Standard Def Steve wrote:

I finally installed WinXP MCE 2005 on my Super P3. I've always liked the MCE theme, and it runs great on this machine. The MCE i […]
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I finally installed WinXP MCE 2005 on my Super P3. I've always liked the MCE theme, and it runs great on this machine. The MCE interface runs at a full 60 fps. It even plays that MCE demonstration video (with the people playing pool) completely stutter-free. That's a 720p WMV-HD encoded video!

Specs of the machine are:
PIII-S @ 1575
2GB DDR-300 CL2
6800GT AGP
X-Fi
QDI Advance 12T
XP MCE 2005 SP3...yeah baby!

PureVideo HD engine on the 6800GT is responsible for that feat. Hardware decoding.

Would working on a radio count? If so, I soldered on an AUX cord to the audio input on the volume/power potentiometer and desoldered the RF wire, and soldered on some wires for it: one for the wire that goes to the logic board, and two (since I made them too short) for the potentiometer. It's a work in progress (not perfect yet since the volume is scratchy mainly because of my not-so-good soldering skills), but, it works (hooked up a Bluetooth receiver to test my phone's audio (music and YouTube videos) and to my laptop as well via the line out jack).

Pics:

Gallery: https://imgur.com/gallery/siGog43

Merovign wrote:

ssokolow wrote:

If you don't want to keep it, try to find it a good home. Heck, even if you have a bad drive, try to find someone willing to take a crack at repairing it. They're only going to get harder to find over time.

If it makes you feel any better, I have like a dozen of them in a box, and a spare (but needs work) Mac superdrive. Not sure that drive will ever work again, but it's a source of parts, anyway.

I will confess to once disposing of an 8" drive that I'd moved around for years with no use, but that was an ugly move for hardware - someone (not me) dropped my Cromemco off the back of a truck, I'll probably never see one of those again.

That does make me feel somewhat better and I'm in a similar situation.

I have nine spare WinXP-era machines, six with 3.5" drives, plus a P133 with a 3.5" drive, two early Pentium laptops with floppy drives, possibly a spare in a box (can't remember if I used it), and a broken one to investigate when I can find the time, but I think I gave the two 5.25" drives I used to have to my mother to be taken apart and turned into art.

ssokolow wrote:

but I think I gave the two 5.25" drives I used to have to my mother to be taken apart and turned into art.

(sigh) I have ONE 5.25 (a Teac combo) but it doesn't work.

Why I got rid of my old ones from the old days I'll never know - or maybe I didn't, after all, I had a Voodoo 3 go "missing" during a move. Grumble grumble.

Now 5.25's, even untested ones, are just expensive.

What's the issue with your Teac combo drive? Motor seized up, belt snapped, or worse? I have an Epson Dual SD-800 floppy drive (3.5" 1.44MB and 5.25" 1.2MB) and it works without issues (I should lubricate the motor ramps and clean the heads).

I managed to luck into a bunch of REALLY old DOS software on original floppies recently. Took some time yesterday to image them on my 386. I have no idea what kind of life some of the disks have had & where they were stored, and even despite the fact that I was reading 360k disks on a 1.2MB drive, every one I tried read 100% perfectly with NO drama. Even this one which is shaped like a dinner plate. 😜 What's bit rot??

I don't think I got anything that can't be downloaded online already, but now I have images of MY copies, and I know all the disks work. Worth doing.

I'm starting to setup the AlphaPC 164 with PowerStorm300 system that I acquired recently. So far: it's alive!

I need to change the fan on the video card because it's very noisy. And there is a bad contact somewhere in the fan connector because I have to tweak its position or else the fan starts and stops randomly.

Notice in the first picture the improvised startup "switch" made from a twisted piece of wire connecting the green wire on the ATX connector to ground... without that it won't run (known problem http://www.omnistep.com/~advantag/pwrsup.htm )

Merovign wrote:

(sigh) I have ONE 5.25 (a Teac combo) but it doesn't work.

I have one of these faulty as well. The 3.5" doesn't work but the 5.25" is good. I pulled out the ribbon cable to the 3.5" drive and it functions fine as a single 5.25" drive B: with a separate 3.5" drive as A:

Standard Def Steve wrote:

I finally installed WinXP MCE 2005 on my Super P3. I've always liked the MCE theme, and it runs great on this machine. The MCE i […]
Show full quote

I finally installed WinXP MCE 2005 on my Super P3. I've always liked the MCE theme, and it runs great on this machine. The MCE interface runs at a full 60 fps. It even plays that MCE demonstration video (with the people playing pool) completely stutter-free. That's a 720p WMV-HD encoded video!

Specs of the machine are:
PIII-S @ 1575
2GB DDR-300 CL2
6800GT AGP
X-Fi
QDI Advance 12T
XP MCE 2005 SP3...yeah baby!

Interesting. Media Center Edition is one of my favorite versions of Windows XP. My favorite feature (and I'm not sure if this was built into the MCE Edition or if it was an OEM program) was the Dancer program which let you put a dancing person on your screen while you were listening to music.

FYI the Royale theme (included in Media Center and Tablet PC Edition) was available for download for users of other editions of Windows XP.

bjwil1991 wrote:

What's the issue with your Teac combo drive? Motor seized up, belt snapped, or worse? I have an Epson Dual SD-800 floppy drive (3.5" 1.44MB and 5.25" 1.2MB) and it works without issues (I should lubricate the motor ramps and clean the heads).

I think it's electronic. 5.25 doesn't respond at all, the 3.5 lights up but doesn't read.

There's a trace of corrosion that doesn't look too bad, I'm afraid there's probably worse inside. Haven't torn it down, I have a monitor and a few motherboards to fix first.

I just cleaned and fixed like 4 Mac floppy drives, but none of them seem to have had any corrosion problems, just horrifying dirt and ash.

I was able to make a massive amount of progress yesterday/today.

Yesterday, after about an hour and 15 minutes of filing, I was able to file away enough metal to cut in half the bad standoff screw off my doctor's PC's motherboard and save the standoff.

With that out of the way, I went ahead and reassembled the entire PC, and lo-and-behold, everything still worked!

After taking a break for a few hours, earlier this morning, I then proceeded to thoroughly clean that nice PS/2 keyboard that I got along with the PC (it was hella-dirty underneath the keys; yuck), and then finally updated the board's BIOS to the latest revision.

Now, for those who know more than me, I have a question. Is this keyboard indeed a buckling-spring membrane keyboard or not? I did see membranes beneath the keys, but, without taking the board fully apart, am unsure of whether or not it is in fact like those famous IBM buckling-spring keyboards.

Rubber dome.

Bummer. I was hoping is wasn't that. 😀

Thanks!

the_ultra_code wrote:

Now, for those who know more than me, I have a question. Is this keyboard indeed a buckling-spring membrane keyboard or not? I did see membranes beneath the keys, but, without taking the board fully apart, am unsure of whether or not it is in fact like those famous IBM buckling-spring keyboards.

If a keyboard is based on the Model M-style buckling spring mechanism, you'll know it just from the combination of a distinctive low pitch to the sound when the key engages (compared to a Cherry switch) and the slight ringing noise the keys make when released. It varies from key to key but, for keys that produce the purest example of it, I'd describe the sound of a slow press-release cycle as "tack-ting" or "tack-ing", depending on the key. (The Print Screen/Scroll Lock/Pause block is a good place to get a strong, clear test sound, in my experience.)

Beyond that, I once had to get a refund from an eBay seller on a mis-labelled Unicomp rubber dome keyboard, so I can show you the "pop off one of the key stems using a $2 keycap puller and look" photographic comparison that I submitted of the difference between a buckling spring and rubber dome mechanism when everything else is identical:

ssokolow wrote:

If a keyboard is based on the Model M-style buckling spring mechanism, you'll know it just from the combination of a distinctive low pitch to the sound when the key engages (compared to a Cherry switch) and the slight ringing noise the keys make when released. It varies from key to key but, for keys that produce the purest example of it, I'd describe the sound of a slow press-release cycle as "tack-ting" or "tack-ing", depending on the key. (The Print Screen/Scroll Lock/Pause block is a good place to get a strong, clear test sound, in my experience.)

Beyond that, I once had to get a refund from an eBay seller on a mis-labelled Unicomp rubber dome keyboard, so I can show you the "pop off one of the key stems using a $2 keycap puller and look" photographic comparison that I submitted of the difference between a buckling spring and rubber dome mechanism when everything else is identical:

That's a great comparison you provided here. Yeah, sadly, my keyboard has none of those mechanical noise characteristics, and that photo comparison, with the photo on the right, fits my case completely. Plus, I have a Corsair Cherry MX Red keyboard, and that PS/2 keyboard sounds nothing like it. Thank you for backing up what oeuvre said.

AFAIK Keytronics are all rubber domes, usually high quality.

the_ultra_code wrote:

That's a great comparison you provided here. Yeah, sadly, my keyboard has none of those mechanical noise characteristics, and that photo comparison, with the photo on the right, fits my case completely. Plus, I have a Corsair Cherry MX Red keyboard, and that PS/2 keyboard sounds nothing like it. Thank you for backing up what oeuvre said.

No problem. In fact, since the whim hit me, here's a recording of my Scroll Lock so you can actually hear what I mean.

https://instaud.io/2vKe

(It actually sounds more pleasing in person, but I don't have the greatest microphone in the world.)

Putting together some tools to fix an annoying problem... and an excuse for some really low-res ansi art while I'm at it.

stamasd wrote:

I'm starting to setup the AlphaPC 164 with PowerStorm300 system that I acquired recently. So far: it's alive!
...

Nice system! Seems your board has the firmware version with the older MS blue ARC bootstrap for NT4. These boards had various firmware updates. Maybe you can find one for your specific model with the newer AlphaBIOS system with the pseudoGUI setup utility, which includes support for Windows 2000 RC1, the last NT revision with support for the Alpha CPU.

These ATX Alpha board kits are rare, really hard to find. Please don't dispose it once you get tired of it.

the_ultra_code wrote:

https://c2.staticflickr.com/2/1800/28886235407_f64166fbd6.jpg […]
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That's one of those fake BTX cases that were popular in the middle of the last decade.