Long dead sony Vaio+me= ongoing legendary battle

Rototiller · Post by **Rototiller** » Sat Jan 17, 2009 4:26 pm

yes, i'm back, from outer space.

so, my dad plopped a laptop on my desk today that has been dead for 3-4 years. Now, i've pulled many a Ghost Rider before and captured the souls of ex-consumer electronic products (the 9 yr old dell i'm typing on is an example with a duct taped wi-fi finder, ghettoblaster soundsystem and no battery

), but this case hurts my head.

the AC jack is broken, we've put up posters for power cord, it's missing it's hard drive (which i'll discuss later), and my dad got it from his retired boss in a box(containing my mom's current similarly once dead lappy after being fixed with the vaio's HD, my current lappy and our current wireless home phone system), which mean's we've never seen it working, so there may be more issues. The hard drive contained the bios and all that jazz(more of a hardware guy than a software guy) and i can't retrieve it from my mom's compy

.

now, i could make it a picture frame or a tesla turbine, but since it would be a major improvement over this computer, i'm ohwoah! livin' on a prayer *cough* that it could be built better, faster, and stronger. Anyone? bueler? Bueler?

Post by **bicostp** » Sat Jan 17, 2009 4:36 pm

CompactFlash to laptop IDE adapter + CF card + DOS + 20k image viewer = digital picture frame.

http://www.kevinfreitas.net/projects/digitalframe/

The BIOS is stored on onboard flash memory, not the hard drive. Once you get a new power connector on it, throw a hard drive in and it should be all set.

Rototiller · Post by **Rototiller** » Sat Jan 17, 2009 4:52 pm

bicostp wrote:

SUNDAY! SUNDAY! SUNDAY! live at the arena! Its gardening toolbot against The undead Vaio!

that's a truly great pic

Turns out we chucked the cord a while back. Good news is that we have another ancient power supply with the same voltage. If i can find a donor, i think it will fly.

Rototiller · Post by **Rototiller** » Mon Jan 19, 2009 4:11 pm

Okay, status report and part deux of my questionaire, removed the ac plug and solder'd two wires for ground and power. Power button is responsive and turns on the rest, fan moves (however, it's strenuous-sounding, and i'm really concerned about it overheating during an extended run), the power light comes on as well as the battery light if it's plugged in, and things are looking for the most part, good.

However, the screen is eternally dark as the rainy miasma of a teenager's soul, and if plugged into a external monitor nothing shows up, and i'm also unsure about the keyboard's status.

Tl;Dr: how could i test the visuals both on it's screen and external, doublecheck the fan if it's working as good as possible, and see if the keyboard is working?

oh, and i apologize for the double post. Uno!

ghosstt · Post by **ghosstt** » Mon Jan 19, 2009 4:13 pm

Rototiller wrote:
bicostp wrote:

SUNDAY! SUNDAY! SUNDAY! live at the arena! Its gardening toolbot against The undead Vaio!

...

also known as a rototiller.

Post by **bicostp** » Mon Jan 19, 2009 4:27 pm

Does the Vaio have a hotkey for switching monitors? The old Toshiba laptop I'm building into a picture frame does; it cycles between 1 desktop across 2 monitors, mirrored video between monitors, and composite video.

If not, the backlight may be shot.

Rototiller · Post by **Rototiller** » Mon Jan 19, 2009 5:49 pm

bicostp wrote:Does the Vaio have a hotkey for switching monitors? The old Toshiba laptop I'm building into a picture frame does; it cycles between 1 desktop across 2 monitors, mirrored video between monitors, and composite video.

If not, the backlight may be shot.

It has a Switcher(fn-f7), i'll check the backlight, plugged it into a vga monitor and zlich.

Oh boy, this is definitely obeying my familys creed. Never repair anything with the last name of Murphy.

ghosstt · Post by **ghosstt** » Mon Jan 19, 2009 6:19 pm

Oh.. Wow.. That.. ugh.. Sucks.

At least you have a law after you guys. Unless it was his first name.

Rototiller · Post by **Rototiller** » Mon Jan 19, 2009 9:33 pm

Yeah, I fixed everything that is visible, now i'm almost caught up to where I started!

Since nothing shows up on the laptop screen, and nothings shows up on the external monitor, how can i be sure that things are running besides the fan. I mean, i can hear the buzz of the other components running, but i don't know if there's anything going on.