Palm TX USB-C Mod

A Palm TX personal digital assistant (PDA) with stylus beside it, display is on and main application menu and connected to a USB cable.

I've recently got my hands on Palm TX pda, and like most, I hate having different cables, so I decided to add USB-C port to it. I assumed the process is easy, but was unsuccessful in finding reference how to do it, so here it is:

  1. Get USB-C breakout board, like this one(without 5.1k resistor) or this one(with 5.1k resistor), make sure that it's simplest 5V model (no PD is required)
  2. Following Ifixit guide, remove back cover and de-solder battery
  3. Modify case: using hand file, carefully create a slot for breakout board.
  4. Solder positive wire to VDOCK pin, I've chose one of capacitors, because it's much bigger solder point (and easier then trying to solder to flex pcb).
  5. Solder ground wire to VDOCK_RTN (fancy way of Palm Inc. of saying ground).
  6. Solder your wires to breakout board and you are done.
  7. Glue breakout board to the inside of the case (I've used hot glue, it worked okay)
  8. Solder new battery, reassemble the case.

Picture for a reference to were to solder: The internal view of the Palm TX PDA with its back cover removed, revealing the circuit board, and an added USB Type-C charging modification.

Important notes:

With specific breakout board I used, charging works only when cable is USB-A to USB-C. This happens because it doesn't feature 5.1 kΩ resistor on CC pin. Make sure to get board that has 5.1k resisor soldered.

Also, I personally don't plan to use wired connections (Bluetooth and Wifi is perfectly fine method for me), if you plan to use USB-C as dock, you will need to find places were to connect USB_D- and USB_D+ pins.

Update 2025-08-19: Added link to USB-C breakout board with 5.1k soldered. Thanks to Leseratte10 for a comment on r/Palm.