Re: Bought these (retro) hardware today

Posted on Today, 05:55

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by canthearu

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Picked up an old ATI 5850 for a cheap price ($30 AU) gbyte 5850.jpg Excellent card for my windows XP retro build, and nostolgic because it is the same (or similar) to a card I used to have years back but died. Had to clean it and repaste it .... wasn't careful the first time and used way too much …

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Re: Collecting rants

Posted on Yesterday, 14:03

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by canthearu

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Yeah, If paypal ever goes away for ebay, I'd probably stop using ebay by at least 90%. It's why I don't buy anything on Aliexpress, don't need the stress in my life. I'm sure sellers will cry bloody murder when there are no customers left on the platform, despite spending the last 10 years crying …

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Re: 80286 BIOS image collection

Posted on Yesterday, 12:06

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by canthearu

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

can you run a couple of benchmarks on the 286 with 0 wait states ... want to compare it to my 286-12mhz

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Re: ISA video cards in DOS - where is the cap?

Posted on 2020-07-06, 11:58

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by canthearu

in Marvin \ Video

in Marvin \ Video

A good ET4000 or Cirrus Logic GD542x card is about the fastest ISA goes in DOS. In windows, you can get some good improvements through ISA cards with graphics accelerators (Cirrus Logic GD5426/28/29/34 or S3 801) vs dumb frame buffer cards (ET4000, Trident 8900D, Cirrus Logic GD5420/22)

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Re: What retro activity did you get up to today?

Posted on 2020-07-05, 11:01

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by canthearu

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I received my Stealth 24 ISA video card a few days back. Was very disappointed in the display output originally .... very dark. After much research, I deduced that the RAMDAC wasn't getting the correct reference for creating the RGB signals. Generic comments on the internet suggested it was a …

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Re: Can you remove the built-in switch on an AT PSU?

Posted on 2020-07-05, 03:48

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by canthearu

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Yeah, those are the spade connectors I was talking about. Any AT power supply you purchase should be have those spade connectors to hook up your switch. The photo from your OP just doesn't show this though for this particular AT PSU.

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Re: Can you remove the built-in switch on an AT PSU?

Posted on 2020-07-05, 02:53

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by canthearu

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Hmmm, ok, my post is probably a little off. Your example post is something I've never seen on a PSU before. Normally, the power switch for a PSU is on the end of that black cable, and is attached to the switch with spade connectors. You would just remove the switch by pulling off the spade …

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Re: Can you remove the built-in switch on an AT PSU?

Posted on 2020-07-05, 02:51

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by canthearu

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Normally the AT switch is attached to the power supply cable using spade connections that you can pull off (with some effort sometimes) Rarely are they soldered in place (and when they are, you can simply unsolder if you need to) Just be very careful doing this, as it is 120 or 240V live switch, …

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Re: Newly made ISA CL-GD5434

Posted on 2020-06-28, 00:24

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by canthearu

in Marvin \ Video

in Marvin \ Video

After testing my 486sx/16 with a GD5422, I found it to be particularly slow. Do you think that an accelerated cirrus chip like the GD5434 would be a better choice for such a machine? I think occasionally you'll see a Cirrus Logic 5428/29/30 pop up and these are still a good option, otherwise very …

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Re: Newly made ISA CL-GD5434

Posted on 2020-06-28, 00:17

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by canthearu

in Marvin \ Video

in Marvin \ Video

After testing my 486sx/16 with a GD5422, I found it to be particularly slow. Do you think that an accelerated cirrus chip like the GD5434 would be a better choice for such a machine? Did you correctly benchmark the system and find it to be slow compared to systems of similar vintage? A 486SX/16 …

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Re: Newly made ISA CL-GD5434

Posted on 2020-06-28, 00:07

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by canthearu

in Marvin \ Video

in Marvin \ Video

Interesting! Can you make a picture of that modding and wasn't B7 the -12V voltage? How much was the performance impact? I remember having problems on older mobo but I had in the bios the wait state options to tweak so I found the fastest ones even if it weren't 0-0 values. With this mobo I've no …

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Re: Newly made ISA CL-GD5434

Posted on 2020-06-27, 14:54

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by canthearu

in Marvin \ Video

in Marvin \ Video

It sounds like a nice complex project and impressive. I suppose the chip choice has been made but what about older (than Trio) S3 based chips? The ones that were used on the VLB bus should or not compete with the GD5434? Anyway I've the GD5429 on ISA with 1MB 60ns DRAM (even if my 386 mainboard …

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Re: How to upgrade memory on my 386sx

Posted on 2020-06-27, 05:08

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by canthearu

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I would avoid playing games from within Windows 3.1 Especially on a low end 386SX. The performance hit from windows and being in v86 mode rather than real mode is pretty significant on low end hardware.

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Re: Bought these (retro) hardware today

Posted on 2020-06-27, 01:32

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by canthearu

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Everyone wants a proper geforce 2 eventually. Finally found one for myself ... with an OK, but not great price! s-l1600 (1).jpg Geforce 2 Pro - with S-Video out. My carpet ARK1000PV arrived. Had a couple of bent pins on the ARK chip, but that is sorted now and the card runs fine. Haven't really …

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Re: Can Cirrus Logic 5440 diaply 24-bit color at 800x600?

Posted on 2020-06-21, 07:50

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by canthearu

in Marvin \ Video

in Marvin \ Video

I wouldn't bother with a 5440 in a retro build (except maybe a mid-range 486). Picked one up a month ago for fun, but it is pretty mediocre card. Put an extra meg onto it, and played around with it a bit, but wasn't impressed by the performance. Not even sure it's accelerator works in 24bit mode. …

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Re: What retro activity did you get up to today?

Posted on 2020-06-21, 07:15

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by canthearu

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I think the new ones last the same as the old ones, about 35-40 years or more if used regularly. Like Electrolytics their life span is increased by normal usage, if rarely used they will breakdown internally in 20 years or less and internally short. Electrolytics can last 20-30 years or more but …

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Re: Collecting rants

Posted on 2020-06-19, 11:53

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by canthearu

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I agree with you but also think that proper handling would prevent most of the damages. Fedex workers already admitted that they throw and kick boxes around all the time so yes, that became the norm. It's not the bumpy road. They let them do it so why wouldn't they? It's faster and it's not their …

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Re: Memory Test tools for DOS ?

Posted on 2020-06-14, 02:05

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by canthearu

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

If your card has VBE 2.0, then the video memory test from Heron's boot CD works fine for testing video memory.

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Re: Bought these (retro) hardware today

Posted on 2020-06-14, 01:44

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by canthearu

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

The fundamental science of the issue tells us it is high, which is also the reason IC/card/board manufacturers spend millions of dollars on proper ESD controls... And nature doesn't like to work with exact numbers... That's why our modern world is going bs... Too many people worried and stressed on …

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Re: Bought these (retro) hardware today

Posted on 2020-06-13, 17:47

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by canthearu

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I don't think it really is that big a deal for a quick photo shot It is. Damage is done in less than a millisecond. You would have to convince me that the risk of that happening is high. In typical conditions, it isn't a high risk. The trip in the mail is likely to be riskier. I've had expansion …

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