[COMPLETE] Project ARoMa

DigitalHermit · March 28, 2015

Project ARoMa

(ARoMa is an alternate reading of ア―六〇 which is an alternate writing of A-60)

ft. Toshiba Satellite A-60

Introduction

Allow me to introduce you to Project ARoMa, my not-so-cutting-edge not-so-portable laptop. The laptop in question is a Toshiba Satellite A60 from way back in the early 2000s.

This one is in blue-silver-black and has been with me for around 5 years now (after someone gave it to me)... This baby survived mild water damage and a 2m+ drop...

Now why am I posting a build log of it? Because she broke a few months back and I was finally free to fix her today... She had some mild water damage and some corrosion this time around so I just had to strip her down and get to work...

Specs

CPU: Intel Pentium 4 3.06GHz HT
GPU: ATIi Mobility Radeon with 64MB VRAM (?)
MoBo: Toshiba Satellite A60-192
RAM: 256MB DDR1 800MHz
HDD: N/A (the HDD died on me... anybody know where to get a laptop IDE HDD for cheaps?)
PSU: 100W 19V LiteOn power brick
Cooling: this beast of a laptop heatsink (makes up 20% of the laptop's weight)

Process

So I went ahead and took her apart... It was messy so there will be no images of the teardown... But here's the reassembly images...

I cleaned out some substance buildup near the traces for her 19V power supply... Might've been the cause of her coma...

Did a bare test boot with only the RAM and HDD in...

For now, she's waiting for a disc carrying Damn Small Linux (I don't have any blank CDs on me)... I intend to run it using a LiveCD (because USB Boot was not yet mainstream when she hit the market) until she boots her last (read: not anytime soon)...

I'll update when the disc is ready and she's online...