Re: Socket 370 Zif repair ?

Posted on 2020-12-20, 03:38

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by RoberMC

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I have in my collection a very nice Jetway motherboard..but sadly it is not really possible to mount a cooler on the cpu any longer due to the hooks ..2 per side having been damaged. Perfect on one side of the cpu ..but damaged on the other with the centre hook totally missing. I have a cooler with …

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Re: Has any one delidded a Pentium 3 Tualatin?

Posted on 2020-12-05, 15:24

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by RoberMC

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

The thermal interface between the die and the heatspreader is usually less efficient than toothpaste in this 20 years old CPUs. That may affect their longevity, even at stock speeds. I usually delid the CPUs i care the most, replace the old paste with the higher quality interface i consider suitable …

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Re: QDI Advance 10T S370 / VIA 694T FSB settings issue

Posted on 2020-12-02, 15:34

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by RoberMC

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

That's a QDI, and other brands, classic. They made a lot of different revisions of a motherboard without no way to identify them from the model number and sharing the same bios file. Look closely to the motherboards looking for differences, they are probably using different clock generator ICs

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Re: VIASBCFG - VIA SBPro configuration tool for VIA VT8231 & VT82C686/A/B chipsets (v0.10a)

Posted on 2020-09-28, 00:38

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by RoberMC

in Marvin \ Sound

in Marvin \ Sound

Is there any possibility to add volume control for CD-in and other inputs? I am trying to chain two sound cards; an YMF744 for FM, and the integrated VT8231 for SB PCM only. My motherboard has a CD-in header so i want to internally connect the YMF744 Line-out to the CD-In on the motherboard, but it …

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Re: CpuSpd - A Hardware Based CPU Speed Control Utility for DOS/Win9X Retro Gaming

Posted on 2020-09-27, 00:47

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by RoberMC

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

And... i found another one; Mainboard: VIA EPIA 5000AG CPU: VIA EDEN (6.9.8 Nehemiah) 133x4=533 Mhz CpuSpd reports the multiplier can be changed to 3.5 but it cannot be, and when it tries the CPU freezes. The minimum multiplier for this CPU seems to be 4.0 as reported by Setmul.

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Re: CpuSpd - A Hardware Based CPU Speed Control Utility for DOS/Win9X Retro Gaming

Posted on 2020-09-16, 00:24

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by RoberMC

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I have found another issue, a minor one. I am playing with an AMD Geode NX1500 (6.8.1) in a HP T5720 Thin Client (Sis 741 Chipset) and the CPU allowed multipliers are incorrectly identified in CPUSPD. It says allowed multipliers are "Min: 4.0, Max: 4.0", when it should say "Min: 3.0, Max: 24.0" It …

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Re: CpuSpd - A Hardware Based CPU Speed Control Utility for DOS/Win9X Retro Gaming

Posted on 2020-09-09, 21:56

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by RoberMC

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Yes, I've made the same observation on my socket-A XP motherboards (Asus A7V600-X, Epox EP-8KMM3I) during testing too. It is not a program bug but the issue of whether the motherboard supports the mobile CPUs (Mobile Athlon 4, XP-M, mobile Duron, Geode NX etc.) The desktop socket-A motherboards …

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Re: CpuSpd - A Hardware Based CPU Speed Control Utility for DOS/Win9X Retro Gaming

Posted on 2020-09-08, 23:18

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by RoberMC

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I think i have discovered a bug. Test System is: Asus A8V8X-MX (Via KM400 / VT8235) CPU: AMD Mobile Athlon 4 1600+ (1.4Ghz) AHM1600AQQ3B OS: Direct Boot into MS-DOS 7.1 The problem in question is that VID cannot be set directly, i want it to be set at correct speed/voltage on boot so i use "cpuspd …

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Re: New sound card project: AWE64 Legacy

Posted on 2020-05-12, 16:03

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by RoberMC

in Marvin \ Sound

in Marvin \ Sound

IMHO, as a hardware designer, if you want to recreate any hardware, you should fully re-create it. Invest money and study/decap/recreate the main custom chips, then build the rest with modern widely available parts, which will highly reduce the costs. I am also a retro hardware lover, and even …

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Re: VIASBCFG - VIA SBPro configuration tool for VIA VT8231 & VT82C686/A/B chipsets (v0.10a)

Posted on 2020-05-07, 22:59

by

by RoberMC

in Marvin \ Sound

in Marvin \ Sound

Very nice! It is a nice feature to have, i tried it today in a Thinclient and it works, but anyway the FM emulation is one of the worst i have ever heard, really, it is not usable at all once you have heard how those games should sound. I have also noticed there are some sound effects missing, …

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Re: Mounting mixed-mode CD images for DOS games?

Posted on 2020-02-27, 18:19

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by RoberMC

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Finally I tried the ESS Solo-1 (PCI ESS1938s), and it cannot do it. @henryVK The Crystal CS4232 is an ISA card, and if it is able to do this, that would be highly unexpected. Are you talking about DOS games with Audio CD Tracks played using Daemon Tools under Windows 98, or just Windows 98 games …

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Re: Mounting mixed-mode CD images for DOS games?

Posted on 2020-02-26, 20:50

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by RoberMC

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I discarded completely the SB Live! and newer Creative cards because they sound awful in pure DOS games, and this is about running DOS games using virtual CD drives. It will be nice to know if it works or not anyway, but i would prefer using two sound cards than suffering the Live! OPL3 emulation in …

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Re: Mounting mixed-mode CD images for DOS games?

Posted on 2020-02-26, 17:47

by

by RoberMC

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Sorry to resurrect such an old thread, i had the same issue, i found this thread, and i think i have the definitive answer, so Riiiise from the grave! I managed to have DOS games with Audio CD tracks working under Windows 98 using Daemon Tools and a single sound card. After trying lots of ISA …

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Re: Asus P5A motherboard does not POST with VIA VT6212L USB 2.0 card

Posted on 2020-02-26, 17:27

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by RoberMC

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

This is a simple PCI version compatibility issue. The VT6212L is designed for PCI 2.2 and doesn't work with older PCI versions ALi Aladdin V (and i440BX and most other contemporary chipsets) only offer PCI 2.1. PCI 2.2 stuff won't work, which is an issue with a lot of USB 2.0, SATA and NIC chipsets …

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Re: hypothetical "new" system for DOS / Win3x / Win9x / WinXP retrogaming

Posted on 2020-02-18, 18:25

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by RoberMC

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I'm in Italy and on ebay the cheapest Solo-1 is 50$ plus shipping from USA! I might have more luck with local ads... I'm finding some Yamaha YMF724s for a few pennies, would they be a good alternative? You are doing something wrong, i see now at least 4 for 16€ to 19€ + 7€ to 10€ shipping in Europe …

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Re: hypothetical "new" system for DOS / Win3x / Win9x / WinXP retrogaming

Posted on 2020-02-18, 13:12

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by RoberMC

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I had a quick look on ebay and the 1938S Solo-1 cards are very scarce and cost an arm and a leg... However I can easily find ESS 1989S "Allegro" cards. But I have a feeling they wouldn't be as good for DOS, am I right? Well it depends on where you and the seller are, but i have just made a quick …

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Re: hypothetical "new" system for DOS / Win3x / Win9x / WinXP retrogaming

Posted on 2020-02-17, 19:56

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by RoberMC

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I have some suggestions: 1- You can go with a Tualatin if you use a intel 440BX platform + slotket + CPU mod. This gives you ISA, there exists some micro-Atx boards, high performance dos/Win 98, but low performance for Win XP games. I would discard this option if you really want some good Win XP …

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Re: Any love for AM2?

Posted on 2020-02-17, 11:42

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by RoberMC

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

IMHO, i prefer a fast Core 2 Duo. Windows XP games do not benefit from multiple cores, and a fast C2D runs pretty cold and overclock like crazy, a 3,3 Ghz easily to over 4 Ghz with default voltage, while still running cool and silent. It beats even any Core 2 Quad for WinXP gaming because of the …

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Re: Converting an SB-AWE-64 into an AWE-64-Gold ?

Posted on 2020-02-14, 13:17

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by RoberMC

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

if you somewhat want to improve it, replace the jacks with gold plated ones One of many misconceptions of audiophiles. Gold is a very bad conductor. The only advantage of gold is that it does not oxidise, but since its electrical resistance is higher than silver or copper, it will not improve audio …

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Re: Soldering Polymer Capacitors ?

Posted on 2020-02-13, 20:33

by

by RoberMC

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

They are even easier to solder than through hole ones when using a proper fine tip soldering iron.

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