Posted inElectronics & Retro Gaming

Compaq SLT/286 Tear Down and RTC Real Time Clock Battery Fix

A good while back, I picked up a somewhat crusty Compaq SLT/286 “portable” with an azerty keyboard for $20. The owner sold it saying that the laptop wouldn’t fire up, the power supply just blinked a green LED, and that was it. I was just happy to add a 286 to my collection, and for the of fun trying to bring it back to life!

Well, today I found a folder on my phone with all the pictures I took so that, a) I could put the damn thing back together, and b) for that big long article I was going to write about the fix process. (haha)

Instead… Here’s a 65 image pictorial, with some random comments and links thrown in.

No Comments
Posted inElectronics & Retro Gaming

Commodore C64 Quick RF to Composite Video Mod

When I got my C64, it did not come with a power supply or video cable. A friend loaned me a power supply, but I had to wait weeks for my video cable to arrive from eBay. In the meantime, I was struggling for a way to get video, until I found this page shows the pinouts for the C64 AV connector. Helpfully, pin 4 on this connector is a composite out signal! So I made this quick video mod, to get composite video through the RCA RF jack on the back of the C64 while I waited for my AV cable to arrive.

No Comments
Posted inAstronomy Astrophotography

M51 The Whirlpool Galaxy

M51 The Whirlpool Galaxy
M51 The Whirlpool Galaxy


I pushed my FSQ to f/8 with the Extender-Q 1.6x for this one. I was my first attempt with this setup because I was having a lot of tracking issues with my G11. I was getting an average RMS of 1.5″ and peaks of 4″. Not great at f/8! After a full clean and relube, lots of fiddling, and adjustment of the worms (boy, was that part frustrating), I now have it down to an RMS of (mostly) just under 0.5″ and peaks of 1.5″….

My first try at processing this came out with a lot of noise, bad color balance, and bad background gradients because I seem to have messed up my flats. This version was a re-process with no flats, which still produced some strong gradients, but they were much easier to filter out in PixInsight. I’m pretty happy with the color and detail now, and I am really impressed with the Extender-Q and the performance of the FSQ at f/8. Next (if I ever see good weather again) I’m going to try for M81/M82 with this setup.

No Comments