Psion netBook
 | |
| A Psion netBook running EPOC ER5 | |
| Specifications | |
|---|---|
| Developer | Psion PLC (Psion Enterprise Computing) |
| Manufacturer | Psion PLC |
| Type | Clamshell sub-notebook |
| Released | 1999 |
| Discontinued | November 2003 |
| CPU | Intel StrongARM SA-1100 at 190 MHz |
| Memory | 32 MB DRAM, expandable to 64 MB |
| Storage | CompactFlash Type II (including IBM Microdrive), PC Card Type I/II |
| Display | 7.7 in 640 × 480 backlit colour STN touchscreen, 256 colours |
| Sound | 12-bit audio, built-in speaker and microphone |
| Dimensions | 235 mm × 182 mm × 37 mm |
| Weight | 1150 g including battery pack |
| OS / Firmware | EPOC32 (ER5), loaded from an OS.img file |
| Predecessor | Psion Series 5mx |
| Successor | Psion netBook Pro |
| Model no. | Also sold, in reduced form, as the Psion Series 7 |
The Psion netBook of 1999 is Psion's corporate sub-notebook: a StrongARM clamshell with a 7.7-inch colour VGA touchscreen, a full-travel keyboard and an operating system that is not in the machine at all. Psion Enterprise Computing sold it to fleet buyers who wanted to configure their own image, and the Series 7 that followed in 2000 was the same machine cut down for consumers.[1][2]
It is also the machine that gave the world the word netbook — a trademark Psion Teklogix was still defending with cease-and-desist letters in December 2008, by which time the term had escaped.[1]
Hardware
| Item | Specification |
|---|---|
| Processor | Intel StrongARM SA-1100 at 190 MHz, 16 KB instruction cache, 8 KB data cache |
| RAM | 32 MB DRAM, expandable to 64 MB with a 32 MB module |
| ROM | None. In EPOC, about 14 MB of RAM is presented as the Z: drive |
| Boot Flash | 16 Mbit (2 MB) rewritable Flash holding the bootloader — reported as a Sharp LH28F160S3HT-L10A (LHF16KA7). netBooks carry bootloader version 11 |
| Display | 7.7 in 640 × 480 backlit colour STN touchscreen, 256 colours, nine brightness levels |
| Storage | CompactFlash Type I/II 3.3 V (IBM Microdrive supported); one PC Card Type I/II slot |
| Serial | RS-232 to 115200 baud via a Maxim 78266, a part made for Psion and functionally close to a MAX3243; plus SIR infrared |
| Main power | 11.1 V, 1500 mAh Li-ion pack of three CGR18650H cells |
| Backup power | CR2032 lithium coin cell |
| External power | 15.5 V, 1.5 A (one source gives 15 V); 4.75 mm OD / 1.75 mm ID barrel |
| Keyboard | 84 keys, QWERTY |
| Size and weight | 235 × 182 × 37 mm, 1150 g with the battery |
| Environmental | 0–50 °C operating; designed to survive a 1 m drop onto wood; IP30; EN55022 Class B, FCC Part 15 Class B |
No internal operating system
This is the single most important thing to know about a netBook, and the reason a perfectly healthy one can look dead.
The netBook contains no operating system. At power-on it searches the D: drive for a CompactFlash card holding a file called OS.img, loads it into a walled-off region of RAM, and runs from there. If no card is present it displays a message saying so. Because the OS lives in RAM, the netBook ships with twice the Series 7's memory.[2]
The arrangement was deliberate: fleet customers could build their own image, roll out updates by replacing one file, and standardise a thousand machines without opening any of them.[2]
The personality module
The memory and bootloader sit on a removable card — Psion's "personality module" — reached under the covers above the keyboard. Swapping it changes what the machine is, and the community established this by experiment:[2][4]
- Fitting a netBook module to a Series 7 produces a working netBook. The reported CPU speed changes from 132.71 MHz to 191.692 MHz, RAM rises to 32 MB, and the netBook logo replaces the Series 7 one.[2]
- The reverse — netBook down to Series 7 — is the safer direction. Going the other way "may not work, as some Series 7 failed the test for being able to work reliably at the higher speed."[4]
- Only 16, 32 and 64 MB configurations are accepted. 48 MB does not work, and a Series 7 memory upgrade will not work in a netBook.[4]
Remove all batteries before changing the module.[2]
Boards and revisions
The netBook and Series 7 share the same motherboard, with revisions over the production run:[4]
- "Most Series 7s and Netbooks share exactly the same motherboards. Early Series 7s appeared to have a lower power limit on the PCMCIA slot. Very recent Netbooks have a higher power rating for GPRS cards."[4]
- Revision 10 began in week 35 of 2002 and replaced revision 7; it supplies more current to the PC Card slot.[4]
- Date of manufacture is encoded in the serial number, on a paper slip inside the CompactFlash slot: after the four letters, the first digit is the year (8 = 2000, 0 = 2002, 1 = 2003) and the next two are the week.[4]
A teardown in December 1999 found an SA1100, an ASIC manufactured by NEC and a Philips CPLD with five visible JTAG programming pads on the underside of the board.[5]
The board also carries two unfitted DRAM sockets and what appears to be an unfitted Flash ROM site. At least one owner soldered Hitachi HM5165165LTT-6 devices to them to make a 32 MB Series 7 mainboard, noting that low-power parts are essential because the DRAM is powered continuously.[4]
Malaysian netBooks
A few thousand netBooks reached the market in late 2002 when the education company OneEd went bankrupt. These "mBooks" or "malayBooks" are hardware-identical to an ordinary netBook but carry bootloader version 12, which prevents standard EPOC upgrades from installing.[3]
Replacing the personality module with an ordinary netBook one is the understood route to making them behave normally. For Linux they need no special treatment at all.[3]
Linux
The OpenPsion project (formerly PsiLinux) ported a 2.4 kernel to the netBook, with framebuffer, X11, CompactFlash, PCMCIA and touchscreen support. Two boot routes exist: ArLo, which starts Linux from a running EPOC system, and bookboot, which builds a Linux OS.img the bootloader loads directly.[3]
Three things never worked: power management (there is no way to switch a Linux netBook off), battery level reading, and sound. Infrared never worked either.[3]
General maintenance
Troubleshooting
Battery service
See also
- Psion Series 7 — the consumer version of the same machine
- Psion netBook Pro — the 2003 Windows CE successor
- Psion Series 5mx · Battery Refurbishment · Recommended Tools
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 "Psion netBook", Wikipedia. Source for the release date, the corporate positioning, the relationship to the Series 7, the netBook Pro succession and the netbook trademark history.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 2.5 "Psion Series 7 FAQ: General & hardware information", oocities.org/epoc_32 (February 2000). Source for the netBook's OS.img boot arrangement, the RAM difference, the CPU speeds, the ROM-board swap results, the screen behaviour, the reset procedures and the hardware quirks described here.
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 3.4 OpenPsion (formerly PsiLinux), "Linux on the Psion netBook HOWTO — section 3.4, The netBook Specifications". Source for the processor and cache sizes, memory configurations, the bootloader Flash part, display and panel notes, the serial interface chip, the power specification and cell type, the physical and environmental ratings, and the Malaysian netBook history.
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 4.4 4.5 4.6 4.7 Eric Lindsay, "Psion 7 and NetBook Portable Computers", mirrored at ericlindsay.com. Source for the motherboard revisions and week-coded serial numbers, the memory-size restrictions, the netBook-to-Series 7 downgrade caveat, the microphone contact fault, the display description and the RS-232 port cover comment. Includes material posted to comp.sys.psion by Ralph Barrett.
- ↑ Craig Newell, "Disassembling the NetBook", 14 December 1999. Source for the disassembly sequence and the identification of the SA1100, the NEC ASIC and the Philips CPLD.