dominusprog wrote on Yesterday, 05:38:

Alexraptor wrote on 2025-05-09, 21:59:

riplin wrote on 2025-05-09, 20:19:

I still find it odd that the G450 has a grounded heat sink.

You know, I was actually wondering what that wire was for!

Grounding the heatsink done for eliminating the internal current of the chip. The output quality is excellent, but unfortunately the memory bus is 64 bits.

https://incompliancemag.com/proper-heatsink-grounding/

🤯 I have never heard of such a thing in my life. That's really interesting. I wonder why Matrox felt the need to do this when basically no one else ever did for a graphics card?

Got myself a Dreamblaster S2. I too, have now experienced the hanging note bug. 😀

Welp, test results for lot one:

- X1950 Pro 256MB - dead, artefacting
- Quadro 4 750XGL - same
- FX5900XT 128MB - surprisingly WORKING!
- Terratec Gold 16/96 - not yet tested
- mainboards all work, Soyo needs a bit of in-depth recapping and so does the ST6-RAID as the fan doesn't work, it seems

appiah4 wrote on 2025-05-07, 13:12:

I don't buy much anymore, but when one of my regular junkyard guys rang me up with two miserable looking 386 boards and CPUs I said OK and paid up.

They took a bit of work to get working, both had battery damage and one had pretty terrible corrosion all over. They both work now, though.

Very nice find! The MSI is one of the fastest 386 motherboard. May i ask please photos the area under the BIOS and Keyboard BIOS? I also have some corrosion there and would like to repair the board.

appiah4 wrote on 2025-05-07, 13:12:

I don't buy much anymore, but when one of my regular junkyard guys rang me up with two miserable looking 386 boards and CPUs I said OK and paid up.

They took a bit of work to get working, both had battery damage and one had pretty terrible corrosion all over. They both work now, though.

Very nice find! Is it possible tho ask photos under the BIOS and Keyboard BIOS areas? My MSI has also have corrosion problems... 🙁 Its one of the fastest 386 motherboard AFAIK.

PcBytes wrote on 2025-05-09, 12:45:

Well, slowly becoming the Artex of recycler rescues: […]
Show full quote

Well, slowly becoming the Artex of recycler rescues:

- 2x ASUS P3B-F
- ABIT KA7-100
- 2 or 3 GA-7IXE
- BX2000+
- BX2000 standard
- 2x MSI 6167
- I think at least two GA-7IX
- Socket 8 Dell mobo
- Epox EP-MVP3G5
- ASUS P2B-DS Rev 1.05
- Tekram P5M3-A+ (686A!!!)
- another PCChips M577
- some Intel Desktop board that I suspect is dual Slot 1 + 440GX, and uses Cirrus Logic video

Love it!

Ozzuneoj wrote on Yesterday, 05:49:

dominusprog wrote on Yesterday, 05:38:

Alexraptor wrote on 2025-05-09, 21:59:

You know, I was actually wondering what that wire was for!

Grounding the heatsink done for eliminating the internal current of the chip. The output quality is excellent, but unfortunately the memory bus is 64 bits.

https://incompliancemag.com/proper-heatsink-grounding/

🤯 I have never heard of such a thing in my life. That's really interesting. I wonder why Matrox felt the need to do this when basically no one else ever did for a graphics card?

You might not have realised you saw it, there were some implementations with soldered pegs holding the heatsink on that were actually on ground plane. Mostly low end cards though.

Back in the day the K6-2 crowd found that heatsink grounding was worth about 25mhz of stability... i.e. if you could boot at 560 or something but not stable where you were at 550, then grounding might get you stable at 560 and tweaked up to 570.

A while back, I got a Sanyo MBC550 motherboard, and I want to restore it at some point. The problem is that someone removed the keyboard and composite video connectors. Whoever did it desoldered the composite video connector, but was terribly lazy with the keyboard connector and simply cut it off the board.
Since the motherboard is two-layered, it's easy to follow the lines. But I haven't found a suitable photo of the underside.
I sent images (and some references to software, info and the bios) of mine to theretroweb (I edited the cut part in the image from above, cloning the other connector) for a new entry.
https://theretroweb.com/motherboards/s/sanyo-fs-555d
https://theretroweb.com/motherboard/image/san … f8547383519.jpg
https://theretroweb.com/motherboard/image/san … 15061121590.jpg
So, I would appreciate it if anyone has a full picture of the underside with enough detail , or has this PC and could take a detailed photo of that part of the board.
I have the schematics, and I can see the keyboard and controller connections, but an image would help me do the job even faster later.
Also, to make a better, more complete picture for the retroweb.

BitWrangler wrote on Today, 02:49:

Ozzuneoj wrote on Yesterday, 05:49:

dominusprog wrote on Yesterday, 05:38:

Grounding the heatsink done for eliminating the internal current of the chip. The output quality is excellent, but unfortunately the memory bus is 64 bits.

https://incompliancemag.com/proper-heatsink-grounding/

🤯 I have never heard of such a thing in my life. That's really interesting. I wonder why Matrox felt the need to do this when basically no one else ever did for a graphics card?

You might not have realised you saw it, there were some implementations with soldered pegs holding the heatsink on that were actually on ground plane. Mostly low end cards though.

Back in the day the K6-2 crowd found that heatsink grounding was worth about 25mhz of stability... i.e. if you could boot at 560 or something but not stable where you were at 550, then grounding might get you stable at 560 and tweaked up to 570.

Wow, actually, I don't think I've ever seen a heatsink with soldered pegs before. I am curious though, can you think of any particular cards that were made this way?

I wonder if they were pushing the clocks on the G200 and some weaker silicon was borderline stable so they grounded the heatsink for some extra cushion? It's so funny to think about the whole K6-2 clock thing now. On one hand I feel like that must no longer be an issue, but it's also possible that most modern heatsink designs are grounded through the mounting system. Back when they just clipped onto the plastic CPU socket it wouldn't have worked.

PcBytes wrote on Yesterday, 15:55:

Welp, test results for lot one: […]
Show full quote

Welp, test results for lot one:

- X1950 Pro 256MB - dead, artefacting
- Quadro 4 750XGL - same
- FX5900XT 128MB - surprisingly WORKING!
- Terratec Gold 16/96 - not yet tested
- mainboards all work, Soyo needs a bit of in-depth recapping and so does the ST6-RAID as the fan doesn't work, it seems

Try that X1950 pro in at least a few different boards. Also if the artifacting is minor go ahead and load up drivers in Windows and see what happens.

Whatever AGP-PCIe translator ATI used for those late AGP cards is a piece of junk. In my experience depending on the board they might not work at all, artifact during the bios and work fine under 2D with drivers installed and 3D, or vice versa.

Susanin79 wrote on 2025-05-09, 14:08:

Bought this laptop:
Chicony NB5625. Intel 386SX @25MHz CPU; 1MB RAM + expansion board; 9.5" Passive Grayscale (32 shades) LCD @640x480 (does not work from sellers description); no power adapter included.
Will try to return it back to life.

I have the same laptop, as i remember it works once then disassembled it. If you need parts or photos from inside feel free to contact me.

Susanin79 wrote on 2025-05-09, 14:08:

Bought this laptop:
Chicony NB5625. Intel 386SX @25MHz CPU; 1MB RAM + expansion board; 9.5" Passive Grayscale (32 shades) LCD @640x480 (does not work from sellers description); no power adapter included.
Will try to return it back to life.

I have the same model. It works once, then i disassembled it. Feel free to contact me if you need photos or parts from inside.

Just got these 2 mobos, anyone knows the model of the 386? It only says MBA-021.

pitchshifter wrote on Today, 14:15:

Just got these 2 mobos, anyone knows the model of the 386? It only says MBA-021.

Educated guess would be an as yet unlisted MITAC/Trigon board... https://theretroweb.com/motherboards/?page=1& … =24&name=mba-02

TheAbandonwareGuy wrote on Today, 11:58:

PcBytes wrote on Yesterday, 15:55:

Welp, test results for lot one: […]
Show full quote

Welp, test results for lot one:

- X1950 Pro 256MB - dead, artefacting
- Quadro 4 750XGL - same
- FX5900XT 128MB - surprisingly WORKING!
- Terratec Gold 16/96 - not yet tested
- mainboards all work, Soyo needs a bit of in-depth recapping and so does the ST6-RAID as the fan doesn't work, it seems

Try that X1950 pro in at least a few different boards. Also if the artifacting is minor go ahead and load up drivers in Windows and see what happens.

Whatever AGP-PCIe translator ATI used for those late AGP cards is a piece of junk. In my experience depending on the board they might not work at all, artifact during the bios and work fine under 2D with drivers installed and 3D, or vice versa.

Tried it in three different MBs - ABIT ST6R (815EP), KG7-RAID (AMD 761), Acer S61 (694X), Gigabyte GA-8IPE1000-L rev1 (865PE). Same result.

iPonRMA wrote on Yesterday, 17:07:

appiah4 wrote on 2025-05-07, 13:12:

I don't buy much anymore, but when one of my regular junkyard guys rang me up with two miserable looking 386 boards and CPUs I said OK and paid up.

They took a bit of work to get working, both had battery damage and one had pretty terrible corrosion all over. They both work now, though.

Very nice find! Is it possible tho ask photos under the BIOS and Keyboard BIOS areas? My MSI has also have corrosion problems... 🙁 Its one of the fastest 386 motherboard AFAIK.

I moved it to storage but I'll try to get some for you next time I'm there.

PC Hoarder Patrol wrote on Today, 14:55:

pitchshifter wrote on Today, 14:15:

Just got these 2 mobos, anyone knows the model of the 386? It only says MBA-021.

Educated guess would be an as yet unlisted MITAC/Trigon board... https://theretroweb.com/motherboards/?page=1& … =24&name=mba-02

Already send info to retroweb
https://theretroweb.com/motherboards/s/mitac-trigon-mba-021
Thank you

SteveC wrote on 2021-08-16, 20:43:

It's actually a 1969-111 from the seller's picture - it seems more of an unusual part number?

Necroing this because when you search online for the part number this thread comes up.
I got a Thinkpad 560X with the 1969-111 20x SCSI CDROM drive.

It is indeed a drive with an integrated soundcard and gameport, super cool!
I don't know what IBM was smoking when they made the recovery media for the 560X - because the recovery floppy can access this drive and setup Windows 95 with the Recovery CD, but restoring the full system does not restore the driver, so Windows 95 cannot access the drive. You could probably grab the driver from the recovery floppy and edit config.sys, autoexec.bat etc.

What worked much better was the 820xsnd.exe driver. Pointing device manager to a floppy it creates installs all drivers.
Beware, the setup.exe does not find the 1969-111 drive when running it. Maybe there's another driver for that specific model but I couldn't find it.

The 820xnosnd.exe would be for the 1969-110 drive which does not have an inbuilt soundcard - that seems to be even more rare than the 111 model.