Fixing Up An IBM Thinkpad 380ED From 1997! 

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When you notice that this RU-vidr knows what we love to see, *Love me an old portable device*

“It’s honestly really *thicc* ” -Psivewri 2019

Please never stop making these videos I need themmm Whattttt? My mans hearted my comment thanks bro that made my day keep up the good work!

Holy shit, they put the CMOS battery in a location where it doesnt require a complete teardown to replace???? Amazing. Also gotta love the PSTN display. I believe this is one of the more pedestrian thinkpads from the time so it's to be expected.

800x600 is pretty wild for 1997 considering in 2021, they still sell many new laptops with 1366x768 displays.

Must have a passive matrix screen LCD which explains the ghosting.

IBMs were such beautiful laptops with gorgeous keyboards. Lenovos today aren't half bad, but of course, with the times, things have gotten thinner, so the keys will not be as satisfying to press, however, Lenovo's keys on their mid to highend laptops are still a joy to chatter away on and some of the best in the business.

I have an IBM ThinkPad T30 and I love it. Combined it with my father's T30 which was cracked and atuff

i have that one! Is a very confortable writing machine and it's great for clasic games, for full screen scaling just press fn+f8 keys

I was started to use computer back in 1997, still remember using windows 95, browsed netvigator & yahoo, and played AOE. flat screen laptop in that time is definitely a luxury.

This will probably sound fake, but I can promise you it’s real. Around 2 weeks ago I bought an IBM ThinkPad 380ED “for parts”, this same model, from eBay for $35, and when it arrived it was only wrapped in one (and a half) layers of bubble wrap, and sustained considerable shipping damage, similar to this one in the video. The seller later offered me a 50% refund. When I booted it up it gave those same 161 & 163 CMOS errors, and when I replaced the battery it booted into Windows 95 as well. What timing!

That keyboard is marvelous! They need to make keyboards on laptop like that today. I’d buy them even if they were 2 lbs.

That's really cheap, lucky find. Similarly, I got a Dell Latitude C610 circa 2002 on eBay for $36. It had 512MB of RAM and no hard drive. I got a 60gb hard drive for $9 and a proprietary adapter to use the hard drive in this laptop for $4.50. I added 256MB of RAM because I had extra and installed Windows XP alongside 98. Works great! Only problem is there is a line running down the screen. A new screen is like $30, maybe I'll replace it one day...

@Psivewri Pro tip - turn on "Mouse cursor trail" in the mouse settings. It helps a LOT to see mouse pointer on these old passive-matrix LCD screens. This feature was actually developed to to exactly this.

PLEASE upload this ThinkPad video to RU-vid. It looks amazing.

I love these old laptop restorations. I’ve been seeing a ton of these now. I think it be sick if someone could switch hack a board in there, I mean even a raspberry to keep the drives. Don’t think they’d work tho.

It is wonderful and very satisfying to see old machines working, technology pushes us forward, but it does not let us see at the same time, that there are machines that can be used today.

I used to have a 385XD as a kid, I loved that thing. I destroyed it though when the power socket pushed into the computer. I tried to find replacements for it online but this was like 2012 and I had no idea what I was looking for so I eventually just smashed it because I had figured it was beyond saving.

I just watched LGR get a ThinkPad X1, and now this video pop up... what perfect timing!

The windows 95 startup sound gives me shivers to this day

That was excellent in every way!! Delighted to have discovered your channel because this is also my hobby : reviving old laptops (usually 10-15 years old) bringing them up to a very acceptable level of everyday computing - usually with Win 7 and sometimes even with Win 10! - and donating them to charity. Subscribed !!

Hi! You can select to have lower résolutions scaled to fit the LCD in the Thinkpad Configuration Utility

<a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="110">1:50</a> - Wow… that brought back memories.

Thinkpads have a fantastic appearance in shape.

Your channel bridges and the gap between sustainability (restoring usable tech) and preserving historic artefacts. I like that very much!!!

I have the 380xd, the exact same laptop, but with an amazing 1998 USB 1.0 port!

What a historical Gem! Even after all the years gone by, you can see where IBM were going with their ThinkPad design. Great Chapter and great to see you testing those games. Thumbs up! [as always]

Must be one of the last ThinkPad systems with a passive matrix LCD. IBM sold Active Matrix as a higher end option on most models. My 365XD from 1996 has an active panel, but could have shipped with a passive at a lower cost.

These laptops are great for DOS! Complete hardware sound blaster pro compatibility out of the box no drivers. Sounds identical to my ears to a real SB Pro. If you can find a docking station (took me a while) you can hook this up to a crt , speakers, keyboard, mouse, and even a classic joystick and have an excellent retro dos machine. The PCMCIA card works great to boot from if you use a CF Card Adapter. The 380ED is my favorite native Dos Laptop for sure. Got 2 of them while they were cheap. Batteries still hold a charge for like an hour lol.

Really love watching this old retro reviews man !

Back when I was a little Bab, I had a Compaq laptop that also featured an 800x600 Passive Matrix LCD. I thought it had something to do with my Age, and not the Tech which is why I thought it appeared blurry, just the same way the DMG Gameboy I had did as well. I played Lots of AoE II and used Game Maker 4 extensively back in the day, until one day the charging port finally broke off the motherboard. I did so much gaming on that crappy Passive Matrix display to the point of getting used to it. A couple years later I got another laptop but with an Active Matrix display, which didn't blur, and I asked a kid who was around if it appeared blurry or not, and he said it wasn't blurry so I figured it had nothing to due with age, and Eye Maturity. Another few years later I wound up with a Toshiba from 1997 that while having an Active Matrix display, the iGPU didn't feature upscaling, so Starcraft and Quake (the only games that I really played on there aside from zSNES and NESticle) were all in a small lil' viewport, just as seen on this IBM. But the overall image quality of Passive Matrix displays do in fact have a strongly "washed out" appearance to them, horrible refresh rates (Pixel Shift Response Times as I call it) (Mouse Trails were really handy then) and general uneven-ness of color (Solid color backgrounds generally appear "Gradient". However, For a 22 year old laptop that thing has truly stood the test of time. IBM sure built their stuff pretty well back in the day, huh?

A couple of months ago I found my old 1997 760XL in the attic that hadn't been booted since 2005. The battery is shot but with AC it fired right up except there's a vertical line in the screen.

I have a 380D here, in almost new condition. Maxed out 80MB RAM and running NT 3.51 like a champ. Still runs an hour or so on battery even.

sticker was black because it had a pentium mmx

Thanks for the video mate, I've got a Thinkpad 380D and thought that I was the only one that had a screen that ghosted like crazy! Also suprised that the Hard Drive worked, from my experience and research, they seem to be quite prone to failing.

I just found your channel I just subbed I love how you take old laptops 💻 that most likely would be thrown out and help save the earth

<a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="109">1:49</a> 《change the world, my final message... goodbye》

I actually never played the original NFS till 2007-08. NFS 2 SE was the first one i owned in the late 90s when i was about 4. Loved the game to death & finished it. I played NFS 3 HP on the ps1 as well around the same time.

Uf that Psion is gold, I love those machines, sadly don't own one anymore but always want to snag another one for my collection.

I have a gateway 2000 windows 95 laptop from 1997 that i got from my dad’s friend. It was covered in dirt and the battery was dead so it needed to be plugged in to work. I’m surprised it worked at all. The same day i got it the cord died. i had so much trouble finding a new cord on ebay as the cord is old and rare. now it works good but is slow. i am working on it as I watch this video. 💻♥️

This tanks of a laptop is just great. Also great Video, greetings from Poland :D

i like old laptop and that was the era when i play old game...Thank you for remember

You know man my favorite of ur videos are the ones about old laptops, thinkpads, and cheap thin and lights nice vid man!

You have an excellent find there. Sorry to hear that they treated it rough in shipping. A couple of years ago, I fixed up a Toshiba Satelite 330 CDS manufactured in November of 1998. Has a 266 MHz Pentium MMX CPU with 96 MB ram and it's original 4.1 gb hard drive. I put a fresh install of Windows 98 second edition with Office 97. I feel like hanging on to it for many more years.

Your eucalyptus oil trick is great I used it to clean my MacBook Air keys and it was super shiny at first but it like evaporates and leave it looking beautiful!!!

"It is now safe to turn off your computer"

Great video. I used to have a 380. My mate still uses it to program old PLCs

You won't believe how fast I clicked on this vid when I got the notification

Great video! I have a very similar laptop like that (365 XD) that that I've got with matching bag for around $10. Still working just fine with Windows 95, still in mint condition too. One of the best finds for sure. I also found a matching IBM mouse and numerical pad, but unfortunately the latter is in white. I love that BIOS, by the way. GUI and mouse driven before it was common, this only became a thing when UEFI came around.

So far, most stuff I’ve got as untested for parts on eBay have either been things with common, mostly easy to fix, needing basic routine maintenance, or just straight up work, no fuss. 🤷‍♂️

I’m more surprised he didn’t bother taking the white sticker off! OCD kicking in!

I found one running wiendos me, sometimes it work, sometimes not, is the video card, since my dad worked at IBM from 80's to 90's it brings a lot of memories too

Age of Empires 2 is the best game from the 90s

the reason for the motion blur is because the particular configuration you have has a Passive Matrix LCD, and Passive Matrixes are crappy when it comes to things like games and video, but are ok when it comes to text editing

What kind of person packages stuff like that?

Ur vids are the best

Plz Nathan do more IBM thinkpad videos 🤣

The screen looks bad because this is a ThinkPad with a low-end DSTN/Passive Matrix display. STN and DSTN displays were designed to work in that way.

BTW - Lenovo of China took over the Thinkpad series 8 years after this laptop was released. In the year 2005.

Old is gold bro love it

to be honest that IBM Thinkpad is probably the thickest laptop I have ever seen! well things get slimmer and lighter as the generations go. basically these newer laptops are on way better diets and are losing weight!! LOL ;) don't hate it's just a joke but seriously tech has really improved over the past several years

The display IS capable of scaling - you need a small TSR driver from one of the driver disks that came with the laptop. I know this, because the laptop is very similar to the 760ED from around the same period.

Wake up in the morning, new psivewri videos is up, best thing ever!

This really shows how good the ThinkPad line-up has been in terms if quality.

Just press fn+F8 and the display will scale the content to fullscreen. Also it's cheap to get a better display. Mine has a TFT display and has no blurriness at all. It is a surprisingly bright and wide angle panel for the age. Yours has a FRSTN display, which is just atrocious. These are very solid machines, so get a better one for it! :D

Love these old laptop resurrection videos

The only downside to IBM Thinkpads is that they become addictive, and you end up owning more than you originally planned to do! I had about eleven up until last year, but slowly offloading some to Ebay. However I will no doubt end up adding more in the coming years!

You're really taking me back with this one

LGR has covered both this and it's XD variant cousin. He might know the key combo to scale the screen.

The 365 and more are the first era off notebook before only laptops and heavy weight.

Thats sound bring me to 4 years old memory , when my dad bring me to their office and all his friend on the office allowed me to playing the office computer...

Well, Classic 90,s IBM laptops are no longer sleeper buys. Get'em while you can...

birthday upload oh its 2019

Hehe I live for this stuff! I love chunky laptops. Why is an extra 1/2" of thickness such a problem for people lol. (well in this case, an inch) Wow, never tried eucalyptus oil, great for sanitizing but doesn't it dissolve the plastic?

press f1 to go to the bios and turn hv expamsion on. that option enables display scaling.

Up next: fixing up an old IBM server

You got a few ads back yayyy I want to support you

<a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="289">4:49</a> "For distribution only with a new PC" Only OEM system builders can legally golf on their customers' computers.

IIRC, some older thinkpad do scale up the lcd to fullscreen for displaying lower resolution setting different from lcd's native. Either in the bios setting or shortcut key fn+f8 (if i'm not mistaken), or was it in the driver setting/thinkpad utilities. Oh, one more thing, those old thinkpads are uber durable, had 760xl that's been taken apart completely then rebuilt back frankenstein style for many many times over many many years and the damn thing still working; so a little bump on the postal service really just like a little shrug off for these older thinkpads (one that still using 3 digits numbering models followed by some lettering).

I always called them "eraserheads". I have one on my IBM X41 tablet which I use everyday for work because it has an eraserhead.

I wonder that what do you do with so many old and obselete machines after doing videos on them?

Oh my god that demo video is the literal definition of 90s tat

one time i was given a yellow dell laptop to take apart, possibly a business machine

"Fixing a DELL laptop" the thing you might never hear in your life.

It's great to see there are still folks out there like yourself who work to bring old computers back to life. I have a recommendation. I know that you're not very familiar with Linux, however Linux has the ability to truly revive these old computers most of the time. The benefit is that unlike Windows 7 and previous versions of Windows, these Linux distributions will continue to receive security updates for some time. I've used Linux Mint Xfce 32-bit (linuxmint.com/download.php) and Puppy Linux (puppylinux.com/) on 32-bit machines. The installation is pretty straightforward (you can even install it from a CD or DVD). These older computers are still good for some general productivity as well as basic games and even browsing the internet. Not only that, but Mint ships with a complete Office Suite already installed. My parents use an old HP-Compaq laptop that’s 16 years old now. It won’t run Windows 8 or higher, so I installed Linux Mint Xfce on it and it works just fine with only 2gb ram and a 30gb hard drive. It's by no means a speed demon, but it sure beat out the need to purchase a new computer for them to just browse the web and use email. In addition to this, it keeps yet another perfectly-working computer out of a landfill. Keep up the good work!

I love this vids of old computers!

<a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="110">1:50</a> nostalgia

Windows 95 in 2019 Wow!

Watching you cleaning laptops is satisfying

I love how IBM ThinkPads haven't changed much in looks

I loved Commander Keen, great game

“Portability” 🤣

Classy psion 5 on the table!

The Windows 95 boot sound is the best evar.

eucalyptus oil companies after inventing Psivewri: WOOOO! IM RICH!

Can we modify the body of laptop and put inside more modern specs hardware? Such a beautiful body does not manufacture nowadays designs

You have good taste in games. I salute you.

Excelent video. I have the same and installed on it Windows 98. Run perfect. Played quake, dukenukem and nes emulator among other classic games

Great video and great buy!