Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!bonnie.concordia.ca!uunet!samsung!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!wuarchive!udel!burdvax!pastor From: pastor@PRC.Unisys.COM (Jon Pastor) Newsgroups: comp.sys.laptops Subject: Battery, memory, and disk info for the T1000SE Message-ID: <16203@burdvax.PRC.Unisys.COM> Date: 21 Jan 91 17:45:12 GMT References: <177692@kean.ucs.mun.ca> Sender: news@PRC.Unisys.COM Organization: Unisys Corporation, Paoli Research Center; Paoli, PA Lines: 55 I just spoke with Toshiba's tech people (1-800-999-4273). According to the person I was speaking with, they suggest charging up the machine at least once a week if you have hardRAM; if you're going to have to go more than a week between fillups, back up hardRAM and don't expect it to be there when you come back (although there's no reason to expect it to go at any particular time). I don't have my user manual here, so I can't check this against the specs. I asked, while I had them on the line, whether it hurts to (1) charge up before running the battery all the way down or (2) leave it plugged in for extended periods. The answer to (1) was, as expected, that NiCd batteries do not take kindly to partial charges [in case you didn't know, they develop a "memory" for the partial charge and lose their ability to take a full charge; this is reversible, I believe, by a couple of full-discharge/recharge cycles]. Let your batteries run all the way down as often as you can before charging, rather than charging after each use. BTW, "all the way down" is apparently "until it starts beeping at you". The answer to (2) was that they do not recommend leaving it plugged in all the time, but extended charging ("a couple of months") will not do any harm. In summary, discharge fully, and let the machine come up to a full charge without worrying about overcharging, but don't leave it plugged in forever. Another question I asked was about third-party memory: would it damage my machine? The answer was "highly unlikely". I have seen third-party memory much cheaper than Toshiba memory, which lists for $999. I asked about disk drives. The Toshiba floppy lists for $499; there are 20/40/100/200 MB hard drives from Axonix that hook onto the parallel port, with the 20MB listing for $799; and a 20MB from Weltech (sp?) that goes on the serial port for about $1100. I didn't ask about third-party floppies, under the assumption that they were not going to give me another source for things they'd like to sell me. I did get a useful piece of advice on third-party hardware. Toshiba will honor warranty repairs on machines that have third-party stuff installed *PROVIDED* that the third-party stuff didn't cause the damage. If you buy and install third-party stuff, get a written commitment from the manufacturer that they'll repair any damage caused to your machine if Toshiba refuses to do so. Right. That's the old single-source/ multiple-source dilemma, and will be easier to talk about than to do, but at least you don't have to rip out your Megahertz modem if you floppy drive flakes out so Toshiba won't see non-Toshiba hardware and void your warranty. Although it would be interesting to see what they'd do about a memory error in resident RAM if you also had a third-party RAM card... Also, in the unlikely event that anyone else got a wrong steer from his/her dealer, there are factory authorized service centers other than the one you have to mail your machine to. In fact, I found one about two miles from home. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Jon Pastor pastor@prc.unisys.com Unisys Corporation ..!{psuvax1,sdcrdcf,cbmvax,bpa}!burdvax!pastor PO Box 517, Paoli PA 19301 215-648-2769 (o)