VOGONS


Reply 60 of 222, by wirerogue

User metadata
Rank Member
Rank
Member

blew a cap on a brand new fic 865 dynasty P4-865PE Pro motherboard i got off ebay. shot e liquid all over.

there are quite a few of the same exact cap on this board so i'm just going to return it. 😢

blown.cap.jpg
Filename
blown.cap.jpg
File size
646.42 KiB
Views
1388 views
File license
Fair use/fair dealing exception

Reply 61 of 222, by PARKE

User metadata
Rank Oldbie
Rank
Oldbie

Managed to shear off a VRM cap off of an, at the time favourite, S7 board with one of those stiff 3-point Athlon heatsink clamps everbody was always warning for. Since then I even more agree, they are bad news if you want to change your heatsink with the motherboard installed in a case.

1819.jpg
Filename
1819.jpg
File size
85.1 KiB
Views
1385 views
File license
Fair use/fair dealing exception

Reply 62 of 222, by Vynix

User metadata
Rank Member
Rank
Member

Oh and to add insult to the injury of the loss of my CD drive, I just ripped off the IDC connector from the IDE cable while trying to remove it from said drive.

Not my day today 🙁

Proud owner of a Shuttle HOT-555A 430VX motherboard and two wonderful retro laptops, namely a Compaq Armada 1700 [nonfunctional] and a HP Omnibook XE3-GC [fully working :p]

Reply 63 of 222, by ruthan

User metadata
Rank Oldbie
Rank
Oldbie

I killed second Geforce 6600 PCI-E i got it almost for free, so not big deal and i wanted to try again some passive cooler, it died before i installed drivers, maybe werent again cooler+paster good enough, for chip is really fragile at the corners, like old Athlons.

Im old goal oriented goatman, i care about facts and freedom, not about egos+prejudices. Hoarding=sickness. If you want respect, gain it by your behavior. I hate stupid SW limits, SW=virtual world, everything should be possible if you have enough raw HW.

Reply 65 of 222, by canthearu

User metadata
Rank Oldbie
Rank
Oldbie

Didn't realize the MX 27C1000 bios chip was a one time programmable chip.

I tried to flash over the top of the existing BIOS with a modded bios. Because the modded bios was mostly using the blank space on the chip, it wrote quite a bit before failing. The chip still boots, but I don't really trust it worked properly.

I have replaced it with a 128kb EEPROM I thieved off a PCCHIPs board that I don't really need or want (it is very unreliable, difficult to even get to boot)

Reply 66 of 222, by oeuvre

User metadata
Rank l33t
Rank
l33t
PARKE wrote:

Managed to shear off a VRM cap off of an, at the time favourite, S7 board with one of those stiff 3-point Athlon heatsink clamps everbody was always warning for. Since then I even more agree, they are bad news if you want to change your heatsink with the motherboard installed in a case.

1819.jpg

damn dude those caps are thicc AF

HP Z420 Workstation Intel Xeon E5-1620, 32GB, RADEON HD7850 2GB, SSD + HD, XP/7
ws90Ts2.gif

Reply 68 of 222, by Daniël Oosterhuis

User metadata
Rank Member
Rank
Member
PARKE wrote:

Managed to shear off a VRM cap off of an, at the time favourite, S7 board with one of those stiff 3-point Athlon heatsink clamps everbody was always warning for. Since then I even more agree, they are bad news if you want to change your heatsink with the motherboard installed in a case.

I managed to do that to an ASUS Slotket by using a phat Cooler Master Aero7 heatsink fitted with a Noctua Redux fan (the only fitting heatsink I had at that moment). Thankfully the cap didn't shoot across the room, nor took out the pads or traces, so a quick 'n dirty solderjob fixed that.

sUd4xjs.gif

Reply 69 of 222, by Vynix

User metadata
Rank Member
Rank
Member

I nearly killed my SHUTTLE HOT-555A... A floppy molex connector landed right and square on the IDE header, thankfully I hadn't turned the power on!

Proud owner of a Shuttle HOT-555A 430VX motherboard and two wonderful retro laptops, namely a Compaq Armada 1700 [nonfunctional] and a HP Omnibook XE3-GC [fully working :p]

Reply 70 of 222, by JonathonWyble

User metadata
Rank Member
Rank
Member

Yeah? Well my experience with this type of stuff was even worse. A year ago I put a vintage desktop back together after taking it apart, and I somehow had a molex for the power supply connected incorrectly on the motherboard, so when I plugged the PC into the outlet and then flipped the power switch on, the PSU popped, making a big (almost deadly) spark. Now this desktop needs a new power supply, which I will get eventually. But gosh, I am so damn angry at what I did to a PC that worked 😠

1998 Pentium II build

1553292341.th.19547.gif

Reply 71 of 222, by assasincz

User metadata
Rank Member
Rank
Member

Hi all,

I don't know if this qualifies a "killing" but my most recent blunder was when I tried retrobrighting keycaps on my dumpster-find Ortek MCK-101, using a heat method. After the peroxide bath, most of the caps came out slightly warped, the larger the keycap, the worse it was. The spacebar came out the worst, but I thought straightening it in hot water could work, right? It worked for me in the past. Well, it did not work, at all, as you can see in the pictures.

20190408_064803.jpg
Filename
20190408_064803.jpg
File size
537.01 KiB
Views
1221 views
File license
Fair use/fair dealing exception

Since then I got a replacement spacebar in blue so the board is usable but, man, I wish it did not happen.

received_2323611251225852.jpeg
Filename
received_2323611251225852.jpeg
File size
122.24 KiB
Views
1221 views
File license
Fair use/fair dealing exception

Reply 72 of 222, by Windows9566

User metadata
Rank Member
Rank
Member

i remember last year that i accidentally broke the right tab off my Intel AN430TX's ZIF socket when attempting to remove the heatsink that was on it. i later figured out that i had to remove it with a standard flathead screwdriver, i was just failing at removing the heatsink by pulling it off with my hands and not knowing how to properly remove a heatsink. i have finally learned my lesson and have been removing heatsinks properly. i have 2 working an430tx boards that have 512k l2 cache and 4 PCI and 3 ISA slots on them unlike that one and also having a broken tab on the zif socket so it's going in the parts bin, it's some stripped down Packard Bell OEM version of the AN430TX aka the PB790 with 2 PCI and 2 ISA slots, no l2 cache, and onboard ATI Rage II+ graphics.
p8RXTdI.jpg

R5 5600X, 32 GB RAM, RTX 3060 TI, Win11
P3 600, 256 MB RAM, nVidia Riva TNT2 M64, SB Vibra 16S, Win98
PMMX 200, 128 MB RAM, S3 Virge DX, Yamaha YMF719, Win95
486DX2 66, 32 MB RAM, Trident TGUI9440, ESS ES688F, DOS

Reply 73 of 222, by CaelThunderwing

User metadata
Rank Newbie
Rank
Newbie
Vynix wrote:

I nearly killed my SHUTTLE HOT-555A... A floppy molex connector landed right and square on the IDE header, thankfully I hadn't turned the power on!

i wish i had a close call with my SHUTTLE HOT-677 V2.2 , it just stopped booting one day i dont know if this cheap "EL Series" PSU fried it or not RIP it was a nice Motherboard too.

Reply 74 of 222, by Bruninho

User metadata
Rank Oldbie
Rank
Oldbie

I did kill an Acer Extensa 710T after it was forgotten by me and my dad for 25 years. The extensa was our first ever laptop. Running Windows 95, internet access.

It was in a so bad condition, like if it was made of sand. Every touch was breaking every part of it, except the keyboard - it was in a great condition and working very well. The screen was quite destroyed but working.

After a few minutes trying to turn it on and trying to make it boot, at first it did boot to DOS, but the HD was corrupted. While we were searching in our things for other HD, the screen died. Then we managed to plug it to an external monitor. While we were searching for the HD and a bootable WIN95 disk or CD, it finally died.

Probably got super hot because of all the dust inside. We killed it really - but we couldn’t do nothing. Any attempt to clean it, and the laptop would fall into pieces. He was really bad.

Sad to see one of the best parts of my childhood go away. We threw it to the bin...

"Design isn't just what it looks like and feels like. Design is how it works."
JOBS, Steve.
READ: Right to Repair sucks and is illegal!

Reply 75 of 222, by keenmaster486

User metadata
Rank l33t
Rank
l33t
assasincz wrote:

I don't know if this qualifies a "killing" but my most recent blunder was when I tried retrobrighting keycaps on my dumpster-find Ortek MCK-101, using a heat method. After the peroxide bath, most of the caps came out slightly warped, the larger the keycap, the worse it was. The spacebar came out the worst, but I thought straightening it in hot water could work, right? It worked for me in the past. Well, it did not work, at all, as you can see in the pictures.

Hahaha - this exact same thing happened to me, except it was with a junker keyboard and only an experiment that I knew might fail.

World's foremost 486 enjoyer.

Reply 76 of 222, by ruthan

User metadata
Rank Oldbie
Rank
Oldbie
Vynix wrote:

I nearly killed my SHUTTLE HOT-555A... A floppy molex connector landed right and square on the IDE header, thankfully I hadn't turned the power on!

I wonder if exist some plastic/rubber caps/terminator for Molex connectors? It would be nice.. we have them for lots of things, but i never saw them for molex, maybe i someone have some Chinese fried, he can make living from that..

Im old goal oriented goatman, i care about facts and freedom, not about egos+prejudices. Hoarding=sickness. If you want respect, gain it by your behavior. I hate stupid SW limits, SW=virtual world, everything should be possible if you have enough raw HW.

Reply 77 of 222, by Vynix

User metadata
Rank Member
Rank
Member
ruthan wrote:
Vynix wrote:

I nearly killed my SHUTTLE HOT-555A... A floppy molex connector landed right and square on the IDE header, thankfully I hadn't turned the power on!

I wonder if exist some plastic/rubber caps/terminator for Molex connectors? It would be nice.. we have them for lots of things, but i never saw them for molex, maybe i someone have some Chinese fried, he can make living from that..

I generally sticky-tape any unused molex to a side of the case, but this time, I didn't.. Don't know why, but either way this was a very close call.

Proud owner of a Shuttle HOT-555A 430VX motherboard and two wonderful retro laptops, namely a Compaq Armada 1700 [nonfunctional] and a HP Omnibook XE3-GC [fully working :p]

Reply 78 of 222, by SirNickity

User metadata
Rank Oldbie
Rank
Oldbie

Just received a like-new micro-ATX Socket 423 motherboard that took about a month to ship overseas. I mounted it in a slimline ATX case, installed the CPU, RAM, net card, video card, drives, header and power supply cables, hit the switch and.... nothing. Checked the header pins, PSU power switch.. all looks good. Tried the power button again... nothing.

So I thought I would try a different PSU just for grins. That's when I noticed that, in the dark of the insides of a case, I had plugged the PCI-E 6-pin connector into the ATX 12V 4-pin connector on the motherboard. The pins lined up and fit perfectly, but the polarity is exactly opposite. Thanks for that, ATX spec.

I have no idea if the board worked out of the box. But if it did, it survived the last 15 or so years intact, and took less than a fraction of a second to completely destroy it, because it sure doesn't work now. Welp, so long, $100 worth of rare hardware.

Edit: HAH! No, it was just a dead coin cell battery. Replaced that and it.... got stuck in a reset loop without POSTing. But, it worked with a slower CPU so I used that to flash a later BIOS image and now it's totally healthy! WHEW. 🙄

Last edited by SirNickity on 2019-05-29, 00:29. Edited 1 time in total.

Reply 79 of 222, by Windows9566

User metadata
Rank Member
Rank
Member

Plugged in a CF card into the proprietary HDD caddy port on my Gateway Solo 2500, the laptop fried the CF card after inserting it into there. the CF card was hot to the touch, and melted the plastic slightly in the laptop. and after i waited for the card to cool down, my PC didn't even recognize the CF card when i hooked it up to my USB 3.0 card reader, it was dead as a doornail. my biggest mistake i ever made. Lesson: that proprietary HDD caddy port on the Gateway Solo 2500 is not compatible with CF cards or Microdrives.

R5 5600X, 32 GB RAM, RTX 3060 TI, Win11
P3 600, 256 MB RAM, nVidia Riva TNT2 M64, SB Vibra 16S, Win98
PMMX 200, 128 MB RAM, S3 Virge DX, Yamaha YMF719, Win95
486DX2 66, 32 MB RAM, Trident TGUI9440, ESS ES688F, DOS