Received a Zenith Data Systems 620N. It's a 386SX. Bought it because it was my first "computer" after playing on Amstrad during my childhood.
This time it came with a 3MB Ram expansion !
It's noisy, like there's a defect fan in it... but there's no fan. Just the 60MB HDD not working...

I replaced it with an new old 40GB HDD. Installed Ms-Dos 6.22 and Windows 3.1
To change the HDD you have to open the computer completely. No easy way.
Can start with win /s and working like a charm. I even ordered a Math Copro to test 😀

I know, it's a AZERTY. I really don't like this layout but I won't really use it 😀

TrashPanda wrote on 2022-04-03, 18:05:

appiah4 wrote on 2022-04-03, 18:03:

He says he doesn't want to reveal it and now people are actively drying to dox him :rofl

not really, I mean Former Eastern Bloc covers a lot of countries, it would be impossible to find the right one, but its not wrong to have a little fun with it without going too far right ?

Technically, "Eastern Bloc" even includes a third of Germany.

We'd gladly give that part to Putin if he'd leave Ukraine alone.

We sincerely tried. No luck so far.

appiah4 wrote on 2022-04-03, 18:03:

He says he doesn't want to reveal it and now people are actively drying to dox him 🤣

I don't mind, saying I don't care if someone finds out on their own wasn't an invitation for playing 20 questions, only that I have close to 700 comments on Vogons and I know for sure I've left clues here and there (though I always erase exif data when I upload an image somewhere) 😁

Bought a Dell Precision M60 for $10 locally.

Didn't work because whatever tool had this thing open last FORGOT TO LOCK THE CPU INTO PLACE. Like how do you show that level of incompetence.

Anywho, fixed that and it fired right up. Has the QuadroFX GO 700 which is equivalent to the GeForceFX Go 5650 (and I force loaded the GeForce drivers onto it) and a 1.7GHZ Pentium. For some reason whoever ordered this sprung for the 1920x1200 display but not the more powerful QuadroFX 1000 (which is a GeForceFX 5700) and to say the 5650 is underpowered is an understatement. 3DMark2003 performance is straight up comical. 3DMark2001 performance is only marginally acceptable.

Not bad for $10 but damn what a dog of a machine this is. Also whoever at Dell decided 1920x1200 is an reasonable display choice @ 15.6 inches must have super-human vision. This is the same panel as my Dell XPS Gen1 as far as I can tell.

I might upgrade it to a 2.13GHZ CPU and a QuadroFX Go 1000 later.

TheAbandonwareGuy wrote on 2022-04-03, 20:54:

Didn't work because whatever tool had this thing open last FORGOT TO LOCK THE CPU INTO PLACE. Like how do you show that level of incompetence.

Has it occurred to you that whatever tool closed up that thing last did not mind that it does not work?
I know it sounds preposterous but there are some genuinely weird people out there.

Also, the weaker GPU: There are quite a few use scenarios where CAD or game performance doesn't quite matter that much, but battery life does.

TheAbandonwareGuy wrote on 2022-04-03, 20:54:

Also whoever at Dell decided 1920x1200 is an reasonable display choice @ 15.6 inches must have super-human vision.

The roughly 15 inches for an average notebook were defined by the size of our hands and the average briefcase.
Unreasonably high resolutions came about the very moment unreasonably high resolutions could be achieved.
So whoever bought it could claim that he wins IT.
(I know I'm supposed to write "they" instead of "he" but who are we kidding?)

Most laptops are bought for business use, they'll throw stupid money at whatever over-marketed mediocre crap, provided it has a brand name and a warranty.

Shreddoc wrote on 2022-04-03, 22:00:

Most laptops are bought for business use, they'll throw stupid money at whatever over-marketed mediocre crap, provided it has a brand name and a warranty.

Hilariously thats exactly the story the original owner of my XPS had.

He said his work told him he could spend $5k on a laptop since he was the head admin (IIRC he just asked how much, and they threw out that ridiculous number) so he bought a maxed out XPS. 2GB RAM, Radeon 9800 Pro, etc. Then I bought it for $25 like 5 years ago. LMAO. Only thing he didn't max out was the CPU, which was a wise decision because I suspect there is a reason I've only seen a single gen 1 XPS with the Northwood Extreme Edition that works.

Also @the other dude it would make sense it was just thrown back together if there was another problem, but the CPU being unlocked was the sole reason it was not working. One does not disassemble a machine and reassemble it unless they intended to fix it or upgrade it.

TheAbandonwareGuy wrote on 2022-04-03, 23:20:

Hilariously thats exactly the story the original owner of my XPS had. […]
Show full quote

Shreddoc wrote on 2022-04-03, 22:00:

Most laptops are bought for business use, they'll throw stupid money at whatever over-marketed mediocre crap, provided it has a brand name and a warranty.

Hilariously thats exactly the story the original owner of my XPS had.

He said his work told him he could spend $5k on a laptop since he was the head admin (IIRC he just asked how much, and they threw out that ridiculous number) so he bought a maxed out XPS. 2GB RAM, Radeon 9800 Pro, etc. Then I bought it for $25 like 5 years ago. LMAO. Only thing he didn't max out was the CPU, which was a wise decision because I suspect there is a reason I've only seen a single gen 1 XPS with the Northwood Extreme Edition that works.

Also @the other dude it would make sense it was just thrown back together if there was another problem, but the CPU being unlocked was the sole reason it was not working. One does not disassemble a machine and reassemble it unless they intended to fix it or upgrade it.

I have an original XPS laptop but I don't think it has the Extreme Edition CPU. It doesn't like that I don't own a 180W PSU to power it but I can get it to run with the PSU from my XPS M1710.

Nothing much but today I managed to get my hands on 4gb of OCZ Reaper PC2-9600 DDR2 1200 memory, not sure how many of my DDR2 boards could actually hit 1200mhz with DDR2 but it'll be interesting to find out, I have a nice collection of 775 and a few AM2 boards to play with.

Might post some data here, I have two boards I can recall that will do 1200 DDR2 but I have never tested all of them.

First board will be the Asrock 4core board I got recently .. I doubt itll hit 1200 but only one way to find out 😁

TrashPanda wrote on 2022-04-04, 16:18:

Nothing much but today I managed to get my hands on 4gb of OCZ Reaper PC2-9600 DDR2 1200 memory, not sure how many of my DDR2 boards could actually hit 1200mhz with DDR2 but it'll be interesting to find out, I have a nice collection of 775 and a few AM2 boards to play with.

Might post some data here, I have two boards I can recall that will do 1200 DDR2 but I have never tested all of them.

First board will be the Asrock 4core board I got recently .. I doubt itll hit 1200 but only one way to find out 😁

I have had no issues with 1200mhz ddr2 in Nforce 680i boards. I have to Evga 680i boards and both with do 1200mhz I've seen the 680a boards also have no issues hitting those speeds. The Nforce 780i and 780a boards are reported to have no issues with 1200mhz.

chrismeyer6 wrote on 2022-04-04, 16:33:

TrashPanda wrote on 2022-04-04, 16:18:

Nothing much but today I managed to get my hands on 4gb of OCZ Reaper PC2-9600 DDR2 1200 memory, not sure how many of my DDR2 boards could actually hit 1200mhz with DDR2 but it'll be interesting to find out, I have a nice collection of 775 and a few AM2 boards to play with.

Might post some data here, I have two boards I can recall that will do 1200 DDR2 but I have never tested all of them.

First board will be the Asrock 4core board I got recently .. I doubt itll hit 1200 but only one way to find out 😁

I have had no issues with 1200mhz ddr2 in Nforce 680i boards. I have to Evga 680i boards and both with do 1200mhz I've seen the 680a boards also have no issues hitting those speeds. The Nforce 780i and 780a boards are reported to have no issues with 1200mhz.

Nvidia was always good with DDR2 speeds ...DDR3 was a different story and the 790i boards were a bit picky about which DDR3 they would work well with, I only have 790i based boards so nVidia wont be in this race. The other question I have is how much better is DDR2 1200 over say 1066 or 800, was it worth it back in the day to invest in 1200 over the cheaper modules, back when 775 and DDR2 was the thing I didnt have the cash to buy anything amazing so I was never involved in the enthusiast side of it.

I guess I could go look up reviews ..but I do have a good selection of DDR2 to play with so I may as well just run the tests my self.

@Chrismeyer6 - Since I dont have any nforce DDR2 boards which one would you say gives the best compatibility/stability ?, I know the 700 series had its issues and even the 790i Ultra boards I have can be a bit flaky at times but I know little about the 600 boards, would a 680i be a good pick or are the 650i boards more stable? I guess the 780i boards are an option too if they are solid.

I only used the 680i boards and they have always been 100% stable and performed excellently for me in both systems I have based around them. I borrowed the 1200mhz sticks from a friend of mine back in the day and compared to my 1066 sticks it made a difference in synthetic and game benchmarks.

Got myself a cmslpt which came in yesterday , I'm absolutely chuffed to try it out.

Also got a boxed sidewinder 3d pro recently as well.
Its made playing flight sim games like A10 tank killer a helluva lot more manageable. Descent 2 is also really fun with it.

The seller also had a sidewinder gamepad included , which i havent had the chance to try out yet since as far as I'm aware it's not really compatible with dos but more so with Windows 95.

AppleSauce wrote on 2022-04-05, 01:25:

The seller also had a sidewinder gamepad included , which i havent had the chance to try out yet since as far as I'm aware it's not really compatible with dos but more so with Windows 95.

20220405_111934.jpg

"SDWRGMPD" from this page might sort out your DOS Sidewinder needs. In a limited manner (from documentation: "...will not work with a program that looks at the joystick directly - the program must use the BIOS to look at the joystick").

Shreddoc wrote on 2022-04-05, 01:44:

AppleSauce wrote on 2022-04-05, 01:25:

The seller also had a sidewinder gamepad included , which i havent had the chance to try out yet since as far as I'm aware it's not really compatible with dos but more so with Windows 95.

20220405_111934.jpg

"SDWRGMPD" from this page might sort out your DOS Sidewinder needs. In a limited manner (from documentation: "...will not work with a program that looks at the joystick directly - the program must use the BIOS to look at the joystick").

Ahk cheers , I'll give it a look.

AppleSauce wrote on 2022-04-05, 01:25:

Also got a boxed sidewinder 3d pro recently as well.

These are my favourite sticks - ugly as hell but very comfortable and full featured.

Received this glorious little bugger in the mail yesterday all the way from Aussie land:

X1600 Pro AGP thats a nice little GPU, looks like its a NOS one too or at least a boxed one with all accessories.

TrashPanda wrote on 2022-04-05, 08:13:

X1600 Pro AGP thats a nice little GPU, looks like its a NOS one too or at least a boxed one with all accessories.

Yep, it's used as theres dust accumulated on the fan blades, but its complete in box. I have another card on the way too for my PIII machine, All in Wonder Radeon 8500DV 64MB complete in box as well. I'll post pics as soon as that one arrives as well.

Bought this beast.

A PCS 286 computer.

Unknown specs at the moment and if the board is long gone, I have a spare that's ready to be installed.

Pictures: