PcBytes wrote on 2023-11-14, 11:16:

After a rather nasty morning, I dug this ole' Latitude CPx J650GT out of storage and get it up on 98SE.

Warning if you haven't already - pull the CMOS battery from that CPx. They're varta...

3lectr1c wrote on 2023-11-14, 17:39:

PcBytes wrote on 2023-11-14, 11:16:

After a rather nasty morning, I dug this ole' Latitude CPx J650GT out of storage and get it up on 98SE.

Warning if you haven't already - pull the CMOS battery from that CPx. They're varta...

I think those ones like to leak around the trackpoint buttons 😀 So if the buttons above the touchpad are bad / don't click properly then it's definitely leaked.

Some bad things happened when I tried adding PS/2 mouse support to my Freetech 486F55 motherboard, maybe before since it's stopped posting before now too. Sadly didn't test whether it posted before attempting modifications, I was soldering on it while the RTC battery was still hooked up...

Swapped the northbridge and southbridge from another motherboard that I broke a few years back and stripped the parts off of. I used this little USB-PD hotplate thing in combination with soldering iron instead of hot air and that worked quite nicely - I don't just pull off chipsets for no reason, there were some damaged traces on the northbridge since this mainboard came from a scrap lot. And because I thought the southbridge might be dead from my testing while battery was still installed.

Good news? It seems both chipsets might be both functional or perhaps both dead, the behaviour of not POSTing and giving "--", "C0" or "C1" codes has not changed. So now I suppose they're schrodinger's SIS496/497 chipsets.
Bad news of course is that I can't get it to go past this C1 code (memory) with Award BIOS or 02/13 codes with AMI bios, it goes in the box of things to fix later with the ASUS PVI-486SP3 that has somewhat faulty ISA bus.

Thermalwrong wrote on 2023-11-14, 18:12:

I think those ones like to leak around the trackpoint buttons 😀 So if the buttons above the touchpad are bad / don't click properly then it's definitely leaked.

I'm not actually sure where they are in the CPx. I've looked around for photos but haven't found any.

Couldn't find any battery either. Either way, it's done now.

Quick specs:

P3 650MHz Coppermine
440BX chipset
20GB Fujitsu HDD
128MB RAM
98Lite 4.7 w/ NUSB3.6

Check the Service Manual here: https://dl.dell.com/manuals/all-products/esup … anual_en-us.pdf
On page 31 (39 in the PDF) it shows how to replace the reserve battery, that's the ~6v nimh pack that likes to leak - it's hiding inside the palm rest assembly

watched a YT on how to use a Cisco ATA device to emulate a telco and managed to setup 2 modems that can call each other.

Veeb0rg wrote on 2023-11-15, 04:20:

watched a YT on how to use a Cisco ATA device to emulate a telco and managed to setup 2 modems that can call each other.

I must have a SPA112 laying around here somewhere, sounds interesting.

We used those things to fax over VoIP. *shivers
Incoming call flashlights and buzzers/horns were more fun. 😁

PD2JK wrote on 2023-11-15, 07:16:

I must have a SPA112 laying around here somewhere, sounds interesting. […]
Show full quote

Veeb0rg wrote on 2023-11-15, 04:20:

watched a YT on how to use a Cisco ATA device to emulate a telco and managed to setup 2 modems that can call each other.

I must have a SPA112 laying around here somewhere, sounds interesting.

We used those things to fax over VoIP. *shivers
Incoming call flashlights and buzzers/horns were more fun. 😁

I run a Obi200 and a USR courier for dial in access to my bbs. I bought this Cisco ATA191 as the OBI device is EOL and when the service goes down, its done. Here a link to the video, there's a link in the description that shows how to setup the device. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EGFIEF6siIE

Thermalwrong wrote on 2023-11-14, 20:47:

Check the Service Manual here: https://dl.dell.com/manuals/all-products/esup … anual_en-us.pdf
On page 31 (39 in the PDF) it shows how to replace the reserve battery, that's the ~6v nimh pack that likes to leak - it's hiding inside the palm rest assembly

Thanks, not long after your post I had dismantled it, and found it on the left of the palmrest.

It had somewhat started to leak as I found some vague corrosion on the connector. Yanked it out anyways.

some recent activity revolving around a mystery motherboard

well, not that much of a mystery - reporting itself as a Trigem Cognac with i810 (similar to https://theretroweb.com/motherboards/s/trigem-cognac-2.x )

a common enough example, seen all over business desktops back in the day, this one with 900Mhz celeron

adding 64mb sdram and an IDE to SD card adapter with cheap 8gb card and it all actually worked, easily installing win 98se by temporary use of FDD and CD reader it is now nestled in a small carboard case without FDD or CD and working ok

i plan a small self-build case for it and maybe have it as test bed for 9x and DOS applications, nusb and the two usb 1.1 ports make transferring things easy

but sadly it has CS4299 audio and while nice enough in windows 98, it seems not to work under MSDOS at all. i do have some old pci sound cards as an option though, in case i really want it

there is something fun about reviving old budget hardware like this!

Meanwhile I also have an old viglen laptop, screen surround cracked and wobbling on the hinges (screen itself ok though), case old and worn and until recently working fine with its P3-750. However the old hard disk was always a little 'crunchy' in sound and i suspect has finally gone, reporting inability to read FAT on start up. I should just let the thing go, but then with a 2.5 to SD card adapter maybe i could..... 😀

thats the thing, just cant thrown things away if they might be persuaded to work - and i'm one who has moved onto a mix of GOG, Dosbox and patches for running pretty much all games on W7 and 64 bit systems and hence shouldn't value older stuff so much

PcBytes wrote on 2023-11-15, 09:36:

Thermalwrong wrote on 2023-11-14, 20:47:

Check the Service Manual here: https://dl.dell.com/manuals/all-products/esup … anual_en-us.pdf
On page 31 (39 in the PDF) it shows how to replace the reserve battery, that's the ~6v nimh pack that likes to leak - it's hiding inside the palm rest assembly

Thanks, not long after your post I had dismantled it, and found it on the left of the palmrest.

It had somewhat started to leak as I found some vague corrosion on the connector. Yanked it out anyways.

Yay 😀 On mine it's ruined the left mouse button for the trackpoint, though the touchpad buttons still work fine.

I have been documenting the pinout of the 3Dfx Voodoo 1, making the schematic I found a bit more readable for PCB diagnostics: 3Dfx Voodoo 1 - Low level hardware information and diagnostics thread

I ordered some EPROMs, ST M27C256B. Got some M27C256B-10F1.
XGPro can't identify them correctly, issuing an error message.
I tried writing and they seem to be fine.

I can't really understand if they are legit or what.

Recently acquired this Socket 5 motherboard. It had a Dallas clock chip installed which is naturally DOA, and would refuse to boot up past the POST screen.

I replaced the Dallas chip with a socket. Even after de-soldering all the pins, it needed some hot air before the Dallas chip came free.

After installing a replacement clock chip, it would boot from a floppy but didn't like any of my CF cards with DOS pre-installed. Any attempt to boot from them resulted in a "Missing operating system" error. Even running FDISK /MBR didn't fix the issue.

Ended up partitioning, formatting, and installing DOS on a 1 GB card from scratch, and it now boots up from that card at least.

While it lacks a turbo switch header, turbo can be toggled via keyboard (Ctrl-Alt-+ and Ctrl-Alt--). Toggling turbo throttles it down to roughly 386 SX-25 speed. I'm going to play around with SETMUL and cache disabling and see how flexible this board is for slowing down.

Desoldered an 8MHz xstal and replaced. Still 0MHz out.

Vin and Vout are 4.15V to a keybaord controller. This 286 is driving me crazy. It was issuing a few codes but no reset, now reset works but no clock...
Damn! 😀

Shponglefan wrote on 2023-11-16, 00:17:

Recently acquired this Socket 5 motherboard. It had a Dallas clock chip installed which is naturally DOA, and would refuse to bo […]
Show full quote

Recently acquired this Socket 5 motherboard. It had a Dallas clock chip installed which is naturally DOA, and would refuse to boot up past the POST screen.

intel Neptune chipset motherboard.jpg

I replaced the Dallas chip with a socket. Even after de-soldering all the pins, it needed some hot air before the Dallas chip came free.

Dallas chip removed motherboard.jpg

DIP Socket added.jpg

After installing a replacement clock chip, it would boot from a floppy but didn't like any of my CF cards with DOS pre-installed. Any attempt to boot from them resulted in a "Missing operating system" error. Even running FDISK /MBR didn't fix the issue.

Missing OS error - CF boot.jpg

Ended up partitioning, formatting, and installing DOS on a 1 GB card from scratch, and it now boots up from that card at least.

While it lacks a turbo switch header, turbo can be toggled via keyboard (Ctrl-Alt-+ and Ctrl-Alt--). Toggling turbo throttles it down to roughly 386 SX-25 speed. I'm going to play around with SETMUL and cache disabling and see how flexible this board is for slowing down.

Pentium 90 Turbo Off.jpg

Cool, I've never seen a mobo layout like that before, with PCI slots below the ISA slots. And are those 3 very angled SIMM sockets and 1 upright one? 🤨

Edit: and is that another power connector above the top PCI slot?

ubiq wrote on 2023-11-16, 02:36:

Cool, I've never seen a mobo layout like that before, with PCI slots below the ISA slots. And are those 3 very angled SIMM sockets and 1 upright one? 🤨

It's an interesting layout for sure.

Two angled slots are Bank 1, and the upright slot and angled slot right next to each other are Bank 0. Installing RAM was a bit weird. 😒

One nice thing about this layout are the unobstructed ISA slots. I can easily fit several full length ISA cards if needed. Perfect for those lengthy sound card PCBs.

Edit: and is that another power connector above the top PCI slot?

Yup, it's a 3.3V power connector for the PCI bus apparently required to meet PCI 2.1 (?) spec, I believe.

ubiq wrote on 2023-11-16, 02:36:

Shponglefan wrote on 2023-11-16, 00:17:

Recently acquired this Socket 5 motherboard. It had a Dallas clock chip installed which is naturally DOA, and would refuse to bo […]
Show full quote

Recently acquired this Socket 5 motherboard. It had a Dallas clock chip installed which is naturally DOA, and would refuse to boot up past the POST screen.

intel Neptune chipset motherboard.jpg

I replaced the Dallas chip with a socket. Even after de-soldering all the pins, it needed some hot air before the Dallas chip came free.

Dallas chip removed motherboard.jpg

DIP Socket added.jpg

After installing a replacement clock chip, it would boot from a floppy but didn't like any of my CF cards with DOS pre-installed. Any attempt to boot from them resulted in a "Missing operating system" error. Even running FDISK /MBR didn't fix the issue.

Missing OS error - CF boot.jpg

Ended up partitioning, formatting, and installing DOS on a 1 GB card from scratch, and it now boots up from that card at least.

While it lacks a turbo switch header, turbo can be toggled via keyboard (Ctrl-Alt-+ and Ctrl-Alt--). Toggling turbo throttles it down to roughly 386 SX-25 speed. I'm going to play around with SETMUL and cache disabling and see how flexible this board is for slowing down.

Pentium 90 Turbo Off.jpg

Cool, I've never seen a mobo layout like that before, with PCI slots below the ISA slots. And are those 3 very angled SIMM sockets and 1 upright one? 🤨

Edit: and is that another power connector above the top PCI slot?

I think this is the same MB: AA 622998-207/PBA 541277-207/Intel PCIset S82433NX Motherboard

Bought me a test bench finally! DIMASTECH MINI V2

This is the second socket 478 board I bought back in 2003. This board serves me very well, today I gave it a good wash so I can put it back in her box.

I set up my Pentium 3 since moving to a new place. I played some Quake 3 on it, but unfortunately it runs a bit slow. I have a 933 CPU and a voodoo 3 2000 but I would like a faster CPU. I also got the SB live installed so I could finally hear some sound. I love it. I forgot how fun and frustrating Quake 3 is . I hope this counts as retro activity . I've been dying to get my retro computers set up so I can play my games again.