Does the card work in another system?

If so, it sounds like it's just incompatible and you'll need to find something else that will work. Any reason you can't just put an old ethernet adapter in there and xover to another machine for data xfer?

Nope, infact I have an ethernet card in there. I'm just using linux on my other computers and I figured it would be a pain to get them to communicate. 🤣

The problem is it uses a VIA USB 2.0 controller that requires a newer PCI revision than your motherboard has. I suggest a card with a NEC chip.

Which USB 2.0 cards for old motherboards

How can you tell NEC from VIA? When I search on ebay for NEC it looks exactly the same as the board I have in my hand.

King_Corduroy wrote:

How can you tell NEC from VIA? When I search on ebay for NEC it looks exactly the same as the board I have in my hand.

Find auctions that have photos of what they're actually selling and look for a big NEC chip.

Yeah I found one right after I posted that. 😜
Thanks though. 😁

King_Corduroy wrote:

Nope, infact I have an ethernet card in there. I'm just using linux on my other computers and I figured it would be a pain to get them to communicate. 🤣

Shouldn't be a problem with Samba. In fact probably easier than with a newer Windows OS.

I think I'm going to give the NEC suggestion a try and then I may resort to samba.

what is the number on that via chip?

The chip says this:

VIA (logo)
VT6212L
0840CD China
23B79300001

Hmm well a VIA 6202 USB card works in my 486 board.
Either that mobo is picky or the 6212 is less compatible with old systems. Or maybe its just intel's chipsets :p

It could be the Packard OEM board. They are kind of known for being finicky. 🤣

The problem is they need PCI 2.2. You don't have PCI 2.2. That comes in with 1999 chipsets. But even if you satisfy that requirement and the motherboard recognizes the card, those ultra cheap VT6212 cards tend to cause problems for other PCI devices.

I knew newer video cards could pose compatibility problems with older mobos, but I never thought of USB2 cards doing the same. Are there any other types of PCI cards that have compatibility problems on pre-1999 systems?

I might need to buy a 6212 just to test it.
I don't know if it is as cut and dry as "pre-1999" not working and "post-1999" working
It may be a chipset implementation quirk

Do it, I would love to see your results. The cards are dirt cheap on ebay. 😁

smeezekitty wrote:

I might need to buy a 6212 just to test it.
I don't know if it is as cut and dry as "pre-1999" not working and "post-1999" working
It may be a chipset implementation quirk

I'm trying to say that the VIA VT6212 spec sheet says PCI 2.2+ is required. Chipsets with PCI 2.2 start with models like AMD 750 and Intel 810.

But on the other hand I've found these ultra cheap VIA USB cards to be problematic even when they do work. I doubt the VIA chip is at fault for flaky operation considering they were often used on motherboards before USB 2.0 was integrated into the chipset.

On the other other hand, the NEC chips specify PCI 2.1 support and work well on such chipsets.

Just a quick thought. Are you certain this motherboard doesn't have a USB header pin set on the board for a USB port? I have an older Asus Socket 5 board that has the header and I can plug a bracket USB port into it. If so, this would save you some heartache. Of course it will be USB 1.1

No I don't think it does, it's an old Packard from '96. I'll look later but I doubt I'll find one.