Compaq Portable 486/66 screen issues

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From my experience, the less disassembly you do the better off you are. The last one I worked on, on the AST has ribbon cable that is bonded directly to the screen and several IC's bonded to this ribbon cable. Rather than a Zebra strip connection. There was nothing there to service, or it sure looked that way to me. I would imagine your Compaq is much the same. I could have unsoldered the ribbon off the control board but there enough room to swing in out on the way.

How much electrolyte damage do you have?

Isopropyl does pretty good.
A strong mix of dish soap and hot water also cleans electrolyte off well. I like Comet on a wet soapy Q-tip for dealing with dull crusty solder pads. i like to keep this away from mounted chips and such, but in the direct work area it's cheap and effective.

My favorite final rinse and for dealing with the greasy leftovers of the electrolyte is Ronsonol lighter fluid. It flows well under SMD chips desolves oils and drives any water out, and wicks up great with paper towels.

 

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I dont mean to hijack the thread from the 486 lcd issues.

I have listened to what most people said about my compaq 286 lcd screen. Most say it probably just looks like it does. Regardless though since I have had to do so many other things to it. I thought I might as well take the lcd apart and just see whats what. I opened it up to see a simple inverter board at the bottom and a ribbon cable and wires to the lcd. I found no smd capacitors on the lcdpanel. Only two long boards with Controller chips. I didnt take that board off to see what was under it. The inverter board has a single electrolytic 100uf 25v capacitor so I replaced it. Two 1uf tantalum capacitors I replaced as well and I used contact cleaner on the sliders.

People also said the external psu should be serviced so I cracked it open. There was just a single 100uf electrolytic capacitor and I replaced it. funny I smelt a fishy smell when I did so It must have been leaking a bit. Used alcohol to clean underneath it but wasnt any residue I could see. The capacitor I removed was epoxy potted at the bottom.
The psu also has two large rifa branded 0.47uf X2 supression capacitors. I dont have any so I ordered a few. I also saw at least one tantalum on one of the several psu daughter boards. Ill get to tantalums when the other suppression caps come in. I cleaned the bezel and lcd thoroughly and used contact cleaner on the sliders.

So when it was back together, yes there is still ghosting. But I think the image is crisper and it doesnt flicker as much when the floppy drive is being accessed. Could this all just be related to contact cleaning the sliders? Yeah maybe.

Early LCD screens were UGLY! I hope someone makes a replacement for this thing in case it bites the dust. Next thing to tackle is the keyboard cable which is just pieces at this point.