Re: What could this be?

Posted on 2024-02-15, 10:10

by

by dionb

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

A beast! Second the idea that whatever this is now, it's been modified from original config. I'm guessing the case originally held two full-AT boards with slots on either side of the keyboard connector. Now though there are only serial and parallel ports 'above' the connector, so I'm guessing there …

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Re: [Advice wanted] Pentium 3 450mhz budget soundcard + GPU for DOS / Win98 games

Posted on 2024-02-14, 22:25

by

by dionb

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

First up: the SE440BX2 frequently came with Yamaha YMF740C audio chip onboard. If so you already have an excellent option for Windows and DOS. Does yours have it? I will have to look when I'm at home over the weekend... I don't have a PS/2 M+K yet either lol, so if I can tell by looking at the …

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Re: [Advice wanted] Pentium 3 450mhz budget soundcard + GPU for DOS / Win98 games

Posted on 2024-02-13, 23:42

by

by dionb

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Hi, first post here. Recently found an Apple Studio Display 17" CRT (VGA) and a PC - Pentium 3 (450mhz), SE440BX2 motherboard, 128mb system memory. I'm looking to get this thing setup for an affordable price with a soundcard, HDD, and GPU off eBay to start using, but as I was looking I found there …

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Re: Aztech sound card

Posted on 2024-02-13, 21:58

by

by dionb

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

It has three audio chips. Marking are “AZT2316R” 3rd gen Aztech audio controller. Supports SBPro2 and has bug-free UART MPU-401 “YMF262-M” Real OPL3 chip for FM synthesis “CS423A-KL” DAC that offers WSS support. This MMSN841 was known internally at Packard Bell as 'Rocky 2' (due to the 28k8 …

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Re: 3 sound cards, 1 ISA slot, MIDI advice?

Posted on 2024-02-13, 21:03

by

by dionb

in Marvin \ Sound

in Marvin \ Sound

[...] Definitely leaning toward ditching the SB 16. I mainly bought it for nostalgia reasons... and because I thought it would be sick to have 3 distinct sound cards :D. It's probably overkill though. I agree the MX300 with the waveblaster technically accomplishes my DOS gaming much better. Maybe …

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Re: 3 sound cards, 1 ISA slot, MIDI advice?

Posted on 2024-02-13, 18:58

by

by dionb

in Marvin \ Sound

in Marvin \ Sound

Normally I'd go off on a rant about crappy SB16 MIDI bugs, but in this setup you can use the MX300 in DOS for MPU401 duties (including the X16GS), thereby avoiding hanging notes and slowdownd on the SB16. I'd probably leave as-is unless you had some very specific requirements.

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Re: Quantum Fireball 1.2GB SCSI prices

Posted on 2024-02-12, 19:24

by

by dionb

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

It's probably a model that was used in old Macs or something. Everything related to Mac or Amiga (even if it's just a regular item like a SCSI drive) tends to be absurdly priced. It does has the Mac logo ... lol But cant you use a regular SCSI hard drive on a Mac ? Thanx Course you can, but then …

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Re: Should I buy or build a Pentium 4 desktop PC? (re: Dell, HP, etc)

Posted on 2024-02-11, 19:30

by

by dionb

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Thing with OEM stuff is that it's not always 100% standards compliant, so if some component dies you need to find the exact FRU replacement for it rather than just some generic thing that does the same. I'm not even talking about Dell's non-ATX pinout on ATX connector (or Compaq doing something …

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Re: msi ms-5128 v1.1 bios recovery procedure

Posted on 2024-02-10, 18:00

by

by dionb

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Options for BIOS recovery in most cases: 1) use an EEPROM programmer like the TL866. Essential kit if you mess around with vintage stuff a lot (not just for this sort of situation, but also to make bootROMS for cards, test SRAM and 74-logic chips etc etc) 2) hot-flash on a different board that …

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Re: Socket 7 board with 430fx-60

Posted on 2024-02-08, 21:31

by

by dionb

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Good question. I'd expect the -60 would have been cheaper than the -66 so some bottom feeder might have bought them up, but this is Asus, so about as premium as motherboards could get in those days. It's even weirder looking at date codes - I can't make out any on the chipset, but can see one on the …

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Re: RAID on Pentium 75

Posted on 2024-02-08, 09:48

by

by dionb

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Be clear about which problem you want to address / which metric you want to improve. Depending on the version you use, RAID can improve HDD throughput either in reads only (RAID 1) or in reads and writes (RAID 0, 5 etc). In case of a slow CPU it can also improve non-I/O performance by offloading. …

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Re: Retro PCs, internet connection sharing, safety

Posted on 2024-02-08, 07:53

by

by dionb

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

[...] I just found out about custom firmware on routers (in part due to researching the DIR-655 I thought I bricked - but is now mysteriously working and accessible from my XP and main PCs,) and I think that the concept is pretty neat. I read that we can thank Linksys for that. I saw info about the …

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Re: Found a Socket 3 board with AMD X5-133 but no information at all about jumper settings...

Posted on 2024-02-07, 11:08

by

by dionb

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

That board looks pretty much identical to this one which does have a jumper manual: https://theretroweb.com/motherboards/9881 As far as I can see it's exactly the same design, just a different colour PCB and here and there different passive components. The actives all look the same though and every …

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Re: Generic/uninteresting, yet rare/obscure video cards?

Posted on 2024-02-06, 01:28

by

by dionb

in Marvin \ Video

in Marvin \ Video

Do S3 Trios equipped with 4mb of vram count? 20221119_160545 (1).jpg 20220924_140340.jpg If it were equipped with VRAM it might, but that's plain DRAM and so not exactly uncomon. Well I will list the chipsets that I am still trying to get for vgamuseum: NetVision 2200i (Artist 3GA) There are some …

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Re: Different Windows eras

Posted on 2024-02-05, 12:02

by

by dionb

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

For me, there is some overlap between the different eras, so it doesn't make sense to do a hard cutoff in every single case. That said, I generally view things like this: 1980s-1996: DOS era 1997-2001: Win9x era 2002-2009: WinXP era 2010-2015: Win7 era 2016 and up: modern Windows era Of course, …

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Re: Was DIP VRAM ever made in 512 kB?

Posted on 2024-02-04, 22:15

by

by dionb

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

[...] Did you upgrade your card to 2MB? I have the RAM, but haven't actually installed it as I can't even use the 1MB currently on the card. [...] I would do so immediately if I had the equipment. Point me to what I need and I will see what I can do. The IIT AGX016 PCI bios is on vgamuseum if you …

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Re: Was DIP VRAM ever made in 512 kB?

Posted on 2024-02-04, 17:51

by

by dionb

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Ooh, another IIT board... Any chance you could dump the VGA BIOS ROM? I have a different one (a Puretek PT-2072 with AGX 016A chip), but have hit a brick wall twice trying to get VESA working fully. Hercules has VESA drivers which look interesting, but they refuse to run on non-Hercules cards. Maybe …

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Re: Dual boot DOS and Windows 95 on different disks

Posted on 2024-02-04, 14:04

by

by dionb

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

You need a boot manager on one of the drives. It can boot partitions on any drive. PLOP would be the obvious choice, but there are many more, including some period correct ones.

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Re: What hasn’t been done?

Posted on 2024-02-04, 13:59

by

by dionb

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

[...] Can AI help with any of this? I asked ChatGPT. This is what it said: Yes, AI can potentially assist with many aspects of these tasks. Here's a breakdown: TinyGL as a MiniGL: AI could assist in optimizing and refining the implementation of TinyGL as a MiniGL by providing insights into …

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Re: Packard Bell C115 sound

Posted on 2024-02-02, 19:55

by

by dionb

in Marvin \ Sound

in Marvin \ Sound

[...] i don't have any experience with sound/modem combos, but i imagine the azt2316 will be solid It's an AZT2320, and yes, solid as other 4th gen. and you can just disable or not install drivers for the modem part. In DOS, just don't bother with it, in Windows it's a PnP device so will get …

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