Leandro A. F. Pereira

Introduction

I’ve been planning to overclock a little toy of mine (a Toshiba Libretto 50ct) for some time now. Almost the size of a video tape, this notebook is very practical to do some field jobs. But its 75MHz clock frequency is too low for lots of tasks (such as compiling C programs, browsing the Web, etc cetera). And the pointing device (AccuPoint) isn’t that comfortable.

Instructions to overclock are available at various places on the Web. To add the PS/2 port too, although the only page I’ve found suggested the installation on the mini port replicator.

Overclocking

I’ve followed Xin Feng’s instructions and it worked wonderfully: from 75Mhz to 133MHz. I didn’t want to install that diode so I could get 166MHz, since I don’t need a portable fridge.

Soldering with my El Cheapo Hikari 30W soldering iron was a pain, but it worked. I’ve used wires from a printer cable.

PS/2 Port

Googling away for other adventurer fellows who hacked their Librettos to add a PS/2 port, I’ve found a forum post on a Libretto User Group from Taiwan, that showed an internal PS/2 socket. His (or her) hack was wonderfully done: a clean job that didn’t require that bulky port replicator thing. Unfortunately the reset button had to be removed, but I’ve never used it.

All the comments were in Chinese, but the photos spoke by themselves. I’ve found all the PS/2 signals on the Libretto Service Manual, soldered a connector from a PS/2 splitter cable, and Dremelled away the hole. Then glued the connector with hot glue. I’ve also had to remove the power connector on the motherboard, since it wouldn’t fit. I’ve just soldered some telephone wires to the board and used the same connector, which worked out fine.

Tips

• Use soldering paste to solder on the expansion port connector

  

• Wires from 80-way IDE cables are perfect for this job
• If possible, use a thin lead, with a diameter of 0.5mm
• Drill, then use an abrasive point to enlarge the hole

Testing

After my job was done (after two days of SMD soldering with a simple iron — something I’ve never done before), I’ve reassembled the machine, turned on the machine and — voila — it worked! Then booted DOS and opened Norton System Information (the only thing that I had in hand to show the system information). 133MHz. And a significant performance increase in the CPU benchmark. Yay!

Turned off the machine, plugged the first PS/2 mouse I could find. A pretty cheap generic scroll wheel mouse. Turned on, booted DOS again and opened the same program. Whoa, I could move the mouse cursor! No more AccuPoint pain

Then rebooted to Linux and opened AbiWord. The mouse wheel worked fine, and I didn’t had any lags whatsoever.

© 2007 Leandro A. F. Pereira