Re: Bought these (retro) hardware today

Posted on 2021-04-02, 22:35

by

by SteveC

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

BetaC wrote on 2021-04-02, 21:23: SteveC wrote on 2021-04-02, 20:57: Noooo SSDs can't ever be retro! I thought I drew the line at USB, but surely there's a line at spinning rust disks?! 😁 If you want to be semantic about it, you could argue that EEPROMs were used like SSDs in some old game carts. …

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Re: What modern activity did you get up to today?

Posted on 2021-04-02, 22:32

by

by SteveC

in Milliways

in Milliways

I upgraded all 3 nodes of my home Nutanix cluster (little 1U Lenovo RS140 servers) to their max of 32GB each today. Guess it won't be long until this comment would end up in the retro activity thread!

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Re: Golden age of computing for personal computers

Posted on 2021-04-02, 21:08

by

by SteveC

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I understand saying the 8 bit era but for me being born in 1980 I was too young to experience much of it (although first computer was an Atari 800XL). The 8 bit era didn't seem to leap enough forward in a price bracket that people could afford - there were similarly capable 8 bit machines for like …

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Re: Bought these (retro) hardware today

Posted on 2021-04-02, 20:57

by

by SteveC

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Noooo SSDs can't ever be retro! I thought I drew the line at USB, but surely there's a line at spinning rust disks?! 😁

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Re: The World's Fastest 486

Posted on 2021-03-28, 21:57

by

by SteveC

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Just watched the CPU Galaxy video - this is all great stuff, thank you folks 😀

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Re: USB Floppy

Posted on 2021-03-26, 14:41

by

by SteveC

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Oh it actually says TEAC Model No FD-05PUB on the bottom. Even came in a padded pouch 😀;

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Re: USB Floppy

Posted on 2021-03-26, 14:40

by

by SteveC

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

My IBM one just turned up and works great! Formatted a disk at 720KB too! Almost identical case (just the blue eject button and two screws instead of one) to my rubbish old cheap one.

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Re: USB Floppy

Posted on 2021-03-25, 23:46

by

by SteveC

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Imation "Superdisk" (LS-120) drives. The packaging says they're for Mac but they also work on PC. Most require a chunky dongle thing to connect to USB, some of the late ones have a regular USB connector on them though. The colored ones are older, slower, not as good at reading bad disks. The …

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Re: USB Floppy

Posted on 2021-03-24, 10:48

by

by SteveC

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Thanks for the replies! I didn't realise the inability to write/format 720kb disks was a common thing. Anyway I've just ordered an IBM branded one.. let's see if this is any better (well it couldn't be much worse haha)

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Re: Saved a Compaq Contura 3/25

Posted on 2021-03-24, 00:35

by

by SteveC

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

DOS 6.22 and Win 3.1 all installed now 😀

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Re: CF vs DOM vs SSD

Posted on 2021-03-23, 23:49

by

by SteveC

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Quantum Bigfoots everywhere or go home 🤣

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USB Floppy

Posted on 2021-03-23, 23:28

by

by SteveC

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Hi all, Can anyone recommend a decent USB floppy drive? They all seem to look the same, the same as the one I have (eSYNiC) and it's rubbish. I don't know if it's normal but this one I have won't play with 720kb disks either. From my 'modern' PC, I'm currently copying files to a CF card, then …

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Re: Saved a Compaq Contura 3/25

Posted on 2021-03-23, 23:07

by

by SteveC

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

The stuff turns up and I start messing about with wiring the step down converter to a fuse on the 18.5v line on the inverter board and the 5mm tape (https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/5mm-Slim-Thin-WHITE-Ultra-Bright-5m-600-LED-12V-Light-Strip-Sticky-Tape-120LED-m/382986716226?ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT& …

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Saved a Compaq Contura 3/25

Posted on 2021-03-23, 23:03

by

by SteveC

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

So I got this old Compaq Contura 3/25 off eBay recently - the seller said it worked but dim screen. I've been having fun with it this evening! s-l1600 (1).jpg Powering it on and yes the screen is very dim - the backlight doesn't work, but hey I've been playing with an Amstrad PPC640 recently - who …

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Re: Bought these (retro) hardware today

Posted on 2021-03-19, 15:35

by

by SteveC

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Bit different - Another random purchase from eBay for just a few pounds. mx1004.PNG It's an IBM/ISS Proventia MX1004 firewall - I'm going to try and upgrade it as much as possible and run Sophos XG firewall on it. I believe it's a Celeron 600Mhz or something inside with a normal looking 2.5" hard …

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Re: Matrox card questions

Posted on 2021-03-16, 22:36

by

by SteveC

in Marvin \ Video

in Marvin \ Video

The G550 is worse than the G400 yet it's years younger - it is die shrunk to save money with 64 bit memory bus. Technically it has a T&L engine but it only worked in their Headcasting thing - a crude 3d model of your head used when doing "video" conferencing. It was just awful. It is only any good …

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Re: Bought these (retro) hardware today

Posted on 2021-03-16, 21:41

by

by SteveC

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Bit different - Another random purchase from eBay for just a few pounds. mx1004.PNG It's an IBM/ISS Proventia MX1004 firewall - I'm going to try and upgrade it as much as possible and run Sophos XG firewall on it. I believe it's a Celeron 600Mhz or something inside with a normal looking 2.5" hard …

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Re: Bought these (retro) hardware today

Posted on 2021-03-16, 20:31

by

by SteveC

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Bit different - Another random purchase from eBay for just a few pounds. mx1004.PNG It's an IBM/ISS Proventia MX1004 firewall - I'm going to try and upgrade it as much as possible and run Sophos XG firewall on it. I believe it's a Celeron 600Mhz or something inside with a normal looking 2.5" hard …

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Re: Bought these (retro) hardware today

Posted on 2021-03-15, 20:27

by

by SteveC

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Had a bit of fun on eBay and these will be turning up over the next few days. Always need more RAM. All sorts here including cache modules. s-l1600.jpg Compaq Contura 3/25 Laptop - seller says it boots but the screen is very dark so this should be fun to play with. s-l1600 (1).jpg An Amiga 600 - got …

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Re: My collections of Matrox video cards

Posted on 2021-03-15, 20:15

by

by SteveC

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

What an amazing collection. I thought I had too many - I have maybe ten! Covered them in a video I made a couple years ago - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pa08lCtqtzc I used to be quite involved over on the Matrox Users Resource Centre (MURC) forums and was picked along with 3 or 4 others to beta …

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