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Spent TWO YEARS putting this vintage thinkpad BEAST together. Hope you guys like it!

Older ThinkPads from the 300, 500, 600, 700 Series, iSeries, Transnote etc.
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sean1978
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Spent TWO YEARS putting this vintage thinkpad BEAST together. Hope you guys like it!

#1 Post by sean1978 » Mon Jan 22, 2018 6:53 pm

I have a Windows 95 equipped Thinkpad 770 with a Selectadock III and VooDoo2 SLI!

https://youtu.be/DGHcX0YTPKw

clarkey
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Re: Spent TWO YEARS putting this vintage thinkpad BEAST together. Hope you guys like it!

#2 Post by clarkey » Tue Jan 23, 2018 2:13 am

Fantastic upload, great to see LGR commenting on it as well!

I have been working on something very similar, I have a 760 that I am attempting to find a ThinkPad Dock I (3545) for, plan to use the ISA slot for some soundcard and upgrade fun.

Cheers

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Re: Spent TWO YEARS putting this vintage thinkpad BEAST together. Hope you guys like it!

#3 Post by dr_st » Tue Jan 23, 2018 4:13 am

A pretty amazing piece of nostalgia, and in pristine condition! Thanks for sharing. :thumbs-UP:

How would a Voodoo 2 SLI perform compared to a single Voodoo 3 3000?
Thinkpad 25 (20K7), T490 (20N3), Yoga 14 (20FY), T430s (IPS FHD + Classic Keyboard), X220 4291-4BG
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Re: Spent TWO YEARS putting this vintage thinkpad BEAST together. Hope you guys like it!

#4 Post by madicetea » Tue Jan 23, 2018 4:58 am

And yes, I was subscribed to LGR so as soon as he commented on this and starting endorsing you (and when I saw this on Reddit earlier), I threw you the like and subscribe.

So, to more likes and subscribes on more videos in the future - show us the rest of your collection too!
Last edited by madicetea on Tue Jun 11, 2019 7:05 am, edited 1 time in total.
MadIceTea, Thinkpad Enthusiast

Daily: X250 FHD
Museum: PC110 20MB, X61 T9300 SXGA+ LED
Donated: x2001 AFFS i5-530 (to my alma matter)
Past: 701Cs German, 535/X, 760E/XL, i-series 12/14xx, piano s30, R60e, X60, X61, T60, T61, X200 P8700, X121e

That chicken sure looks funny.

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Re: Spent TWO YEARS putting this vintage thinkpad BEAST together. Hope you guys like it!

#5 Post by rheacox » Tue Jan 23, 2018 9:15 am

Love the selectadock III, I should get mine out again. Was a pain before with a bad battery but now that I rebuilt the battery pack I can actually dock and undock :D

As far as a wireless card, look for a Cisco Aironet 350. As far as I know, it's one of the only PCMCIA wireless cards with DOS drivers. I'm positive that I've sent files over my wireless network between Windows XP and WFW3.11 using this card. It's been a few years but it's hard to forget something like that.
IBM 380Z, 770X w/Selectadock III, X31, A31
Lenovo T61p, X61s, X270

rheacox
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Re: Spent TWO YEARS putting this vintage thinkpad BEAST together. Hope you guys like it!

#6 Post by rheacox » Tue Jan 23, 2018 9:23 am

Also, don't think you'll ever find a 770z from 1997. Pretty sure they came out in the tail end of 1998 or early 1999.
IBM 380Z, 770X w/Selectadock III, X31, A31
Lenovo T61p, X61s, X270

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Re: Spent TWO YEARS putting this vintage thinkpad BEAST together. Hope you guys like it!

#7 Post by madicetea » Tue Jan 23, 2018 10:39 am

rheacox wrote:
Tue Jan 23, 2018 9:15 am
Love the selectadock III, I should get mine out again. Was a pain before with a bad battery but now that I rebuilt the battery pack I can actually dock and undock :D

As far as a wireless card, look for a Cisco Aironet 350. As far as I know, it's one of the only PCMCIA wireless cards with DOS drivers. I'm positive that I've sent files over my wireless network between Windows XP and WFW3.11 using this card. It's been a few years but it's hard to forget something like that.

...

Don't think you will find a 770Z from 1997.
If you could give advice and/or a good DIY blog link, I could use the help.

I will definetly look for one of those Cisco Aironet 350 cards.

Ah darn. Maybe a different model then, because more than anything I want that sticker date on at least one laptop I own. Thanks for the warning.
Last edited by madicetea on Tue Jun 11, 2019 7:04 am, edited 1 time in total.
MadIceTea, Thinkpad Enthusiast

Daily: X250 FHD
Museum: PC110 20MB, X61 T9300 SXGA+ LED
Donated: x2001 AFFS i5-530 (to my alma matter)
Past: 701Cs German, 535/X, 760E/XL, i-series 12/14xx, piano s30, R60e, X60, X61, T60, T61, X200 P8700, X121e

That chicken sure looks funny.

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Re: Spent TWO YEARS putting this vintage thinkpad BEAST together. Hope you guys like it!

#8 Post by rheacox » Tue Jan 23, 2018 11:33 am

This is the only guidance I used to rebuild my battery https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VrDnTXqoqjM

Now, using a soldering iron directly on any battery isn't a good idea but it was all I had and it did work.

Doesn't really seem to be much to rebuilding a battery pack. I just opened the case as carefully as I could, cut the old spot welds with an xacto knife and soldered the new batteries in.
Hardest part was closing everything back up since I used solder instead of a spot welder. Lots of clamps were used.

http://www.thinkwiki.org/wiki/ThinkPad_History

According to the list in that link even the 770 came out in 10/97... but it's a good list to look at to find a model that fits your criteria.
IBM 380Z, 770X w/Selectadock III, X31, A31
Lenovo T61p, X61s, X270

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Re: Spent TWO YEARS putting this vintage thinkpad BEAST together. Hope you guys like it!

#9 Post by Thinkpad4by3 » Tue Jan 23, 2018 11:45 am

rheacox wrote:
Tue Jan 23, 2018 11:33 am
This is the only guidance I used to rebuild my battery https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VrDnTXqoqjM

Now, using a soldering iron directly on any battery isn't a good idea but it was all I had and it did work.

Doesn't really seem to be much to rebuilding a battery pack. I just opened the case as carefully as I could, cut the old spot welds with an xacto knife and soldered the new batteries in.
Hardest part was closing everything back up since I used solder instead of a spot welder. Lots of clamps were used.

http://www.thinkwiki.org/wiki/ThinkPad_History

According to the list in that link even the 770 came out in 10/97... but it's a good list to look at to find a model that fits your criteria.

Wouldn't use that guide. The TP batteries are bloody hard to crack open(literally)! I would send the pack off to a receller and get it done professionally.
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The efficiency of two screens equally sized with equal numbers if pixels are equal. The time spent by a 4:3 user complaining about 16:9 is proportional to the inefficiency working with a 16:9 display, therefore the amount of useful work extracted is equal.

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Re: Spent TWO YEARS putting this vintage thinkpad BEAST together. Hope you guys like it!

#10 Post by rheacox » Tue Jan 23, 2018 12:08 pm

Agreed, if you can, send the battery out. I was very surprised at how easily the pack out of my 770 opened up, definitely not the norm.

This is a case of do as I say not as I do :lol: I got lucky every step of the way.
IBM 380Z, 770X w/Selectadock III, X31, A31
Lenovo T61p, X61s, X270

sean1978
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Re: Spent TWO YEARS putting this vintage thinkpad BEAST together. Hope you guys like it!

#11 Post by sean1978 » Tue Jan 23, 2018 11:14 pm

Wouldn't use that guide. The TP batteries are bloody hard to crack open(literally)! I would send the pack off to a receller and get it done professionally.
I actually figured out how to open mine pretty easily. I'll make a video demonstrating.

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Re: Spent TWO YEARS putting this vintage thinkpad BEAST together. Hope you guys like it!

#12 Post by olex126 » Wed Jan 24, 2018 5:08 am

Congrats on the refurb!

So I actually purchased a Thinkpad 770 retail in April of 1998.

Including the DVD drive (a $675 option!) and some additional memory, total out-the-door price, including taxes...

$9221.85 Cdn

https://imgur.com/a/kAdbV

Still have pics of the 770 if anyone is interested..

About six months after my purchase, the retail price on these had dropped to about half :evil:

You can always tell the front-runners by the arrows in their back :D

Regards.

Dave
Previous & Collection Thinkpads: 701C A22m A30/A31p T23p x2 T30 T41 X31 various 750's 760's & 390's.

Test Benches: X41T, X60T & X61T's, various T42p-T43p's, x200 x201 x220T x230 T520 W530 T601F LED (X9000/8Gb/250SSD/W7 U)

DD: P50

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Re: Spent TWO YEARS putting this vintage thinkpad BEAST together. Hope you guys like it!

#13 Post by MustardOrMayo » Fri Feb 16, 2018 12:12 pm

Icewobs wrote:
Tue Jan 23, 2018 4:58 am
How do you find a 13GB Solid State Drive for this kind of machine? Where can I buy these things for the 760EL I have :D
Well, it could be an early IDE interface SSD, like the rare Samsung "FlashSSD" 16GB I have (I only have 1, and no, I'm not selling it).

However, at least the 760EL I have, which has an older BIOS, and I can't update it due to me having a dead battery pack, wouldn't recognise my 8GB SD card in an adaptor, so I tried a 2GB card and it worked (I don't have a 4GB card).

Anyway, I installed that card in an adaptor, then installed that inside one of those IBM hard drive cartridges the 760 series used (the actual drive in it was already dead when I got it, anyway), and used cardboard to fill the rest of the space inside the cartridge. I do plan to do a tutorial on how I did it, if I do ever repair one of my 760EDs.
Wander wrote:I only have turkey left but I'll let you pick... Mustard Or Mayo? Mustard Or Mayo? Mustard Or Mayo?
X250 FHD+T | R52 15" x2 (1 for parts) | R51 15" | T43 14.1" | 760ED & EL (TFT) (both SG) (both unbootable/parts) | 760ED (USA) (semi-functioning) | 760EL (DSTN, USA)

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Re: Spent TWO YEARS putting this vintage thinkpad BEAST together. Hope you guys like it!

#14 Post by axur-delmeria » Fri Feb 16, 2018 1:24 pm

IIRC no BIOS on the 760 series can support HDDs 8GB and larger. The solution was to install Ontrack Disk Manager's Dynamic Drive Overlay (DDO) on the HDD before installing it on the 760.
Planned Purchase: T480s i5-8350 FHD Touch
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Re: Spent TWO YEARS putting this vintage thinkpad BEAST together. Hope you guys like it!

#15 Post by Brad » Fri Feb 16, 2018 8:49 pm

Beautiful beast! Thanks for sharing your hard work.

In April 1999 I picked up a used 770Z from a notebook fanatic on fleabay. It was as new as they said that they bought it for testing.

It was a model 9549-8AU and after the S/N on the bottom label it said 02-99 which is the date of manufacturer.

This model had the 13.7" 1280 x 1024 which at the time was considered high resolution.

I picked up two other 770Z's along my journey. One I still run occasionally to lookup an older program. The other one doesn't like to turn on.

That keyboard is incredible. The keypresses seem so luxurious.

Most all the examples now show a peeling palmrest and mine are no different.

A neat example of ThinkPad hardware.

Brad
Long Island New York
T43p 2669-Q1U, A22p's UTU A21p HXU
Transnote, 770's 8AU, 600, 701CS, 755CD

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Re: Spent TWO YEARS putting this vintage thinkpad BEAST together. Hope you guys like it!

#16 Post by sean1978 » Mon Mar 19, 2018 10:15 pm

FYI guys this is the type of SSD I got, chinese eBay special.
If the link doesn't work it's a Zheino PATA SSD. I got the cheapest / smallest model they had.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Zheino-2-5-32G ... SwJcZWb9gh

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Re: Spent TWO YEARS putting this vintage thinkpad BEAST together. Hope you guys like it!

#17 Post by kishy » Mon Mar 19, 2018 11:16 pm

rheacox wrote:
Tue Jan 23, 2018 9:15 am
Cisco Aironet 350. As far as I know, it's one of the only PCMCIA wireless cards with DOS drivers. I'm positive that I've sent files over my wireless network between Windows XP and WFW3.11 using this card. It's been a few years but it's hard to forget something like that.
The Aironet 350 is also one of not many cards that is capable of connecting to a WPA-secured B/G/N mixed network, which is a desirable trait on its own. Not relevant to these ThinkPad models, but if your machine can only take 16 bit cards, you have very limited options yet this card is one of them.

I'm not sure if WPA support works on OS below XP as I haven't tried yet, but if it does (would depend on Cisco's client application) that would be a very handy thing. Edit: I've now tried that on 98 and unfortunately it doesn't work, but perhaps a third party client utility of some kind might.
PC 110 | 760E SVGA | 760E XGA | 235 | 600 | T21 | Z60m | T520 | W520 (dd) | T430 | T530

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Re: Spent TWO YEARS putting this vintage thinkpad BEAST together. Hope you guys like it!

#18 Post by pkiff » Sun Apr 01, 2018 2:08 pm

Nice work putting your 770 + SelectaDock III beast together, sean1978.
dr_st wrote:A pretty amazing piece of nostalgia, and in pristine condition! Thanks for sharing. :thumbs-UP:
How would a Voodoo 2 SLI perform compared to a single Voodoo 3 3000?
My personal preference would be for a Voodoo 5 5500. I think that will perform better than two Voodoo cards in SLI. Not sure about a pair of Voodoo 2's in SLI vs a single Voodoo 3.

For anyone looking to build a system similar to sean1978, and for those with questions about which video cards might work, some years ago I compiled a list of compatible graphics cards for the SelectaDock III and it is still up here:
http://thinkpads.kiff.ca/selectadock3/graphics_cards

Also, the fastest Thinkpad you can get that will work with the SelectaDock III is a 770X or 770Z with an upgraded CPU: you should be able to get it to work with a PIII 500MHz, with some work, including some light BIOS editing.

And finally, I'd recommend running Win98SE - with supplements, instead of 95. That generation of operating systems are basically the same in all significant ways. 98 is just an incremental update over 95, and it should feel the same in terms of nostalgia when you use it. But Win98SE is a big upgrade over 95 or 95B in terms of performance and stability. Which is not to say that 98SE should be considered "stable"! But it is a lot better than 95. At least that was my experience when I actually used them!

Phil.
X1E Gen 4 · X1T 3rd Gen · W520 · Legacy: P52, T60p, X61T, 600X, 770Z
Nostalgic for: 600X PIII 850MHz in a SelectaDock III with 64MB Voodoo 5 5500 and Sound Blaster Audigy 5.1.

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Re: Spent TWO YEARS putting this vintage thinkpad BEAST together. Hope you guys like it!

#19 Post by tecmes » Sat Apr 07, 2018 11:16 am

Selectadock III: The ultimate laptop theft preventer.

Bonus points for the Duke Nukem 3D mousepad, btw. Groovy!

Many years after, I can still remember the 770 keyboard feel under my fingers. It was even better than the 600! Pure keyborgasm. No. That's not a very creepy Star Trek fanfic reference. It's a very weird Thinkpad reference.
Workhorse: vanilla X61s. "Gaming": 14s-IWL. Drawer: X31, X201s (sold, couldn't get used to it...). Office: T560. First crush: X20. Fond memories: SXGA+ 770

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