This Vintage Libretto Laptop is TRASH. Let's Fix that.

Software:

The LibrettyKey50:

Chapters:
0:00 - Introduction
1:56 - Breakdown
9:39 - The New Cast
13:35 - Elegoo Centauri Carbon Recap
16:49 - Test Fitting
19:13 - Final Assembly
22:27 - The BIOS Key
27:28 - Success? Final Notes

Music:
(All music is licensed through Epidemic Sound unless otherwise stated)
Polymatt Intro & Outro theme - @banjoguyollie
Lumina - Valanta
Goodbye Earth - Sum Wave
DOX - Lennon Hutton
Terms of Gravity - Out To The World
Questions - FLYIN
Out There - Out To The World
Hidden Enigma - Dream Cave

[sampletextlensflare]

The laptop coming out of sleep to it's DECADES OLD session is so crazy to imagine! 10/10

[SkaveRat]

tip: instead of using a heatgun to remove hotglue, use isopropanol. it basicallyy instantly unsticks hotglue without a trace and leaves the glue in one piece, so you can pull it off easily

[rogerwilco]

You should put the type of the laptop in the title for people who are actually looking for solutions with the model specifically.

[julithething]

I love your dedication to just old quirky laptops. Battery not working? reverse engineered. Case cracking? reverse engineered, twice.

[linuxsuperuser]

the internet needs more people like you

[stinkertonsden]

As a fellow owner of the Libretto 50, who's plastics are NOT broken yet, I cannot thank you enough for all the effort you put into this. Fantastic work!

[ptonpc]

I still have my Libretto 100CT. The first time I saw one (1999) it was running NT 4 server and working as a file server.

[DanicusPrime.]

When you said the computer was coming out of hibernation for who knows how long, kind of hits home. Almost out of a sci-fi movie, an AI or a robot waking up after a long slumber and trying to remember their directive or purpose, their protocols sort to speak. I love stories like that.

[Holycurative]

I started out in laptop repair over 20 years ago with an old soldering iron and a borrowed set of screwdrivers and over 3 or 4 years gradually bought equipment. I'm now retired at 56 although I still help out people with tech problems for free and have a small gardening job for fresh air and exercise. The reason I stuck at laptop repair is because it's so bloody satisfying fixing something that's broken, getting into a password locked machine, fault finding and repair in general and watching people when they get their machine back fixed. IPA for hot glue works well and Kapton tape in edge connectors (other people will have said this I expect). Great video BTW!

[voodle_d]

For the scans - try getting hold of an old CCD type scanner, they have a greater depth of field than CMOS sensors that you'll find in all-in-one printer/scanners. That and an unsharp mask should make for more usable scan data for elements further away from the glass

[VerdASMR]

Insane level of quality in this video. Amazing use of such a variety of tools to create this project.

[montre-moi]

I wish some brands would make small, thick, tough laptops again

[Nuklen]

A trick is to put kapton tape over the edge connector pins so you don't get solder on them when soldering next to them. It's a neat solution though, you're almost at the point where a new dock could be made heh.

[kudui]

Each time i watch your next piece i'm amazed how much both work and patience you put in these projects. Not beeing afraid to mention failures, aka stepping stones, which sooner or later will be part of ones project makes it even better. And finally open sourcing your designs is cherry on top. 10/10 will watch it again soon, just for the feel.

[RetroWK]

Great job man! Most people don‘t get how much work this is. It‘s 30 minutes of video but weeks or month of measuring, modelling, printing …repeat. Well done!

[WarlordEnthusiast]

Haha, as soon as I read the title I literally said "What the hell did you say??"
I own both a Libretto 50ct and 100ct along with some accessories:
The dock or "I/O Adapter" as Toshiba calls it, a 56k modem expansion card, a 10mbps ethernet expansion card, 3 floppy disk expansion cards, all the other misc cables and a carry bag designed for the Libretto series.

I inherited the 100ct and accessories from my dad who used it as a demo model whilst he was a sales rep in 2000's for a Toshiba distributer in Dublin, he'd drive around Ireland selling all kinds of hardware but very rarely he'd manage to sell a Libretto to someone higher up that could afford it.

When I was a teenager I worked with my dad who's now a systems technician and we did some work in an office up the country and met one of the executives (Now the CTO) that he'd sold a Libretto 50ct to all those years ago. He'd kept it in pristine condition on the same desk for about 20 years as a daily planner/calendar and he gave it to me as a gift.

So that's how I ended up with two Librettos that I'll never sell for sentimental reasons and because I think they're just about the coolest laptops ever made. The keyboard on the 100ct is broken however, so I might have a crack at fixing it sometime,

[ryuhaneda]

I was curious about old Toshiba Libretto systems for a long time, but never heard of an issue like brittle cases (with that said, i have a beat-down Toshiba laptop from the same era that has cracks in its shell, now I see why).

This one video made me pay attention to laptop teardown, it reminded me of days gone when I used older and slower tech, and it kinda poured a little nerdyness back into me. For a career techie who was starting to really wonder if it was possible to enjoy old tech again, you gave me a reason to smile.

You just got yourself another sub. 😊

Thank you for a little bit of happiness.

[EgoChip]

13:27 those print outs freaked the hell out of me. They look like something out of nightmares.

[dantemalus]

As a child i was fascinated from the Libretto. Such a tiny thing could hold as much power as my computer? So i always wanted one of them.
Well now i wanted to start a project to create a "Pi-bretto". With you work, 3d moddeling the Libretto, a big part is already done.
Thanks for your work! I really like your video and will watch more.^^

[yetzt]

missed opportunity to call your dongle pcb the liberattool :)