[NTLK] Serial Port repair or replacement?

[James Fraser]

Hello,

--- On Fri, 10/22/10, Lloyd A. Conway <ssgconway at juno.com> wrote:

>I bought the necessary adapter, and after a few 
>successes, the connection became spotty, so much so that I
>could not load a large file.  After about a week, I could no
>longer connect at  all.   Perhaps I bumped the adapter and
>knocked something loose, or perhaps it was lose to begin with, or...?

Or perhaps the Interconnect Port itself suffers from inferior build quality?  Unfortunately, I think that's what you're encountering there.

IIRC, Apple didn't think very hard when they came up with the soldering scheme for the Interconnect port.  Meaning that, over time, there's a tendency for the port to come loose.  I believe (but am not 100% sure) that this tendency is partly what prompted people to come up with add-ons like the Dongle Destroyer (well, that, and the fact that the dongle, being so small, is so easy to lose).

As far as repair goes, someone else with better soldering skills will have to comment on that.  The only semi-useful advice I can give is A) constantly plugging and unplugging the serial dongle into the interconnect port causes wear and tear on the port and leads the problem you've encountered and B) filing the "bumps" off of the portion of the dongle that plugs into the Newton helps to prevent the problem -somewhat- (although perhaps "delay" is really a better word).

I think this blog entry:

http://myapplenewton.blogspot.com/2009/07/interconnect-port-101.html

...summarizes the problem (although I do not have time to read through the whole entry just now, so someone else might be able to provide you with a better link).


Best,

James Fraser