Finally trying out the Roland Um-4 I picked up for cheap a few months ago. Not really sure what to do with it.

I tried in in windows and connected it to my MP32L and it works.. But I guess it only works for windows 98 (and XP) games that support midi. Not a long list of games I suppose..

Set up a much smaller MIDI controller just for the Roland SC-7 so I don't have to use the much larger Roland XP-80 (or even the Roland MT-32) as a MIDI controller. It is basically an Arduino Uno with a MIDI shield and the KonverterMidiUSB sketch compiled and uploaded to the Uno. I test projects using my authentic Uno, but typically use clones on the final design.

Used my Compaq Armada 1573 with the dock to test this MIDI controller setup instead of the proposed desktop MIDI box just because I didn't feel like getting it out of storage once again, especially for just testing something. I'm aware photos don't really show much, so here's a very short demonstration video (note to self - free more space on phone): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x0e3riEUcNQ

Edit: My original Roland SCB-55 Disk 3 has some bad sectors! Four Five MIDIs on the disk are corrupt. Glad I imaged these disks back in March 2013.

LATE edit: A simple Serial.begin(31250); in the sketch starts raw MIDI serial right up; MIDI plays and everything. However, I am trying to get the LED to correspond to MIDI serial data within the Arduino...

With some extra time to myself, I spent some time today on the Tandy 1000A, recording some video for YT for #SepTandy. The main thing I did was upgraded the Flash BIOS on the Xt-IDE Rev 1 card I have in there. - sooooooo much faster now. I was running with the BIOS, I think XUB 1.1.2 or something like that, now I have the V3 Beta and it's running great. Seems software is running better as well overall after some tuning, feels like a whole different computer, and shockingly faster.

Next, it'll be time to throw in a V20 and an 8087 (Sim City uses an 8087, and I like to play Sim City on the Tandy quite a bit).

For over a year I had been trying to find an ATX IO shield for my Pentium 4/Windows XP build and after finally finding one that fits my board (and one that wasn't going to cost me an arm an a leg in shipping costs), it finally arrived a few weeks ago.

So, today being Sunday I figured it would be a nice day to get rid of that hole in the back of my case where that IO shield is supposed to be and to my horror I discover leaky caps! I never had leaky caps on boards before. My common retro era is 286/386/486 so I guess boards from those periods might have better quality caps, not sure.

Anyhow, a simple IO shield fit has now become a recapping exercise and I don't even have the equipment to do this... Sigh... I guess this is going to be a xmas project (if I can find the time). Bummer... I guess I can ask the wife for a desolating station for xmas, maybe she'll bite... 😀

pan069 wrote on 2021-09-26, 06:03:

For over a year I had been trying to find an ATX IO shield for my Pentium 4/Windows XP build and after finally finding one that […]
Show full quote

For over a year I had been trying to find an ATX IO shield for my Pentium 4/Windows XP build and after finally finding one that fits my board (and one that wasn't going to cost me an arm an a leg in shipping costs), it finally arrived a few weeks ago.

So, today being Sunday I figured it would be a nice day to get rid of that hole in the back of my case where that IO shield is supposed to be and to my horror I discover leaky caps! I never had leaky caps on boards before. My common retro era is 286/386/486 so I guess boards from those periods might have better quality caps, not sure.

Anyhow, a simple IO shield fit has now become a recapping exercise and I don't even have the equipment to do this... Sigh... I guess this is going to be a xmas project (if I can find the time). Bummer... I guess I can ask the wife for a desolating station for xmas, maybe she'll bite... 😀

PXL_20210926_052848691.jpg

PXL_20210926_052901105.jpg

Shame, tho it should be possible to fix with just a decent iron. However, it did put me in mind that I think I have your boards 'little brother' - the GA-8IPE1000MK - in an old media center system which hasn't seen any use for quite some while, so I opened her up to see if I'd suffered the same fate but luckily no - caps seem fine and system still boots OK. The caps brands seem good too, with Rubycon, Nichicon & Sanyo, but from that era I suppose none are really 'safe'.

Got a new power switch for the AST. Its fit is weird but possible, since I won't be using the upper 5.25" bay anyway.

Cut my finger, so I guess the Blood Gods have been honored.

3D printing a button now for a test fit.

Got another CF adapter and have another CF card on the way.

Just started trying to find parts to convert good ATX power supplies to AT (not just an adapter, but all the accessory cables as well to molex/floppy 4-pin, and a built-in power switch. I have a couple of dead AT PSUs, but I'm looking at sourcing new 6-pin connectors. They aren't that bad once you find them. I also have a ton of ATX PSUs. I could also extend the wiring so I could properly cable-manage the older systems, and even sleeve the wires. I used to cut and bind IDE and floppy cables back in the day to get better airflow, so "modern" cable management is kind of retro for me.

Edit: The 3D printed button failed spectacularly, will have to try to figure out what happened (probably just adhesion).

PC Hoarder Patrol wrote on 2021-09-26, 07:28:

pan069 wrote on 2021-09-26, 06:03:

For over a year I had been trying to find an ATX IO shield for my Pentium 4/Windows XP build and after finally finding one that […]
Show full quote

For over a year I had been trying to find an ATX IO shield for my Pentium 4/Windows XP build and after finally finding one that fits my board (and one that wasn't going to cost me an arm an a leg in shipping costs), it finally arrived a few weeks ago.

So, today being Sunday I figured it would be a nice day to get rid of that hole in the back of my case where that IO shield is supposed to be and to my horror I discover leaky caps! I never had leaky caps on boards before. My common retro era is 286/386/486 so I guess boards from those periods might have better quality caps, not sure.

Anyhow, a simple IO shield fit has now become a recapping exercise and I don't even have the equipment to do this... Sigh... I guess this is going to be a xmas project (if I can find the time). Bummer... I guess I can ask the wife for a desolating station for xmas, maybe she'll bite... 😀

PXL_20210926_052848691.jpg

PXL_20210926_052901105.jpg

Shame, tho it should be possible to fix with just a decent iron. However, it did put me in mind that I think I have your boards 'little brother' - the GA-8IPE1000MK - in an old media center system which hasn't seen any use for quite some while, so I opened her up to see if I'd suffered the same fate but luckily no - caps seem fine and system still boots OK. The caps brands seem good too, with Rubycon, Nichicon & Sanyo, but from that era I suppose none are really 'safe'.

Interestingly enough, I took a photo of the board a year ago (Oct 10 to be exact), and I'm pretty sure the popped caps weren't there 6 months ago either when I was fiddling with this board. Amazing how fast and sudden this can happen.

Any recommendations on what a good soldering iron is these days?

I just came across something I am pretty sure I ran not too long ago, that grew a bloaty cap when I looked at it last week. Brain ain't co-operating to tell me what it was right now, just got the picture in my head of the chrome dome on this electrolytic that should not be.

Anyway, I don't regard fancy soldering irons as essential for re-capping, I've done it with "the first soldering iron I come across" when I have a bit of a variety. I intended to keep one with car tools, one with household, and have my electronics ones separate, but they all seem end up anywhere. In general it's easier with more than 25W because the ground planes soak up so much heat. I've used the discount store $3 iron I bought for backup when I was having a spate of bad luck with them (Dropped one and shattered ceramic insulator, cat chewed out a cord on another, and a third I'd got the tip very destroyed and was having difficulty sourcing replacement.)

pan069 wrote on 2021-09-26, 06:03:

So, today being Sunday I figured it would be a nice day to get rid of that hole in the back of my case where that IO shield is supposed to be and to my horror I discover leaky caps! I never had leaky caps on boards before. My common retro era is 286/386/486 so I guess boards from those periods might have better quality caps, not sure.

Yeah, I hate that. I have an Abit SR7-8X mainboard I got in 2011 that has some bulging Teapo and Nichicon caps, an issue I caught ~3 years ago: Teapo caps first, Nichicon caps second. Started with two, now it's nine (including one more Nichicon starting to bulge.) Hadn't bothered fixing it, either, as those caps with particular values from the same series are now suspect to me, even the non-bulging ones. At least I have a capacitor tester this time.

The A-trend 6240M board I have actually did this as well, but I have long fixed that; board had terrible Choyo caps at the CPU area, making the board quite unstable to the point that the machine that used it turned on by itself at around 3AM. Only thing to do on that board is to replace the BIOS socket.

Been busy acquiring games for my recently purchased Intellivision console. I was missing some overlays for the controllers and thought rather than pay out for replacements, I'll try a DIY print-out approach.

So this weekend I created some of my own, got the images from the web and sized them correctly.

The end result, some look better than others, but they're all at least functional:

Ignore the white edges sticking out the top, that's just paper behind them. I used Transparency Film to achieve the desired plastic feel without having to touch the ink directly. I'll probably attach them to some kind of white background, perhaps a plain white sticker and then trim to perfection.

PARKE has been adding more slockets and Info to the already impressive ~12MB PDF of Slot-1 to socket 370 adapters. The latest version is here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1kGgO3TJyFDTH … iew?usp=sharing

I also edited my previous post with the new link: Re: What retro activity did you get up to today?

Collected some drivers and utilities, put them onto an USB stick to move them to the DFI HD620-H81 Haswell mobo which has the SSD I prepared for DOS and Windows 98..
I am so curious whether I manage to get Windows 98 work not only in the safe mode, but in the normal mode, too, with SoundBlaster AWE32 working 😀

AmiSapphire wrote on 2021-09-26, 13:28:

Yeah, I hate that. I have an Abit SR7-8X mainboard I got in 2011 that has some bulging Teapo and Nichicon caps, an issue I caught ~3 years ago: Teapo caps first, Nichicon caps second. Started with two, now it's nine (including one more Nichicon starting to bulge.) Hadn't bothered fixing it, either, as those caps with particular values from the same series are now suspect to me, even the non-bulging ones. At least I have a capacitor tester this time.

I am not sure, but bulging Nichicon caps for my personal feeling indicate that something is seriously wrong.
Check the power supplies you use.
If they have high ripple, even less than2Vpp, they will even destroy Nichicon caps over time.

retardware wrote on 2021-09-26, 19:37:

I am not sure, but bulging Nichicon caps for my personal feeling indicate that something is seriously wrong. Check the power sup […]
Show full quote

AmiSapphire wrote on 2021-09-26, 13:28:

Yeah, I hate that. I have an Abit SR7-8X mainboard I got in 2011 that has some bulging Teapo and Nichicon caps, an issue I caught ~3 years ago: Teapo caps first, Nichicon caps second. Started with two, now it's nine (including one more Nichicon starting to bulge.) Hadn't bothered fixing it, either, as those caps with particular values from the same series are now suspect to me, even the non-bulging ones. At least I have a capacitor tester this time.

I am not sure, but bulging Nichicon caps for my personal feeling indicate that something is seriously wrong.
Check the power supplies you use.
If they have high ripple, even less than2Vpp, they will even destroy Nichicon caps over time.

That board was never used since I tested it in 2011, so this happened entirely in storage.

Edit: Though the power supply part will be useful on boards I am still using, so thanks. 😀

AmiSapphire wrote on 2021-09-26, 20:04:

That board was never used since I tested it in 2011, so this happened entirely in storage.

Edit: Though the power supply part will be useful on boards I am still using, so thanks. 😀

Please thoroughly examine the "Nichicons" after you removed them, and open a thread if you find anything unusual.
Google "nichicon counterfeit capacitors" search delivers a lot of information and hints to identify fake nichicons.

retardware wrote on 2021-09-26, 20:15:

AmiSapphire wrote on 2021-09-26, 20:04:

That board was never used since I tested it in 2011, so this happened entirely in storage.

Edit: Though the power supply part will be useful on boards I am still using, so thanks. 😀

Please thoroughly examine the "Nichicons" after you removed them, and open a thread if you find anything unusual.
Google "nichicon counterfeit capacitors" search delivers a lot of information and hints to identify fake nichicons.

A bit of a memory lapse from me here.
I just remembered: These particular Nichicon HM caps on the board are from 2002: they're real, but defective. They tend to vent even in storage (eventually).

I was like: "Wasn't there a bad batch of Nichicon caps that just bloated for no real reason?" ...Yeah. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nichicon

Tested a non-vented one along with a vented one and... ~1100uf. They're supposed to be 3300uf...
Found a Nichicon HM cap from 2012 in my stash and that reads near 3300uf. So yeah...

I pulled out my Sil3112 PCI SATA card and found it to be dead with many suspicious looking capacitors.Today was a repair day. 😀

Must've been cheap capacitors.

bjwil1991 wrote on 2021-09-27, 06:15:

Must've been cheap capacitors.

The perfect post for 20,000.

I replaced the cheap capacitors with new cheap capacitors. Should last another 6 months at least. 😀

It's very interesting. The old distressed capacitors all tested accurately but were definitely the problem. Replacing them brought the card back to life.

I had the same problem with my other Sil3114 card I tested. Completely dead until I changed the capacitors.

Munx wrote on 2021-09-23, 08:10:

Pulled a Pentium200 PC from storage for a Win95 install. During Windows and other installations I got some error messages about not being able to write to disc C, as well as the drive just being sluggish in general. Ran checkdisk and found this:P_20210922_204918.jpg
OOF. When 1 appears, more will soon follow. RIP my 8GB IBM drive.

Run a MHDD erase, then a few MHDD scans with remap. At this point the drive should have reallocated all dodgy sectors. Then use Victoria (Service > HGST Vendor Specific) to force the drive to merge the G-List to the P-List with a format. If you want the used car salesman experience you can also clear SMART. Congrats, now you have a good drive.