Cyrix200+ wrote:

I got mine there as well. I don't think these were 'unsoldered' from anything, but that they maybe mean that it was never soldered. They work fine 😀 (Yes, mine also at 600MHz).

jheronimus wrote:

Finally got my AMD K6-3+ from this seller. Haven't checked yet, but it's really clean for an unsoldered chip.

2017-05-12 11.51.32.jpg

Oh, I see! That explains it. I've read here somewhere on Vogons that most of these chips were manually unsoldered from laptop motherboards, which always left me wondering how can such a tedious process be profitable.

Yeah I think the laptops they are coming from just has a socket. I've got an Acer note laptop which originally came with a pentium 120MHz but when I disassembled it, I was quite surprised to see a ceramic chip in a socket 7 ^^. I upgraded it to a pentium MMX166 which has roughly the same TDP and works perfectly fine. I'm pretty sure that it is the same kind of deal with K6-x+ laptops. And even if they were actually soldered, removing them with a hot air station shouldn't be that difficult.

Now that I speak about that acer laptop and K6-x+ this makes me wonder if I could mod that laptop to handle a K6 chip. (I need a really low tdp cpu because that machine is fanless). I would have to modify the CPU regulation circuit in order to do that because otherwize it doesn't go lower than 2.9v 🙁 but I have not enough knowledge to know how to do that

Deksor wrote:

Yeah I think the laptops they are coming from just has a socket. I've got an Acer note laptop which originally came with a pentium 120MHz but when I disassembled it, I was quite surprised to see a ceramic chip in a socket 7 ^^. I upgraded it to a pentium MMX166 which has roughly the same TDP and works perfectly fine. I'm pretty sure that it is the same kind of deal with K6-x+ laptops. And even if they were actually soldered, removing them with a hot air station shouldn't be that difficult.

Now that I speak about that acer laptop and K6-x+ this makes me wonder if I could mod that laptop to handle a K6 chip. (I need a really low tdp cpu because that machine is fanless). I would have to modify the CPU regulation circuit in order to do that because otherwize it doesn't go lower than 2.9v 🙁 but I have not enough knowledge to know how to do that

I never tried putting a desktop socket 7 CPU on a laptop, but i did the oposite, putting a mobile Pentium MMX 150 on a desktop motherboard, it worked without problems and it was stable at 166 mhz as well, which is a good thing for motherboards which doesn't do FSB 60 like some later SS7 motherboard i used to test with.

I don't think putting a desktop K6-2/3 on a laptop is a good idea, K6-2 is a downgrade due to the lack of L2 cache compared to K6-2+/3+ when the K6-3 can't clock high as the plus version and uses more power, the mobile K6-x+ are better than the older desktop versions due to the 180 nm process and on die L2 cache

Edit:

The original 350 nm K6 had similar TDPs and voltages, especially the K6 166/200/233 which they are rated usually to 2.9-3.3 volts depending of the model, but they have higher TDPs, the later 266 mhz and 300 mhz might not be optimal due to begin rated at 2.2v since AMD dieshunk the K6 to 250 nm staring with the 266 mhz model. Mobile K6s won't be a good idea due to the even lower voltage

My 99 cent XPS arrived today. And it works!!!! It's gonna need some good cleaning up to get the sticker residue off. Needs a wifi card and an HDD as well, and possibly a CMOS battery. Can't wait to put a 9800 and a P4 EE in it. Going to bench it against the desktop and see how well it does with equal specs.

No I don't want to put a K6-2 in there and even if I did, no it wouldn't decrease the performance since at the moment the CPU is a pentium MMX 166 so even the K6-2 is munch faster than this (and a K6-x+ would be even faster because that computer has no L2 cache) but like I said this would require me to mod the circuit ...

xplus93 wrote:

My 99 cent XPS arrived today. And it works!!!! It's gonna need some good cleaning up to get the sticker residue off. Needs a wifi card and an HDD as well, and possibly a CMOS battery. Can't wait to put a 9800 and a P4 EE in it. Going to bench it against the desktop and see how well it does with equal specs.

Oh cool, someone from here got that. Lemme know if you find a source on those 9800s that isn't $LOL, I've been looking forever for mine.

If you're cleaning the dust out, remember that there's a third fan under the palm rest that blows through the middle of the laptop. It's a PITA to get to, though. I dunno how the EE compares, but swapping to a Northwood from a Prescott dropped my idle temps into the low 40s, which is pretty alright for a desktop CPU in a laptop.

One thing to keep in mind with the wifi card is that many laptops have BIOS whitelists for mini-PCI devices (Thinkpad T43s have 'em for the hard drive!), and will complain/refuse to work with off-the-shelf cards. I don't know if Dells from that particular era do, but it's something to watch out for. Also, it uses this stupid card-edge connector that fits onto the hard drive, so make sure to grab that if it didn't come with.

Good luck and have fun.

Rawrl wrote:

Oh cool, someone from here got that. Lemme know if you find a source on those 9800s that isn't $LOL, I've been looking forever f […]
Show full quote

xplus93 wrote:

My 99 cent XPS arrived today. And it works!!!! It's gonna need some good cleaning up to get the sticker residue off. Needs a wifi card and an HDD as well, and possibly a CMOS battery. Can't wait to put a 9800 and a P4 EE in it. Going to bench it against the desktop and see how well it does with equal specs.

Oh cool, someone from here got that. Lemme know if you find a source on those 9800s that isn't $LOL, I've been looking forever for mine.

If you're cleaning the dust out, remember that there's a third fan under the palm rest that blows through the middle of the laptop. It's a PITA to get to, though. I dunno how the EE compares, but swapping to a Northwood from a Prescott dropped my idle temps into the low 40s, which is pretty alright for a desktop CPU in a laptop.

One thing to keep in mind with the wifi card is that many laptops have BIOS whitelists for mini-PCI devices (Thinkpad T43s have 'em for the hard drive!), and will complain/refuse to work with off-the-shelf cards. I don't know if Dells from that particular era do, but it's something to watch out for. Also, it uses this stupid card-edge connector that fits onto the hard drive, so make sure to grab that if it didn't come with.

Good luck and have fun.

A fair bet for a wifi card is the Intel one that every other laptop used to have from around 2004-2008. I can't remember the model number. 4300 sounds right. Most OEM's offered those as factory installed options hence forth they are widely supported.

@ynari, thanks for the details! I've got a monitor that should work with it, however the previous owner has installed an ATi card in it for VGA output. Not sure what card exactly...

I'll probably make an adapter, presuming I have the parts required nearby. I'd much prefer to have an original keyboard and mouse but those prices on eBay are stupidly expensive. I got the machine for $30!

As it is, I also got a Power Mac G5 the other day too, so I'm focusing my efforts on that one for now...

@TheAbandonwareGuy, my Dell Inspiron 9300 from 2005 uses an Intel 2200 mini PCI card. From memory, the 2100 and 2200 cards were also quite popular.

Also, as for the whole white list thing. My Dell only supports the Nvidia 6800Go card. There were updated BIOS images available to support the newer card from the XPS line, so I can only presume there might be some hacked up BIOS out there for xplus93

TheAbandonwareGuy wrote:

A fair bet for a wifi card is the Intel one that every other laptop used to have from around 2004-2008. I can't remember the model number. 4300 sounds right. Most OEM's offered those as factory installed options hence forth they are widely supported.

Yeah, Dell either used an Intel 2100/2200/2915 or a Broadcom 43xx-based card for most Mini-PCI systems. I was specifically thinking of Thinkpads, which check the card's sub-vendor PCI-ID against the BIOS list (HP are notorious for this as well). I don't know if Dell does it, but after screwing around with the problem on IBMs, I've just always made sure to use cards with a Dell P/N on them.

Picked up this LG Xnote LM50 today.

Specs:
1.5 Ghz Pentium M
Intel 855PM Chipset
2 GB of RAM
Radeon 9200 Mobility
VIA AC'97 compliant Audio
DVD/CD-RW drive
15" 1024x768 screen
Intel 2200BG WiFi

The WiFi is faulty - This model seems to have an XP recovery image in some sort of ROM - I loaded the recovery image and it crashes on first boot loading the driver

That said... the main plan is for this to be a Windows ME laptop, and the 2200BG isn't supported anyways 😀
I dropped it to 1 GB of RAM, and the Chipset is fully supported by the default Intel drivers.
The audio works when installed with a VIA package from an Acer (Audio_VIA_6.14.01.4020_XPx86, which seems to include WInME compatible WDM drivers. Several amusing spelling errors in the system tray tool 😀 )
The video works with the latest Catalyst drivers, though I had to manually force-install the Radeon 9200 driver.

I was looking at the usual online places and i saw this

According to the seller : "non working PC 286 25mhz"
fully loaded, they didnt treat well the pc case damn it,i dont know how to fix the broken plastic (bottom left) and the dark spots might be burned plastic because i can´t take it out. (next to hdd light). Picture looks better, the actual color of the front is more yellow/orange plastic

5 fucking dollars

and when i opened the case......

386. and the shit works, PINK PURPLE bios! SO OLD!
it was broken because of the power supply, they plugged it to 220volt. Took the battery out becaue it was bad and almost destroyed a trace ( see the vertical trace next to where the battery goes)

I am not quite sure why this 386 takes 10seconds after powering it, to actually give a video signal to the monitor , happens always at cold boot, tried many video cards.

I've got the following coming in:

Confirmed Working

ELSA Erazor X (GeForce256 SDR)

Untested, but assumed working. Acquired for free

Dell GeForce 256, unknown RAM type. Likely SDR
STB Systems Voodoo2 12MB (My first 3dfx card!)

Untested from bulk lot, appears undamaged

BFG Technologies GeForce 7800GS OC AGP
Dell Quadro FX 5500 PCIe (GF7800 based)
NVIDIA Quadro FX 570 (GF8600 based)
XFX GeForce 8800GTS XXX Edition (Factory OC)
MSI NX8600GT GeForce 8600GT (Fanless cooler)
EVGA GeForce 8800GTX of unknown configuration
EVGA GeForce 9400GT (why does this exist?)
Unknown brand GTX 285 missing outer shell
ASUS Radeon HD 7470 (silent cooler)

I've got a few more side bets I'm still waiting for the results on. I'll add pictures here whenever they get here and of course I test the red. The 7800GS is rare and a great match for my P4 machine for 2004-2005 games.
As I understand (correct me if wrong) the STB Voodoo2 is quite sought after. I've got 2 GeForce256 cards coming in which is great although sadly it looks like I still need to find a DDR. The GTX 285 is nice to have. It's a top notch DX10 card and I can use the cooler shell of my 260 for it. The XFX 8800GTS is nice. The EVGA 8800GTX is cool but I don't think SLI would be possible with the XFX 8800GTX I already own as it's factory OCd and I don't know the rules on SLI and various clock speeds. The Quadros are nice but I don't know if they can use the GeForce drivers like older ones can (if anyone knows for sure let me know).

So, what's the effective range of games for my new GLIDE capabilities? By which I mean what's the newest games I can run at maximum settings @ the 800x600 max of a single Voodoo2.

Nice haul! Pics when?

AFAIK in SLI the lowest speed wins. Your OC-ed GTX will downclock itself to the speed of the other one (stock?). Good luck on the heat with those things though 🤣.
Watch the fans on those Geforce256s. They're cheap little things, and like to seize or get wobbly. The heatsinks are also epoxied on for extra fun times.

Rawrl wrote:

Nice haul! Pics when?

AFAIK in SLI the lowest speed wins. Your OC-ed GTX will downclock itself to the speed of the other one (stock?). Good luck on the heat with those things though 🤣.
Watch the fans on those Geforce256s. They're cheap little things, and like to seize or get wobbly. The heatsinks are also epoxied on for extra fun times.

When I test the rest* that's when the pictures will arrive. As far as heat goes I had the same thoughts. My XFX doesn't suffer from the lead free solder issue, EVGA versions however do AFAIK so it would not surprise me if it's DOA. Also, I forget to mention the Dell 256 already is missing it's fan. Just the fan, the heatsink its self is still there. I might even try working out some sort of passive solution around the existing heat sink so either way I think I can rig something up. I also forgot to mention my total cost on all of this was like $45 USD.

Thanks for the info about SLI. Now I just need to figure out what the rules on Quadros using GeForce drivers are. I noticed the Quadro variant of the chip has a different pipeline configuration than the normal 7800GTX but I'm not sure if this is done in hardware or in software or in the video bios itself.

Rawrl wrote:

Nice haul! Pics when?

AFAIK in SLI the lowest speed wins. Your OC-ed GTX will downclock itself to the speed of the other one (stock?). Good luck on the heat with those things though 🤣.
Watch the fans on those Geforce256s. They're cheap little things, and like to seize or get wobbly. The heatsinks are also epoxied on for extra fun times.

Actually in my own testing with nvidia GTX 400's, 200's, and 6000's, if you use two cards of different manufacturers in SLI they actually will run at their own independent speeds if one's overclocked and the other isn't. And it actually can lead to a lot of instability and problems gaming like this unless you manually use software and down-clock the faster one.

kithylin wrote:

Rawrl wrote:

Nice haul! Pics when?

AFAIK in SLI the lowest speed wins. Your OC-ed GTX will downclock itself to the speed of the other one (stock?). Good luck on the heat with those things though 🤣.
Watch the fans on those Geforce256s. They're cheap little things, and like to seize or get wobbly. The heatsinks are also epoxied on for extra fun times.

Actually in my own testing with nvidia GTX 400's, 200's, and 6000's, if you use two cards of different manufacturers in SLI they actually will run at their own independent speeds if one's overclocked and the other isn't. And it actually can lead to a lot of instability and problems gaming like this unless you manually use software and down-clock the faster one.

Yeah I figured I'd either down clock the XFX or over clock the EVGA if it can handle the slight bump up in clock speed. That being said I'll likely go with the safer route thanks to aforementioned leadless solder crap.

Pabloz wrote:

I was looking at the usual online places and i saw this […]
Show full quote

I was looking at the usual online places and i saw this

According to the seller : "non working PC 286 25mhz"
fully loaded, they didnt treat well the pc case damn it,i dont know how to fix the broken plastic (bottom left) and the dark spots might be burned plastic because i can´t take it out. (next to hdd light). Picture looks better, the actual color of the front is more yellow/orange plastic

5 fucking dollars

and when i opened the case......

386. and the shit works, PINK PURPLE bios! SO OLD!
it was broken because of the power supply, they plugged it to 220volt. Took the battery out becaue it was bad and almost destroyed a trace ( see the vertical trace next to where the battery goes)

I am not quite sure why this 386 takes 10seconds after powering it, to actually give a video signal to the monitor , happens always at cold boot, tried many video cards.

Wow, hopefully you're not living in europe because the opposite thing (220v in while the psu is in 110v would have burn it)

orinoko wrote:

@TheAbandonwareGuy, my Dell Inspiron 9300 from 2005 uses an Intel 2200 mini PCI card. From memory, the 2100 and 2200 cards were also quite popular.

Also, as for the whole white list thing. My Dell only supports the Nvidia 6800Go card. There were updated BIOS images available to support the newer card from the XPS line, so I can only presume there might be some hacked up BIOS out there for xplus93

I actually have everything needed to convert Inspiron 9300s into XPS Gen 2s, most of it is software but once the bios update is done you will need to have the 9 cell battery installed as well use a 130w charger at the minimum. Running a 6800 Go Ultra in one system and a 7800 GTX Go in another. Also got a fan control utility as the gpu cooling in these systems isn't the greatest though I wish that modern laptops had the cpu temps these older Dells have. I've booted laptops like this and had cpu temps in the 20s 🤣.

nforce4max wrote:

orinoko wrote:

@TheAbandonwareGuy, my Dell Inspiron 9300 from 2005 uses an Intel 2200 mini PCI card. From memory, the 2100 and 2200 cards were also quite popular.

Also, as for the whole white list thing. My Dell only supports the Nvidia 6800Go card. There were updated BIOS images available to support the newer card from the XPS line, so I can only presume there might be some hacked up BIOS out there for xplus93

I actually have everything needed to convert Inspiron 9300s into XPS Gen 2s, most of it is software but once the bios update is done you will need to have the 9 cell battery installed as well use a 130w charger at the minimum. Running a 6800 Go Ultra in one system and a 7800 GTX Go in another. Also got a fan control utility as the gpu cooling in these systems isn't the greatest though I wish that modern laptops had the cpu temps these older Dells have. I've booted laptops like this and had cpu temps in the 20s 🤣.

This is also true on the Inspiron 9100 and the 1st gen XPS which even used the same motherboard