It’s always hard to take apart an unknown laptop. Here’s a teardown of the olivetti M316, so you don’t have to make the same mistakes as I did.
- 1. Remove the display sliders. They are just clipped on, carefully pull them out.
- 2. After removing the sliders, try to lift the keyboard label above the function keys. I had to use a hot air gun. There is a hidden screw between the F5 and F6 keys under the label.
- 3. There’s the hidden screw! This one took me half an hour to find…
- 4. Now remove the HDD and floppy covers. They are just clipped in, but try not to break the plastic. Pay attention to the floppy drive button. It will fall off as soon as the cover is removed.
- 5. We need to remove the battery. It is in the top right corner of the machine.
- 6. Close up of the battery cover, it’s quite stealthy…
- 7. Push the door away form you. Mine was stuck pretty hard. It will move just a little bit, like in the photo.
- Then lift it up to remove.
- 8. Now you should see the battery. To remove it, pull the lever on the battery.
- 9. Below the battery there is a screw. Remove it and secure it somewhere. There’s only one screw type like this, so don’t lose it.
- 10. Now turn the laptop and open the cover of the ISA slot. It’s one very long screw (there are 5 of those long screws in total).
- 11. If you have an ISA card installed, you have to remove the screw on the top right to get the card out.
- 12. Now remove all of those screws. There are 4 long and 4 shorter screws.
- Turn the laptop back to normal and you should be able to lift the back of it, including the monitor.
- The frame around the front of the keyboard is just clipped in, carefully wiggle it free.
- 13. Now you should be able to open it up like a car hood. But be carefull, there are 5 cables connected (power button, fan, battery, display power and display data).
- I didn’t have a third hand so I turned the laptop sideways.
- The power button and fan cables are the shortest ones, disconnect them first.
- 14. Remove the two screws to remove the keyboard. It is attached with a ribbon cable, but it’s pretty long.
- The HDD and floppy are underneath the metal shield.
- 15. The CMOS battery is under the keyboard. It’s easily reachable and detachable. It’s a 3.6V rechargeable three button cells pack. I tried with a 3V first, but the CMOS could not hold the data. It really needs 3.6V.
- That’s how it looks like under the metal cage. The HDD and floppy cables are very short! Be carefull when detaching and reconnecting those.
- The Conner CP3044 40Mb HDD
- mainboard overview