Continuing - these are all of different locations on the boards.

Thank you for making this thread! I've been wanting to make one like this for a while.

Those cards you posted definitely have some cool printing on them! I have to wonder what the significance of the skunk is though... 🤣

... I had a board a while back that had pictures scattered all over it like that. I remember it had a castle\tower and some other odd things on it. I think it may have been a brown Compaq board or something, but I could be wrong. I don't believe I have it anymore.

I will post some pics of the ones I do have when I get time, since I tend to hang on to cards with interesting printing on them too. 😁

Cool thread! I have to check my collections but first thing that comes to my mind is:
Terratec DMX Fire:

I don't have the board near me at the moment, but there is a Compaq EISA server mainboard with a tennis racket, labelled "Wayne's World". I can't find a pure PCB photo on the Internet at the moment, but https://imgur.com/a/B9pAjzH (taken from Compaq Prosignia 3080 / 486DX33) shows the art nicely.

https://micro.magnet.fsu.edu/creatures/index.html

^^

Jo22 wrote on 2023-04-10, 14:37:

https://micro.magnet.fsu.edu/creatures/index.html

^^

That stuff is SO COOL. I would love to have the ability to see things like that on chips. Though, I would imagine that it is completely destructive on nearly any chip that I would ever come across. If it was possible to see this stuff through the casing of a chip I would probably look at every one I could get my hands on.

For some reason I just find it amazing to think that some aspect of someone's personality and creativity could be forever etched into a tiny chip that 99.99999999% of people will never see, and it could be the only place it exists in the world, and it could be sitting in a box of old modems or something that is destined for a scrap lot.

... it's probably best that I don't have a way to see this stuff, or I'd have yet another weird reason to collect things that are mostly useless. 🤣

Compaq Presario 425 mobo. Happened to snap this one last week.

Maybe not so cool but I still like these. Enermax AT psu:

And another Compaq Presario artwork:

Ozzuneoj wrote on 2023-04-12, 03:03:

That stuff is SO COOL. I would love to have the ability to see things like that on chips. Though, I would imagine that it is com […]
Show full quote

Jo22 wrote on 2023-04-10, 14:37:

https://micro.magnet.fsu.edu/creatures/index.html

^^

That stuff is SO COOL. I would love to have the ability to see things like that on chips. Though, I would imagine that it is completely destructive on nearly any chip that I would ever come across. If it was possible to see this stuff through the casing of a chip I would probably look at every one I could get my hands on.

For some reason I just find it amazing to think that some aspect of someone's personality and creativity could be forever etched into a tiny chip that 99.99999999% of people will never see, and it could be the only place it exists in the world, and it could be sitting in a box of old modems or something that is destined for a scrap lot.

... it's probably best that I don't have a way to see this stuff, or I'd have yet another weird reason to collect things that are mostly useless. 🤣

There's a video from CPU Galaxy on the CPU-art topic. And I think he shows some more examples in other videos

Compaq grapics:

Compaq Deskpro 486 power board.

Compaq Presario 486SX mainboard.

Compaqs have such cool artwork on them 😀 I seem to recall the original Deskpro 386 has the Enterprise on the silkscreen?

I didn't think IBM did interesting silkscreen but this IBM motherboard that might be from a PS/1 (very similar to the one Epictronics fixed up recently) has Card Sharks:

Compaq Prosignia motherboard:

Just found this one on the back of a Netgear GA311 that I got with a system.

The image is even on the backplate of the card. Thinking about it, it's strange that this isn't done more often.

Edit: while putting the card in my 'misc-cards box' another Netgear-adapter (WPN311) jumped at me. Apparently they put the image on many of them. And it's on the backplate as well.

Two VXI VRMs:

The McOtto E-Wave waveblaster module by Serdaco is not exactly old but it has great art. I also like the Turtle Beach inspired logo for the Yucatan reproduction card.

And another nice one:

They were quite conservative. The boards were most probably designed by quite a small team, and those proud of their work could have left their mark there. Amiga team had their signatures on the case like artists.

The Presario 425/433 came to mind as well here, with that funny little cyclops. In my case he's staring at an empty space hehe.

Another Compaq board is this one, the 258125-001. Not in possession anymore, but nice for all USA fans I guess.
Also noticable is that the DIMM slots have a skewed design.