Are PCMCIA/Cardbus cards for Windows 95/Japanese Windows/OSX the same? \ VOGONS

Are PCMCIA/Cardbus cards for Windows 95/Japanese Windows/OSX the same?

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First post, by sangokushi

Posted on 2021-11-08, 03:23

sangokushi Offline

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Want to know the PCMCIA/Cardbus cards back in 1995 are physical the same for different OSs/platforms

For example, if I buy a Adaptec SCSI PCMCIA adapter from Yahoo Japan, can I use the same card on Windows 95, Japanese Windows 95 and OS 9? Assuming I can find the drivers for it.
From what I understand, Japanese 95 supports double byte character, so the driver came with Japanese version may not work in English Windows 95.
OS9 was running on PowerPC processor, it definitely requires a different driver.

Thanks.

Reply 1 of 4, by Byrd

Posted on 2021-11-08, 05:20

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I can't vouch for Japanese cards, but in terms of cross platform compatibility between Windows and Mac OS, no - by and large cardbus cards apart from some network cards, wireless cards are not compatible. Cardbus USB cards are mostly cross platform however. SCSI cardbus cards are not cross platform - I've seen many cheap PC ones thinking of Mac, but yet to find an Adaptec card that crosses over.

Reply 2 of 4, by Horun

Posted on 2021-11-08, 05:53

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Byrd wrote on 2021-11-08, 05:20:

I can't vouch for Japanese cards, but in terms of cross platform compatibility between Windows and Mac OS, no - by and large cardbus cards apart from some network cards, wireless cards are not compatible. Cardbus USB cards are mostly cross platform however. SCSI cardbus cards are not cross platform - I've seen many cheap PC ones thinking of Mac, but yet to find an Adaptec card that crosses over.

Thanks ! Good answer !
edit: all I know and have both vintage PC's and Mac's and nothing ever is cross compatible between except their scsi hard drives 🤣

Hate posting a reply and then have to edit it because it made no sense 😁 First computer was an IBM 3270 workstation with CGA monitor. Stuff: https://archive.org/details/@horun

Reply 3 of 4, by sangokushi

Posted on 2021-11-08, 06:07

sangokushi Offline

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Thanks!! That means when I order PCMCIA device (e.g. sound card) from Yahoo Japan, I need to make sure it's compatible with Windows, and an English version of device driver is available.

Reply 4 of 4, by lolo799

Posted on 2021-11-08, 10:01

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You just need to check if drivers are available for DOS/V and not just the PC-98 standard.

For scsi cards, most will work on both, look at the boxes on the following past auctions:
https://page.auctions.yahoo.co.jp/jp/auction/b1009341409
https://page.auctions.yahoo.co.jp/jp/auction/m493536849
https://page.auctions.yahoo.co.jp/jp/auction/k549258544
https://page.auctions.yahoo.co.jp/jp/auction/n1011936374
https://page.auctions.yahoo.co.jp/jp/auction/1007082243
https://page.auctions.yahoo.co.jp/jp/auction/s1004737543

And some definitely won't:
https://page.auctions.yahoo.co.jp/jp/auction/t1000550535

For soundcards, same deal, a few models were made just for the PC-98 platform, avoid those.

You might have to deal with a setup process in Japanese most of the time too:
http://www.win3x.org/win3board/viewtopic.php? … =19261&style=45

As for Win and MacOS compatibility, a few Cardbus graphic cards have drivers for both.
There was one that was only for MacOS made by ixMicro, the Road Rocket, there's a review in French at https://forums.macg.co/threads/ixmicro.1340619/

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