VOGONS


Reply 40 of 58, by Joakim

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Im far from an expert on this, someone else can guide you in what you can load in high memory or not. I think I just tried to load some drivers into high memory. But I think you should be able to get more conventional memory.

I used Phill's setup as a base then I created some special menus for if I wanted the CDROM to be have fixed speed (very noisy with more than 8x in my opinion as old games search for small files) you can also choose which sound card you want to initialize depending on game which can reduce your consumption. It is pretty handy with menus but easiest is to begin with an already existing autoexec and system.ini..

Maybe also check into Unisound tbh as you only need one driver with both cards, might be more memory consuming? Idk.

Reply 41 of 58, by Irinikus

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I made this video to show the system's current performance while running Doom, Doom II and Helen, as well as to demonstrate what these games sound like on the Gravis Ultrasound PnP in Dos:

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Reply 42 of 58, by konc

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Irinikus wrote on 2024-07-23, 09:15:

I'm able to run all the games that I want to for now with this configuration, but any suggestions as how to improve it will be welcome!

In autoexec.bat try to put LH before the mouse and mscdex lines to attempt "loading high", if there is space you'll immediately free some more conventional memory.
LH c:\mouse...
LH mscdex.exe...

Reply 43 of 58, by Irinikus

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konc wrote on 2024-07-25, 09:57:

In autoexec.bat try to put LH before the mouse and mscdex lines to attempt "loading high", if there is space you'll immediately free some more conventional memory.
LH c:\mouse...
LH mscdex.exe...

Thanks for the info! 😀

here's my current memory usage:

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Here's my current config.sys:

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Here's my current auto exec.bat:

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Reply 44 of 58, by Bruno128

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Irinikus wrote on 2024-07-22, 15:11:

In CPU-Z it reports as an AMD chip though!

Hi that’s a very neat PC.
Can you post the CACHECHK v7 (by Ray Van Tassle) output for CPU detection?
Have you considered changing PSU for a modern one?

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Reply 45 of 58, by Irinikus

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I've gone ahead and purchased the Perceptive Solutions Easycache Pro SCSI 1200 16-Bit ISA card for this machine.

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I don't know how much additional drive speed this thing will give me, when it's populated with cache. (The seller said that it does 5MB per second without cache.)

But it's extremely rare, and for that reason I want it in this machine!

Here's some documentation for the card: (You cannot find much on one of these cards online at all, and this seems to be the only one pictured on the internet!)

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I may look at attaching one of these to this card as a secondary drive for games, as I don't know whether I'll be able to boot DOS and Windows 3.11 off of it. (If I can get it to boot, then I may go ahead and install a 50-pin mechanical SCSI drive to replace the current system disc.)

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One question: This card takes 30-pin FPM simms, but I can't find any information anywhere which indicates whether it takes ECC on non-ECC simms - Any ideas?

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Reply 47 of 58, by Irinikus

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Yoghoo wrote on 2025-02-04, 14:28:

In the memory page they say "x 9". That means parity so ECC. Don't know if it is really needed but I would buy/use ECC memory in that case.

Thanks very much for the info! 😀

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Reply 48 of 58, by Disruptor

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Doesn't your machine have VESA local bus?
Why do you bother with an ISA SCSI controller then?

It seems you have onboard Cirrus Logic local bus graphics too.

I see your 2 of your RAMs may collide with the VL socket. But that shouldn't be a problem which can be solved...

Reply 49 of 58, by Irinikus

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Disruptor wrote on 2025-02-04, 14:38:
Doesn't your machine have VESA local bus? Why do you bother with an ISA SCSI controller then? […]
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Doesn't your machine have VESA local bus?
Why do you bother with an ISA SCSI controller then?

It seems you have onboard Cirrus Logic local bus graphics too.

I see your 2 of your RAMs may collide with the VL socket. But that shouldn't be a problem which can be solved...

The reason I've gone this way is because I intend on fitting a Diamond Stealth 64 4MB VLB in the future. (The onboard Cirrus Logic GD5430 only has 1MB of VRAM, and I'd also like to play around with the Diamond Stealth!)

The SIMMS are slanted enough to keep them clear of the bottom VLB slot:

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The unpopulated cache sockets are screaming at me, so I'll also have to populate those soon! 😀

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Reply 50 of 58, by Irinikus

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Disruptor wrote on 2025-02-04, 14:38:
Doesn't your machine have VESA local bus? Why do you bother with an ISA SCSI controller then? […]
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Doesn't your machine have VESA local bus?
Why do you bother with an ISA SCSI controller then?

It seems you have onboard Cirrus Logic local bus graphics too.

I see your 2 of your RAMs may collide with the VL socket. But that shouldn't be a problem which can be solved...

If I ever got my hands on a board like this, I'd try out a VLB SCSI adapter!

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Reply 51 of 58, by Irinikus

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This is how the PERCEPTIVE SOLUTIONS EASY CACHE SCSI and the ICP GDT6538RD compare size-wise, when placed next to each other:

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Some SCSI goodness!

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Reply 52 of 58, by BitWrangler

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Irinikus wrote on 2025-02-04, 17:15:

If I ever got my hands on a board like this, I'd try out a VLB SCSI adapter!

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If I ever got my hands on a board like that, I'd probably sell it to you, 'coz I don't think it's faster than a POD on an M919 🤣

Though I have a memory of doing battle with an Opti Viper board somewhere between "the day" and today, (after obsolete, before retro interest) but I don't think it was a VLB version. I can't remember if it was a buddy's system, a giveaway system or one I just found a bit hopeless to use for anything so is still hiding at the bottom of a box where I stuck it 2 decades plus ago. I have a feeling it turned up around when I was switching to P133ish as being "minimal viable web and office" machine to deploy to fam and friends, and early slot 1 machines were turning up cheap and caught my attention.

Unicorn herding operations are proceeding, but all the totes of hens teeth and barrels of rocking horse poop give them plenty of hiding spots.

Reply 54 of 58, by Intel486dx33

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We used these computers when I was taking computer education classes.
But we used IBM Pentium-90 desktops.

We use to run DOS, Win-95, Novell Server, WinNT 3.5.1, Win 3.11
Lots off programs and CBT courses.
Microsoft Office and Access Database.
IBM OS2, Linux and UNIX too.

What Really set IBM Appart from all the Other computer manufactures was the tools, batch files, programs and menus IBM put into the Original hard drive installations.
I would try to obtain an original hard drive CD or installation image and use that.
You can learn allot from those images of how IBM setup these computers.

There are also the IBM “Select-a-System” CD’s that install Win3.11, Win95, and OS2 onto your computer.
If you have the supporting hardware.
I think all you need is a Pentium CPU, 16mb RAM, S3 864 video card, Crystal Audio chip, and IBM network card or 3com 3c509 network card.

CD link:
https://archive.org/details/ibm-pc-recovery-cd/

See my post:
IBM Desktop P-750, Pentium 90 ( Select-a-System ).

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Reply 56 of 58, by Disruptor

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Irinikus wrote on 2025-02-04, 17:15:
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Sorry but this board has neither a good PCI performance nor a good VL performance.

Reply 57 of 58, by Irinikus

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Bruno128 wrote on 2025-02-07, 14:31:
Irinikus wrote on 2025-02-06, 16:12:

The M919 does look to be a super cool board!

Are you trolling? M919 is a meme board for its fake cache

No I'm not, I wasn't aware of that fact! (I just stated that the board looked cool)

I noticed that most of them that I found didn't have cache chips installed, that's why I purposely chose a picture of one that features installed cache chips (I was not aware that they didn't work!)

To be honest I haven't paid too much attention to straight Pentium systems and have opted for Pentium Pro instead.

Last edited by Irinikus on 2025-02-07, 18:48. Edited 2 times in total.

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Reply 58 of 58, by Irinikus

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Disruptor wrote on 2025-02-07, 15:49:
Irinikus wrote on 2025-02-04, 17:15:
pbhk5mverta71.jpg
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Sorry but this board has neither a good PCI performance nor a good VL performance.

That's a pity! (It's almost impossible to source anyway)

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