Help Identify Lot of Old BIOS EPROMs? \ VOGONS

Help Identify Lot of Old BIOS EPROMs?

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First post, by boxpressed

Posted on 2020-04-22, 00:16

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I recently received a big lot of EPROMs, DRAM chips, and a few CPUs. The lot wasn't too expensive, and I was intrigued by how many old BIOS EPROMs were there. I noticed that one is a MR.BIOS for a 386-DX40 (not as big of a deal after the recent discovery of MR. BIOS dumps). But I was wondering if anyone could identify any of the others.

I don't have a dumper, but I'm kind of interested in getting one after reading the MR. BIOS thread. Here are photos of the BIOS EPROMs (and a few DRAM chips stuck onto the same foam).

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Last edited by boxpressed on 2020-04-22, 14:09. Edited 1 time in total.

Reply 1 of 4, by Horun

Posted on 2020-04-22, 01:34

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None of the labels look familiar. Did you look on on the under side of them, maybe someone felt pen what they for on their bottoms (I do that with old roms). Yes a chip reader would be very handy !

Hate posting a reply and then have to edit it because it made no sense 😁 First computer was an IBM 3270 workstation with CGA monitor. Stuff: https://archive.org/details/@horun

Reply 2 of 4, by dionb

Posted on 2020-04-22, 01:36

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Labels stuck over the codes of half of them and out-of-focus codes on the others doesn't help. In any event they don't look like EEPROMs, but old EPROMs, mainly 27C256 256kb (32kB) and 27C128 (16kB) EPROMs. Pretty bog-standard; what is on them is probably more interesting than the chips themselves.

Reply 3 of 4, by Vynix

Posted on 2020-04-22, 02:48

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Among that stack, the Jetkey chip is just a plain old KBC, can be useful if you've got a old 486 mobo that lacks one...

I think I can see a chip with "MR BIOS" written on it, next to the Jetkey. Could be worth a shot trying to find a EPROM reader and dump its contents.

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Reply 4 of 4, by boxpressed

Posted on 2020-04-22, 14:12

boxpressed Offline

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dionb wrote on 2020-04-22, 01:36:

Labels stuck over the codes of half of them and out-of-focus codes on the others doesn't help. In any event they don't look like EEPROMs, but old EPROMs, mainly 27C256 256kb (32kB) and 27C128 (16kB) EPROMs. Pretty bog-standard; what is on them is probably more interesting than the chips themselves.

Thanks -- I was confusing EEPROMs with EPROMS. I fixed the problem in the original post.

Yes, I wasn't as interested in the EPROMs themselves as I was in their contents. I didn't know whether these old AMI and Phoenix BIOSes needed to be dumped or not.

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