Torx Screwdrivers for Jornada 680s

Thought some might be interested in the result of my search for a set of micro torx screwdrivers. After finding sources that grossly overcharge, I discovered that Home Depot carries a quality set of precision micro Torx driver tips made by Husky. The eight-in-one kit (T4 - T10 & T15). The bits are stored in the handle. "For precision engineering, electronics..." PRICE? $5.97 !

If you do not have a local Home Depot, you can order the set, for the same price, through the Home Depot Internet site.

For those who have the custom Dutch Railway 680e, I removed the base plate in five minutes and inserted a 256MB compact flash card I had installed in a PCMCIA to CF card adapter card. The 680e recognized it immediately. The unit does have the stabilizer and it is very stable with it out, once you remove the custom plate.

REALLY?! Wow. I went there in a pitiful search and they had NOTHING. Glad it worked out for you, I ended up (partially ) stripping my screws with eyeglass-repair flathead screwdrivers of various sizes....but my screen is stable now!

yep, nice find, i purchased the same ones after looking for a cheap reliable set for doing xbox mod installs and repair. The are a bit tough to find, i searched for a while and finally asked someone who looked knowledgeable quickly, and they directed me to the area the chisels/bits/dremels are housed, ususally in the middle of the store. its a single driver, with 3 dual sided heads with different sized torx, bright yellow and black package gray plastic, top pops off and houses bits, pretty neat little tool, ESP for $6!!

That's a great price! Radio Shack wants $14.95 for their set. Sear's cheapest set is $29.99. And Husky tools are decent.

I went down to my local DIY cornership last year, run by a little old guy who knows about everything he sells, and got T5 through T10 for £6.

Forget large chains like B&Q. Help the little guy.

You can get the Husky set for $5.97 through the Home Depot site, Internet Catalog
# 165748. It is a standard store inventory item, located in the tool cage (or correl) area,

I live in dying Auto country, so our large building supply (Depot & Lowes) tool departments are staffed by older, former auto workers. They know what they have & like sharing their knowledge. where the power and hand tools are located. I also picked up a tiny (quality) pen micro screwdriver set (four micro bits in the reverse end) for $2.95

Now, if I can find a J-680 screen protector...

The Expansys J700 series ones will fit the J600 series.

This is what you need. Comes in a pack of 10 and fits 680 screens just fine it:

http://www.expansys-usa.com/product.asp?code=EXP-PROTEC-720

I'd wondered why they sell them 10 per pack, until I put them on and discovered they do scratch up faster than I'd expected. But they do protect the screen itself and don't fog the display much at all.

Re: Expans's screen protector: in the end, are you satisfied with them? I use Write Rights, old ones left over from the Newton days. I feel that while they may protect, they do cut down on visibilty.

And they were a bear to custom-cut and put on, usually trapping some kind of dust against the screen, even though I was working in a clean, careful environment.

Jake

Well, I'd prefer not having to have them. But the touch screen on these HP's are definitely more prone to getting scratches from the stylus than some other PDAs, like the Tungsten, or my old Psion 5. My wife put a couple of light scratches across the first unit's display playing solitaire the first day.

The Expansys screen protectors seem to be the ONLY ones available. They are approximately 1.5 millimeters smaller than the 680e screen, so there's no trimming needed. They are thin sheets of soft plastic of around 5 mil thickness (not unlike high-quality comic book/magazine archival bags) and have a sticky cling side that adheres well enough that you can't see any air bubbles after you've pressed it down. Because of the sticky side, one needs to be a bit careful lining them up. Their slightly-smaller-than-screen size helps in case you're slightly off angle, but I suppose the gaps could also trap dust.

They do dim the display a little and add an *extremely* slight moire that most people wouldn't notice (doubtless due to light diffraction throught the added layer). But my biggest complaint is that the material scratches easily. In just two days of light stylus use (I try to use the keyboard as much as possible) I already have about a dozen noticeable scratches on the protector. This explains why they ship in packs of ten. Annoying, but I'd still rather have scratches on the protector than on the actual screen.

So, in the end, I could want for something better. But since handhelds are hard to find these days (at least in the U.S.), I feel screen protectors are something of an aid to prolonging the life of my units as much as possible.

Edited by Lensman 2005-03-05 10:03 PM

Thanks for a very informative post, fair and well-reasoned. I guess I'm going to go ahead and order a set.

I agree with you: the HP screen is more delicate than most, certainly more delicate than my Mako.

Writerights appear to have more durability, and I actually have about five or six left. But WR packaged their protectors in boxes that used to hold CDs, so the plastic contraption for the CD's hole pressed and scarred all the protectors. Hard to believe the company's still in business with such comic shipping and handling.

Well, as you say, the competition is thin.

Thanks again for filling me in.

Jake

You're quite welcome. Bummer on those Write Rights. If they packaged them in jewel cases it seems like they'd at least have removed the inner tray holder first.

I'm now seeing what you mean about dust. Somehow overnight, some starting appearing on my screen. I suppose the cling surface may attract it. Guess I'll add canned air to my 680e accessories.

On the one hand it's disappointing that there aren't more choices. On the other it's pretty nice that there's still someone selling them.

Hey, if you've got dust ON your protectors, then you're ahead of me, since I've got everything stored UNDER my WriteRight

Wonder why Psion (whose hardware has never been known for its durability) could come up with a tougher screen material.

Jake

There are companies that sell PDA screen protector kits. You fit them yourself. I examined one that is a little pricey but it makes it so users can see the screen in bight outdoor like. The protector filters UV rays. I am not up to laying out $35 for a screen protector myself. It has given me some ideas though. What they did was simply a chemical treatment of protector plastic.

Thank you all for the information. I noticed the screen protector that came on my unit is easily scratched. There is no excuse for such a poor screen lense. I have a Casio BE 300 that has a much tougher screen that you describe Jornada 600s to have. Many owners do not bother to get protectors. I would never consider that but there are owners who do not get them and the BE is 2001 technology.

The link was particularly helpful. Does anyone know if the protectors will ship from UK or USA?

By the way, some BE 300 enthusiasts spray paint the removeable plastic flip cover, that comes with BE 300s. We remove them and use heat resistant flat black spray paint from Lowes. We then position the cover toward the sun and can see the screen fine. In a sense, we turn the flip cover into a sun shade.

By the way, will a Serial to USB adapter work with the J680s? I am not sure but I think USB may require a driver but it seems to me that HP did sell USB cables for the 600s, which would mean the unit supports at least USB 1.0 -Correct?

Edited by bruisedquasar 2005-03-06 8:10 PM

That's not good. The Expansys units do adhere quite tightly to the screen, so there' really no space for dust to go behind. The dust on the edges might cause the protector to start curling after a while, but I don't know. Though perhaps that's another reason they come in packs of 10. I guess I'll just have to see how they fair over time.



These 680e's are nice and there's some really cool stuff they can do... try playing a video on a Psion. But the screens do leave a little to be desired. Double-clicking on a 680e is like rolling dice - a gamble.

I do miss my old Psion 5. Yes Psions were flimsy in their manufacture, but their engineers were quite ingenious. Old Psion screens were clear, tough, and had the good stylus sensitivity that PocketPCs have only recently come to match. Plus, no one has ever come up with a better fold-out mechanism that minimized overall size while maximizing screen and keyboard sizes like Psion. And I absolutely loved the way the Psion 5 used standard AA batteries and ran for weeks! Of course, the Psion also didn't run Windows, so it naturally it was faster and more stable as well.

I do have to give props to the Jornada keyboard. I was concerned the much-smaller keys would be more difficult to type on than the Psion 5's. But to my surprise, they're actually a little better. My wife (who wrote a novel on the Psion 5 agrees). This appears to be because you can hit a key on the Jornada anywhere and it'll register, whereas hitting a key off-center on the Psion might not. The 680e, despite the screen, is also considerably better made.

Edited by Lensman 2005-03-06 10:23 PM