feipoa wrote:There are certainly deals to be had, but they are becomming harder and harder to scores for older rare hardware. A TI486SXL2-66 […]
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There are certainly deals to be had, but they are becomming harder and harder to scores for older rare hardware. A TI486SXL2-66/PGA132 sold for $20 on eBay recently. This occured because the seller didn't know what he had and just so happened that nobody else saw it, which is hard to believe because quite a few people are looking for it.
My core interests are 386/486, but go up to dual PIII Tualatins. Like most users here, I have fond memmories of the 386/486 era and this shapes my interest today.
bakemono, I find the older 386 chipsets, like those based on CHIPS and SIS tend to have faster memory throughput, particularly with read (according to the speedsys graph) compared to 386/486 hybrid chipsets, e.g. VIA 495, UMC 481, etc. Some results in brief here, download/file.php?id=20091&mode=view
Also, for some reason, AMI BIOSes for the UMC 481/482 chipset implement more wait states for the main memory compared to using MR BIOS for the same chipset. The results above are when using MR BIOS, but still not nearly as good as CHIPS or SIS.
Well you got lucky i guess, otherwise there is no chance if the seller knows what he have... That type of deals are the very best when the seller does not have a clue what he holds, this is how i did get IBM Model M gen 3 for 5 euro, or now P3B-F for like 6-7 euro, but that happen once in a years if lucky...There are also people that know very well how much their old hardware costs and if its priceless, but they just don`t need it anymore, they don`t have space to store them, and they just give them away as presents, this is the best that can happen to a collector, but it happen very rarely, rest of the time i need to hunt parts down, to look for them in sites like ebay (but not ebay) to look just for old computers as many people don`t have a single clue what is inside the white old case, this is how i did found ASUS P2B with working Quantum 10GB and AWE 64 Value, i found some computer that did have pictures only on the outside, so i did ask for pictures inside and i saw the AWE 64 and P2B, but it takes time to do so, but when i found something is very nice for minimal cost...
Im not sure if some chipsets are better on 386 boards or not, some boards specially the ones with OPTI chipsets seems very retarded as they don`t if i don`t fill all the RAM slots, also they don`t post if they don`t like the ISA video card even if its Trident...
Now im having problems running OPTI board but it is with a damn AMD DX CPU and i want to make it alive, but so far nothing, the batter was leaked and there is little damage, but i think it should be fine, the CPU is getting hot after a while so that is good thing, but no matter what i try the damn board just don`t post, for now i don`t have 8 SIMM modules to fill all the slots and to see if it will run...
Mah systems retro, old, newer (Radical stuff)
W3680 4.5/ GA-x58 UD7/ R9 280x
K7 2.6/ NF7-S/ HD3850
IBM x2 P3 933/ GA-6VXD7/ Voodoo V 5.5K
Cmq P2 450/ GA-BX2000/ V2 SLI
IBM PC365
Cmq DeskPRO 486/33
IBM PS/2 Model 56
SPS IntelleXT 8088