While not the best picture, picked up the following today from Kijiji:

Pentium 4 w/ Voodoo 3 2000 for $80 CAD. 😀 He threw in extra RAM, an extra HDD, and an extra CD-RW as well. A pretty good deal though! He has a few other items he mentioned when I picked this up that I might move on as well. 😀

I was lookng for one of these for a while. Best of AGP as far as I know: HD 3850 (Sapphire 512MB version, for around 15 USD)

tayyare wrote:

I was lookng for one of these for a while. Best of AGP as far as I know: HD 3850 (Sapphire 512MB version, for around 15 USD)

WhatsApp Image 2018-10-31 at 13.53.56.jpeg

Great card, I was considering using it for my Socket 754 system, I went for the X1950PRO as a more period correct option instead.

I love those meeces and pieces!

^That PSU looks... suspicious, at best. Wonder how it looks inside.

PC Hoarder Patrol wrote:

I love those meeces and pieces!

I love those mice; that's a very nice find my friend! 😀

SW-SSG wrote:

^That PSU looks... suspicious, at best. Wonder how it looks inside.

Probably the name of it :p

Pretty much one of these early 2000's/late 90's empty piece of crap

stamasd wrote:

Picked up a few ISA network cards, NOS, appear unused.

https://i.postimg.cc/ydvcPr7W/ae3.jpg

Probably just the lighting but when looking at the ISA connector I am not convinced this card is actually new.

^Thanks @Strahssis

SW-SSG wrote:

^That PSU looks... suspicious, at best. Wonder how it looks inside.

Fair point, but it comes from a longstanding (commercial) source I trust and it passed their visual inspection & load testing bench before sale. However that won't stop me popping it open 😈

It's clean, no bulging caps (top or bottom), very heavy gauge wire throughout, weighs a ton and if it blows tomorrow - that's life 🤣

blurks wrote:

stamasd wrote:

Picked up a few ISA network cards, NOS, appear unused.

https://i.postimg.cc/ydvcPr7W/ae3.jpg

Probably just the lighting but when looking at the ISA connector I am not convinced this card is actually new.

It's not. It came from the Pentium Pro haul and these are lightly used, BUT all the AE3 NICs I have are damn near mint. The lighting in that photo is harsh.

When is a quadcore CPU with 6MB of L3 cache running at 2.8GHz "retro"? Well, when paired with a motherboard that isn't fully supported on Vista or later and has an AGP slot, I'd say it qualifies 😉

Phenom II X4 925 and a NOS Asrock AM2NF3-VSTA.

This beast is going to run my retro-area "server", i.e. PC with every piece of I/O out there, for getting any data from A to B, and testing any kind of drive I find easily. First incarnation will see it inserted into an AOpen HQ8 bigtower, with removable SCSI, PATA and SATA drive bays, IDE-CF converter, DVD+-RW, 5.25" FDD and 3.5" FDD - once I dig up some 3.5"-5.25" converters I'll also add ZIP100 and Castlewood Orb to the mix. 4GB of DDR2-800, an 8GB SSD and a 1TB HDD complete the setup. I was originally intending to pair it with my Matrox Parhelia, but I want to run Linux on it and Linux Parhelia support is as old as the card itself, so no good for this system. For now I've stuck an ATi HD4650 in there, although I'll probably downgrade it at some time in the near future as this card is complete overkill for a system that just needs a decent 2D desktop display.

At the other end of the retro experience, here's a little beauty from 1992 I picked up:

PC Hoarder Patrol wrote:

Fair point, but it comes from a longstanding (commercial) source I trust and it passed their visual inspection & load testing bench before sale. However that won't stop me popping it open 😈

psuguts.jpg

It's clean, no bulging caps (top or bottom), very heavy gauge wire throughout, weighs a ton and if it blows tomorrow - that's life 🤣

Yeah, doesn't look too bad, actually. Might even have passive PFC (evidenced by that hanging transformer). I figured it might be an OK unit given that the fan is from Power Logic (not a no-name vendor), but there is a PSU brand out there called Macron Power that is known for real gutless wonders and I was reminded of those.

appiah4 wrote:

tayyare wrote:

I was lookng for one of these for a while. Best of AGP as far as I know: HD 3850 (Sapphire 512MB version, for around 15 USD)

WhatsApp Image 2018-10-31 at 13.53.56.jpeg

Great card, I was considering using it for my Socket 754 system, I went for the X1950PRO as a more period correct option instead.

My XP box/secondary PC had a socket 754 board and I had been looking for a reasonably priced HD 3850 for a very looong time. That never happened for years . I upgraded that PC with a non-AGP socket 939 board last year, and this happens 🤣

tayyare wrote:

appiah4 wrote:

tayyare wrote:

I was lookng for one of these for a while. Best of AGP as far as I know: HD 3850 (Sapphire 512MB version, for around 15 USD)

WhatsApp Image 2018-10-31 at 13.53.56.jpeg

Great card, I was considering using it for my Socket 754 system, I went for the X1950PRO as a more period correct option instead.

My XP box/secondary PC had a socket 754 board and I had been looking for a reasonably priced HD 3850 for a very looong time. That never happened for years . I upgraded that PC with a non-AGP socket 939 board last year, and this happens 🤣

Time to rebuild the Socket 754 with the HD3850 😎

I also have an HD4650. It's a slower GPU but has better video acceleration and runs cooler with less power draw so not a bad option either.

I still went with X1950PRO though. I wasn't going to watch H264 HD videos etc on the system (purely gaming XP PC) and that card felt like a more contemporary option.

appiah4 wrote:

Found a seller with a damaged 486 laptop, selling it for parts. I asked to buy the CPU so he took it out of the socket for me. The result:

The attachment 486 DX33 Bent Pins.JPG is no longer available

I'll buy it nonetheless, the DX33 is lacking in my collection. What is the safest way to fix this? Align a ruler and push the pins up until they are semi- straight, then shove into a Socket 3?

Thanks to everyone who helped me out with ideas on how to fix this; a combination of metal ruler, pincets and mechanical pencils has brought the chip to this state (Leftmost row):

It doesn't look as pretty as I would have liked but it goes into sockets without issue, and should probably work.

I noticed the MSI stamp while taking this photo.. My first PC (that was exclusively mine) was a DX33 tower by MSI (who produced OEM PCs at the time, Under the Microstar International brand..), so this is a pretty nostalgic CPU for me. It's not the one I originally owned (traded it away when buying a DX4 later) but I can now build my original PC; DX33 with VLB Cirrus Logic 5428, 4MB RAM and 213MB HDD (256MB CF will have to do). Fun times.

I can now compare i486 SX33/DX33/DX2-66 vs UMC U5SX-33/40. This should be a fun project. I will probably leave it as a U5SX-40 in the end though, I feel it's a very sweet CPU for DOS games, it that handles speed things like U7 Pt1 perfectly while still being adequately fast for games like Doom 😀

I also received a Winfast A250 Ultra (GeForce 4 Ti4600) in the mail today, seller claimed it was working when removed but visual inspection reveals one major component is missing at L803/R1102/R1103 marked below:

I can make out that it reads 1R0, same as the component below but it is an unknown component type to me. What is this? What rating? I want to source and solder it on before trying the card.

appiah4 wrote:

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I also received a Winfast A250 Ultra (GeForce 4 Ti4600) in the mail today, seller claimed it was working when removed but visual inspection reveals one major component is missing at L803/R1102/R1103 marked below:

LeadtekGF4.jpg

I can make out that it reads 1R0, same as the component below but it is an unknown component type to me. What is this? What rating? I want to source and solder it on before trying the card.

Not sure about that component (looks like a coil), but at least three caps in that pic are bulging - same as on pretty much every Leadtek card from that era...

The photo is not the card I receiverd, but actually something I found online. Mine also has three suspect bulging caps, noname 1000uF 6.3V ones. I will replace them immediately.

I need to figure out what the marked component is though.. I *think* it's an inductor, but not the kind I am familiar with..

1R0 is a power inductor. (1 uH, DCR ohms and current saturation depend on the package size) Do a search for "SHIELDED INDUCTOR SMD" and you'll find a bunch that look similar.

Somebody able to identify this thing? Looks like a Wavetable-Soundcard? Thanks!

Thanks!

Also, got these in the mail last week but repairs were finished today:

Currently untested but I am confident on them working except for the Voodoo 2, which had extensive repairs. Repaired/replaced parts are as below: