Some nice PC133 CL2 memory and longer CD Audio cables 😀

Random question Phil, but where exactly did you buy that RAM? If you bought it on eBay, would you mind giving me a link to the seller's page. I bought some RAM from a guy who claims to sell Micron / Crucial, but he ended up sending me EDGE-branded memory. If you look on the memory chips themselves, you'll see that it's Infineon who made the RAM. Not that there's anything wrong with them, but I prefer using Kingston or Micron (Crucial) memory.

Hey guys, I haven't ever written to this thread despite having (and constantly enlarging) a decent collection of retro PC hardware (I guess, if I took pictures, even Artex would notice some bits absent from his well-known hoard 😀), but what happened to me yesterday makes me break the silence.
So, last weekend I noticed a local ad for a 4-slot ISA riser card for only $5 and felt some temptation to buy it (although I already have some 2-3 of them, but ISA risers are never enough, you know). I wrote to the seller and received a question if I needed any other rare items. As usual, I expected some common AWE's and Pentium boards, but what I received yesterday surpassed ALL my expectations, here we go...

1. AOpen AX6BC Pro II Millennium Edition (perfect state!)

2. XGI Volari Duo V8 Ultra 256MB (in perfect functioning state!)

3. THE JEWEL OF MY COLLECTION - SAPPHIRE RADEON 9800 MAXX (long considered as a fool's day joke photoshopped in 2003-2004! BUT IT EXISTS!)

4. Some SiS engineering sample motherboard - it has a non-standard form-factor, won't fit in any case, just have a look at the lower edge of the board with all those connectors. Won't function, I guess, as ALL capacitors are unfortunately blown to death.

5. Some unsorted hardware, including the riser card that began it all.

6. Not so hardware, but still - a boxed OS/2 Warp 3.0 with ALL blows and whistles, including a promo CD from IBM that they distributed during COMTEK'96 expo in Moscow.

7. And finally a box of new never used BASF 8" disks 😀

DISCLAIMER: Russian members will most probably understand where this hardware comes from originally, but the seller asked me not to disclose that in public.

soviet conscript wrote:

http://i43.photobucket.com/albums/e385/0blivi0n1/20150727_012622_zpseri33wzh.jpg only problem is the fan is dead but the card s […]
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only problem is the fan is dead but the card seems to work just fine.

Take the fan out,clean it,take it apart and lube it,might come back to life.

hard1k wrote:

1. AOpen AX6BC Pro II Millennium Edition (perfect state!)

DISCLAIMER: Russian members will most probably understand where this hardware comes from originally, but the seller asked me not to disclose that in public.

Very nice! Never seen this board in the wild, only in old reviews. Give it a good clean though 🤣

Love my AX6BC to bits.

soviet conscript wrote:

Was in San Diego for the weekend and decided to check out one of the famous swap meets in the area I've heard so much about. unf […]
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Was in San Diego for the weekend and decided to check out one of the famous swap meets in the area I've heard so much about. unfortunately didn't find much except a few boxed MS-DOS games and this

only $7, I never played around with Kyro II cards before so I grabbed it. I cleaned the dust around the heatsink you see and tried it out and it works. only problem is the fan is dead but the card seems to work just fine.

Beware of the mofset on the top right corner , it can run very hot (I had to put a dissipator both on its top and at the back of the card to keep it cool).
It's a decent card with a good picture quality but it really needs cpu power to shine.
I remenber playing Max Payne 2 on a 32 MB 4000XT with a XP2400+ and it was playable 😳

soviet conscript wrote:

vetz wrote:

soviet conscript wrote:

music quest cards with firmware V10 and up should work fine with WC, no fiddling required but I cant see the firmware version on that card.

AFAIK that is only possible on the card Keropi owns (Music Quest MIDI card). The MQX-32(m) can't use this firmware as its a different card.

your right. its late and I'm tired. I just glanced at the card and assumed it was the same kind of music quest card with a different layout.

Here are a couple of photos of the EPROMs. Which version is it?

I also have an MQX-32(m). What's the difference between these two cards? Thanks!

philscomputerlab wrote:

hard1k wrote:

1. AOpen AX6BC Pro II Millennium Edition (perfect state!)

DISCLAIMER: Russian members will most probably understand where this hardware comes from originally, but the seller asked me not to disclose that in public.

Very nice! Never seen this board in the wild, only in old reviews. Give it a good clean though 🤣

Love my AX6BC to bits.

I also like my AOpen AX6BC, its better than all other BX boards I have tested including QDI, Gigabyte, Abit and Asus boards.

If anyone feels they own too many AOpen AX6BC Pro II Millennium Edition boards and wants to donate one, think of me 😘

Congratulation on finding those EXTREMELY RARE video cards 😉

Is that ATI RADEON 9800 MAXX in a completely functional condition?

hard1k wrote:

2. XGI Volari Duo V8 Ultra 256MB (in perfect functioning state!) http://i.imgur.com/QgCnASvh.jpg […]
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2. XGI Volari Duo V8 Ultra 256MB (in perfect functioning state!)

3. THE JEWEL OF MY COLLECTION - SAPPHIRE RADEON 9800 MAXX (long considered as a fool's day joke photoshopped in 2003-2004! BUT IT EXISTS!)

.

VooDooMan wrote:

Congratulation on finding those EXTREMELY RARE video cards 😉

Is that ATI RADEON 9800 MAXX in a completely functional condition?

Yesterday I checked the photos of the 9800 MAXX that were already on the net - and it seems that the only existing card is with me 😀 I concluded that from those blue marker lines on the capacitors.

As the seller told me (confirmed by the person who originally received it from Sapphire for a Fool's Day review), the card is definitely non-functional.
This can be proven by the lack of any traces from the second GPU (on the right) - and absence of its memory as well (all RAM chips are linked to the main GPU).
However, I've inspected the card quite well already and haven't noticed any evident obstacles for its functioning as a normal 9800 PRO 128Mb - everything is in place and connected.
But I don't feel quite good about actual tests - as the card was produced just as an exposition sample, who knows what can happen if you supply current to it?.. And the main aim of the card was to make others believe in Sapphire's resurrection of MAXX technology - but no one was interested enough (including ATI refusing to develop drivers), so the project was abandoned at the very beginning, leaving this card as the only evidence of such long-forgotten attempt.

Skyscraper wrote:

Its even better! That looks like the ELSA Gloria III, hardware wise its more or less identical to the Geforce 2 Ultra only with the same clocks as the Geforce 2 Ti.

Why would you want a GeForce 2 Ultra with GeForce 2 Ti clocks? The GeForce 2 Ti is slower than GeForce 2 Ultra. I think you have your GeForces confused.

sliderider wrote:

Skyscraper wrote:

Its even better! That looks like the ELSA Gloria III, hardware wise its more or less identical to the Geforce 2 Ultra only with the same clocks as the Geforce 2 Ti.

Why would you want a GeForce 2 Ultra with GeForce 2 Ti clocks? The GeForce 2 Ti is slower than GeForce 2 Ultra. I think you have your GeForces confused.

The good thing is that the components on the card is more or less identical to the Ultra and not to the Ti which was made using cheaper power circuitry components and probably cheaper memory chips.

Its perhaps best I explain why its better to have a card that uses the GF2 Ultra reference design than having a card using the Geforce 2 Ti design. A card using the same components as the Ultra and the same PCB as the Ultra can run at the same clocks as the Ultra without stressing the power circuitry and the memory is guaranteed to handle high clocks.

Changing the clocks manually is not rocket science. Without overclocking the Glora III should in theory last longer than the other Geforce 2 cards as it is an underclocked GF2 Ultra with a different BIOS and usually a DVI port.

The card is a Compaq OEM (I noticed a label on another picture which has the Compaq part number) - but the spec is still good enough or I wouldn't have bought it.

Apparently you can mod a GeForce 2 by switching resistors, making it run as a Quadro 2. The same can, apparently, be done in reverse. Whilst I have no desire to do such a thing, it's an interesting thought - especially given that there is sometimes a price gap when the components dry up for a while. For now though, patience works as an abundance of cards shows up again. Apparently the mod does not require one to alter the BIOS, but I have never tried and probably never will.

This is the first post made with my new EliteBook. It seems to work, the hard drive is the bottleneck but I plan on changing that anyway. Sure is faster than the Dell and it's weird how I can click stuff and it just works instead of taking a million years of drive activity to load an error message that won't even display properly. Hehe, I like this thing already, browsing this web page feels like I'm sending a tank to swat a fly and it's awesome!

I am currently eyeing up another graphics card - my dream card from over a decade ago that I could never afford and never saw on sale locally. If I can get it, I might have to run down the street yelling joyously. Only clue I will give you; it is considerably more impressive than a Quadro2 Pro.

HighTreason wrote:

The card is a Compaq OEM (I noticed a label on another picture which has the Compaq part number) - but the spec is still good enough or I wouldn't have bought it.

Apparently you can mod a GeForce 2 by switching resistors, making it run as a Quadro 2. The same can, apparently, be done in reverse. Whilst I have no desire to do such a thing, it's an interesting thought - especially given that there is sometimes a price gap when the components dry up for a while. For now though, patience works as an abundance of cards shows up again. Apparently the mod does not require one to alter the BIOS, but I have never tried and probably never will.

Compaq OEM or not visually the card looks identical to the ELSA Glora III and by extension the Geforce 2 Ultra. I actually think all retail Quadro2 Pro were sold under the ELSA brand as Gloria III cards, Im not 100% sure though.

The Geforce 2 / Quadro mod can also be done with software or registry editing if I remember right but I do not think it matters when it comes to performance.

Well I might try software/registry modding out of curiosity as I usually play with that a little anyway.

I have obtained the other card I was looking at;

OK, so it's not a real GeForce 4 Ti 4800... It's just a Ti 4400 with a fancy label, but it's the best I will ever do. I don't know if it works but if it does I am wondering if I can fit the nicer copper heatsink from my dead Ti 4600 (also an ASUS and was a beast of a card). Heh, back when these were around, I had to use the puny MX 420 (Creative 3D Blaster, still have the box) and even then, it was hard to pay for (69.99) with the pocket money I used to get... And I missed my Radeon 7500. 12-year-old me is very happy. It might have taken me 13 years but I got one at last. Yeah Derek, I told you I'd get one eventually (He'll never read this, but whatever), now who's got the rig with anemia? Hahahahahaha! - For anyone wondering, Derek was a friend of mine back then, he had a Triplex Ti model - a simply beautiful card - in some overkill Xeon rig. My other friend at the time had an ageing K6-500 in a 430TX motherboard with FPM RAM and a SoundBlaster 16, so I never felt too bad about my Duron box. Good times.

This might finally be incentive enough to sort out that dying Athlon box I liked, I doubt it will look much like it does now when I'm done, maybe it is time to put one of my Pentium III 1400-S Processors to work? I suppose I could use the Chaintech 7VJL/Athlon 2600 I have had lying around for years now too as that's a good board and would be an appropriate replacement for the low-end Chaintech I currently have.

I bought that same asus geforce 4 ti card last week. Had to scrap it as mine didn't work at all 😢

Today in the mail: asus p/i-p55t2p4 socket 7 intel hx board (hope it works!) and a boxed/new Diamond v770ultra card.

Just missed 2 brand new boxed Banshee's from the same seller 😒 So, who stole them from me?? 🤣

Also expecting an upgradeware slot-t adapter to come very soon.

Had several Quadro4 980XGL's and those never worked, so I suspect the reliability wasn't so good on these GPUs - typical of the time really, reliability wasn't the order of the day; it was all about going faster no matter what the consequences.

Damn....didn't get the boxed v770ultra (it was clearly on his foto's) but he send me a normal v770 without a box...... it is new but i bought these already and for less money.
Did get the asus hx board in original box and with all brackets so i guess we call it even. It works perfectly.

Bought an awe64 gold, should be here soon. (then i must stop this buying frenzy i have lately 😊 )

My little video-card hall!

Voodoo3 3000 AGP + S3 Virge/DX PCI + Matrox G550 AGP

Nvidia Quadro4 980XL (not tested yet):

And this is how I had to install a cooler to blow some air on the Voodoo3 🤣. I ended up needing the Voodoo2 for some older Glide games, and the only slot that the V2 fits is the one directly below the V3, so I had to get a little creative.

meljor wrote:

Damn....didn't get the boxed v770ultra (it was clearly on his foto's) but he send me a normal v770 without a box...... it is new but i bought these already and for less money.

Was this on ebay? I would raise hell. You clearly didn't get the item in the description. This is a scam.