GRiD 1530 Dissassembley

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How to see the hard drive in a GRiD 1520/30 series laptop:
This is how to disassemble a 1530 40 Mb HD and floppy laptop. Understand that this is what I do and may be different from the factory method and I am not considered an expert or am in any ways advising you to do it this way, this is just what I do.
First remove AC power supply from the back of the system. Then the two black feet plugs on the back of the case. Then back the two Philips screws out several turns but don’t remove them yet. With the screwdriver on the screws tap the back of the driver in to pop the front of the back cover off the display hinges and remove the screws and back cover at that time.
Second with the display unlatched but down lift the display off the hinges and flip it over to the side. Caution some displays have a power cable on the opposite side of the cable that connects it but it has a disconnect plug. You cannot disconnect the main cable to the display but you won’t need to. Remove the four screws on top of the display driver board and it will pull out with the display cable attached. There will also be a ground cable that can be disconnected but with the display card removed you have plenty of room to work just by laying it aside.
Third take a regular screwdriver and insert it between the plastic keyboard cover and the case and pop the cover out by gently prying up. That will release it from the two front latches.
After this you will have something that looks like this.

 

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The next step is to remove the three white ribbon cables that go over the drive to the back panel. Push in the clip on the front of the connectors and they will unplug. Flip them back over the back panel for now.
Next will be removing the power supply section between the drive assembly and the back panel. It’s held in place with two screws, one on each end and will lift out of the system.
There will be four screws two in the front with one long screw on the display hinge and one regular length one over by the connectors. Remove them, you do not have to remove the display hinge.
The other two screws are located under the power supply that you have already removed.
There are two ribbon cables that connect the drive adapter board to the mother board that use the same type of snap in connectors as the white connectors that you have already removed. Release them and the drive assembly will lift out.

 

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Removing the four screws on each bracket will allow you to remove the screen covers located over the floppy drive and the hard drive.
The adapter board on the back of the two drives has connectors that allow it to connect directly to the floppy and hard drive. The only thing that’s different is that the floppy has in addition to the regular power connector a small power connector but I have seen this on many of the floppy drives and do not think anything is special about this drive and it appears the same size and layout as any floppy drive of the time.
The hard drive is just beneath that and plugs directly into the adapter. It’s a standard IDE series drive, in this case a Conner CP-3044
From what I recall I have replaced them with off the shelf CP-3044 drives before but it’s been years and I may be mistaken, Grid calls that a type 9 drive 40 Mb, 980 cylinders, 5 heads and 17 sectors.






Assembly is reverse order of disassembly. Be careful of how you rout the display cable thru the hinge. I usually check for proper operation before attaching the back cover. Also while it’s apart you may want to change the clock battery located by the front of the drive stack. It’s a hack job but I cut the wires as close to the old battery as possible and solder on jumpers to the new cell.