Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2023-05-24, 10:48:

Elsa_Gladiac_511.jpg

Bought this ELSA Gladiac 511 (GeForce 2 MX400) for 6 EUR on my local classifieds. I only got it because I wanted an ELSA branded graphics card in my youth, but they were out of my price range at the time. This manufacturer used premium components and their GPUs always had outstanding image quality. And I'm happy to say that this card is no exception. Granted, it's not as sharp as a Matrox G400, but it's still much better than what most GeForce 2 cards display out of the box.

Now, if only I could find the official driver CD image for this card. Obviously, I know that I can just use Nvidia's reference drivers, but ELSA always had some customized driver options that I wanted to check out first hand. I've only seen those in period correct reviews and magazines.

You might check out archive.org: https://archive.org/details/winner-99-f

I don't know which drivers are included, but it should be fairly complete, being a full cd ...

Skorbin wrote on 2023-05-26, 12:26:

You might check out archive.org: https://archive.org/details/winner-99-f

I don't know which drivers are included, but it should be fairly complete, being a full cd ...

I did check a few ELSA images on there, but none of them worked for me.

They were either too old (pre-2001) or didn't want to install on this card (GeForce 3 drivers).

ubiq wrote on 2023-05-25, 21:30:

Did we all used to pull our desks a foot away from the wall for our CRTs to hang off? I feel like that was a thing.

This was the norm back then indeed, especially since at the time many people were using way too tiny desks to do their pc stuff on 😋

mrfusion92 wrote on 2023-05-26, 09:59:

Asus P2B and P3B-F from same seller for total 25€ (+ local shipping) […]
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Asus P2B and P3B-F from same seller for total 25€ (+ local shipping)

Unknown working status. The CPU retention brackets aren't in the pictures but seller will include them.

s-l1600.png
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IF they are no go first try, remember these are fussy about CMOS batteries, and also tend to kill their BIOSes, so fresh batt, fresh BIOS would be first things to try. Also, CPU slots are glitchy in general and may need cleaning and multiple insertions.

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2023-05-26, 13:11:

Skorbin wrote on 2023-05-26, 12:26:

You might check out archive.org: https://archive.org/details/winner-99-f

I don't know which drivers are included, but it should be fairly complete, being a full cd ...

I did check a few ELSA images on there, but none of them worked for me.

They were either too old (pre-2001) or didn't want to install on this card (GeForce 3 drivers).

May not help (think these are likely generic drivers), but this page:
https://web.archive.org/web/20051127015251/ht … river_game.html
has a supported card list:
https://web.archive.org/web/20051127015226/ht … driverListG.htm
which includes the 511, which leads to:
https://web.archive.org/web/20051124141601/ht … iver/index.html and
https://web.archive.org/web/20060109201037/ht … iver/index.html

Which seem to have download links that work. The European Elsa website seems to have hosted downloads on ftp servers:
https://web.archive.org/web/20031204090434/ht … a.com/download/
That at least gets some filenames to search for, but they're fairly generic things like 'elsa2kxp.exe', though it does give dates and sizes to help id the file.

Two of the university sites still have their ftp servers up, but not the Elsa files. Bielefeld doesn't have an ftp server anymore, but do say people can contact them to ask for old data:
https://www.cebitec.uni-bielefeld.de/brf/ftp

snufkin wrote on 2023-05-26, 15:30:

May not help (think these are likely generic drivers), but this page: https://web.archive.org/web/20051127015251/ht … river_game […]
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Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2023-05-26, 13:11:

Skorbin wrote on 2023-05-26, 12:26:

You might check out archive.org: https://archive.org/details/winner-99-f

I don't know which drivers are included, but it should be fairly complete, being a full cd ...

I did check a few ELSA images on there, but none of them worked for me.

They were either too old (pre-2001) or didn't want to install on this card (GeForce 3 drivers).

May not help (think these are likely generic drivers), but this page:
https://web.archive.org/web/20051127015251/ht … river_game.html
has a supported card list:
https://web.archive.org/web/20051127015226/ht … driverListG.htm
which includes the 511, which leads to:
https://web.archive.org/web/20051124141601/ht … iver/index.html and
https://web.archive.org/web/20060109201037/ht … iver/index.html

Which seem to have download links that work. The European Elsa website seems to have hosted downloads on ftp servers:
https://web.archive.org/web/20031204090434/ht … a.com/download/
That at least gets some filenames to search for, but they're fairly generic things like 'elsa2kxp.exe', though it does give dates and sizes to help id the file.

Two of the university sites still have their ftp servers up, but not the Elsa files. Bielefeld doesn't have an ftp server anymore, but do say people can contact them to ask for old data:
https://www.cebitec.uni-bielefeld.de/brf/ftp

Hi,
in my digital equivalent of the kitchen junk drawer i found these files:
ELSA2KXP.EXE and ELSA_W9X.EXE

The XP file is a split 7z to fit within the attachment size limitation and renamed so that the forum could upload it. Rename it and delete the last "_.7z" before extracting.

BitWrangler wrote on 2023-05-26, 14:50:

IF they are no go first try, remember these are fussy about CMOS batteries, and also tend to kill their BIOSes, so fresh batt, fresh BIOS would be first things to try. Also, CPU slots are glitchy in general and may need cleaning and multiple insertions.

Well I'm not even sure that I have a working CPU! I do have a PII that comes from my first desktop PC in 1999. But it has never been used in the last 20~ years.

Luckily I do already have a TL866A programmer so I should be covered if BIOS flash will be necessary.

mrfusion92 wrote on 2023-05-26, 16:14:

BitWrangler wrote on 2023-05-26, 14:50:

IF they are no go first try, remember these are fussy about CMOS batteries, and also tend to kill their BIOSes, so fresh batt, fresh BIOS would be first things to try. Also, CPU slots are glitchy in general and may need cleaning and multiple insertions.

Well I'm not even sure that I have a working CPU! I do have a PII that comes from my first desktop PC in 1999. But it has never been used in the last 20~ years.

Luckily I do already have a TL866A programmer so I should be covered if BIOS flash will be necessary.

PIIs are like tanks, crazy hard to kill and can sit in assorted tech shit for years and still work.

Almost 100% sure that PII will fire right up in a working board.

Athlon 64 X2 6000 & 6400 - I originally bought a 5200 cheaply for testing; either the motherboard was bad or the 6400 was cooked (because I utilized a cooler too small for a 125w CPU). The 5200 arrived with a busted pin. No problem, the seller agreed to send me a replacement. In the meantime, I bought a 6000 because 6400s are too expensive, and a 6000 is just fine for a long-term build. The 5200 seller ran out of the 5200, so I was asked if I wanted a 4200 or ...a 6400! Naturally, I selected the 6400. Well, both the 6000 and the 6400 arrived safely yesterday and both work great (board was OK).

Next is the Abit MX440. The listing was for a Ti4200, which I thought I was getting a great deal, but the card turned out to be the MX440. Still, it's a nice-looking card, looks basically unused, and is a good performer, so I decided to keep it anyway.

Finally, we have the Joytech/3dfx Banshee. I've read this version is the smallest form-factor produced for the Banshee. I don't know if this is official, though. it's also a good-looking card, seems to be newish, and works great.

Meatball wrote on 2023-05-26, 18:37:

Finally, we have the Joytech/3dfx Banshee. I've read this version is the smallest form-factor produced for the Banshee. I don't know if this is official, though. it's also a good-looking card, seems to be newish, and works great.

A great looking card.

I bought an FX-62 recently, was overclocking on stock voltage last night, got up to 3.2GHz before I had to switch gears and do something else. The temps were crazy, a stock AM3 cooler rose to 50C stock before I got the fear, and with an eight pipe tower cooler, ~45C stock and 48C at 3.2 just idling in the BIOS. Toasty!

andrea wrote on 2023-05-26, 15:47:

Hi,
in my digital equivalent of the kitchen junk drawer i found these files:
ELSA2KXP.EXE and ELSA_W9X.EXE

These worked perfectly, thank you! 😀

I'd still be interested in an image of the driver CD which came with this card, if anyone has that. Just in case ELSA had some extra utilities there.

snufkin wrote on 2023-05-26, 15:30:

May not help (think these are likely generic drivers), but this page:
https://web.archive.org/web/20051127015251/ht … river_game.html
has a supported card list:

Thanks! I will try those as well.

Today I managed to get a pair of 64MB 5V 168 Pin EDO DIMMs. That jumble of terms does describe a real thing, I swear. Doing this has allowed my UMAX Mac clone to finally have more than the 48 it previously had.

Now to figure out if I want to give up my UMAX Computer logo for running Mac os 8.6. And, in case anyone asks, it's 144MB thanks to the soldered 16MB on the board. The board also uses Socket 5, funnily enough.

schmatzler wrote on 2023-05-26, 10:56:

QDI P5I430VX-250 (Explorer) for 10€ in a broken state.

Seller states every CPU only runs with 66MHz. This will be interesting to debug.

The board works just fine. It has a really old BIOS from 1996 on it, though - so I guess it detects a lot of CPUs as a 66MHz 486 and that just confused the seller. 😁

Best 10 bucks ever spent.

There really is a black & gold edition of the Terratec Solo-1 sound card. (a.k.a. 128i PCI)

And finally, someone took the time to misspell it on ebay.

dell geforce2 ultra.
resistors confirmed. thanks vogons.

Tetrium wrote on 2023-05-26, 14:28:

ubiq wrote on 2023-05-25, 21:30:

Did we all used to pull our desks a foot away from the wall for our CRTs to hang off? I feel like that was a thing.

This was the norm back then indeed, especially since at the time many people were using way too tiny desks to do their pc stuff on 😋

Or specific computer furniture, with a slide out tray for the keyboard and mouse beneath the monitor.
They were absolutely dreadful, I remember bashing my hands against the sides of the computer desk/cabinet we used to have the family computer in, there just wasn't enough space for comfortable use.

Went hunting, caught some unicorns, work horses, and some donkeys. ...

Was a box of random bits, these are the highlights...

Unicorn (and -ish): The real deal is I guess that Voyetra MIDI card, MPU401 interface, OP-400x board WITH the dongle. Then a Paradise/WDC 8 bit VGA card, an 8 bit floppy card with manual that can be set to secondary address, and supports HD floppies, then the ST-02 that also supports HD floppies, and has bootable SCSI interface. Finally, a monster sized fax/modem card with a scanner interface from "The Complete PC Inc" whose claim to fame is semi autonomous send and receive of faxes under DOS and document to fax and hand scanner capabilities, quite a "featurey" card for the late 80s. Yeah it's like Vogons Pimp my XT edition up in here today.

Workhorses: ISA I/O with leaflet manual, 3Com NIC ISA and PCI, Realtek NIC, the SARC card might actually be more unicorny than the VGA since nobody seems to have heard of it, but herc/CGA are in general common-ish and less sought after. Yet another Rage 128, AGP.

Other and donkeys: Not pictured. Two 4GB IDE drives, two desktop trackpads serial interface, never seen those before and I get 2, Cirque brand. 12GB Archive tape drive, apparently SCSI. and the real donkeys, a "scanner" scsi card, 25 pin external only, and a PCI modem.

Also followed me home, SFF Acer system, AX1930, sandycrotch era, not sure what CPU, OEM was a Pentium yawnmonger, dude said it got a quad core upgrade, so might be a decent i5. Got a GT710 PCIe 4x card in it, which is meh, but kinda good for low heat and decent features, might become HTPC kinda thing.

Apologies if photos not that good or I am not making sense, super tired and got the pollen blahs still.

cyclone3d wrote on 2019-02-02, 06:36:

wiretap wrote:

Sony Vaio Picturebook PCG-C1VPK. Offered $40 and the seller accepted. Looks like it needs a hard drive, which I already have to […]
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Sony Vaio Picturebook PCG-C1VPK. Offered $40 and the seller accepted. Looks like it needs a hard drive, which I already have to fit it. Hmm, Windows ME or 2000? Originally it came with ME, but later offered Win2k. Or maybe if I can find a restore disc with all the original software.. because dat Jog Dial.

Seller photos:

Pretty sure I have restore CDs that will work with that. Not sure if it is the same exact model. Either way, I should have all the drivers and such as I have a few different models from that series. I'll double check my restore CDs this weekend and try to get them uploaded somewhere. Not sure if my Google Drive has enough space left or not.

I've been searching the internet the last couple of weeks, spending probably hours trying to locate the restore discs for this particular model (PCG-C1VPK) and haven't had any luck, were you able to locate these discs? Or is there a place where I can download them? I'm also willing to PayPal if you can burn me a copy. Really desperate at this point. 😀 Thanks!

Life is strange. The other day I decided I need a GF4-MX440 for a future project. After going through my box of graphics cards I realized I didn't have one and bought a model from Gainward. Now, two weeks later, a friend showed up with a discarded PC he found. And that contained a nearly identical model from Albatron 😀

That PC also contained an interesting board: Albatron PX865PE Pro.
I was never much interested in Pentium 4 stuff so I don't know much about chipsets from that era. Maybe some experts here can tell me if that's a capable board. But from what I've found on the web so far it looks like that might be a good choice for a Pentium 4 system. The PC also came with a P4 3GHz.

bartonxp wrote on 2023-05-26, 19:11:

I bought an FX-62 recently, was overclocking on stock voltage last night, got up to 3.2GHz before I had to switch gears and do something else. The temps were crazy, a stock AM3 cooler rose to 50C stock before I got the fear, and with an eight pipe tower cooler, ~45C stock and 48C at 3.2 just idling in the BIOS. Toasty!

I'm not sure if the FX heatspreader is soldered on.
The 5200+ AM2 has thermal paste under the headspreader. Very old thermal paste.