digger
Experienced Member
Hi everyone,
Before you judge me, please read the entire post.
So I finally received my Tandy 1000 EX that I ordered on-line from someone in Greece. I was excited to try it out, but the plug was missing from the power cord. At first that gave me some pause about the possibility that this might be a North American unit, since Tandy 1000 machines weren't that common in Europe. However, I saw a "warranty void if opened" label on the bottom that contained notices in 4 European languages, including German and even Dutch(!). So it must certainly be a unit intended for the European market, or so I thought.
So I spliced a grounded Schuko plug to the severed power cable, noticing that the previous owner had apparently connected an ungrounded plug to it, since the yellow/green ground wire was cut back lower with no copper exposed.
Anyway, I powered the machine up, it sprung to life, the PSU fan was spinning and the power LED lit up... For a few seconds. Then I saw a brief flash on the back of the unit towards the PSU and the system went dead.
I opened up the system, and the left-side of the cover that covered the power supply had a sticker with a warning to wait 10 seconds after powering off the system before accessing the PSU. That warning was also shown in the same 4 languages (English, French, German and Dutch). Then I removed that cover and took a look at the PCB of the power supply. In the corner, towards the back of the unit, where the power cable plugs into the PCB, I noticed a printed text on the PCB that said "120VAC". There was my first "uh oh", moment. I removed the fuse and took a closer look at it. It looked dirty, so it looks like it had indeed blown out.
Then, I finally took a closer look at the label on the back of the unit. And on the top of the label it indeed said "VOLT ... 120 V FREQ ... 60 Hz AMP ... 0.4 A"
D'oh! This was such a classic embarrassing n00b mistake. But I was really lulled into a false sense of security by those multilingual labels. Why on Earth would a North American computer have warranty notices and warning labels in multiple languages, two of which are only spoken in Europe? (Well, they speak Dutch in Suriname as well, but I doubt that would have been a large market for Tandy.)
So my question for people more knowledgeable (and competent) than me is this: how likely is it that the fuse completely protected the unit? The unit was running and being powered by 230V for at least a few seconds before the fuse blew out. If a PSU rated for 120V 60Hz gets 230V 50Hz, doesn't that also result in roughly twice the DC power that it feeds into the circuitry? So 5V becomes 10V and 12V becomes 24V? Or are there voltage regulators and such that would limit the DC voltage regardless? This is a machine from 1986.
I really hope it's only the fuse that got damaged, or at most the PSU. Tandy 1000s are rare and valuable these days! I'm glad I found this one at a somewhat reasonable price, and from a European seller no less. The PSU looks fine by the way. No bulging caps or anything.
Thanks for any advice or other information you can provide. And feel free to chew me out, or to laugh at my expense.
Before you judge me, please read the entire post.
So I finally received my Tandy 1000 EX that I ordered on-line from someone in Greece. I was excited to try it out, but the plug was missing from the power cord. At first that gave me some pause about the possibility that this might be a North American unit, since Tandy 1000 machines weren't that common in Europe. However, I saw a "warranty void if opened" label on the bottom that contained notices in 4 European languages, including German and even Dutch(!). So it must certainly be a unit intended for the European market, or so I thought.
So I spliced a grounded Schuko plug to the severed power cable, noticing that the previous owner had apparently connected an ungrounded plug to it, since the yellow/green ground wire was cut back lower with no copper exposed.
Anyway, I powered the machine up, it sprung to life, the PSU fan was spinning and the power LED lit up... For a few seconds. Then I saw a brief flash on the back of the unit towards the PSU and the system went dead.
I opened up the system, and the left-side of the cover that covered the power supply had a sticker with a warning to wait 10 seconds after powering off the system before accessing the PSU. That warning was also shown in the same 4 languages (English, French, German and Dutch). Then I removed that cover and took a look at the PCB of the power supply. In the corner, towards the back of the unit, where the power cable plugs into the PCB, I noticed a printed text on the PCB that said "120VAC". There was my first "uh oh", moment. I removed the fuse and took a closer look at it. It looked dirty, so it looks like it had indeed blown out.
Then, I finally took a closer look at the label on the back of the unit. And on the top of the label it indeed said "VOLT ... 120 V FREQ ... 60 Hz AMP ... 0.4 A"
D'oh! This was such a classic embarrassing n00b mistake. But I was really lulled into a false sense of security by those multilingual labels. Why on Earth would a North American computer have warranty notices and warning labels in multiple languages, two of which are only spoken in Europe? (Well, they speak Dutch in Suriname as well, but I doubt that would have been a large market for Tandy.)
So my question for people more knowledgeable (and competent) than me is this: how likely is it that the fuse completely protected the unit? The unit was running and being powered by 230V for at least a few seconds before the fuse blew out. If a PSU rated for 120V 60Hz gets 230V 50Hz, doesn't that also result in roughly twice the DC power that it feeds into the circuitry? So 5V becomes 10V and 12V becomes 24V? Or are there voltage regulators and such that would limit the DC voltage regardless? This is a machine from 1986.
I really hope it's only the fuse that got damaged, or at most the PSU. Tandy 1000s are rare and valuable these days! I'm glad I found this one at a somewhat reasonable price, and from a European seller no less. The PSU looks fine by the way. No bulging caps or anything.
Thanks for any advice or other information you can provide. And feel free to chew me out, or to laugh at my expense.