5300 (603e) was generally slagged on at the time of release for a number of issues.
1400 (603e) might be better choice for that era.
The wallstreet/pismo was when they really knocked it out of the park.
Try avoid passive matrix screens like the 190cs
for 68k powerbooks at the moment I have 145, 180, Duo230, 520, 540 in various states of repair that I used for live sets in the past.
so just issues in general I've had with old powerbooks :
Any battery will be long past useful. You can find *new* batteries for as far back as g3 from china. Better to run it without it inserted, but don't bump the power cable.
at least one key will be stuck
screen may drop out. if you press on the side of the bezel or on body near hinge where video connector attaches, might fix it.
vertical / horizontal ghosting, banding, burn of single pixels across the whole display can be common with the passive matrix displays.
Also will need to replace CMOS on mobo at some point for time/date stamp.
you can rip a 540 in half & onto concrete into the audience & it will basically survive.
Those things are tanks. it still works with RGB adapter.
still figuring out midi to serial on Duo as it has a unified modem/printer port which seems to cause issues.
//
finding a 550 in North America is about as fun as finding a 2400.
both super popular in Japan.
Didn't even know they had an 040 laptop with an FPU. neat.
//
Just quit working in games & film for a long time. finally have time to repair / boot
the macs I've collected over the years.
Including some weird stuff like a full media composer 9600 suite (12 powerplugs).
Also most media related nubus cards.
So this website is the best thing ever.