dr_st wrote on 2025-12-20, 13:15:

Nexxen wrote on 2025-12-20, 12:56:

I got a new retro laptop, IBM Thinkpad R50: https://www.thinkwiki.org/wiki/Category:R51
Installed Win XP SP2 and found the drivers on the same site (great, thanks guys!)

R50 or R51? LCD size and resolution? (Or better yet - what is the 7-character model number?)

Most likely, it can be a reasonable retro-gaming laptop for early XP gaming. You may even be able to get Win9x/Me on it, but drivers can be a little bit of a pain.

R51, my mistake.
LCD 15" TN 1024*768 65MHz
Intel 855PM chipset + ICH4-M
99HBG33 -- identifies as R50 though, prolly the family?

Banias 1.6GHz (planning already to replace it with a Dothan 755 - 2 GHz).
Ram is plenty at 512MB

Lan is Intel pro 1000 + 21003B wireless, not bad.

And it doesn't come with the sticky coating of my P-III T22 😀

99HBG33 is the serial number. It indeed identifies as an Italian R50 type 1830. On the sticker with the serial number there should also be a model type number (1830-XXX). The complete MTM can be used to identify all components of the system as originally shipped. It doesn't matter much because there is much overlap between R50 and R51.

I think if you have 512MB RAM in a single stick, I would suggest another 512MB stick. 1GB is a good sweet spot for early XP systems.

dr_st wrote on 2025-12-20, 17:52:

99HBG33 is the serial number. It indeed identifies as an Italian R50 type 1830. On the sticker with the serial number there should also be a model type number (1830-XXX). The complete MTM can be used to identify all components of the system as originally shipped. It doesn't matter much because there is much overlap between R50 and R51.

I think if you have 512MB RAM in a single stick, I would suggest another 512MB stick. 1GB is a good sweet spot for early XP systems.

1830-BLG

512MB x 2 : duly noted.
Thanks for the suggestion!

Btw, are keyboards of R5x models interchangeable? I see many available of this family number but without it.
Missing are HDD caddy (always) and DVD (these are super cheap).
It's going to be a funny little retro project.

Nexxen wrote on 2025-12-20, 21:42:

1830-BLG

Yes, it's an R51 alright.
https://tp.krelay.de/index.php?type=1830-BLG
I think you are correct - when a 4-digit model number is used across different series (something that isn't happening now, as far as I know, but happened in the IBM era) - the new Lenovo warranty lookup website always shows the first model name (e.g., I have an old T42 whose serial is detected as a T40).

Nexxen wrote on 2025-12-20, 21:42:

Btw, are keyboards of R5x models interchangeable? I see many available of this family number but without it.

They are interchangeable across the same LCD size, but 15" and 14.1" LCD models had different keyboards.

dr_st wrote on 2025-12-20, 23:59:

Great place to check models.

You wrote about W98SE installation. I tried but there are problems with a few things.Lan, wifi, apic, modem, sound...
I'm pretty sure someone figured out how to get there 100% 😀

Nexxen wrote on 2025-12-21, 00:31:

You wrote about W98SE installation. I tried but there are problems with a few things.Lan, wifi, apic, modem, sound...
I'm pretty sure someone figured out how to get there 100% 😀

That is what I expected. It won't work well out of the box, because it was never tested (by IBM) on these machines. As far as I know, the community has indeed figured out how to get T40-T42 / R50-R51 series working fully on Win9x, but I am not convinced it is worth it.

I picked up a Disney Sound Source recently and I'm having trouble getting it to do anything.

When I power on the PC the red light comes on and it makes a slight pop sound from the speaker. Eventually the light goes off as it enters battery-saving mode, but it just doesn't make any sound in games. I have tried Pinball Fantasies (since I can use the sound setup to select Covox), and I have tried Dick Tracy: The Crime-Solving Adventure since it has native DSS support. When I loaded Dick Tracy it made a pop like it was doing something but I still get no sound. Pinball Fantasies runs but there is no sound at all from the DSS.

I have my parallel port enabled in the BIOS, the speaker has a fresh 9v battery installed. This is on a K6-III+ system in DOS 7.1 and I have tried disabling internal and external cache to reduce the speed as well. Dick Tracy wouldn't load (divide by zero error) at full speed, but disabling caches fixed that... though it does run fairly sluggish like this. If the system is slow enough to make the game sluggish, I feel like that should rule out the system being too fast for the DSS to work... but this is my first experience with one of these things.

Anyone have any ideas?

EDIT: Duh... right after posting this I switched the parallel port address in my BIOS to 3BC and that made it work in Dick Tracy immediately. Anyway. Yay, it works! What a neat device. 😁

Still can't get Pinball Fantasies to work though, even if I manually set the Covox address to 03BC in the sound setup application.

Made a wallpaper for my Alienware Area-51 build.

Whatever your questions are, the answer is yes.

I've been trying to clear some space after several months of projects, being given old PCs, etc... and I need to make a decision.

The absolutely absurd PC I posted about here is... still huge... and more importantly, still here in my office. Since those pictures I have reassembled it (it is much taller than that), inverted everything so that it opens on the "correct" side and wired it all up so that it works and isn't a mess.

I think this is one of the largest non-server PC towers ever made, and it really does a poor job of utilizing that space. I could shave 5-6 inches off the height of it, put some intake fans in the front and it would likely perform better, but would still be around two FEET deep. The solid, non-movable drive cage makes it too annoying to use for testing\using huge GPUs, so the one thing I thought about using it for just isn't going to work.

The motherboard is nice but sadly one pin on the front USB3 connector was bent over and broken, which is a flaw that greatly hurts its resale value- either as a complete system or just the board. So, it makes more sense to keep the board and CPU to use for an extreme high end XP\Vista\7 build or something. I don't like the bulky plastic-covered V8 cooler and they seem to sell for high prices for some reason so I'd probably sell that and get something else. I'd definitely keep the PSU because it is still a monster, despite it's age.

... but what on earth do I do with this case? It is really an awesome relic, especially with the CyperpowerPC logo and the goofy fake "screen" for controlling fans... but it is just so incredibly huge and really offers no benefit over a decent ATX mid tower. I spent a fair amount of time cleaning it all up and rewiring everything, but there just isn't any room for this thing in my office. There is a weird blemish on the red plexiglass window unfortunately, and there's realistically nothing I can do about that, so it will never look "pristine".

Options:
1. It is too cool and should be kept in my collection as a reminder of how absurd things got in the early 2010s... shove it in the garage and have to work around it every time I go out there. (It will dinged up and filthy out there over time, for sure.)
2. Gut it, put the case on marketplace and hope some crazy person will buy it.
3. ?

I think #2 is what needs to happen, but I figured I should ask for advice before I let this once in a lifetime find of an absurd PC case go.

Installed an AX510 soundbar on a DELL U2410 monitor. First time I try those DELL soundbars. The concept is neat - it fits snugly in a designated spot on the back of the display, gets power and audio directly from it, has integrated volume controls and headphones out, and doesn't sound worse than el-cheapo basic speakers (or integrated monitor speakers for that matter).

bought a box of random hardware on facebook marketplace for $20, seller didnt know what it was and neither did I, just computer hardware thrown into a barely held together box 🤣

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w-44JpS2Sqc

dr_st wrote on 2025-12-26, 20:59:

Installed an AX510 soundbar on a DELL U2410 monitor. First time I try those DELL soundbars. The concept is neat - it fits snugly in a designated spot on the back of the display, gets power and audio directly from it, has integrated volume controls and headphones out, and doesn't sound worse than el-cheapo basic speakers (or integrated monitor speakers for that matter).

A few weeks ago, I thought about making my own soundbar that mounted to one of those Dell monitors, but I'm not smart enough to make something reasonably small (larger than the original AX510, but not obstructing the monitor's height adjustment) that would sound good. Those old Harman/Kardon computer speakers set the bar too high. Also, I think I would have to 3D print it instead of using wood so they're lighter and the wall thickness doesn't add significantly to the height. I don't have a 3D printer, and it kind of feels wrong after all those years of building stuff out of scrap.

RetroBus wrote on 2025-12-27, 02:08:

bought a box of random hardware on facebook marketplace for $20, seller didnt know what it was and neither did I, just computer hardware thrown into a barely held together box 🤣

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w-44JpS2Sqc

Watching now, your videos are always a good time.

Been expanding my vmodem a bit, I think its good enough now for public usage.
You can get it here : https://archive.org/details/serial-modem
Its based on someone elses PR to vmodem from the protoweb project, but wrapped in a VM and edited a bit to make it handle better on Windows 3.11.
I added a dialup sound wav to it when your dialing, added latency emulation and even added a basic http proxy for protoweb available by dialing number 11 (Dialing 1 and manually setting the proxy does produce better results).

Hope this is fun for the rest of you, it can be used with USB serial adapters, physical serial ports or com2com virtual serial ports in your VM's.

henk717 wrote on 2025-12-27, 15:43:

Been expanding my vmodem a bit, I think its good enough now for public usage. You can get it here : https://archive.org/details/ […]
Show full quote

Been expanding my vmodem a bit, I think its good enough now for public usage.
You can get it here : https://archive.org/details/serial-modem
Its based on someone elses PR to vmodem from the protoweb project, but wrapped in a VM and edited a bit to make it handle better on Windows 3.11.
I added a dialup sound wav to it when your dialing, added latency emulation and even added a basic http proxy for protoweb available by dialing number 11 (Dialing 1 and manually setting the proxy does produce better results).

Hope this is fun for the rest of you, it can be used with USB serial adapters, physical serial ports or com2com virtual serial ports in your VM's.

I'm feeling a bit dense. I have read your archive.org page and the original github page... but I can't tell what this is used for. 😅

If I'm the average retro enthusiast with a collection of PCs and parts, what do I do with this?

Ozzuneoj wrote on 2025-12-27, 16:24:

henk717 wrote on 2025-12-27, 15:43:

Been expanding my vmodem a bit, I think its good enough now for public usage. You can get it here : https://archive.org/details/ […]
Show full quote

Been expanding my vmodem a bit, I think its good enough now for public usage.
You can get it here : https://archive.org/details/serial-modem
Its based on someone elses PR to vmodem from the protoweb project, but wrapped in a VM and edited a bit to make it handle better on Windows 3.11.
I added a dialup sound wav to it when your dialing, added latency emulation and even added a basic http proxy for protoweb available by dialing number 11 (Dialing 1 and manually setting the proxy does produce better results).

Hope this is fun for the rest of you, it can be used with USB serial adapters, physical serial ports or com2com virtual serial ports in your VM's.

I'm feeling a bit dense. I have read your archive.org page and the original github page... but I can't tell what this is used for. 😅

If I'm the average retro enthusiast with a collection of PCs and parts, what do I do with this?

Hmm. Let's amuse the author.

This seems more about software than hardware. It seems related to pre-WWW networking and mentions Win3.11 so use cases might be found in various ~1993 software assumptions throughout UNIX, MacOS, MS-DOS worlds.

So maybe it enables debugging ~1993 networking when trying to host a multiplayer game (maybe Doom, 1993) on new hardware? Maybe it would enable ~1993 software to phone home for updates without an actual serial modem and copper phone line?

From what I can tell it is virtualising early modems but it contradicts my ~1993 assumption because the default setting is 56K, and 56K modems didn't exist ~1993. If it's pushing the upper range of serial comms then why not explicitly allow 112K shotgun modem emulation?

The USB-Serial adapter, I'm guessing, is to enable retro null-modem connections on new hardware - and that ties in with some of my "security-through-obsolecense" ramblings. So, I think it's probably an enabler for various use cases.

Also awaiting author's clarifications, when they bring themselves to stop laughing.. 😉

Ozzuneoj wrote on 2025-11-12, 21:38:

Ozzuneoj wrote on 2025-11-11, 05:08:

Well, this is a weird one. […]
Show full quote

Well, this is a weird one.

The attachment 20251111_000108.jpg is no longer available

The attachment 20251111_000114.jpg is no longer available

This PNY FX 5200 card clearly has all of the RAM locations populated, and is clearly marked as "128MB" on the sticker, yet the BIOS screen at startup says it has 64MB, and various programs in Windows agree. With 8 8Mx16bit chips it should also have a 128bit bus, but programs say that it is 64bit.

What's the deal here? I can't find any physical damage on it. It's actually in very good condition.

I've tested a lot of cards but this is an unusual issue to find, especially on a card with no visible damage. In testing the card works perfectly, other than performing like a 64bit card.

Just a follow up to this. If anyone has this exact FX 5200 design with 8 RAM chips (128MB, 128bit), can you please upload some high resolution pictures of it so I can try to spot any differences?

I just looked through my collection and was surprised that I don't have any other 128bit FX 5200 cards at all. I have a Quadro FX500 with a similar layout but it is different enough on the back that I don't really learn anything from comparing them. The biggest difference I have noticed between FX 5200-based cards I have is that the two rows of 4 tiny smd caps near the upper left corner on the back are different on some. Some have the caps in the lower row. Some are in the upper row. The FX500 has them in the lower row, where as my 5200 with half the RAM missing has them in upper row. But then, I have another 64bit card that has them in the lower row as well. Definitely need to see an identical card to be sure!

Still hoping someone can chime in on this one. To summarize: PNY FX 5200 128MB (128bit) card reporting only 64MB (64bit) in BIOS and in Windows. No visible damage or defects of any kind on it and it otherwise works flawlessly, though obviously with 64bit performance.

Interestingly, I actually found another identical PNY card that properly reports 128MB and get this: There are no obvious differences to the PCB layout or components. In fact, the one that reports the full 128MB actually has a couple of tiny SMD caps snapped off the back from being in a scrap lot. Those apparently don't affect anything at all because the card works perfectly and is clearly faster than the one using only half its memory. And before you ask... yes, they are clearly broken off and not intended to be missing.

The BIOS files also seem to be identical between the cards.

Anyone have any ideas? I have used my microscope and inspected the card quite thoroughly but I can't find any broken components or any visible damage.

I'm wondering if maybe a solder joint on one of the memory chips has broken and it is one that doesn't introduce any errors but it disconnects the other 64MB... I have no idea if this is possible.

Here is the datasheet for the memory chips.
https://www.alldatasheet.com/datasheet-pdf/vi … 281622DT-5.html
I have looked it over and nothing obvious is jumping out at me like "if this is disconnected you lose megabytes" 😅. If anyone is feeling brainy and wants to offer any input, I'd love some theories at least.

Ozzuneoj wrote on 2025-12-27, 22:42:

Still hoping someone can chime in on this one. To summarize: PNY FX 5200 128MB (128bit) card reporting only 64MB (64bit) in BIOS […]
Show full quote

Ozzuneoj wrote on 2025-11-12, 21:38:

Ozzuneoj wrote on 2025-11-11, 05:08:

Well, this is a weird one. […]
Show full quote

Well, this is a weird one.

The attachment 20251111_000108.jpg is no longer available

The attachment 20251111_000114.jpg is no longer available

This PNY FX 5200 card clearly has all of the RAM locations populated, and is clearly marked as "128MB" on the sticker, yet the BIOS screen at startup says it has 64MB, and various programs in Windows agree. With 8 8Mx16bit chips it should also have a 128bit bus, but programs say that it is 64bit.

What's the deal here? I can't find any physical damage on it. It's actually in very good condition.

I've tested a lot of cards but this is an unusual issue to find, especially on a card with no visible damage. In testing the card works perfectly, other than performing like a 64bit card.

Just a follow up to this. If anyone has this exact FX 5200 design with 8 RAM chips (128MB, 128bit), can you please upload some high resolution pictures of it so I can try to spot any differences?

I just looked through my collection and was surprised that I don't have any other 128bit FX 5200 cards at all. I have a Quadro FX500 with a similar layout but it is different enough on the back that I don't really learn anything from comparing them. The biggest difference I have noticed between FX 5200-based cards I have is that the two rows of 4 tiny smd caps near the upper left corner on the back are different on some. Some have the caps in the lower row. Some are in the upper row. The FX500 has them in the lower row, where as my 5200 with half the RAM missing has them in upper row. But then, I have another 64bit card that has them in the lower row as well. Definitely need to see an identical card to be sure!

Still hoping someone can chime in on this one. To summarize: PNY FX 5200 128MB (128bit) card reporting only 64MB (64bit) in BIOS and in Windows. No visible damage or defects of any kind on it and it otherwise works flawlessly, though obviously with 64bit performance.

Interestingly, I actually found another identical PNY card that properly reports 128MB and get this: There are no obvious differences to the PCB layout or components. In fact, the one that reports the full 128MB actually has a couple of tiny SMD caps snapped off the back from being in a scrap lot. Those apparently don't affect anything at all because the card works perfectly and is clearly faster than the one using only half its memory. And before you ask... yes, they are clearly broken off and not intended to be missing.

The BIOS files also seem to be identical between the cards.

Anyone have any ideas? I have used my microscope and inspected the card quite thoroughly but I can't find any broken components or any visible damage.

I'm wondering if maybe a solder joint on one of the memory chips has broken and it is one that doesn't introduce any errors but it disconnects the other 64MB... I have no idea if this is possible.

Here is the datasheet for the memory chips.
https://www.alldatasheet.com/datasheet-pdf/vi … 281622DT-5.html
I have looked it over and nothing obvious is jumping out at me like "if this is disconnected you lose megabytes" 😅. If anyone is feeling brainy and wants to offer any input, I'd love some theories at least.

Try Linux kernel logs; Linux might reinitialise the GPU and repeat whatever the VBIOS did at POST. The big difference being one has logs, one doesn't. Good news is you can generate two sets of logs with your two cards and diff them 😀

MattRocks wrote on 2025-12-27, 22:58:

Ozzuneoj wrote on 2025-12-27, 22:42:

Still hoping someone can chime in on this one. To summarize: PNY FX 5200 128MB (128bit) card reporting only 64MB (64bit) in BIOS […]
Show full quote

Ozzuneoj wrote on 2025-11-12, 21:38:

Just a follow up to this. If anyone has this exact FX 5200 design with 8 RAM chips (128MB, 128bit), can you please upload some high resolution pictures of it so I can try to spot any differences?

I just looked through my collection and was surprised that I don't have any other 128bit FX 5200 cards at all. I have a Quadro FX500 with a similar layout but it is different enough on the back that I don't really learn anything from comparing them. The biggest difference I have noticed between FX 5200-based cards I have is that the two rows of 4 tiny smd caps near the upper left corner on the back are different on some. Some have the caps in the lower row. Some are in the upper row. The FX500 has them in the lower row, where as my 5200 with half the RAM missing has them in upper row. But then, I have another 64bit card that has them in the lower row as well. Definitely need to see an identical card to be sure!

Still hoping someone can chime in on this one. To summarize: PNY FX 5200 128MB (128bit) card reporting only 64MB (64bit) in BIOS and in Windows. No visible damage or defects of any kind on it and it otherwise works flawlessly, though obviously with 64bit performance.

Interestingly, I actually found another identical PNY card that properly reports 128MB and get this: There are no obvious differences to the PCB layout or components. In fact, the one that reports the full 128MB actually has a couple of tiny SMD caps snapped off the back from being in a scrap lot. Those apparently don't affect anything at all because the card works perfectly and is clearly faster than the one using only half its memory. And before you ask... yes, they are clearly broken off and not intended to be missing.

The BIOS files also seem to be identical between the cards.

Anyone have any ideas? I have used my microscope and inspected the card quite thoroughly but I can't find any broken components or any visible damage.

I'm wondering if maybe a solder joint on one of the memory chips has broken and it is one that doesn't introduce any errors but it disconnects the other 64MB... I have no idea if this is possible.

Here is the datasheet for the memory chips.
https://www.alldatasheet.com/datasheet-pdf/vi … 281622DT-5.html
I have looked it over and nothing obvious is jumping out at me like "if this is disconnected you lose megabytes" 😅. If anyone is feeling brainy and wants to offer any input, I'd love some theories at least.

Try Linux kernel logs; Linux might reinitialise the GPU and repeat whatever the VBIOS did at POST. The big difference being one has logs, one doesn't. Good news is you can generate two sets of logs with your two cards and diff them 😀

I haven't used Linux in 20+ years (unless you count Android 😋).

I kind of doubt that OS logs would be able to identify anything that runs deeper than the card BIOS. It is likely a physical defect of some kind, not a software or firmware issue.

Ozzuneoj wrote on 2025-12-27, 23:09:

MattRocks wrote on 2025-12-27, 22:58:

Ozzuneoj wrote on 2025-12-27, 22:42:

Still hoping someone can chime in on this one. To summarize: PNY FX 5200 128MB (128bit) card reporting only 64MB (64bit) in BIOS […]
Show full quote

Still hoping someone can chime in on this one. To summarize: PNY FX 5200 128MB (128bit) card reporting only 64MB (64bit) in BIOS and in Windows. No visible damage or defects of any kind on it and it otherwise works flawlessly, though obviously with 64bit performance.

Interestingly, I actually found another identical PNY card that properly reports 128MB and get this: There are no obvious differences to the PCB layout or components. In fact, the one that reports the full 128MB actually has a couple of tiny SMD caps snapped off the back from being in a scrap lot. Those apparently don't affect anything at all because the card works perfectly and is clearly faster than the one using only half its memory. And before you ask... yes, they are clearly broken off and not intended to be missing.

The BIOS files also seem to be identical between the cards.

Anyone have any ideas? I have used my microscope and inspected the card quite thoroughly but I can't find any broken components or any visible damage.

I'm wondering if maybe a solder joint on one of the memory chips has broken and it is one that doesn't introduce any errors but it disconnects the other 64MB... I have no idea if this is possible.

Here is the datasheet for the memory chips.
https://www.alldatasheet.com/datasheet-pdf/vi … 281622DT-5.html
I have looked it over and nothing obvious is jumping out at me like "if this is disconnected you lose megabytes" 😅. If anyone is feeling brainy and wants to offer any input, I'd love some theories at least.

Try Linux kernel logs; Linux might reinitialise the GPU and repeat whatever the VBIOS did at POST. The big difference being one has logs, one doesn't. Good news is you can generate two sets of logs with your two cards and diff them 😀

I haven't used Linux in 20+ years (unless you count Android 😋).

I kind of doubt that OS logs would be able to identify anything that runs deeper than the card BIOS. It is likely a physical defect of some kind, not a software or firmware issue.

If the VROM image is identical, and the physical VRAM is identical, then the fault has to be something between VBIOS and VRAM - such as resistors?