Re: [SOLVED] 5x86 not running most games

Posted on 2017-06-24, 20:47

by

by feipoa

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Did you try several brands of 8 MB FPM sticks? I have found that, for whatever reasons, some boards do not like certain brands of RAM, whereby different brands of the same internal memory arrangement would work. This seems particularly true of 486 boards in my experience.

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Re: 486F55 motherboard (Freetech?)

Posted on 2017-06-21, 21:08

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by feipoa

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I have been unsuccessful with SiS 486/497 and UMC 8881/8886 DMA on onboard IDE. There was one post which indicated success with DMA on ALI 1487, however I was unsuccessful on the same ALI chipset. There are reports that the latest version of SiS 496 supports EDO and tested to work. I think it was on …

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Re: 20 years of junk in a tower: wildly anachronistic PII/233 build

Posted on 2017-06-19, 21:03

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by feipoa

in Marvin \ System Specs

in Marvin \ System Specs

I think there were some PII's with a 5x multiplier you might want to try instead of that PIII-500. I read somewhere that you want the later stepping models of the PII-333 (5x). So if your max FSB is 75 MHz, then you could perhaps get 375 MHz out of it.

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Re: Need some help adding MMX capabilities to a P5-120 Gateway 2000

Posted on 2017-06-19, 18:37

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by feipoa

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I would focus on CPU-motherboard compatibility issues before considering which graphics card. The order of operation here is far from optimal.

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Re: 4GB of RAM in a Slot 1 system?

Posted on 2017-06-19, 18:32

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by feipoa

in Marvin \ System Specs

in Marvin \ System Specs

Also relevant is how different people maintain their systems. I don't maintain my wife's laptop much. The speed feels about onpar with my [maintained] dual-core Opteron 2.8 GHz desktop system from 2005.

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Re: 4GB of RAM in a Slot 1 system?

Posted on 2017-06-19, 08:02

by

by feipoa

in Marvin \ System Specs

in Marvin \ System Specs

Question: While using 4Gb in a P3 system is useful in a server with several clients how is it useful for retro gaming? . I supposed for the diehard who is still going online with their overclocked dual P3 Tualatin, more than 2 GB of RAM might be of interest. My three dual P3 Tualatins all have 3 GB …

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Re: Need some help adding MMX capabilities to a P5-120 Gateway 2000

Posted on 2017-06-18, 20:47

by

by feipoa

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Does the P166 overdrive have the voltage regulator onboard? If so, this is the CPU I'd try to get working first. When the jumpers and CMOS settings are optimised for this CPU, I would then begin experimenting with MMX CPUs. Weren't there Socket 5 - to - Socket 7 VRM interposer boards? You might want …

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Re: 286 mobo cpu upgrades (386sx+) , opinions?

Posted on 2017-06-18, 19:33

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by feipoa

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

User Anonymous Coward has probably mastered this topic. PM him if he does not chime in.

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Re: Which of these two 486 motherboards would you choose?

Posted on 2017-06-18, 19:31

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by feipoa

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Benchmark them first, particularly with your target VLB cards. which CMOS and jumper settings work with which hardware can take some time to uncover. I am leaning towards the MSI board, it has a zif and 72-pin SIMMs.

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Re: 5x86 not running most games

Posted on 2017-06-18, 19:25

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by feipoa

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I would start with an Intel DX2-66 (write-thru) and jumper accordingly. This was probably the most compatible CPU.

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Re: PS/2 to Microsoft Serialmouse Adapter Converter

Posted on 2017-06-11, 20:53

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by feipoa

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I will not have time for awhile. I'm digging and building a large retaining wall on my property line. I'll be working on this until late evening for some weeks. I just stumbled in now to get some water and check my email.

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Re: PS/2 to Microsoft Serialmouse Adapter Converter

Posted on 2017-06-11, 16:15

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by feipoa

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Does anyone else have a 4-port KVM with audio to test this converter with? If one does not exist which functions normally, the converter will, unfortunately, be of little use for my purposes.

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Re: Lucky Star LS486 rev. C1 CMOS bad checksum

Posted on 2017-06-06, 23:44

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by feipoa

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

You would have to modify the motherboard's voltage regulator circuit to adjust the CPU voltage. This normally involves changing out a resistor.

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Re: MP3 hardware decoding ISA cards

Posted on 2017-06-05, 17:54

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by feipoa

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I was using an AMD Am5x86-133 without L2 cache until late December 1998. I already had a substantial MP3 collection, but I had to down-sample my mp3s, otherwise the computer was unusable with other tasks. If I had heard of one of these cards before Dec. 1998, and the price was right, I would …

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Re: Lucky Star LS486 rev. C1 CMOS bad checksum

Posted on 2017-06-05, 11:20

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by feipoa

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

If your board has an AWARD BIOS, you can use Modbin to edit the default settings of the BIOS, then save the BIOS, and flash it to motherboard. This will solve the issue of the settings being reset, because they will be reset to what you set them to using Modbin. The drawback is that the time still …

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Re: MP3 hardware decoding ISA cards

Posted on 2017-06-05, 01:41

by

by feipoa

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Any idea how much these might have cost in the late 90's? I suppose people still running 486's or slower Pentiums in the early Napster days might have grabbed one if the price was right.

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Re: Lucky Star LS486 rev. C1 CMOS bad checksum

Posted on 2017-06-05, 00:31

by

by feipoa

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

What voltage is actually getting to the CPU? Measure Vcc to Vss. If it is only 3.3V, try running at 100MHz. Use conservative CMOS timings for testing purposes.

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Re: Why no 486 to 386 socket adapter?

Posted on 2017-06-03, 20:10

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by feipoa

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

It really just depends on what you want to include in your definition. This doesn't really seem like a point worth debating. If including interposers, there is also the IBM Blue Lightning BL3, which is faster than the SXL2-66. The fastest PGA-132 CPU without an interposer is either the Cyrix DRx2-66 …

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Re: Another high-end 486 back in action (ASUS GX4 conversion success! Tons of pictures)

Posted on 2017-05-28, 11:06

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by feipoa

in Marvin \ System Specs

in Marvin \ System Specs

Keep looking! It can be difficult to find working units these days. One day, I'd like to dedicate some time to fixing my defective 5.25" drive. I currently only have two working.

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Re: eBay shipments from Asia taking 2+ months

Posted on 2017-05-27, 07:14

by

by feipoa

in Milliways

in Milliways

Last time I bought something from China a little over half a year back, it got here in under a week. Then again, I'm in Canada and I've noticed that shipping from China is typically faster and cheaper than from the USA for whatever reason. In fact, even shipping from Europe tends to be faster, but …

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