VOGONS


What retro activity did you get up to today?

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Reply 9940 of 28625, by appiah4

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Could your PB be using a proprietary Floppy drive or cable? Many OEMs use these.. You could try another ISA IDE/Floppy controller to it to resolve the issue maybe, in case the one you tried is also faulty?

Reply 9941 of 28625, by Murugan

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Finally finished my K6 build:

Motherboard: MS-5169. I was lucky to find a backplate that almost had the same layout on ebay for 5€
CPU: K6-3 450
RAM: 655MB
GPU: Matrox Millenium G200 (might add 8MB SGRAM later on) + 2x Voodoo2 CT6670
Soundcard: Yamaha YMF724F-V PCI
HD: CF 8GB as a main HD + Quantum Fireball CR 13GB
Drives: Gotek floppy and 16x or 32x CD-ROM
OS: Win ME. System restore is disabled. Unofficial SP not installed (yet)

Tested Thief 1 Gold on it. Had to try it......Aaaaaah memories!!!
I had problems with Fastvoodoo drivers so I installed the 'latest' Creative ones. Works like a charm now.
The only thing missing is a casebadge but I ordered a 3dfx one :p

nLvIQvcl.jpg
LtJ0aN9l.jpg

My retro collection: too much...

Reply 9942 of 28625, by appiah4

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Nice machine.. I'm also looking for a similar old ATX backplate myself, for my K6 PC.

Reply 9943 of 28625, by Thallanor

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appiah4 wrote:

Could your PB be using a proprietary Floppy drive or cable? Many OEMs use these.. You could try another ISA IDE/Floppy controller to it to resolve the issue maybe, in case the one you tried is also faulty?

I've gone nuts with it. Installed an ISA FDC and tried various combinations of FDDs, cables, disks, combinations of BIOS settings, you name it. It's the most bizarre thing I've seen with this computer. I'm going to be SOL if the HDD fails, shy of first setting the HDD on another PC before transplanting. Doable, I suppose, but a PITA.

Oh well! I'll figure something out. 😀

Reply 9944 of 28625, by Murugan

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appiah4 wrote:

Nice machine.. I'm also looking for a similar old ATX backplate myself, for my K6 PC.

Thanks! I had to search a bit but found it on ebay.

My retro collection: too much...

Reply 9945 of 28625, by Merovign

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Huh.

The attachment !Huh1.jpg is no longer available

8 bit ISA, 68k CPU, 16MHz clock crystal, TI memory controller, NEC and Motorola DSPs, two bios chips labeled 11001 PC17

Labeled (K) VOX 33101001 R2, A 851 0160/00 R1A A41, SA 201/PC R2A 8502, and Löpnummer 100061

The attachment !Huh2.jpg is no longer available

One of the traces from the pins looks deliberately cut and there's a "blue" wire on the other side of the board. It could also be accidental damage, the card was found in a pile of leaves, pine needles, spiders, and dirt, and I have no history on it at all. Surprisingly almost completely free of corrosion.

The bracket has two unlabeled 1/8" sockets and an unlabeled rotary rheostat.

I won't say *no* idea what it is, but not much of one.

*Too* *many* *things*!

Reply 9946 of 28625, by dionb

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The "vox" bit combined with the 3.5mm (?) jacks and rheostat sounds like it was some kind of voice/audio system, but that hardware... this is almost a whole Mac / Atari ST on an ISA card - computationally more powerful than the XT-class machine it would have been inserted into. As intrigued as you are.

Reply 9947 of 28625, by liqmat

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Merovign wrote:

...the card was found in a pile of leaves, pine needles, spiders, and dirt, and I have no history on it at all. Surprisingly almost completely free of corrosion.

When you find something like this in a pile of leaves, nine times out of ten it opens a dimensional portal.

Reply 9948 of 28625, by appiah4

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liqmat wrote:
Merovign wrote:

...the card was found in a pile of leaves, pine needles, spiders, and dirt, and I have no history on it at all. Surprisingly almost completely free of corrosion.

When you find something like this in a pile of leaves, nine times out of ten it opens a dimensional portal.

Or it came through dimensional portal and is probably a galactic scale apocalyptic weapon. Expect inter-dimensional forces to invade your home in search for it pretty soon.

Reply 9949 of 28625, by Merovign

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liqmat wrote:
Merovign wrote:

...the card was found in a pile of leaves, pine needles, spiders, and dirt, and I have no history on it at all. Surprisingly almost completely free of corrosion.

When you find something like this in a pile of leaves, nine times out of ten it opens a dimensional portal.

(looks around)

Leave it to me to be the one out of ten.

Hmph.

*Too* *many* *things*!

Reply 9950 of 28625, by Merovign

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dionb wrote:

The "vox" bit combined with the 3.5mm (?) jacks and rheostat sounds like it was some kind of voice/audio system, but that hardware... this is almost a whole Mac / Atari ST on an ISA card - computationally more powerful than the XT-class machine it would have been inserted into. As intrigued as you are.

None of the labels led me anywhere on Gurgle.

Given the low serial number (almost certainly #61) and the edit wires, I'd say it's a low-production piece of gear, maybe something academic or for sound studios in the mid-to-late 80s.

It may mean something that the sound (?) jacks are 1/8" instead of 1/4" or RCA, given the estimated vintage.

I'm not sure what it means that almost everything is in English but the label for the serial number is in German.

Maybe I will try to figure out which is input and output (if that's even relevant). I wonder if it requires -5V?

If I find anything I'll open a thread in the main hardware area just for kicks. Who doesn't like a little mystery?

Last edited by Merovign on 2018-09-25, 10:34. Edited 1 time in total.

*Too* *many* *things*!

Reply 9951 of 28625, by Merovign

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appiah4 wrote:
liqmat wrote:
Merovign wrote:

...the card was found in a pile of leaves, pine needles, spiders, and dirt, and I have no history on it at all. Surprisingly almost completely free of corrosion.

When you find something like this in a pile of leaves, nine times out of ten it opens a dimensional portal.

Or it came through dimensional portal and is probably a galactic scale apocalyptic weapon. Expect inter-dimensional forces to invade your home in search for it pretty soon.

Frankly a cash offer would be easier for all parties.

*Too* *many* *things*!

Reply 9952 of 28625, by dionb

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Merovign wrote:
[...] […]
Show full quote

[...]

None of the labels led me anywhere on Gurgle.

[...]

I'm not sure what it means that almost everything is in English but the label for the serial number is in German.

One tip: "löpnummer" isn't German (that would be Laufnummer) but Swedish. That possibly narrows things down.

Reply 9953 of 28625, by stamasd

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Also one thing to keep in mind is, even if the connector looks like 8-bit ISA doesn't mean it's actually ISA. That type of connector were used in all kinds of machines, not only in PCs.

I/O, I/O,
It's off to disk I go,
With a bit and a byte
And a read and a write,
I/O, I/O

Reply 9954 of 28625, by Predator99

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Interesting card. I would read the two ROMs and See what is inside...

Reply 9955 of 28625, by Merovign

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dionb wrote:
Merovign wrote:
[...] […]
Show full quote

[...]

None of the labels led me anywhere on Gurgle.

[...]

I'm not sure what it means that almost everything is in English but the label for the serial number is in German.

One tip: "löpnummer" isn't German (that would be Laufnummer) but Swedish. That possibly narrows things down.

Yup, my Deutsche is apparently a lot rustier than this card. Narrows it down considerably.

*Too* *many* *things*!

Reply 9956 of 28625, by Murugan

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Must be from Ikea then. Sorry,couldn't resist it 😀

My retro collection: too much...

Reply 9957 of 28625, by stamasd

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Murugan wrote:

Must be from Ikea then. Sorry,couldn't resist it 😀

Söund Bläster?

I/O, I/O,
It's off to disk I go,
With a bit and a byte
And a read and a write,
I/O, I/O

Reply 9958 of 28625, by Murugan

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Blästør

My retro collection: too much...

Reply 9959 of 28625, by stamasd

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I stand corrected.

I/O, I/O,
It's off to disk I go,
With a bit and a byte
And a read and a write,
I/O, I/O