Re: Tiny Vortex86-based DOS gaming PC - weeCee

Posted on 2022-12-24, 11:19

by

by Paul_V

in Marvin \ System Specs

in Marvin \ System Specs

@Nachtrave @rasteri @Paul_V I've got some experimental modded XGI Volari BIOS ROMs (32KB and 64KB variants) that I want to test, but I'm wary of risking bricking the 1 SOM I have. Have any of you got a spare SOM that you'd be willing to try a modded XGI Volari BIOS ROM on? Hi, I can try test it on …

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Re: Vortex86DX - A beastie of it's own (General info and discussion)

Posted on 2022-12-24, 00:29

by

by Paul_V

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I've been able to track down the software used to flash Vortex86DX internal BIOS through JTAG port. Also, found another datasheet, which is more comprehensive in terms of register control and functions (including L1\L2 cache control) Finally found the jflash.exe somewhere on DM&P's ftp (PM me with …

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Re: Vortex86DX - A beastie of it's own (General info and discussion)

Posted on 2022-12-17, 20:25

by

by Paul_V

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Based on the documents that Paul_v is gladly shared, DM&P has a tablet computer appliance of sorts running Linux to use with their JTAG. Based on this, I'm not sure it'll be possible to find their official tool. :< "I'm gonna go build my own theme park, with blackjack..." (c) Bender My XILINX …

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Re: Intel Advanced/ML (Marl) securing a bios IC socket after repair ideas?

Posted on 2022-12-16, 10:48

by

by Paul_V

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Use a plcc-32 socket ? That's the initial idea. But using it puts stress on the joints every time you insert or pull off the chip. 1/3 of the joints are already ripped off and condition of the others are unknown. There's a risk of ripping all joints off one day without reinforcing the socket. If …

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Intel Advanced/ML (Marl) securing a bios IC socket after repair ideas?

Posted on 2022-12-16, 09:06

by

by Paul_V

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Hi all. Recently, I've been given a broken Intel Advanced/ML (Marl) motherboard. The motherboard itself checks fine, but its has some damage where the BIOS chip should have been placed. N28F001 is a nasty chip with protected area and I guess this damage was a result of an unsuccessful attempt to …

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Re: Tiny Vortex86-based DOS gaming PC - weeCee

Posted on 2022-12-13, 13:02

by

by Paul_V

in Marvin \ System Specs

in Marvin \ System Specs

I've got an ebox-3300 motherboard, which is Vortex86DX based and has SD card,CF and IDE44 slot. I've tried installing Win98SE on different media. Here are some test results, should someone be interested: 1) SD Card - installed fine, but turns on compatibility-mode on firts boot. Exibits the same …

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Re: Tiny Vortex86-based DOS gaming PC - weeCee

Posted on 2022-12-12, 11:39

by

by Paul_V

in Marvin \ System Specs

in Marvin \ System Specs

@Paul_V Can you see anything with this BIOS ROM that might explain why the IDE controller misbehaves in 98SE? My guess it's hardware\driver related. Have not investigated much, as I'm using DOS exclusively with theese SoC's. There's a mention of the CRC bug: https://www.uwsg.indiana.edu/hypermail/ …

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Re: Tiny Vortex86-based DOS gaming PC - weeCee

Posted on 2022-12-12, 08:56

by

by Paul_V

in Marvin \ System Specs

in Marvin \ System Specs

2) USB Floppy Malformed Data -> Seems that having a disk in a TEAC USB floppy drive upon boot or not messes with how the USB floppy device gets used. Any sort of commands like dir and such can output garbage in certain cases, maybe related to BIOS/OS fighting to handle such. Not exactly sure what …

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Re: Vortex86DX - A beastie of it's own (General info and discussion)

Posted on 2022-12-11, 21:40

by

by Paul_V

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Another small update: Good news: I've been able to track down the software used to flash Vortex86DX internal BIOS through JTAG port. Also, found another datasheet, which is more comprehensive in terms of register control and functions (including L1\L2 cache control) So, writing the cache and divider …

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Re: Tiny Vortex86-based DOS gaming PC - weeCee

Posted on 2022-12-09, 17:16

by

by Paul_V

in Marvin \ System Specs

in Marvin \ System Specs

@Paul_V I have got a Volari GPU BIOS - I'm not sure if it's a V5 or V8? (maybe they're interchangeable?) will this fit? The ROM header does not have the exact model mentioned other that "Volari GPU" It appears to be 6 years older, than the original DMP V9s ROM. It can be swapped, but I had to …

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Re: Tiny Vortex86-based DOS gaming PC - weeCee

Posted on 2022-12-08, 10:12

by

by Paul_V

in Marvin \ System Specs

in Marvin \ System Specs

@Paul_V Oh OK, I thought the VGA BIOS would be on it's own chip. So you think there is enough spare room on the SoC BIOS for the 64KB Volari BIOS? It depends. Dummy 64KB file with random data does not fit (almost zero compression), while a 64KB ROM from a random card did fit with a fair compression …

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Re: Tiny Vortex86-based DOS gaming PC - weeCee

Posted on 2022-12-08, 07:37

by

by Paul_V

in Marvin \ System Specs

in Marvin \ System Specs

VGA, LAN and floppy emulation ROMs are integrated into SoC BIOS. It's 32KB in size, but in theory can be swapped for a larger one.

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Re: Tiny Vortex86-based DOS gaming PC - weeCee

Posted on 2022-11-01, 11:24

by

by Paul_V

in Marvin \ System Specs

in Marvin \ System Specs

@rasteri Would you be willing to risk trying to flash an ITE BIOS onto the IDE controller on the SOM? Like with a hardware EEPROM writer? https://www.vogons.org/viewtopic.php?p=711942#p711942 The BIOS on the Vortex86 is internal to the chip, so no chance of recovery if it goes wrong... If the …

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Re: ALS120, ALS100 Plus audio fix ?

Posted on 2022-10-06, 21:34

by

by Paul_V

in Marvin \ Sound

in Marvin \ Sound

UPD: Uploaded a sample to compare the results. First 5 sec defaults, another 5 sec - VREF connected to external power supply output ( outputs have bypass capacitors, but connecting capacitor to vref does nothing, IDK yet what helps to suppress the noise, maybe impedance\voltage drop caused by the …

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Re: ALS120, ALS100 Plus audio fix ?

Posted on 2022-10-05, 20:05

by

by Paul_V

in Marvin \ Sound

in Marvin \ Sound

I don't know if it might help? But I was able to extract the reference card schematics for the various ALS100 cards a couple of months ago: https://www.vogons.org/viewtopic.php?p=1091723#p1091723 Maybe they show some variation from the production cards that would give some indication of the cause. …

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Re: ALS120, ALS100 Plus audio fix ?

Posted on 2022-10-05, 10:15

by

by Paul_V

in Marvin \ Sound

in Marvin \ Sound

Thanks everyone, I do really hope there may be a redemption for it yet ) One more interesting thing, new chip fails to be detected by Avance Logic Drivers 0_o. Unisound works flawlessly. Maybe there's some ROM info missing. IDK Very nice effort ! Thänk you ~ One thing that may help is forcing your …

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Re: ALS120, ALS100 Plus audio fix ?

Posted on 2022-10-04, 15:42

by

by Paul_V

in Marvin \ Sound

in Marvin \ Sound

Hi, all. Sorry to bump a very old thread. I would like to share my experience regarding ALS120 based soundcards noise suppression. There's a lot to tell about, but I will try to keep it as brief as possible. So here it goes: I've got 3 different revisions of an AS9708 PCB and one of them had been …

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Re: "ISA855" - An interesting and peculiar motherboard from ali

Posted on 2022-07-31, 10:41

by

by Paul_V

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Can never use too much TIM, right? :P Yeah, I've removed excess paste after the inspection :) Heatsink mounting is a nightmare, which may explain the mess :) I have no complaints though. Many cheap motherboards lack any TIM at all on chipsets and mosfets. Did countless repairs on burned down VRM's. …

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Re: Searching for Insyde ExpressRom BIOS dump for AMD Geode LX/CS5536

Posted on 2022-07-31, 10:19

by

by Paul_V

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Hmm the table on page 556 shows lowest CPU speed is 166Mhz as default by bootstrap. am no genius with these things but like other early chipsets the DRAM clock speed is co-dependent on the CPU FSB, for the memory controller to work proper it must match certain multiplier/divider of cpu fsb or it …

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Re: Searching for Insyde ExpressRom BIOS dump for AMD Geode LX/CS5536

Posted on 2022-07-30, 15:04

by

by Paul_V

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Thanks for your time and effort, Horun. Yes, archive links are dead too, I should've mentioned it in my post. Insyde BIOS was also used by such brands as Kontron, Lippert, WinSystems. Could not find any on their sites either. I forgot to mention, that I did actually found one from the link below: …

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