BSA Starfire wrote:

Got an IBM eserver X series 225 model 8647-4BX from the boot sale on sunday for £10. It's a massive heavy beast, nearly killed me carrying it up 3 flights of stairs. Dual Xeon prestonia's at 2.67Ghz, 1 gb of DDR ram, 5 36.4 gb SCSI hard disks (10,000 RPM). It seems to be working OK, although no OS is installed but goes into CMOS OK. It really needs a massive clean up as it is utterly filthy so I will post some pictures once that is done. No idea at the moment what i will do with it, it's is seriously loud, like a jet fighter racing a helicopter in a sandstorm, so not something I want running too often to be honest. I'm thinking media server is not it's calling! 🤣

http://www-01.ibm.com/common/ssi/cgi-bin/ssia … h&language=enus

Any thoughts on what to do with the monster? I have no prior experience with server class machines, RAID or whatever, so keep it simple please folks 😉

WOW - this is a really nice little monster, congratulations. I own since a long time another IBM server model, eSeries x345 (Dual Xeon @3.2 - 2GB DDR Ram - 6x SCSI HDs, etc.) for rack mount. It's really loud and I think also high in consumption, but it is very interesting. Let me know how you'll use it, maybe I'll invent something for mine - also, you should have found yourself a proprietary IBM remote control board, to monitor the machine even when turned off besides being able to do other things.

http://www-947.ibm.com/support/entry/portal/d … ocid=migr-58359

bristlehog wrote:

Wow, a boxed Pinnacle. Is that revision F? Can you upload the driver diskette contents to Vogonsdrivers?

The box is fake 🤣 the seller still needs to find it, I don't complain anyway it's getting tough and expensive buying anything these days.

Stojke wrote:

philscomputerlab wrote:

Doesn't matter much, it's good to upload any version of original disks to the driver archive 😀

Well, if thats the case, I have the same 4.02 floppy disk and the CD that came with it.
I remember the CD wanting some kind of a SERIAL I did not have.

Let me dig the serial number I think I have a pinnacle project studio which came with everything.

Got this in the mail yesterday, went through testing it, its pretty clean sounding for an awe card.
Very happy, replaces my other CT-2760 that has horrible noise on its midi channel.
This card was supposedly New Old Stock, with a somewhat beatup box and has never been used, there were zero marks\scratches on the ISA connector and I/O bracket and it was dust free so I believe it.
It came with the box and all the stuff it would of new, including the reg cards 🤣 .

CT-2760

Sorry floppy fell over the number, did not catch that, its a CT-2760, but unlike my other CT-2760 this one has a completely different jumper and pin-out layout, and a vol-out connector something I've not seen on a Creative card before.

Stack of Manuals

Box Front

Box Back

Beautiful AlphaWing! Boxed AWE32s (non-PNP) are getting tougher to find.

Yea I've already put the card in my Pentium Pro rig, which is likely where its gonna stay.
It has 2-16mb simms on it already plucked from the normal SB32 that was in it.
I'll have pics of that system posted eventually, still trying to get it perfect.
Not throwing away the BOX.
Its sitting right now next to my CT-1740ASP box on display 🤣 .
Inside was a full color flyer for the wave-blaster, I should post a picture of that.
To bad it did not come with it 🤣 .

Note this is just a flyer, that came with my Awe32.
Apparently Creative really wanted the wave blaster to succeed.

Godlike wrote:

I got it free today: […]
Show full quote

I got it free today:

The first is Windbond fax/modem card with female RS-232 COM and female parallel
The second is HDD/FDD adapter Windbond PTI-227B with male RS-232 COM and female parallel as well
Special thanks to retro games 100 for the manual in his post:
Super I/O winbond ISA card model PTI-227B, quick test

I will use these for my new 286 build, I didn't plan it, but during my other builds I collect somehow parts from '80 era, so I decided to build old system to play Wolfenstein3D and Montezuma's Revenge, yay

Godlike!

That's definitely not a fax/modem card. There are no telephone jacks.

Here's another one like it and the ports are labeled Video and Printer

http://www.ebay.com/itm/MGP-UART-Monochrome-V … =item2c956efcf5

Godlike wrote:

I got it free today: […]
Show full quote

I got it free today:

The first is Windbond fax/modem card with female RS-232 COM and female parallel
The second is HDD/FDD adapter Windbond PTI-227B with male RS-232 COM and female parallel as well
Special thanks to retro games 100 for the manual in his post:
Super I/O winbond ISA card model PTI-227B, quick test

I will use these for my new 286 build, I didn't plan it, but during my other builds I collect somehow parts from '80 era, so I decided to build old system to play Wolfenstein3D and Montezuma's Revenge, yay

Godlike!

The first is a 9-pins MDA /CGA / EGA graphics card with intergrated LPT printer port. (you are missing the graphics rom, so this card would be useless anyway)(i think its really and MDA or CGA version)

The Second is just a regular 16 bit ISA Floppy / harddisk controller card.. (its made by DTK i see (because of the PTI - xxxxx Serial)

Robin4 wrote:

Godlike wrote:

I got it free today: […]
Show full quote

I got it free today:

The first is a 9-pins MDA /CGA / EGA graphics card with intergrated LPT printer port. (you are missing the graphics rom, so this card would be useless anyway)(i think its really and MDA or CGA version)

Its late hercules card and dont need that bios rom to work. Bios is hardwired into chip itself, rom is on hercules card for adding national fonts, because hercules dont support loading fonts into memory like later ega/vga cards.

Think that it looks like these...http://old.vgamuseum.info/cards/item/492-winb … d-w86855af.html

Robin4 wrote:

Godlike wrote:

I got it free today: […]
Show full quote

I got it free today:

The first is Windbond fax/modem card with female RS-232 COM and female parallel
The second is HDD/FDD adapter Windbond PTI-227B with male RS-232 COM and female parallel as well
Special thanks to retro games 100 for the manual in his post:
Super I/O winbond ISA card model PTI-227B, quick test

I will use these for my new 286 build, I didn't plan it, but during my other builds I collect somehow parts from '80 era, so I decided to build old system to play Wolfenstein3D and Montezuma's Revenge, yay

Godlike!

Excellent! That was incorrect diagnosis done by me on rush. That's right, as you've wrote. Thanks to point that mistake. For the first look without any deeper research I thought what I thought. Never deal before with such as old hardware before. I'm not that old. My knowledge starts from 1990+. When I have been messing around with hardware last times, someone's donate (instead of bin it) this old computing gear to me. My curiosity and respect to hardware gives me opportunity to build 286. I'm glad that I have almost full set to go. Still have to buy 3.6v battery and 30pin simms. Thanks again for open my eyes on that top card from the picture. I back to this subject today again (and again;). Before I will begin reanimating motherboard, I need test isa cards on my P1 system. I have to find out working bits then take another step. I never use previously such as OLD vga (9pin?). Is it for black and white screens? Is it possible to use adapter and get it working with conventional 15-pin vga screens? Hmmmm

9 pin isn't VGA. Its probably EGA, CGA or Hercules.
Most EGA cards can use all three kinds of monitors.
CGA can use a CGA or EGA monitor
Hercules/MDA needs a mono monitor

None of those old monitors are particularly common

I have two VGA cards using a 9-Pin connector... I think this was used briefly when VGA first appeared.

That card though I suspect may be CGA or EGA and I don't fancy your chances of finding a monitor for that.

smeezekitty wrote:

9 pin isn't VGA. Its probably EGA, CGA or Hercules. Most EGA cards can use all three kinds of monitors. CGA can use a CGA or EGA […]
Show full quote

9 pin isn't VGA. Its probably EGA, CGA or Hercules.
Most EGA cards can use all three kinds of monitors.
CGA can use a CGA or EGA monitor
Hercules/MDA needs a mono monitor

None of those old monitors are particularly common

Of course isn't VGA, but I think I found something will help to plug 15pin monitor to this MDA or CGA card .


is it correct? If this could be MDA or CGA version then should work with adapter? Never use before such as solution. Here is some more pics of this graphics card with intergrated LPT printer port:

The first picture looks like Apple pizza box pc 😀

The signal may be different... As far as I remember EGA is a digital signal.

After a page with nice retro stuff here is another newish video card for my benchmarking needs.

Sometimes the shipping cost is below what you would expect. If this is the case it can be a good idea to ask the seller how he or she plans to package the parts. If you do not this is what you get.

A not very thick envelope (there is no padding, only double layers of thick paper).

A Pristine Geforce GTS 250...

It could have been worse.

Geforce GTS 250 "akasa edition"

😲 XFX with akasa fan?

For last two weeks:

- two 286 mainboards, both with co-processor, one for sipp ram, second for simm (and with onboard mio)
- eight 4mb simm30 pin
- voodoo1 with cable
- creative awe32 ct-3900
- creative waveblaster ct-1910
- orchid soundwave32 (with invision rom)
- prometeus arria16
- unknown aztech sound
- sandisk ssd (flashdisk 80mb)
- seagate narrow scsi 2gb.
- network aui to twisted pair adapter
- (not pictured) tseng et-6000 4.5mb
- (not pictured) NexGen vlb mobo with NexGen cpu (looks like bad, not started)

Every week these days I see someone on Vogons purchasing a Awe32 CT3900. I can't find these for sale anywhere! I've seen 2 on eBay in recent times, 1 for almost $200 (way overpriced but it sold) and another with the ram slots damaged. I already own 2 which are in use but would love to find another one in good condition.

EDIT: Nice haul easy_john 😀

I wish I could find a waveblaster....
All I can get is a stupid poster of it 🙁

AlphaWing wrote:

I wish I could find a waveblaster....
All I can get is a stupid poster of it 🙁

Haha I noticed that in your previous post. I did see a waveblaster on eBay not long ago for around $130 I think it was but I held back on purchasing it as these days I try to only buy hardware I'm going to use. For use a DB50XG or SCB-55 is a lot better. That waveblaster did sell pretty quickly though.

borgie83 wrote:

Every week these days I see someone on Vogons purchasing a Awe32 CT3900. I can't find these for sale anywhere! [..]
EDIT: Nice haul easy_john :)

Thanks. This items from various people, found at local flea market and forums.
Right now I have 3 or 4 awe32 (2760, 3900, 3990), and that enough for all my projects.

AlphaWing wrote:

I wish I could find a waveblaster....
All I can get is a stupid poster of it :(

Looks like, that I have spare waveblaster, so I think about put them on ebay, after all tests.