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You are here: MacNN Forums > Enthusiast Zone > Hardware Hacking > DVD in indigo iBook

DVD in indigo iBook
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SmileyDude
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Mar 1, 2001, 09:21 AM
 
Hello,

Has anyone tried installing a DVD drive in an regular 2000 iBook? If I can obtain a drive, I want to upgrade my iBook to quasi SE status. But I was wondering how DVDs would play on it, considering it's 100mhz slower than the SE....

which brings me to the next step... I'm assuming that it's fairly easy to OC the iBook... if I was to overclock it to 466mhz, would that fool the OS into thinking it was a SE? Specifically, would I be able to clock down to 366mhz with the Energy control panel like you can on a SE?

The end result of all this hacking, is of course, having an iBook SE in the coolest of the iBook colors, indigo.

Thanks!

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dennis
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SmileyDude  (op)
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Mar 8, 2001, 12:23 PM
 
Hmmm... no ideas? No one with an iBook on this forum?

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dennis
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sine -''-..-
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Mar 8, 2001, 12:57 PM
 
well first of all, blueberry is the best

and secondly, putting in a dvd should be pretty simple... i wouldnt worry about if the 366 can handle dvd... one reader in the imac fourm sed he got a dvd drive to work in his imac rev c. the only thing i wonder about is how the video card needs to support the dvd drive....

anyhow im realli interested in this as my blazin blueberry could realli use a dvd


s i n e
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sine -''-..-

now known as pillowcase

     
SmileyDude  (op)
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Mar 9, 2001, 09:28 AM
 
well, that is a concern that the 366 couldn't support the DVD, since the decoding is done via software. Hence, the overclocking as well.

I have an email to pbparts.com regarding the DVD, but they seem to be on spring break (doesn't look spring from here ) so they haven't gotten back to me.

The tough part is that the current iBook is only 6 months old... all of them are still under warranty. So it may be tough to get any parts from broken machines.... but maybe later this year.

There is another option... if anyone is in the market for an iBook (not the SE, but wants it in the graphite color, I'd be willing to swap out motherboards and DVDs... I'll pay the difference in price between the two models. Of course, this would work out much better if we're both in the same area... so, anyone in the Boston area, post a message!

btw... blueberry was nice, but I prefered tangerine... it was one of those colors that really did look much nicer in real life. I still haven't seen a key lime iBook, so I can't comment on those, but they are at the bottom of my list

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dennis
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Steph
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Mar 11, 2001, 12:48 AM
 
My 366 MHz Key Lime iBook plays DVD movies routinely. It has no DVD drive, but I make disk-images and firewire them onto the hard drive when I want them. I use a modified version of DVD Player, and it works just fine. So I'd say the 366 MHz is quite sufficient for DVD playback.

--Stephanie
     
SmileyDude  (op)
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Mar 11, 2001, 08:07 PM
 
So, that means that I could go sans motherboard upgrade/OC, and just get the drive...

just where can I get the drive? .. still no word from pbparts (spring break.. hopefully tommorow)... but if they don't have them yet, then I may be SOL...


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dennis
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Steph
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Mar 12, 2001, 01:12 AM
 
If pbparts has the drive, please let us all know what it costs. I might even think about popping a DVD drive into my iBook, if it's not too costly.

--Stephanie
     
SmileyDude  (op)
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Mar 12, 2001, 09:54 AM
 
Well, they don't have the drives now... I just got the reply from them. They claim that you would need DVD decoder hardware in addition to the drive, but Steph's would suggest otherwise. And since Apple hasn't done hardware decoding in quite some time, I seriously doubt the motherboards are different... beyound the 100mhz difference.

But, to be sure... has anyone compared the boards in a iBook 366 vs an SE 466?

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dennis
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Thebaddog
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Mar 13, 2001, 08:17 PM
 
ive seen the mobos, they look the same (side by side..) there is no HW decoder in the SE.
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SmileyDude  (op)
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Mar 16, 2001, 01:36 AM
 
Thebaddog --

Do you still have access to them? I was wondering if they were any jumpers changed...

I would really like to O/C mine to 466mhz, but I would really like it if the Energy control panel allowed me to clock it back down to 366mhz on demand, like the real SE's do. That would bring me closer to my goal

Has anyone actually O/C a 2000 iBook? Is the procedure the same as on the Rev A/B iBooks? or is it radically different?

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dennis
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AlbertWu
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Mar 16, 2001, 06:36 AM
 
The DVD/CD-Rom drive for laptops are standardized components that can be swapped out of any laptop (even a PC) by removing the right number of screws. I recently had a broken powerBook CR-Rom drive, and in 5 minutes, opened up the expansion module, and swapped it with the one in my Acer's CD module. The only thing that may be different is where the face plate attatches, which would leave a big hole, especially in the iBook.

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AlbertWu
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SmileyDude  (op)
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Mar 16, 2001, 12:22 PM
 
The DVD/CD-Rom drive for laptops are standardized components that can be swapped out of any laptop (even a PC) by removing the right number of screws. I recently had a broken powerBook CR-Rom drive, and in 5 minutes, opened up the expansion module, and swapped it with the one in my Acer's CD module. The only thing that may be different is where the face plate attatches, which would leave a big hole, especially in the iBook.
Hmm, I'd be very hesitant to try this... not from a technical point, just from an asethetic view. I like the way the iBook looks, and I really don't want to leave a hole on the side.

Also, I just looked at the CD drive on the Dell Laptop I have to use for work, and it looks like the tray is molded with the door. It would probally require a lot of surgery to do it...

Now, it may be possible to transplant the guts of the DVD drive into the CD tray and mechanism...

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dennis
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gumby5647
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Mar 17, 2001, 10:43 PM
 
i thought that you needed 400mhz or more for DVD???

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SmileyDude  (op)
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Mar 18, 2001, 10:21 AM
 
i thought that you needed 400mhz or more for DVD???
I think that was probally more of a marketing ploy... If we had a DVD player under OS X, we could actually figure up how accurate that was by looking at how much CPU was being used by the player.

But, since Steph is able to play DVD videos on a 366mhz w/66mhz bus, I'd say that 400mhz w/100mhz bus is a bit conservative.

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dennis
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