Re: Compact Flytech 386.

Posted on 2018-05-25, 13:09

by

by pojo

in Marvin \ System Specs

in Marvin \ System Specs

Hehe, I think I have purchased this exact machine from the original poster. I managed to upgrade the video RAM to 1MB, I used Hynix DRAMs (HY534257AS-70). Right now I'm experimenting with getting OnTrack installed so I can use a large-ish hard disk on it. The PSU is making a high frequency "chirping …

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Help finding drivers for SCM SwapBox ISA PCMCIA interface

Posted on 2018-04-06, 18:54

by

by pojo

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I have one of these obscure things: https://www.amazon.com/Microsystems-SwapBox-PCMCIA-Reader-SBI-D2P/dp/B019Q4EOU2 I have tried scouring the old SCM website on archive.org, and apparently there was drivers for DOS. I would like to get this running to use it for Compact Flash card (with an adapter) …

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Re: Resound OPL3 AdLib sound card just released

Posted on 2018-04-06, 08:36

by

by pojo

in Marvin \ Sound

in Marvin \ Sound

I did a quick test, and it seems the cards can co-exist in some cases. Worked with FM from Resound and SFX from SB16: * Warcraft * Sam & Max Games that didn't work: * Tempest 2000 (only FM music)

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Re: Resound OPL3 AdLib sound card just released

Posted on 2018-04-05, 08:15

by

by pojo

in Marvin \ Sound

in Marvin \ Sound

Unofficially however... since both cards have a real OPL3 chip, they would have the exact same timings. That means that it *might* work if both cards are set to the same address, because both chips will respond exactly the same to reads/writes anyway. Then you could just mute the FM on the SB16 …

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Re: Resound OPL3 AdLib sound card just released

Posted on 2018-04-05, 07:41

by

by pojo

in Marvin \ Sound

in Marvin \ Sound

I have one of these now and I really like it, very noise free as promised. Perhaps a silly question, but would it be possible to run it in tandem with a SB16? So the resound plays the FM music and SB16 is used for sound effects?

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Re: Joystick and Gamepad options for DOS Gaming

Posted on 2016-09-26, 14:02

by

by pojo

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

For a gamepad, you can't go wrong with Gravis Gamepad: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gravis_PC_GamePad There are other gamepads but these are the most compatible, I've found.

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

Posted on 2016-08-23, 13:14

by

by pojo

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I did a recap of my Asus socket 7 motherboard. A couple of caps were bulging, so I replaced them all. The board did not have any symptoms or anything like that, but it was only a matter of time. Still works after the recap, yay 😀 Filename recap.jpg File size 192.46 KiB Views 1920 views The tall …

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Re: Drive from 2008 reporting 60 THOUSAND power on hours?...

Posted on 2016-07-18, 09:07

by

by pojo

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

In my experience, heat is the great killer of hard drives. Keep your drives cool and they should indefinitely. That's a common misconception. http://static.googleusercontent.com/media/research.google.com/en//archive/disk_failures.pdf Surprisingly, we found that temperature and activity levels were …

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Re: Bought these (retro) hardware today

Posted on 2016-07-12, 07:17

by

by pojo

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Bought some lovely stuff for my new build 😀 A very nice AT case, looks almost unused: Filename $_57.jpg File size 104.68 KiB Views 4132 views And a Asus Socket 7 mobo: Filename s-l1600.jpg File size 224.37 KiB Views 4132 views Obviously, the case restricts CPU speed to be below 100MHz 😁

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Re: How do you get a serial mouse working

Posted on 2016-07-11, 13:03

by

by pojo

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I'm wondering if this could be a bus mouse? The AM probably indicates Amiga, IIRC the Amiga mouse protocol is identical to bus mouse (not serial / RS232).

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Re: Worth going slower than P2@266MHz?

Posted on 2016-07-08, 10:39

by

by pojo

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Sure, I believe I have this motherboard: http://soggi.eu/motherboards/abit/BE6.htm Sounds like there is not much point in getting a Celeron or P2@233 instead of this 266.

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Re: Troubleshooting ISA SBC

Posted on 2016-07-08, 08:20

by

by pojo

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

@h-a-l-9000: The IC's near the RAM don't get hot, only the OPTi. Do you have an ISA POST card? If there are any POST codes being broadcast then it would mean there's some life, it's just not managing to put anything on the screen. But the hot Opti chip doesn't sound good. I was not aware of these …

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Worth going slower than P2@266MHz?

Posted on 2016-07-08, 07:57

by

by pojo

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I had some problems with Lucasarts games so I swapped my P3 for an early Pentium II @ 266. This solved the issue with Adlib sound not working in these games. It seems the CPU is locked at multiplier, at least I can't get it going at 233MHz. Is it worth going for the slowest Celeron, for DOS games …

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

Posted on 2016-07-07, 21:08

by

by pojo

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I pulled a 266 Mhz Pentium II from my broken Compaq and swapped out the P3 I have in my retro machine. Suddenly I get the Adlib sound in Monkey Island and Loom :D I will have to fix the cooling though, the Pentium II has a huuuge heatsink that doesn't fit (a heat sink on the mobo is in the way). …

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Re: PS/2 to Microsoft Serialmouse Adapter Converter

Posted on 2016-07-07, 09:11

by

by pojo

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I would definitely be interested in a kit for this.

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Re: Bought these (retro) hardware today

Posted on 2016-07-06, 13:13

by

by pojo

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

@badmojo: I have the same speakers, they're pretty great 😀

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Re: Troubleshooting ISA SBC

Posted on 2016-07-06, 07:15

by

by pojo

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Alright, I hacked together a battery pack (three AA batteries), output was about 4V. Still does not show any image, chip gets super hot. Hard to know where to start hunting for shorts. One thing that I haven't tried yet is powering on without any RAM.

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Re: Troubleshooting ISA SBC

Posted on 2016-07-05, 18:19

by

by pojo

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

h-a-l-9000 wrote: Is VCC identical with 5V? Yep, I believe that VCC is labeled +5V on my backplane.

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Re: Troubleshooting ISA SBC

Posted on 2016-07-05, 18:15

by

by pojo

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I will have to check that. I made some progress now, I measured directly on the ISA bus and saw that pin B3 (5V) was only about 4V. I had used 5V from a molex connector which was apparently a bad idea. I fixed that, and connected a PC speaker. I can hear sort of a faint click when I power it on, …

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Re: Troubleshooting ISA SBC

Posted on 2016-07-05, 10:23

by

by pojo

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I also found a PDF for a newer SBC by the same manufacturer, I-BUS. My board is not exactly the same layout but hopefully it will get me some hint as to were the PC speaker header is. http://www.ibus.com/manuals/manual-orca.pdf

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