This laptop was free, the Centre for Computing History in Cambridge had a number of surplus items for sale and some that were free, this was in the free pile. It's a nice compact laptop. It has an Intel 486 DX/2 50MHz CPU, 8MB of RAM (4MB onboard + 4MB expansion), and a 351MB IBM HDD. It didn't come with a power supply.
On attempting to power it up it was unfortunately DOA. With the use of some freezer spray I found that it was due to one of the input tants that had failed short, removing it allowed the laptop to boot, so I replaced it with a modern tantalum polymer cap. However, the serial connector had a loose pin, so I rather foolishly removed it before looking for a replacement - it turns out that they're unobtanium. I did find an Omron part that's almost right, I reckon with a little bit of machining it could be made to fit, but unfortunately it's EOL and the next production date keeps pushing further and further back, so I don't have high hopes. Additionally, the right hand hinge was broken and my attempts to repair it were pretty fruitless. Fortunately Jesse Fenn bought a couple of Conturas that could be broken for spares, so a replacement motherboard and hinge allowed me to get the laptop back together, and the 8MB memory expansion module I got from him for a total of 12MB is a useful upgrade. The battery is of course dead, but I'll deal with that later.
It came with the Compaq OEM version of Windows 3.1 including Xerox TabWorks. Normally I would wipe the hard drive and reinstall, but this installation seems to be working very nicely and as there's a good selection of period software installed, including some specialist software that seems to be used in surveying for upstream oil or gas applications, so I've decided to keep it as-is.
