DonutKing wrote:

Talking the bezels off and giving them a good soaking in a strong solution of oxygen based laundry detergent works wonders for me.
Like Vanish or Napisan, although the generic versions are cheaper and often have higher concentration of the active ingredient.

A good soaking + brushing is the best if you ask me, if you have the opportunity to dismantle everything that is. I usualy use regular laundry but will try oxygen based now that you mention.

However the magic eraser is very useful for very quick surface cleaning without dismantling anything. Takes a minute and you are done refreshing a computer case, or a console.

Main thing about the oxygen cleaner is that its a primary ingredient of Retrobright: http://retr0bright.wikispaces.com/
So it helps to whiten the plastics too, if you leave it soaking for like a week in my experience.

What kind of boards were in those? 😁

DonutKing wrote:

Main thing about the oxygen cleaner is that its a primary ingredient of Retrobright: http://retr0bright.wikispaces.com/
So it helps to whiten the plastics too, if you leave it soaking for like a week in my experience.

Hahahaha!! Retrobright, the name is just awesome 😁 My dad also has one of those old Osborne in his closet ( dad really has alot of old stuff in his closet ).

ncmark wrote:

What kind of boards were in those? 😁

Case 1:PCChips M598LMR
Case 2:PCChips M919
Case 3:PCChips M598LMR

sebaz_ri wrote:

Case 1:PCChips M598LMR Case 2:PCChips M919 Case 3:PCChips M598LMR […]
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ncmark wrote:

What kind of boards were in those? 😁

Case 1:PCChips M598LMR
Case 2:PCChips M919
Case 3:PCChips M598LMR

yea those boards are better off scrapped. I like how the 598's have EVERYTHING onboard. They might make a nice thin-client but I wouldn't trust them. still cool.

luckybob wrote:

sebaz_ri wrote:

Case 1:PCChips M598LMR Case 2:PCChips M919 Case 3:PCChips M598LMR […]
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ncmark wrote:

What kind of boards were in those? 😁

Case 1:PCChips M598LMR
Case 2:PCChips M919
Case 3:PCChips M598LMR

yea those boards are better off scrapped. I like how the 598's have EVERYTHING onboard. They might make a nice thin-client but I wouldn't trust them. still cool.

About M598LMR... did you know how to fix the voltage regulator?
I can put only Pentium's Classic (P54C) due to 3.8 volts instead of 3.3
That's why the AMD K6-2 that came with this board was burned!

better off scrapped. If you dont see a voltage select jumper on the board clearly marked... its not worth messing with.

luckybob wrote:

better off scrapped. If you dont see a voltage select jumper on the board clearly marked... its not worth messing with.

With the Case 1 M598LMR i can set the voltage in the BIOS, but in the Case 3 M598LMR, even if i select 3.3 volts always 3.8 volts are detected with the Hardware Monitor; always the CPU is too hot because of this

September was bulk trash month here in CT. The city will haul away almost anything you leave on the curb, so people throw out tons of stuff. I found a couple ancient systems that I haven't even looked at yet, and one fairly modern system missing the HD and memory.

The modern one is an Acer system with an AMD processor. I think it's 2.7Ghz, but I can't be sure because I haven't gotten around to putting a hard drive in it and I can't match the exact chip numbers to anything on the net. Why doesn't AMD just put the specs on the chip, like Intel? 😕

I do know that Acer support royally sucks! In the process of removing the HD, they removed the cage that the HDs are secured into and for the life of me, I can't figure out how the cage is supposed to be fastened to the case. The downloadable user guide is no help, Acer won't provide service manuals to anyone but Acer techs and tech support couldn't tell me anything about it. They actually suggested that I take it to a local computer shop and let them try and figure it out! 😠

I also found a DVD burner that worked perfectly for me, but when I gave my friend a disc burned with it, he claimed that half the files were no good.

Unfortunately I don't find too many computers anymore. The scrap dealers drive around like locusts, grabbing ANYTHING made of metal.

Rekrul wrote:

September was bulk trash month here in CT. The city will haul away almost anything you leave on the curb, so people throw out to […]
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September was bulk trash month here in CT. The city will haul away almost anything you leave on the curb, so people throw out tons of stuff. I found a couple ancient systems that I haven't even looked at yet, and one fairly modern system missing the HD and memory.

The modern one is an Acer system with an AMD processor. I think it's 2.7Ghz, but I can't be sure because I haven't gotten around to putting a hard drive in it and I can't match the exact chip numbers to anything on the net. Why doesn't AMD just put the specs on the chip, like Intel? 😕

I do know that Acer support royally sucks! In the process of removing the HD, they removed the cage that the HDs are secured into and for the life of me, I can't figure out how the cage is supposed to be fastened to the case. The downloadable user guide is no help, Acer won't provide service manuals to anyone but Acer techs and tech support couldn't tell me anything about it. They actually suggested that I take it to a local computer shop and let them try and figure it out! 😠

I also found a DVD burner that worked perfectly for me, but when I gave my friend a disc burned with it, he claimed that half the files were no good.

Unfortunately I don't find too many computers anymore. The scrap dealers drive around like locusts, grabbing ANYTHING made of metal.

Hey we want pictures of the ancients systems! 😁
Some of those scrap dealers are evil. They dont care what it is: if its free and has metal in it... Goes right in the melting pot. Knowing what has value and reselling it as is instead is beyond them, too much thinking involved. Leaving the low metal value but high re-usability value stuff for other people is also out of the question.
As for me i found a HP OfficeJet G85 last week, right on the sidewalk:

Problem is they did not include the adapter, that dumb thing needs a 18v external adapter...
Its a pretty cool all in one, used to retail 800$ ten years ago. Only problem is that its inkjet, i hate inkjet, Laser FTW. I am still undecided as to what to do with it, might sell it "as is" ...

MaxWar wrote:

Hey we want pictures of the ancients systems! 😁

Your wish is my command;

MaxWar wrote:

Some of those scrap dealers are evil. They dont care what it is: if its free and has metal in it... Goes right in the melting pot. Knowing what has value and reselling it as is instead is beyond them, too much thinking involved. Leaving the low metal value but high re-usability value stuff for other people is also out of the question.

I know what you mean. The previous pickup month, my friend and I got to a pile too late as a scrap dealer was already there. I watched him grab what looked like a perfectly good computer and heave it into the back of his truck. They cut the cords off everything, even if it's one of those detachable power cords. I find the ends of them plugged into monitors all the time.

I do get lucky sometimes. I grabbed a box of video tapes for my friend and in the bottom was a complete, mint condition Playstation. Console, A/V cable, power cord, two dual shock controllers and a game. In another pile, I found nine PS2 games still in the cases. Last year, I found a ton of Atari 2600 stuff. I found a Colecovision too, but it doesn't work. I also have a working Gamecube, but nothing else (I borrowed the cables, controller and game from someone to test it) and a bare SNES. Not to mention a TON of Star Trek paperback novels. Plus box fans, standing fans, the chair I'm currently sitting in, the keyboard I'm using...

Of course I've had some unfavorable experiences too. Last time, I found a bunch of PS2 games in a box and as I was looking to see if they actually had the discs in them, another guy comes along, see the games and starts grabbing them out of the box right in front of me. My friend and I always give anyone at a pile before us first pick of anything there, but not this guy. Then he asks "How much do you guys sell them for?" Another time I was looking at a monitor in front of one house when the owner came down the driveway, dragging a second monitor, face down, by its cord. I asked if the first monitor worked and he said it did. As I was picking it up, he asked if I wanted the other one too. I told him "Not after you've been dragging the screen across the ground."

Aw so sad to hear stories of how humans trash their good stuff around.

Anyway, both those cases appear to be AT. The packard bell does not have Much of an AT look but it contains a P120 ...
I happen to have a case just like the upper one. I also found it on the side walk, Mine contained a AMD-K6-2/500AFX still on its motherboard with the keatsink and and PSU. But in a funny way the rest of the case was used as a dumpster for verious parts, cables, screws, a floppy drives, nic adapters, a modem. Everything just thrown in there then the lid screwed back on. A real treasure box 😁

MaxWar wrote:

Aw so sad to hear stories of how humans trash their good stuff around.

At one house, I saw the ultimate trashed computer. I don't know what they did to it, but it looked like someone had taken a hammer to it. The case was dented in, the motherboard was cracked, the video, sound and network cards were broken, the ram sticks were broken, the CPU chip was in a nearby box and about 1/4 of the pins were bent over. About the only thing that looked intact was the hard drive, which I took. However when I plugged it in as a slave drive, the system wouldn't boot. It also sounded like a vacuum cleaner.

I found two DVD-ROM drives and one burner at a house right nearby, but none of them worked. I also found a pile of 3-4 wireless keyboards, but no receivers, so I didn't take them.

Oh, I also found an old Compaq laptop. It looks complete, but I have to find a power supply for it. I also have a cute little Toshiba Libretta 50CT that I found. The batteries are shot, but it works fine with a power supply. Has Windows 95 on it, but nothing else. It also doesn't have any ports, other than one on the bottom meant to connect it to some kind of docking station, so I can't even install anything on it.

One house that had a quite large pile of junk last year, had two computers (my friend found them, so he claimed both for his brother, since he doesn't use computers himself), an LCD monitor, about four Dell keyboards (used) and about six Dell mice, still sealed in plastic bags.

I've also gotten a bunch of sound cards, one of which I'm using now, and some older graphics cards. I have two GeForce FX5200 graphics cards that I got from different houses. One is a PCI card with a fan on it and the other is an AGP card. They both work, but when I plugged the PCI one in, before I'd cleaned and lubed the fan, the heatsink got hot enough to burn your finger! It also performed worse than my current card. The AGP version seemed to stay cool, even without a fan, but after my experience with the other one, I want to mount a fan on it, before I trust it. I know the FX5200 isn't the best card, but I have an older system and right now I only have a GeForce MX440, which doesn't have pixel shaders, so I figure it's a step up.

I have a couple Microsoft Sidewinder joysticks, but they're both missing the cords. I bought a copy of one of them at Goodwill for $2, so I should be able to use that as a guide to put a cord on one of them. The other one is a big, force-feedback model so the wiring is probably a bit different. I figured that I could find some info on the net, but so far I've come up dry.

Oh, I even have a Mac clone made by Power Computing. I couldn't do much with it as I didn't have a mouse for it at the time. I found a couple Mac mice this last time, but haven't felt like digging out the computer and setting it up.

Not to mention that in past years, I've lugged home a bunch of older outdated system from Dell, Compaq, HP, etc. Most are either incomplete or don't boot. The best system I found was 2.4Ghz P4 with XP on a 30GB hard drive. Of course it was so full of crap that it literally took 20 minutes before the drive stopped loading! I still haven't gotten around to wiping it and trying to re-install XP. I just disabled pretty much everything in the startup. Doesn't anyone really need three different IM programs running at boot???

I even found a little home-made porn on a couple of them. 😉

MaxWar wrote:

I happen to have a case just like the upper one. I also found it on the side walk, Mine contained a AMD-K6-2/500AFX still on its motherboard with the keatsink and and PSU. But in a funny way the rest of the case was used as a dumpster for verious parts, cables, screws, a floppy drives, nic adapters, a modem. Everything just thrown in there then the lid screwed back on. A real treasure box 😁

I haven't even opened them to look inside. The first one is lighter and has something loose rattling around, so they probably took out the HD. The PB one is heavy. It's also big. If it were completely hollow, the other computer would practically fit inside it.

And what is it with the rubber feet? Almost every computer I find is missing at least one of them, even when they're the type that plug into the holes! Those things don't come out that easily.

Here is my latest scrapyard treasure 😀

Seems to be in a pretty good shape overall. The case has a large dent in it and one of the pins holding the front cover broke off, but that's easily fixed. On the inside everything looks very clean and is still in place.

When powered on it beeps once, that's a good sign 😀

Too bad I can't use it without the monitor and keyboard...

jwt27 wrote:

Too bad I can't use it without the monitor and keyboard...

It doesn't have standard PS/2 and VGA ports? If it has the large, round keyboard connector, I know they sell adapters for that to convert a PS/2 connector.

Actually no. That looks like an original IBM 5150 PC which definitely won't have VGA and it's keyboard is also incompatible with AT keyboards.

However, hargle on vintage-computer.com makes a converter kit that translates the AT or PS2 keyboards scan codes so they are compatible with PC or XT. Send him a PM if you want one.

I've got a 5150 that I'm working on myself, but its been slow progress so far. Its got a MDA graphics card in it and I'm too scared to plug my EGA monitor into it in case it fries. Even though they are both 9 pin the monitor may not handle the frequency.

Rekrul wrote:

jwt27 wrote:

Too bad I can't use it without the monitor and keyboard...

It doesn't have standard PS/2 and VGA ports? If it has the large, round keyboard connector, I know they sell adapters for that to convert a PS/2 connector.

I know about those AT->PS/2 adapters, I actually made one myself to use an AT keyboard on my Pentium 2. The keyboard connector on this thing is the same large DIN plug as the AT connector, but communicates using a different protocol. See:
http://vintage-blog.peacon.co.uk/wiki/Early_P … board_Protocols

The monochrome graphics adapter has DE-9 (serial port) connector, and uses a digital interface, instead of analog like VGA.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monochrome_Display_Adapter

So really the only way to use this machine is with the original keyboard and screen. 🙁

Well you could try an ISA VGA card, many of them will work in an 8 bit slot even if they are 16 bit cards. Combined with the adapter I mentioned before you can at least get the machine going.

DonutKing wrote:

Well you could try an ISA VGA card, many of them will work in an 8 bit slot even if they are 16 bit cards. Combined with the adapter I mentioned before you can at least get the machine going.

Hey thanks for the tip! Now that you mention it I remember having a 16-bit Trident card that had a jumper setting for use in 8-bit slots. I went looking for it but couldn't find it, so I took the graphics card from the 386 I got last week. It doesn't have any jumpers but I plugged it in anyway.

Here is the result:

It's alive!! 😮

Now I know it works, but still can't do anything without a keyboard ofcourse. I could buy one of those converters you mentioned but I'd rather first try to make one myself. I'm sure I have some PIC chips lying around...