A ISA USB controller with DOS drivers would be AWSOME!

It would solve the problem with older PCs that don't come with PS/2 ports for mice! We could finally get rid of serial ball mice - provided the drivers worked right.

I don't think I've ever seen that one, looks like a modern card? Can you tell me more about it?

I did a lot of research into ISA USB cards back around 2003-2005, I may still have my notes somewhere.

Drivers would be the problem, this is why I can't see them being that useful.
But the page I found the image on says the card came with a flash card driver.
Here is the page I found it on.
http://www.vintage-computer.com/vcforum/entry … -it-is-possible!!!

Stiletto wrote:

I don't think I've ever seen that one, looks like a modern card? Can you tell me more about it?

I did a lot of research into ISA USB cards back around 2003-2005, I may still have my notes somewhere.

Form the page I found it on, it's a USB ISA CH375 card and can be bought from china for around 20$. I found one site selling it for about 24 USD.
I think a dual port 16bit card would be far more usable for a use mouse/keyboard, but drivers might be a problem.

did some testing some 5 years ago with a pci card and the mass storage driver: All you need for USB mass storage support in pure DOS, fast!!!

I wouldn't hold my breath on the whole usb+dos situation though...

I don't need mass storage drivers - just Human Interface Device drivers. I got mass storage drivers working on a 486 with windows 95 and a NEC PCI USB 2.0 card - worked great under Windows - but win95 doesn't come with HID drivers, so I'm stuck with a 486 with USB 2.0 and no mouse (Serial ports are fried / no PS2 header). Shame, it's a fast one too... 512kb on board cache, EDO support and up to 16,4GB HDD support in bios...

/\ I'd disable the onboard serial ports and use ISA/PCI serial controllers.

Don't have one 🙁

Will get one later this week out of an old 486SX. I also found a PCI controller with 2xPS/2 and 2xUSB. It looks like it might have a tiny KB controller on it besides the USB controller. Kind of expensive, and I don't know if it will work under DOS, but I'll buy it and give it a shot.

http://www.pcgarage.ro/adaptoare/4world/pci-2x-ps2-2x-usb/

AFAIK these combined PS/2 + USB controllers won't work either in DOS or Windows (without HID drivers). They are just normal USB cards with a PS/2->USB adapter onboard.

I move data to and from old computers through an ISA network adapter or I take the disk out and mount it in a newer PC to move the necessary installs, sneaker net also works. A USB ISA card might be neat, if you can even find one, but I wouldn't bother, it's not period correct, wont work correctly, and might use use up some of your 640K memory.

The most interesting thing is it has a Boot ROM. Could be very handy, depending on some technical questions.

honestly at the speed USB 1 works, its not fit for much else than driving a mouse.

For data transfers a CF card on an adapter mounted on the case (bracket type) is convenient. You can access it without opening the case, you insert it in a card reader on the main PC and just copy files to it. Haven't tried this card in particular, but I must say that my experience with dos+usb is not that positive until now.

Wow a real working ISA USB card (8 bit too)

I am sure it is slow with 8 bit ISA though

Yeh I'd assume it's just useful for accessing usb mouse/keyboard.
It would all depend on the drivers, better stick to compact flash if you want easy removable storage.

konc wrote:

For data transfers a CF card on an adapter mounted on the case (bracket type) is convenient. You can access it without opening the case, you insert it in a card reader on the main PC and just copy files to it. Haven't tried this card in particular, but I must say that my experience with dos+usb is not that positive until now.

+1.

Something like this will solve practical data transfer problems from DOS computers:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/40-pin-IDE-Connector- … =item1c38acc0c6

If you are willing to shell out considerably more money for it, there are even these:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/STARTECH-COM-35BAYCF2 … =item418ee32cd8

Are these IDE->CF adaptors hotswappable? That's the main advantage of sneakernet using USB sticks.

bjt wrote:

Are these IDE->CF adaptors hotswappable? That's the main advantage of sneakernet using USB sticks.

No, but I also don't think that in DOS there are any USB drivers that allow it

^ correct, in my test hot-swapping was not an option, each time you changed a usb mass storage device you needed to reboot.

Why not just get a network card and transfer stuff that way? USB 1.0 and pre-98 OSes sounds like nothing but trouble.

A USB 1.0 interface, especially over USB, is essentially only good for HID... if you can even get it working.