Re: Pure DOS gaming system with 100% digital audio output

Posted on 2018-12-31, 17:01

by

by Tiido

in Marvin \ Sound

in Marvin \ Sound

There's no card's own MIDI support in pure DOS, you just get the dumb MPU-401 UART. For music you need to connect your own MIDI device to the card (and since most have digital output possible you can route it back to the card's SPDIF input also).

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Re: Need help with Opl3-Sa3 in Toshiba 4000cdt

Posted on 2018-12-31, 15:11

by

by Tiido

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Sound tests in SETUPSA were making sound (volumes were set right and everything was audible) ? In games you'll have to choose SBpro2.0, default settings are port 220, IRQ 5, DMA 1 (not sure if you changed those). This is for pure DOS only, once you go to Windows and still use WDM driver you will not …

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Re: Resurrecting an Socket 3 motherboard (Soyo SY-25N)

Posted on 2018-12-30, 16:23

by

by Tiido

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

It would work in place on an EPROM. Then yes, next step is finding a way to actually program one. This is an early chip that isn't JEDEC compatible and cheapo programmers might be incapable of programming it, you'll have to scan through the supported chips list to find out if they can do it or not. …

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Re: Dallas Real Time Clock. Replace RTC or add battery?

Posted on 2018-12-30, 16:19

by

by Tiido

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

When you look on the date codes you see they're some late 90s things or maybe early 2000s but usually at least a decade into their life. The ones you can buy from any big electronics distributor are generally only few years old.

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Re: ThinkPad 770's screen is black only when plugged in.

Posted on 2018-12-30, 15:51

by

by Tiido

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

The amps don't matter but volts do. Using higher voltage is most definitely not recommended as it can destroy the battery (with fireworks) and the charging circuit.

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Re: Dallas Real Time Clock. Replace RTC or add battery?

Posted on 2018-12-30, 15:48

by

by Tiido

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

The modules are very expensive when bought new, it makes no sense for me not to add a battery to one. Cheap stuff on ebay is already past most of their life and will die sooner or later.

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Re: Resurrecting an Socket 3 motherboard (Soyo SY-25N)

Posted on 2018-12-30, 15:47

by

by Tiido

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

It probably is an EPROM but you can use a NOR flash in place of it if once pinout is made compatible (most flashes have very slightly different pinout from EPROMs). EPROM you will not be able to overwrite without a dedicated eraser and a programmer device, flash chip you can do with a programmer or …

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Re: Odd old PCI VGA card; Cyber Rex 128VR... what is it?

Posted on 2018-12-30, 14:18

by

by Tiido

in Marvin \ Video

in Marvin \ Video

I'm pretty sure the 3D means only the visual effect and not acceleration for games.

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Re: 386SX 33Mhz motherboard... need some help!

Posted on 2018-12-30, 07:49

by

by Tiido

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

SX will still have roughly half the performance of a DX, even if the cache was large. Databus is 16bits on SX while it is 32 bit on the DX.

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Re: Tomato 4DPS 2.0 + Cyrix DX2-66 - not work

Posted on 2018-12-30, 03:12

by

by Tiido

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Even for frash the jumper should be at 5V. 12V should only be set only for the duration of flash update IF the chip needs 12V for programming (vast majority don't and will die instantly if 12V is given to them, possibly taking the rest with it).

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Re: Odd old PCI VGA card; Cyber Rex 128VR... what is it?

Posted on 2018-12-29, 02:43

by

by Tiido

in Marvin \ Video

in Marvin \ Video

I would imagine it is a Trident card, they had a line of ISA cards with integrated ROM and google search shows PCI cards without a ROM also. I haven't seen anyone else do that.

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Re: Question about cache ram on motherboard (TAG chip "capacity")

Posted on 2018-12-29, 00:34

by

by Tiido

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Right, width is what matters on that regard, size is needed to actually map all the cache lines/blocks into the actual cache memory. Large cache size needs a large TAG. I'm not totally sure how the actual implementations work on most chipsets but size of TAG impacts the size of cache lines/blocks in …

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Re: Question about cache ram on motherboard (TAG chip "capacity")

Posted on 2018-12-28, 23:06

by

by Tiido

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

TAG size determines how much RAM is cacheable, with a small chip (if the conf works) you might only have small part of the memory cacheable and anything beyond will be very slow compared to cacheable region. You want the TAG to be as large as possible and often faster than other SRAMs to ensure …

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Re: Covox Sound Master Reverse Engineering / Replica

Posted on 2018-12-28, 01:45

by

by Tiido

in Marvin \ Sound

in Marvin \ Sound

JLCPCB ? 😁

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Re: Merry x-mas 2018 everyone....

Posted on 2018-12-26, 23:34

by

by Tiido

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I had a whole bunch of those during the past few days, so very delicious :F

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Re: Help with a PC Tester (XT)

Posted on 2018-12-26, 22:15

by

by Tiido

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

The right side when board has components facing you is the one going toward the slot holes. Left side where the chip is has address lines and right end where the small components are the data lines.

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Re: Need help with Opl3-Sa3 in Toshiba 4000cdt

Posted on 2018-12-26, 20:04

by

by Tiido

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

It is inside Yamaha's drivers. Here's it extracted from them : http://www.tmeeco.eu/TKAYBSC/Win9x/SETUPSA/

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Re: NEC XR385 wavetable daughterboard - some questions

Posted on 2018-12-25, 11:47

by

by Tiido

in Marvin \ Sound

in Marvin \ Sound

It is a Yamaha made DB60XG for NEC PC98 line of computers, it isn't a clone or anything. XR386 is a board designation and a similar number is found on all Yamaha PCBs. DB60XG is XR712 for example. Only difference between the two is the silkscreen (white markings around the parts), all parts are same …

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Re: Cables hell help - tips for some markers or other solutions?

Posted on 2018-12-23, 21:03

by

by Tiido

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I have used white insulation tape and just written what the cable is, or sometimes a white sticker on a cable where I write what the cable is. If I had a label printer I would use one instead.

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Re: Weird behavior from 386 board (slows down after a while)

Posted on 2018-12-23, 20:59

by

by Tiido

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Some boards require turbo header to be explicitly set for normal operation. Untied inputs can and will randomly toggle. The scan does show a jumper in place though...

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