Went thru my collection of scsi cards and drives. Flashed the bios on a few Adaptec's to last known version. Tested a few scsi hd, all worked but the old Seagate ST1480n "brick" 🤣. It finally died and I don't care 😁

Horun wrote on 2020-01-03, 03:25:

Went thru my collection of scsi cards and drives. Flashed the bios on a few Adaptec's to last known version. Tested a few scsi hd, all worked but the old Seagate ST1480n "brick" 🤣. It finally died and I don't care 😁

Nice paperweight 😜

Repaired 4CD, swap clockers from 775DC (ICS to RT). On stock BIOS it didnt want work with AGP card, but on 2.2A MX400 work fine


Bought some stuff))

Still looking for a best SS7 mobo, I'm testing now MPV4.

Last night I attempted to do a new VMWare instance with Windows For Workgroups 3.11. This time I was successful (after some lost nights and headaches), the thing is damn unstable, but now works. The trick was to save a snapshot before installing anything, so I could roll back if things went wrong. I've installed a lot of games and software so I expect to have some real fun with it this weekend. Can't wait to paint some cars for Grand Prix 2 on Adobe Photoshop 3.05... hahahaha

Latest version of VMWare Fusion now includes SB16 emulation for the first time, and it's a very good one, far superior than Virtualbox, Oracle should be ashamed of that. Oracle fails to make it work on macOS since version 5.x, but they aren't bothered anyway. Still, both software cannot beat the way superior DOSBox's SB16 emulation IMO. If only DOSBox with NE2000 patch worked with wifi, then it would be my #1 choice for retro emulation.

derSammler wrote on 2020-01-02, 14:42:

I'll share all modifications I do for other CPUs, of course.

Next one designed, this time for Pentium Pro:
https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:4082085

Quite a bit of space wasted to retain stackability, but how many Pentium Pros does one own anyway? 😁

derSammler wrote on 2020-01-03, 14:19:

Quite a bit of space wasted to retain stackability, but how many Pentium Pros does one own anyway? 😁

Oh, I have a theory on that. 😀

Me too. 😉

Tray for the 68040/060 fits nicely. 😀

derSammler wrote on 2020-01-03, 16:05:

Me too. 😉

Tray for the 68040/060 fits nicely. 😀

For a split second, I thought that was an IBM Power4 MCM.

Doesn't look too bad with the PPro in the middle. 😀

Converted my weird BTC 5100C to a 5-pin DIN instead of the oddball 6-pin DIN. Removed the PIC processor which does some conversion for an unknown keyboard type, moved the connector to the keyboard controller board, then soldered on a metal 5-pin DIN connector.

Solder work:

And here's the keyboard in front of my dusty 10" SVGA CRT, along with a 40% keyboard I just built a few days ago. (wife got me the 40% parts for Christmas):

My girlfriend gave me a TS100 for New Year — my very first soldering iron. Today I went to an electronics market with my friend and got everything else needed for the job. By the end of the day here's what I've managed to do:

So maybe not the most impressive soldering job to be shown on Vogons, but it's the first I've ever done 😀 I've replaced barrel batteries on two 386 boards today.

Then I've proceeded to deal with this:

This is the original SoundBlaster, and the previous owner decided to mod the card to accept CD audio, I guess? Well, it's useless to me and looked very nasty, so I removed the wires. Also finally tested the card with the Ultima 6 intro — it works great!

So it's probably not my place to review the TS100, but I really liked working with this gadget. I've reflashed it with Ralim firmware, and the device became very user-friendly. I instantly got used to the controls, they feel pretty natural to me, and the device lies nicely in my hand.

Next steps: I still have some boards with barrel batteries and I would like to convert them to CR2032 using a battery holder and a diode. I would also like to mod some of my 386 boards to have sockets for an oscillator chip. Then I have some soundcards and motherboards that need new capacitors. Eventually I want to replace SIMM sockets on most of my AWE32 cards and then the ultimate challenge for me would be to build a card like an AdLib replica.

Some of you might remember, way back when, I offered a bounty on Vogons for a newer version of ITT Xtra DOS which has tools to get a proprietary ITT memory board working. A copy finally turned up on Ebay and I was able to successfully image the disks. Once I scan everything in I will get those up to minuszerodegrees.com.

Also, I have been testing a new old stock Cardinal CP600 dumb terminal (circa 1988). Only has composite out, but looks like a clean video signal. Unfortunately, on a LCD TV, the video signal from the unit is blinking on and off like a reset alarm clock after the electricity goes off and on. Don't know if it's something bad on the terminal's PCB or the signal is having trouble being interpreted by the LCD. Will test that tomorrow on a CRT.

Wow! The thing is looking like brand new!

Relocating some of my less used kit to the garage so a bit longer to walk to get stuff. I put it off for as long as I could. Having three extra members in the house hold takes it's toll eventually.

jheronimus wrote on 2020-01-03, 23:45:

My girlfriend gave me a TS100 for New Year — my very first soldering iron. Today I went to an electronics market with my friend […]
Show full quote

My girlfriend gave me a TS100 for New Year — my very first soldering iron. Today I went to an electronics market with my friend and got everything else needed for the job. By the end of the day here's what I've managed to do:

So maybe not the most impressive soldering job to be shown on Vogons, but it's the first I've ever done 😀 I've replaced barrel batteries on two 386 boards today.

It's a nice iron. Tell her she made a great choice.

Looks like you're running with enough heat, but don't be too stingy with the flux. It's essential for your solder to flow properly. In short, nice start!

Can I get an ELI5 on why Amigas are so expensive compared to basically every other vintage PC? It seems the cheapest HDD equipped models go for around $500 USD.

"Fixing" the dead battery issue in a Dallas chip using a cheap $1 knife...

diagon_swarm wrote on 2020-01-04, 08:39:

"Fixing" the dead battery issue in a Dallas chip using a cheap $1 knife...

That surely works, but I prefer to do it right and make it look good.

Impressive. Very nice.

Decided to open up the Sony Trinitron PVM-9L1 that's facing composite issues. Some of the solder leads didn't look good, so I did a reflow and it still doesn't work. S-video and audio function without issues, though, so it's no big deal. Also plugged my C64 into the PVM and the picture is still sharp with my homemade A/V cable.

derSammler wrote on 2020-01-04, 09:12:

That surely works, but I prefer to do it right and make it look good.

It looks like the original battery is still inside. If so, I would not consider it done right.

Btw this is not the final stage - I will cover the internals of the chips and add a proper battery holder. This was just a quick test - the battery inside started to "expand" and there were small signs of corrosion on the battery contacts. Thus, I didn't want to wait with the removal of the battery.