Nice one, and it's a 'proper' 486 too! (VLB). Strange that it has an ISA IO card; it'd be worth tracking down a VLB one I think. And of course that battery is a worry.

badmojo wrote:

Strange that it has an ISA IO card

Did most people get a VLB IO card to go with their 486 when they built them? I can't remember the cost difference at the time. I just pulled all the cards from my 386 and put them in my 486 when I upgraded. I later (funds allowing) jumped the VGA card to VLB. I assumed others did that when they upgraded and possibly made the VLB VGA jump at the same time as their upgrade.

CkRtech wrote:

Awesome, probnot! Detail your restore in system specs or something, would you?

I totally will. Super stoked 😀

badmojo wrote:

Nice one, and it's a 'proper' 486 too! (VLB). Strange that it has an ISA IO card; it'd be worth tracking down a VLB one I think. And of course that battery is a worry.

I thought that was odd too. I would like to track one down just for the second IDE channel (since getting the ribbon cable to go between the CD-ROM and SD adapter will be a PITA. This was a custom-build machine by a local (now defunct) computer builder, and it still has the asset tag from the medical office it came from, so I'm assuming it was a cost reason when built.

Also, I've already removed the battery and replaced with some wires for now (for future battery pack). No leaking and it still was at 2.4v, but definitely had to be removed.

Another audio gear tangent here. Got a new deskside amp. Traded my Pioneer SX-6 for it. Supposedly it didn't work, but seems fine to me.

No pictures, but I bought a buncha HW from a recycle center. The centerpiece being a Diamond Monster 3D II 12MB Rev A matched pair still attached to their SLI bridge! Unfortunately, one of the DM3D2's has some bent 'fingers' (what are those called officially?) and what looks like a very light scratch on the PCB. That one, while it passes video, does not do 3D. I'm going to try straightening the fingers some more (at the very least they are still connected to the PCB and the chip) and give it a try.

Predator99 wrote:

Then there is a nice Socket 7 AT board

Don't want to ruin the day, but it seems that the lever and top locking mechanism from the Socket 7 has been removed 🙁

kithylin wrote:

Predator99 wrote:

Just received this lot.<snip>

I just noticed the seller removed all heatsinks off of the things.. all chipset heatsinks from the motherboards and all heatsink-fans off the video cards... Why?? 😕 😕

And probably ruined several of em in the process. 😢 😵

Yes, you are also right. This lot was sold for recycling, so I think the buyer thought it would be a benefit to have this already removed. 😵
So I am even more happy to have saved these 286/386 boards...

Pajaman wrote:

Predator99 wrote:

Then there is a nice Socket 7 AT board

Don't want to ruin the day, but it seems that the lever and top locking mechanism from the Socket 7 has been removed 🙁

Yes, I also noticed this....
The CPU is tight in place without this locking mechanism, but the board isnt working anyway.

But as the 286 board, at least one of the 386 boards and also the Genoa EGA/VGA are running, this was a good deal for me. I am going to re-sell all the other stuff, therefore it will be even better.

probnot wrote:

I finally found a 486! Just happened to stop at the recycler today and he had one available...25 Canadian Pesos!

Very nice find, i really like it!
I agree, replace battery ASAP

Maybe you should put a 3.5 inch floppy in the vertical slot , or you can find some bezels (3.5 or 5.25) to cover the holes. A 5.25 floppy drive would be a nice addon, but it's great as is

Sunday flea market time! I did find some interesting stuff today.

Box full of ram. 5 eur for the entire box. Mostly pc100-pc 133 ram , varying from 32 to 128 mb ,
lots of Simms too, at least one is 32 mb!! wow
at least 10 cache memory sticks,one ddr 256 and just one 32pin 1 mb ram

The same seller had those pc game boxes at 1 eur each, 97-2000 era

Bought an unused AT Case as good as new from car boot today for just 3 British pounds.

brad1982_5 wrote:

Bought an unused AT Case as good as new from car boot today for just 3 British pounds. http://i185.photobucket.com/albums/x305/b […]
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Bought an unused AT Case as good as new from car boot today for just 3 British pounds.

Nice case! No unnecessary obstructions, so it seems you could have full-length cards like SB AWE 32.

I love the Creative boxes!

I got one of these:

+

Athlon XP 2600+ FSB 266

I saw a Hercules branded card there today also and a Radeon X800 AGP card there too.
I already have an ATX version of that same case with an AWE32 in!
They are called Jupiter AT/ATX cases hence the style of the power and reset switches and were exclusive to Maplin Electronics.

probnot wrote:

I finally found a 486! Just happened to stop at the recycler today and he had one available...25 Canadian Pesos! […]
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I finally found a 486! Just happened to stop at the recycler today and he had one available...25 Canadian Pesos!

Intel 486DX2-66
16MB RAM (4x4MB 30-pin SIMMs)
Unknown motherboard
VI-711A VLB Graphics (Cirrus Logic CL-GD5428)
Pine Technology PT-604A Controller
Enermax PSU

It posts, but the PSU will need a re-cap (some are even bulging).

I suggest a full recap on any capacitor in the system, the fact that the PSU caps are bulging is likely due to the reason the system not being powered for a LONG time (every year is recommended at a max every 3 years to prevent caps from going bad at accelerated rate).

Richo wrote:

I suggest a full recap on any capacitor in the system, the fact that the PSU caps are bulging is likely due to the reason the system not being powered for a LONG time (every year is recommended at a max every 3 years to prevent caps from going bad at accelerated rate).

That's the plan. Unfortunately, I had to order some of the larger value caps that I didn't have in stock, so I won't be able to re-cap until Tuesday at the earliest...

Richo wrote:

I suggest a full recap on any capacitor in the system, the fact that the PSU caps are bulging is likely due to the reason the system not being powered for a LONG time (every year is recommended at a max every 3 years to prevent caps from going bad at accelerated rate).

Never heard of this before. Is there a technical reason (or explanation) why not powering up a system over a long time span will cause caps to go bad? I always thought it was environmental conditions. Of my personal boards, the longest one that remained powered off was probably my Asus P4GPL-X. It was off for 11 years, and the caps are in great shape.

dexvx wrote:

Richo wrote:

I suggest a full recap on any capacitor in the system, the fact that the PSU caps are bulging is likely due to the reason the system not being powered for a LONG time (every year is recommended at a max every 3 years to prevent caps from going bad at accelerated rate).

Never heard of this before. Is there a technical reason (or explanation) why not powering up a system over a long time span will cause caps to go bad? I always thought it was environmental conditions. Of my personal boards, the longest one that remained powered off was probably my Asus P4GPL-X. It was off for 11 years, and the caps are in great shape.

I suggest you read about the Capacitor Plague and exactly what it entails. Basically there was a period with older electronics where suspect capacitors were used and if some have already failed then the rest are expected to fail in very short order. And devices with bad capacitors should not be operated until they're replaced. They can lead to serious overheating and if the electrolyte contained inside leaks onto the surface of the PCB while it's under electrical load, it can short circuit the thing and start a fire in worst cases, leading to damage of entire PCB's and other nasty things that would make repairing it a lot more expensive than just a few bucks for capacitors. Or permanently destroy an entire board if that's the issue, like on a motherboard.

Read here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capacitor_plague

Oxidation and UV can deteriorate components regardless of usage. I wouldn't expect periodically starting a system to ameliorate this. It does help prevent stiction in fan and hard drive bearings, though.

kithylin wrote:

dexvx wrote:

Richo wrote:

I suggest a full recap on any capacitor in the system, the fact that the PSU caps are bulging is likely due to the reason the system not being powered for a LONG time (every year is recommended at a max every 3 years to prevent caps from going bad at accelerated rate).

Never heard of this before. Is there a technical reason (or explanation) why not powering up a system over a long time span will cause caps to go bad? I always thought it was environmental conditions. Of my personal boards, the longest one that remained powered off was probably my Asus P4GPL-X. It was off for 11 years, and the caps are in great shape.

I suggest you read about the Capacitor Plague and exactly what it entails. Basically there was a period with older electronics where suspect capacitors were used and if some have already failed then the rest are expected to fail in very short order. And devices with bad capacitors should not be operated until they're replaced. They can lead to serious overheating and if the electrolyte contained inside leaks onto the surface of the PCB while it's under electrical load, it can short circuit the thing and start a fire in worst cases, leading to damage of entire PCB's and other nasty things that would make repairing it a lot more expensive than just a few bucks for capacitors. Or permanently destroy an entire board if that's the issue, like on a motherboard.

Read here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capacitor_plague

For the lazy here is the basics: Essentially from 1999-2007 a number of non solid water-aluminium based capacitor manufactures were using an unstable formula to manufacture there capacitors leading to an extremely high failure rate increasing exponentially as time went by. By far the worst period would be 2000-2004 and easily the most heavily affected parts would be OEM Motherboards. High end name brand motherboards and add in cards seem to be less affected and when it is its usually off brand or low end stuff.

Come to think of it....
Wasn't the entire fiasco caused by some idiots in Taiwan attempting corporate espionage and stealing/copying a bad/incomplete formula or some such similar idiocy?

Arctic wrote:

I love the Creative boxes! […]
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I love the Creative boxes!

I got one of these:

+

Athlon XP 2600+ FSB 266

Nice find! I have an Asus version of the ti500 but i am a sucker for these Prophet cards, i like them a lot! I do have a Geforce2 Pro version of the Prophet which has the same ''looks''.
I recently found a normal Geforce3 from this Prophet series but i had to leave it at the scrapper as it had too much components missing....i was 😢

Went to a local computer shop again (another one, not the one that's closing 😜 ) and got some cool stuff.

- Boxed 586 cooler (probably Socket 5/7)
- RAM cooler module (for overclocking RAM and keeping them cool? Not sure.)
- Adaptec SCSI card, PCI
- Sound Blaster Audigy SB0090
- "take me home" PS2 mouse
- Generic PCMCIA desktop reader? with ISA controller card
- 4 PS/2 to AT converter cables

In total it was like $47, their clearance aisle is full of cool stuff. 🤣