slowly so they don't end up causing a current spike that could blow other components in the process... :)
can be a bit dangerous for auto line switching modern stuff though.
I know you'll get it working! Can't wait to see the next video.
It's good to see a video like this, life isn't perfect! Let's hope you find the cause :) and can repair it
I’ve never seen grass soda before, but I picked up a bottle of grass vodka in Poland on a business trip a few years back that was actually made with grass rather than flavored with it. I don’t remember it tasting much different to normal vodka.
Na Zdrowie! vodka is basically meant to be tasteless. Which makes "high-end" luxury brands a complete joke. Although, I might pick Grey Goose over Grass Vodka!
Only bright green soda I ever want is green river, God it's been ages
Every time I visit family near Chicago, they stock up on Green River, and it's all I drink while I'm there. I wish it would get wider distribution.
Omg so sad to see it didnt work. I hope there will be another video ill be looking forward if it comes in the meantime cant wait for ur next video :)
8:18 I found a bad large capacitor in, of all things, a ~1980 Tektronix 465B oscilloscope
Just wanted to let you know that the gold coloration on the sheet metal is often a cadmium plating for corrosion inhibition. So always wear a mask when you sand it.
Yep, cadmium is awful stuff, it has mutagenic properties. Skin contact isn't even a great idea. When cadmium coatings corrode you wind up with cadmium salts which have very high bioavailibilty and can be absorbed through contact with skin moisture.
How can you tell cadmium plating from yellow zinc?
15:41 Adrian proceeds to void another warranty. LOL
The timestamp seems somewhat appropriate, considering it was a floppy drive getting the treatment.
For parallel capacitors, it is the sum of the ratings. Unlike parallel resistors (reciprocal of the sum of the reciprocals)
That's where the fun starts with getting the system's cards accessible to an oscilloscope...
That Grass soda reminds me of Meadow Tea, which I think is made by Swiss. Found it in Pennsylvania.
thx for the journey.. looking forward for more on this.
I wonder if they got the idea from Ren and Stimpy's "Sugar Sod Pops" mock commercial (S2 E11) for the soda?
It's not a failure, it's just temporarily in a state of disrepair 😜 I'm looking forward to another video down the line of this beast
12.7 for the filament is fine tubes can be run +/- 10% of their rated voltage.
I have had access to electronic recycling waste for a very long time, but I have nowhere near the knowledge like you when it comes to electronic. I found computers from the 70s, tube radios from the 40s and anything in between. Nearly all of my equipment is from recycling center current amplifier I use is a 60s kenwood ka-6100. All equipment I found I just fired up up from the get go if they were dry and not wet from rain. Guess what?? 99.9999% of the time it just works. This amp I am using now has been on 24/7 for years and even bulbs works. I have just never come across something except maybe one "modern" ampilifer that failed because of a capacitor.
Even had a osbourne 1 at a time with a bunch of working software, but sadly I was dumb enough to trade it away back a long time ago.
This is so damn nostalgic for me. I learned BASIC on a Model 4. (If you held down the little red button at boot it would boot into BASIC from ROM).
If the issue is the disk drive board, I wonder if removing it and trying to boot to ROM would be possible. (I know the model 3 could do it, but don't know about the model 2.)
Speaking of nostalgia, I love the modular design of those early Z80 computers with the backplane and cards like that, there was a project I found in the 2000s where someone had documented building their own Z80 PC like that, writing and burning a custom BIOS, and running CP/M and DOS on it.
Though, I bet the design might make it hard to repair without replacement cards to swap in.
If you want to use your logic analyzer on a card while it's running, I wonder if you can get a card edge extension cable, so that you can have the card flat on your bench while you probe it.
If the custom chips are bad maybe you could do a collab with a hardware designer on youtube and get a replacement board made.
I also wonder if the fan noise would improve if you added some silicone grease in there to lubricate it.
I think the sanding and spray paint to prevent corrosion is totally fine. Though if you ever do get it working, you should paint your signature and the date, so that when it's repaired again in 50 years, there will be a history to the piece.
Love your content Adrian, you rock!
I love the traces on the PSU board. I guess they were done freehand... ? You just never see stuff like this anymore.
They were wave soldered. That's one of the reasons the solder around connector pins crack. They conduct heat away too quickly, so there is less solder at those points. This also applies to pis or heavy copper leads on inductors and transformers.
Good work but my primary concern would be lack of HT on the CRT that should be running regardless of the 'computer' unless its a very weird setup I look forward to more on this.....cheers.
yep if you wind up the brightness you usually get a glow from the tube .. sounds like the EHT has died.
Time to get a Tauntek IC Tester? ;)
That thing seems to be amazing for Retro Enthusiasts that repair stuff regularly.
An 8" floppy disk has the power to make an adult look the size of a hobbit. It even works if the disk is offscreen; I saw Elijah Wood demonstrate it in a bonus feature on my The Fellowship of the Ring DVD.
Could have used PC 4 pin molex power connector's pins to do the testing.
The power supply of that thing is the most scariest thing I've seen
You can make a dummy test load for the power supply. This is the preferred way to test it.
I had a similar connector on a furnace circuit board that had solder joint issues...once re-flowed, our heat was back :-)
As a nerd, this was 30 minutes of riveting content. Looking for how the chip fix goes.