Re: Is my HDD read speed too low?

Posted on 2020-08-11, 09:08

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by waterbeesje

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Try the drive on any faster machine and compare the results: is it the drive or the main system? I'd guess the latter. You could try to see what happens if you get the ISA bus to 9 or 10MHz. If the bus is the bottleneck, things should speed up. Little warning: if anything can't keep up you might get …

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Re: How much RAM do you need ?

Posted on 2020-08-10, 20:11

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by waterbeesje

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

The reason I ask is because I dont know what the memory limitations are on old AT and XT computers and memory cards are hard to find and expensive. So what amount of memory on an old AT computer memory card do you need in order to have a good computer for game play in DOS and Windows and …

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Re: How much RAM do you need ?

Posted on 2020-08-10, 17:35

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by waterbeesje

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Many different opinions :) It may be worth to walk this thread two ways. When the systems came to the mass market, memory was expensive and adding lots of ram would cost you an arm and a leg. Or more. The system would run fine for what you intended, and having to wait a bit was totally fine. Windows …

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Re: How much RAM do you need ?

Posted on 2020-08-09, 19:56

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by waterbeesje

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

For 1993 you still could play a lot of games that did not use more than 512kB of ram, so 640kB should be enough including DOS. For any 386SX I would not bother to go over 4MB and don't use Windows: will probably just crawl. For a faster 386 like DX33/40 8MB would be a practical barrier: 1MB ram …

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Re: Old hard disks lifetime?

Posted on 2020-08-09, 19:01

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by waterbeesje

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Considering 386 limits, the magical C1024 H16 S63 limits produce the 528MB limit. I have yet to see a hard disk that exceeds the values without getting above these figures. There are a lot of hard disks between 528MB and about 1GB that support a 1024 cilinder mode, to support operation with these …

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Re: Old hard disks lifetime?

Posted on 2020-08-09, 18:11

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by waterbeesje

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

This is something every vintage user will experience sooner or later. Old disks just become unreliable. Although I have only had 5 disk failures in my including 2 mfm drives and an XTA. This last week one drive blew a bearing... Can't prevent that. The hot weather we have in the Netherlands at the …

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Re: Bought these (retro) hardware today

Posted on 2020-08-09, 17:17

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by waterbeesje

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Got myself a nice little slug!!! IMG_20200809_170237.jpg I was looking for a 5x86 for cheap and ran into this wannabe 486 for practically nothing. I never had a 486sx before so I just had to have it :D After unpacking I put it onto a VLB board with 8MB ram, 256kB cache, a Trident TGUI9420 VLB 2MB …

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Re: overwhelmed by motherboard and CPU selection for 486 build

Posted on 2020-08-09, 09:57

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by waterbeesje

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

TotalA will stutter even on a 333mhz pentium when there are lots of units and explosions on screen... My lil brother used to play this game when we got a brand new P4 1,7GHz system and Geforce 2 mx... And also managed to make it stutter. Also red alert 2 could crawl on it with 150 conscripts moving …

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

Posted on 2020-08-08, 09:54

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by waterbeesje

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I broke my hard disk. :( Yesterday I was fiddling with my 386 DX40. The system had a Conner cp30174 disk (170MB). It still is working great, but would not let me use any slave drive, so I put in a Seagate ST51080A. Only half of its size would be usable but that is ok with me. Installed the disk, …

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Re: overwhelmed by motherboard and CPU selection for 486 build

Posted on 2020-08-08, 09:28

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by waterbeesje

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

With al good tips from the other members you could also ask yourself if you want the easy setup or you want the bigger challenge. VLB generally comes with challenges of getting things stable. For me this is a goal on its own, making the system more 'mine'. For example, I own an Aquarius MB4DUV that …

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Re: My 286 motherboard collection

Posted on 2020-08-07, 14:50

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by waterbeesje

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Can I join the club with my IBM PS/2 model 30-286? And with my ELT286B 160B? http://www.uncreativelabs.de/th99/m/U-Z/30619.htm (Sorry for not posting pics, I'm lazy today, 35'c / 95'F here)

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biostar 386 memory speed?

Posted on 2020-08-07, 14:25

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by waterbeesje

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Earlier this week I was playing with my 386 DX40 computer and noticed my memory timings were kind of very loose. This computer is build on the Biostar 1340 motherboard with soldered AM386 DX40. http://www.uncreativelabs.de/th99/m/A-B/31865.htm Currently running 8MB ram (30p): 4x 1MB topless 60ns + …

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Re: 486 cache & CPU upgrade questions

Posted on 2020-08-04, 23:31

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by waterbeesje

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

With cache in my opinion it is ok as long as your ram can be cached. So with a 486 and 4-8MB you should be ok with only 64kB. More cache will improve the performance of course but from 128kB to 256kB only gives you 1-2%. More will not give you any more performance, except if you run programs that …

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Re: Master/Slave IDE problem on 386DX with Vitex I/O card and Conner CFS425A HDD

Posted on 2020-08-03, 11:47

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by waterbeesje

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

For file transfer under PC DOS 5.02 / MS DOS 6 and up you may also use laplink and intersvr / interlnk. Over parallel port you'll get speeds that will be ok. Under Windows you can get decent networking as well.

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Re: Bought these (retro) hardware today

Posted on 2020-08-03, 11:13

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by waterbeesje

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Today the mailman brought me a few hard disks. - 4,3GB WDC 14300, 1999. This seems like the only one that is fragile :p - 6,8 GB Samsung SV0682D, 2000 - 8,4GB WDC 28400, 1999. big brother of the first one 😀 Now there rises another problem: which computers to put them in? Need some more I guess 😉

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Re: 486 cache & CPU upgrade questions

Posted on 2020-08-03, 10:21

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by waterbeesje

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Don't know exactly what chips you'd need, should be any "regular" ones. but I'd take a look at AliExpress. I got some 256x1 chips there for my 286 and they work just fine :) so I expect cache chips to be ok too. About the CPU: Have you benchmarked this one side by side with your other 486 with the …

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Re: Tips for thrifting 486 parts?

Posted on 2020-08-03, 09:53

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by waterbeesje

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

What chinny said exactly. Especially take a close look at smd components, check for broken legs or indication they may be pushed down (which can indicate internal damage to the chip) Tantalum capacitors should be standing right up, or all bent the same direction. If they are bent unevenly or not all …

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Re: Master/Slave IDE problem on 386DX with Vitex I/O card and Conner CFS425A HDD

Posted on 2020-08-02, 19:35

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by waterbeesje

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Been there too, came a long way as well. My 386 DX 40 runs a Conner 170MB drive and there is no way of running it along with the CDROM drive on three same IDE channel. I use a soundcard with IDE now.

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Re: CDROM not recognized in DOS after a SOFT reset but works fine after a HARD POWER OFF reset. Any ideas?

Posted on 2020-08-02, 19:21

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by waterbeesje

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Few thoughts came up. Will a regular hard disk/CF card be detected as secondary master? What if you set the CDROM as secondary slave? Will it be recognised then? Perhaps with a hard disk as primary if your bios does not accept a slave drive without master. What if you set an extra delay for …

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Re: Windows 98 & DOS Graphics

Posted on 2020-08-02, 13:13

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by waterbeesje

in Marvin \ Video

in Marvin \ Video

Is the cpu Coppermine or tualatin? Anyways, I think the gf4 ti 4600 or 4800 will be a great choice. Fast, Windows drivers can still be pretty low version ( =lower CPU impact) and support is great. Also vesa is supported very well, although not as good as the slower TNT(2) and gf2. If you go voodoo, …

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