[SunRescue] Dead Sparc NVRAMS

[Gregory Leblanc]

On 01 Jun 2001 14:20:12 -0700, Bran Tregare wrote:
> anyone have any of the dead nvrams floating around?  I'm looking at trying 
> my hand at a little project (removing the battery/oscillator package, and 
> adding a new oscillator and a button battery holder to it (CR2032 type) 
> )  but :(  my wife found my stash in the carage that i'd already dremeled, 
> and threw them away thinking that they were junk :(

I've done this with three of them so far, it's pretty easy.  On the end
of the chip towards the battery, just carve away the glue/filler
substance, until you expose the leads.  I disconnected the leads from
the battery, and soldered some new pieces of wire on there, and then
soldered them to a (larger) battery.  Once connected, I just hot-glue'd
the battery to the top of the chip.  That blocks an SBUS slot, but I'm
just doing this on SS2s, and I run them all with 0 or 1 card anyway.
Make sure you don't leave the old battery hooked in-line, because it
will drain your new battery quickly.  Cutting one of the leads to the
old battery is pretty easy, if you're careful.  All three of the ones
that I've build so far seem to work just fine.
	Greg