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Re: Some eBay sellers are assholes

Posted on 2022-04-30, 01:32

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

As far as this particular instance, stick to your price and if the seller rejects it, try again a week later. Enough time goes by the offer will probably start to look pretty good. Then you can lower your offer, lol. I like this logic! Too bad one of the hardest parts of retro tech is being patient …

Re: So, like, does the K6 3+ 550mhz really exist?

Posted on 2022-04-27, 17:20

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

What do you all think about the TriLevel cache feature of the K6-3? Does it make a noticeable difference? I have a K6-3 450 (256K L2) and my board has 1MB cache, but I can't enable it with the K6-3 or a K6-2 500 (no L2), not even at FSB 66. Just wondering how much I might be missing out on if the …

Re: FIC VA-503+ serial ports not working

Posted on 2022-04-27, 03:55

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

BIOS updated to latest (JE4333) but no change. I put a multimeter between transmit (pin 3) and signal ground (pin 5) and got +11.18V. I think it's supposed to be -12V when not sending. Holding down a key does lower it to about +10.89V. Without an oscilloscope I don't think I can learn more about …

Re: FIC VA-503+ serial ports not working

Posted on 2022-04-26, 18:36

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

That would depend on the flow control settings. Unfortunately no change between using Xon/Xoff or No Flow Control within Tera Term. :/ There was a FIC board I did "15 rounds" with back in the 90s Certainly feels that way with this board, it's been a struggle ever since I got it. :D Narrowed it down …

FIC VA-503+ serial ports not working

Posted on 2022-04-26, 15:40

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Hi everyone, I'm working on a FIC VA-503+ SS7 board but I can't get the serial ports working. Up until the Pentium era there was a different pinout for on-board serial, and for some reason FIC kept this older pinout for this board. Some old forum posts mention this: Make absolutely sure that you are …

Re: Making DOS 6.22 diskettes from image files

Posted on 2022-04-23, 16:10

in DOS

in DOS

Could you try Win32 Disk Imager? It's free but I don't know if it will write to a floppy drive. I don't have a floppy drive in any newer machines at the moment so I can't test it. https://win32diskimager.org/

Re: VGA to HDMI converter... is it any good?

Posted on 2022-04-23, 15:14

in PC Emulation

in PC Emulation

It looks like it takes a common DC 5V 1A barrel connector for power. I think it's worth trying it out. Maybe look inside for signs of work and try it out if it looks intact? Could be useful for capturing BIOS screens or comparing VGA output if it works well. I have a cheapo VGA to HDMI adapter from …

Re: Microsoft enters “final phase” of disabling SMB1 file-sharing in Windows 11

Posted on 2022-04-23, 15:06

in Windows

in Windows

Seems like this has been in the works for even longer, this is from July 2019: Since the Windows 10 1709 build back in 2017, both the desktop and server versions of Windows dropped support for SMB1, and as far back as 2016 Microsoft was urging admins to drop the protocol version altogether. https:// …

Re: Which USB 2.0 cards for old motherboards

Posted on 2022-04-23, 00:46

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Another +1 for NEC chips. I picked up this SiiG branded card today. USB 2.0 works fine under Windows 98 (NUSB36E.EXE) and OpenBSD 7.0. Attached are benches against the onboard USB 1.0 VIA chipset (FIC VA-503+), K6-2 500MHz, using my fastest Sandisk Extreme USB 3.0 USB drive. It's about 0.9 MB/s vs …

Re: FIC VA-503+ USB header question

Posted on 2022-04-18, 22:03

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I leave the pins as is on the motherboard. For the breakout cable, I would apply firm (but not gorilla) force and the pin pushes through the block off. I usually run into this with newer floppy and/or IDE ribbon cables connecting to older boards. This worked! I didn't think to try pushing the …

Re: FIC VA-503+ USB header question

Posted on 2022-04-18, 21:37

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I use these style of USB plates on AT motherboards and adjust them as necessary: Thanks! That looks like what the board expects me to use, where each port has a separate 5 pin connector. There simply are two different styles of USB header around. The missing leg: usb1.gif And the Zig-Zag: usb2.jpeg …

FIC VA-503+ USB header question

Posted on 2022-04-18, 18:19

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Hi everybody, I'm working on a FIC VA-503+ Super Socket 7 build. I noticed the onboard USB header has 10 pins, but my breakout cable that connects to the header only has 9 pins. Pin 9 is blocked on the connector since it's supposed to act as a key to make sure it's plugged in the correct way. …

Re: Upgrades for my Olivetti 486 PC

Posted on 2022-04-17, 03:36

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

That's a really dreamy PC. I love how curved and bubbly the monitor is. I found the manual for the PCS44 on Archive.org: https://archive.org/details/cap36_201908/cap35/ JUMPER JP1 Not installed: i486 SX processor soldered. Default setting. Installed: i486 DX or i486 DX2 coprocessor soldered (not …

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

Posted on 2022-04-17, 01:24

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I've been trying without much success to find out what Goodwill does with computers around here. I have found some parts and even a box of software or two, but I haven't seen an actual computer at Goodwill in probably 8-10 years. I've been to at least 7 or 8 different Goodwill stores, both in the …

Re: Recommended 2D/3D card for a 233MMX PC

Posted on 2022-04-10, 23:19

in Marvin \ Video

in Marvin \ Video

I've tried two PCI graphics cards in my Pentium 233MMX system: ATI Rage Pro Turbo and Rage 128 Pro AIW. The Rage Pro Turbo felt like a pretty good match for the CPU but the 128 Pro is better in every way when tested with 3DMark 99/00. It produces an almost playable 5-15FPS in Half Life (1998) at …

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

Posted on 2022-02-05, 08:07

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

On my Pentium 200MMX, I switched my PCI Rage Pro Turbo 8MB for a PCI Rage Pro All-In-Wonder 128 16MB. It's not as big of an improvement as I hoped, but it's definitely a little faster everywhere I've tried it. Especially at 800x600. Still running benches. As a bonus it can natively do 1920x1200x32! …

Re: How far back do you have to go for a graphics card not selling for an inflated price?

Posted on 2022-01-29, 01:12

in Milliways

in Milliways

it is still a great price/performance ratio in my opinion. Nah, GeForce 3060 is roughly 95% of 1080 Ti performance before any overclocking and costs just a bit more. With benefits of not being a power hog and being a new card with warranty. That price for 1080 Ti is purely due to its mining …

Re: How far back do you have to go for a graphics card not selling for an inflated price?

Posted on 2022-01-29, 00:52

in Milliways

in Milliways

I'm not sure what your budget is but here's an anecdote. I bought a used Zotac 1080 Ti in mid 2019 for $580.00 USD (MSRP $699). It's a little smaller than other similar cards which was ideal for me since it's living in an OEM midtower and just barely fits. Today, almost 3 years later, the same used …

Re: How do you keep old machine Windows 95/98 stable and no crash?

Posted on 2022-01-18, 07:43

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

With Win95/Win98 get a stable configuration and then backup. I think much of the stability issues come from the ‘dll hell’, if your constantly installling and uninstalling new software you will get a mashup of old and new versions of critical dependencies. If you start to experience stability …

Re: How do you keep old machine Windows 95/98 stable and no crash?

Posted on 2022-01-18, 07:20

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I also recommend doing a "practice run" the first time on a new build. Figure out exactly which versions of what work best then wipe and reload I really like this idea. I'm reinstalling Win98 tonight after using the same install for almost 7 years. I didn't save the drivers/patches/software so I …

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