Two more photos

Tried to revive with adapting a CR2 battery.
Also tried to replace the GPU but still no luck.

The HD is from 2007 so is not that old machines than I expected.

Nice little machine and ISA

soupapes wrote on 2023-11-09, 21:22:

So I bouth 2 units off this very weird machines, brand new and sealed in the box, on Facebook market place, which I could not fi […]
Show full quote

So I bouth 2 units off this very weird machines, brand new and sealed in the box, on Facebook market place, which I could not find any information online.

From the looks it seems it might have been a machine for office use as it contains license for Windows 2000 Pro.

The case and the interior disposition of the hardware is also unusual. It contains some weird port in the back. In front on top there is some big and long drawer with also a weird input.

The only think i recognized was the GPU, a GeForce MX2 32mb. The CD-ROM seems to be and old school Matsushita.
I tried to turn it on, the power supply works but the board does not do any beeps when turning on and no image. But only when I power it off it does small bips. Weird!

Maybe the problem is the clock battery? After all this years for sure is shot.

Can anyone help to clarify what are this machines?

It's the main control unit from a Fujifilm Digital Minilab - probably one of the older models; something like the FRONTIER 330 (or earlier). The 'mystery' front bay is for the optional UPS battery.

Ricoh mainboards featured in a number of their systems (probably with a custom BIOS to support its main use) - from the pics, yours seems to be model FB2L1-13.

Not sure how it'll operate when separate from the rest of the hardware.

Thanks you for the feedback.

It comes with a CD mentioning Frontier 330.
Also notice that front case only has two power wires directly to the Power Supply, so makes sense to be for battery.

It also comes with two Hard drivers.

soupapes wrote on 2023-11-10, 12:25:

Thanks you for the feedback.

It comes with a CD mentioning Frontier 330.
Also notice that front case only has two power wires directly to the Power Supply, so makes sense to be for battery.

Doesn't seem to be much detailed info on the control unit itself, though you can see it in a bit more context in section 18.4 of the Frontier 330 Service Manual here - https://www.nodevice.com/service-manuals/othe … lm/frontier-330

This interface in the back is connected into the small Power Button board on the front. Maybe its expected something to be connected to allow power on the motherboard?

the pcb markings (behind the pci slots) suggest you can set a jumper in the frontpanel io pins to power the mainboard by a "switch" or "ac-on".
there are also pins for a power button.

also the db9 connector in the power supply is concerning... but maybe thats there to monitor/control the UPS?

It seems the unit is faulty.

The second computer works fine.
Comes with diferente CD-Rom modelo and smaller pair of HD with 20gb each.
It has a PhoenixBIOS with a boot screen from Fujifilm.
Comes with Windows 2000 installed, 392Mb RAM, and a Celeron 566.

On the second machine that is working I tried to replace the Celeron CPU with a spare P3 866 but the board only takes 650MHz. I guess it still a good upgrade.

Also upgraded to a Pioneer DVD drive.

But the bios is very disappointing, only detects each HD with a maximum of 20Gb aldo they are 40gb HDs.

Cannot find online any information or BIOS upgrade for this motherboard.

The board

soupapes wrote on 2023-11-15, 22:46:

On the second machine that is working I tried to replace the Celeron CPU with a spare P3 866 but the board only takes 650MHz. I guess it still a good upgrade.

Probably a chipset that only supports up to 100 MHz FSB?

soupapes wrote on 2023-11-15, 22:46:

On the second machine that is working I tried to replace the Celeron CPU with a spare P3 866 but the board only takes 650MHz. I […]
Show full quote

On the second machine that is working I tried to replace the Celeron CPU with a spare P3 866 but the board only takes 650MHz. I guess it still a good upgrade.

Also upgraded to a Pioneer DVD drive.

But the bios is very disappointing, only detects each HD with a maximum of 20Gb aldo they are 40gb HDs.

Cannot find online any information or BIOS upgrade for this motherboard.

As the BIOS seems to be custom, think you'll be hard pressed to find an upgrade for it from Fuji (or a standard version from Ricoh for that matter) - seems to do exactly what the Frontier 330 requires of it, and the control units seem to be regarded as almost disposable parts (and there are a whole series of FCxxxx models with ever increasing specs to act as upgrade control units).

Also, far as I can tell the 20Gb limitation is due to the software the unit is intended to run (back-end SQL server & control), as this actually only requires to see a 10Gb partition on each of the two drives for a successful install or recovery.

A brief search on Ricoh FB2LF-15 motherboards gave me some outrageous prices when compared with equivalent Socket 370 motherboards. Guess it's because they are needed in specialized devices (e.g. Fujifilm Digital Minilab) and are not meant for general consumers.