VOGONS


First post, by PowerPie5000

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Hi all, i just received an old 486 base unit today and have no idea who manufactured the motherboard! It also came with a AMD 486DX4-100mhz CPU.

As far as i can tell it seems to be a standard socket 3 ISA/VLB board with 4 x 30-pin simm slots and 2 x 72-pin simm slots.

It has the model number "JK-042A". Is this board worth keeping?

Here is a link to the same board i have: http://farm1.static.flickr.com/236/455596555_ … 9e8c7bc.jpg?v=0

EDIT: it also uses chips manufactured by UMC.

Reply 1 of 8, by Anonymous Coward

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I can't say for certain, but it looks like you have a PCChips motherboard there:

http://artofhacking.com/th99/m/A-B/33259.htm

At least the jumper locations seem to line up.

"Will the highways on the internets become more few?" -Gee Dubya
V'Ger XT|Upgraded AT|Ultimate 386|Super VL/EISA 486|SMP VL/EISA Pentium

Reply 2 of 8, by PowerPie5000

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I found a a tiny bit of info that says they are used in "Viglen Vig 11" PC's but on my PC case it says "BYTE" made in the UK by "Mitac".

This 486 has got a Winbond VLB I/O card with IDE, floppy and com ports. It's also got a Cirrus Logic VLB Vesa VGA card, 545mb Seagate hard drive, floppy and CD drive etc... but no sound card at the moment (will probably use an old SB16).

I have no idea who manufactures the motherboard but at least it's got the jumper settings printed on the board between the slots 😀 I would have preffered a 486 board with PCI/ISA slots instead of VLB/ISA slots.

Reply 3 of 8, by PowerPie5000

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Ok i finally got the PC to boot after hunting down some working memory simms!

On the boot screen it says: U-BOARD GREEN PC with this bios string: 02/28/95-UMC-498GP-2C4X6U01-00 (Award Modular Bios v4.50G)

Reply 4 of 8, by Anonymous Coward

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According to BIOS ID, it is manufactured by "U-Board Computerize Ltd" ...I'm still convinced it's a PCchips board though.

"Will the highways on the internets become more few?" -Gee Dubya
V'Ger XT|Upgraded AT|Ultimate 386|Super VL/EISA 486|SMP VL/EISA Pentium

Reply 5 of 8, by PowerPie5000

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Anonymous Coward wrote:

According to BIOS ID, it is manufactured by "U-Board Computerize Ltd" ...I'm still convinced it's a PCchips board though.

I would agree it's probably an OEM board distributed under different brands. Do you think this board would work with EDO simms? I remember EDO ram being all the rage with old Pentium 1 systems but are they still compatible with 486 PC's?

Reply 6 of 8, by 5u3

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PowerPie5000 wrote:

Do you think this board would work with EDO simms?

Depends on the chipset, but it's rather unlikely. As far as I remember, two or three of the latest 486 PCI chipsets had rather wobbly support for EDO RAM.

Reply 8 of 8, by evasive

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Made a page for it
https://www.ultimateretro.net/en/motherboards/11331
There are several UMC UM8498/8496 boards, the ADI ones in particular that are very similar to this. I don't know if the jumper settings can be recycled 1-on-1 though.