Several years ago, I purchased a small compressor to use in the garage and then Annie added a portable tank as a Christmas present. I should mention at this point that I rarely use the commercial canned compressed air at home, as it's just too expensive. It's a good idea to hold the floppy drive opening down with a finger holding the drive cover open and give it a good blast of compressed air. Dust accumulates from air drawn in by the power supply fan. ![]() The floppy drive is one of the primary dust catchers of any machine and the 7500's floppy is no different. The floppy drive releases from the top by spreading two plastic retainers and lifting up and towards the rear of the machine. Thanks to Kyle Hansen for the correction. I got this one wrong in the first writing of this column as well. The top hard drive sled releases in back by lifting the plastic sled catch and pulling either forward or back and lifting. I was a little overenthusiastic with a catch on a 7200 and broke it rather easily! At any rate, I'd never noticed the sliding tray feature until Tim wrote. As the plastic ages, it does get brittle. Just pry to the inside and slide the tray towards the front of the computer. A plastic catch on each side latches the tray. I find it easier to remove the 3 cables (power, SCSI, and audio) on the CD after releasing the sled and pulling it forward just a bit.įrequent reader Tim Baxter pointed out that the top drive assembly pulls out for easier access to releases and cabling. I often just grip the release with a pair of needlenose pliers, lift up and pull (gently!!). The CD-ROM releases by pushing up on the plastic drive release in the front center of the sled and pulling out the drive. Hard drives and the CD-ROM drive are mounted on plastic sleds. One extra 3.5" (width) drive bay is provided directly under the main hard drive bay (filled in the pictures left and below). The 7500 comes equipped with a floppy drive, a 500-1000 MB hard drive, and a 4X CD-ROM. Once the case is off, all drives are rather easily accessible. Even though I've opened up these cases many times, I still find myself reaching to the rear of the case to open it as one would with the Mac II, Centris/Quadra, and 6100 series machines. Lift the outer case cover upward and towards the front of the computer. The 7500 case opens by pressing upwards on two release buttons at the front of the case. Machines with the 7500 form factor, which includes the 7300 and the 7600, are some of the easiest ever made by Apple to service. The Power Mac 72 introduced a new case design that features easy access to all oft used and upgraded components. I can always ground myself out by touching a grounded cover plate screw. While most manuals suggest you open up a computer case and then ground yourself out by touching the power supply case, I generally remember what has given me a good static zap during the winter and prefer to unplug everything before opening up a unit. (Note: You'll notice that as your cursor passes over some of the images they are linked to full size photos. ![]() When I put the compressor to the power supply, the sunroom was filled with a cloud of dust! I did the photography as I reassembled the 7500, but will present the photos here to represent a disassembly. Actually, the teardown was done without photos. Don't geeks give nice presents? (My wife, Annie, is a computer and network tech for a large, midwestern banking corporation.) It just seemed like a good idea to go ahead and photograph the teardown and cleanup of the 7500. I'd already planned to do a teardown column on my G3 minitower when I took it apart for cleaning and installation of a 256 MB PC-100 SDRAM chip my honey gave me for my birthday. Just a few weeks ago, I finally got around to compiling some web statistics and found that the column Illustrated Mac IIci Teardown had been one of my most popular columns in the last twelve months. It has either been very dusty at school this year, or my memory is sliding. This practice usually includes a somewhat thorough, yet gentle brushing with a camelshair paint brush that I keep hidden in my computer tool bag from all prospective painters. I was absolutely, positively certain - almost - that I'd cleaned the case when I replaced the chip fan on the 7500's Orange Micro PC card. After making a dandy composite digital photo of the feet, I made the "mistake" of opening the case, grounding myself out, and swiping a finger across the motherboard. I intended just to photograph the "feet" of my Power Mac 7500 for the column Great Classroom Computer Buys: When the Worst Can Turn Out to be the Best.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |