This Tandon 286. I have two of these now. They are way better build than the original IBM 5170 - much heavier, better quality materials... When I bough it I didn't realized what was hidden inside...

amadeus777999 wrote on 2023-05-17, 10:18:

Got two nice cases - both containing Pentium era hardware(S7 & SS7).

these look good! planning to keep as S7 era?

amadeus777999 wrote on 2023-05-17, 10:18:

Got two nice cases - both containing Pentium era hardware(S7 & SS7).

Nice! I’d love to find an InWin A500 again.

I remember I bored out the tiny vent holes on the bottom front edge to improve airflow. I think that was around the time that we all collectively started to worry about those sorts of things. 😀

HanJammer wrote on 2023-05-17, 10:22:

When I bough it I didn't realized what was hidden inside...

I'm looking at the pics and I still don't realize what is hidden inside. Looks like all Tandon parts and a Hercules card. What am I missing?

... Nice system BTW! 😀

keenmaster486 wrote on 2023-05-15, 17:34:

I want you guys to see this. Look at it. They SPRAY FOAMED the inside of the package.

It sure didn’t work to protect the drive covers, as you can see.

CE596383-7A4F-4ACE-A5C8-8BA6725024C2.jpegB9F1D5D9-9351-4341-B127-6B2971CAFD0A.jpeg

Maybe the seller actually tried their best and used something like this product https://sealedair.com/products/protective-pac … instapak-quick/ unfortunately the bags can break if subjected to sharp edges, so that might be what has happened ...

HanJammer wrote on 2023-05-17, 10:22:

This Tandon 286. I have two of these now. They are way better build than the original IBM 5170 - much heavier, better quality materials... When I bough it I didn't realized what was hidden inside...

Nice system! the MFM hard disk looks interesting as well 😀

Ozzuneoj wrote on 2023-05-17, 18:23:

HanJammer wrote on 2023-05-17, 10:22:

When I bough it I didn't realized what was hidden inside...

I'm looking at the pics and I still don't realize what is hidden inside. Looks like all Tandon parts and a Hercules card. What am I missing?

... Nice system BTW! 😀

I suppose OP is speaking about the original Hercules card? Somehow clones are very common but you don't see the original card very often...

Ozzuneoj wrote on 2023-05-17, 18:23:

HanJammer wrote on 2023-05-17, 10:22:

When I bough it I didn't realized what was hidden inside...

I'm looking at the pics and I still don't realize what is hidden inside. Looks like all Tandon parts and a Hercules card. What am I missing?

... Nice system BTW! 😀

Well, I meant that original Hercules (well, actually it's GB102, and original was GB100 but whatever) card was hidden inside. Those are pretty rare at least in Poland (we pretty much only got hercules clones). I only once found later Hercules Plus "in the wild".

gerry wrote on 2023-05-17, 14:23:

amadeus777999 wrote on 2023-05-17, 10:18:

Got two nice cases - both containing Pentium era hardware(S7 & SS7).

these look good! planning to keep as S7 era?

I'll put a socket 4 board into it as I'm not really into S(S)7. From a practical point of view S7 is nearly perfect though.

danieljm wrote on 2023-05-17, 17:19:

amadeus777999 wrote on 2023-05-17, 10:18:

Got two nice cases - both containing Pentium era hardware(S7 & SS7).

Nice! I’d love to find an InWin A500 again.

I remember I bored out the tiny vent holes on the bottom front edge to improve airflow. I think that was around the time that we all collectively started to worry about those sorts of things. 😀

Thanks for pointing out the name. These cases look somewhat aesthetic and I have two of those and seen some varation(s) on youtube. The "Ancient Electronics dude" has the bigger version for example.

I do not know how to quote more than one post(er)...

Not all “today”, but this week:

ATI FireGL X1 (9700 Pro) AGP card. £38. Working perfectly

A collection of mainly Geforce 2Mx and 4MX cards, but with a sneaky TNT2 Ultra in the bundle. Well worth the £16.99 for the TNT2 alone, which is now tested working.

And hopefully the bargain of the week (if it arrives working) l, a £50 3dFX Voodoo 3 3000 PCI.

Maryoo wrote on 2023-05-10, 18:20:

When I see Intel D865 boards with a Pentium 4 3GHz processor for $10 at auctions, I just have to buy them. It's the best retro pc base for DOS and Windows 98 in my opinion. Fast, stable and hassle-free.

What about audio? What works well for DOS with this board?

I think i have one of those P4i945GC ... somewhere....

P.S. Anyone got any really old '70s systems like a PDP?11? or something?. so rare these days those pre '77 systems...

Thermalwrong wrote on 2023-05-16, 12:08:

Fired right up, now it gets a socket and I need to figure out how to disable an onboard 386 to allow the socketed one to operate.

Nice job!
Look for pin 54 on the soldered Am386DX-40 and ground it.

To be able to use another CPU on the same board, the 386 must be put in high impedance mode. Basically, this means disabling its outputs so that they don't "fight" with the 486's (that may be why it's getting hot).

According to the 386DX PQFP datasheet, pin 54 FLT# should be low for this to happen. Check carefully with a voltmeter if that's the case. If not, perhaps you can lift the pin from the PCB (may not be needed) and connect it to ground, maybe with a 1k resistor or a value low enough that the pin is around 0V.

Taken from this reddit post

Thank you 😀 That's a big help.

Lately I seem to have had a bit too much free time and I appear to be finding too many interesting items - somehow this IBM Thinkpad 760LD had been sitting available on ebay UK for an entire year for less than £30:

After some cleaning and repair, I really like it - a Pentium 90 with L2 cache and 8MB of RAM (stock, stuck at right now since there's no RAM expansion card) and a 640x480 TFT screen with ES1688 audio. It's in pretty awful condition and I've had to clean off all the rubbery coating from the touchpad but it's in better condition than my very dead IBM Thinkpad 760EL, which gracefully donated its hard drive and CD drive to this more functional one.
I got really lucky that the screen and mainboard are working properly, there's evidence of rust on the back of the LCD panel and it's clearly been crushed at some point, with lots of plastic broken off.

Got this little socket 7 TX board a Shuttle Hot 569A Rev 1.3 with a Pentium 166 MMX and 16Mb of ram, might make a nice Voodoo1 build with a 233 MMX in there. Not sure how good this board is compared to other TX boards, what was considered the best of the TX boards ?

Just ordered the first part of my upcoming window 98 system. Got a Intel D865GBF motherboard . Hope it arrives in a good condition.

theiceman085 wrote on 2023-05-20, 07:49:

Just ordered the first part of my upcoming window 98 system. Got a Intel D865GBF motherboard . Hope it arrives in a good condition.

grüss dich Lansdmann, a bit overkill a P4 478 but it's ok, as long as it's cheap. Remember the maximum memory size for Win98 and proper drivers for that chipset.

vmunix wrote on 2023-05-20, 09:10:

theiceman085 wrote on 2023-05-20, 07:49:

Just ordered the first part of my upcoming window 98 system. Got a Intel D865GBF motherboard . Hope it arrives in a good condition.

grüss dich Lansdmann, a bit overkill a P4 478 but it's ok, as long as it's cheap. Remember the maximum memory size for Win98 and proper drivers for that chipset.

Thanks for the advice about the proper driver and the maximum ram size. I am fully aware btw that it is bit overkill to go with 478 board and a p4 northwood cpu but the availability and the cheap price for both the motherboard and the gpu (have not bought one yet) was the driving factor behind my decision. The same goes for the gpu. The gpu I am going to buy is either a GF3 or one of the Gf4 Ti cards. Both are overkill as well for win 98 but again the the price and the availability is decent

Looks like my Voodoo 3 3000 PCI is “only” a 2000, but it was still cheap at £50. The ones on eBay are all mentally priced! Arrived tested and working, which is nice.

paradigital wrote on 2023-05-20, 13:53:

Looks like my Voodoo 3 3000 PCI is “only” a 2000, but it was still cheap at £50. The ones on eBay are all mentally priced! Arrived tested and working, which is nice.

IMG_1938.jpeg

IMG_1939.jpeg

The PCI Voodoo 3, 4 and 5 cards go for a large premium over their AGP brothers, if you only paid 50 quid for that card then you got a fucking steal, throw a fan on that V3 2K and OC it, the core should hit V3 3k speeds but the memory will be dependent on how fast the ICs are on that 2k but it should still OC a bit and more than enough to be noticable.

Its a nice card to have in PCI format, look after it.