TrashPanda wrote on 2022-02-18, 06:03:

Spent the afternoon cleaning and then repasting a GeForce 4 TI4600 128mb with a new cooler, however the GPU has what looks like […]
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Spent the afternoon cleaning and then repasting a GeForce 4 TI4600 128mb with a new cooler, however the GPU has what looks like a bad memory chip(s) on it, large square patches of corruption on an otherwise clear and viewable picture. Perhaps I need to reflow the memory BGA chips with a hot air gun or replace them. Unless another member has some insight as to other possibilities for failed components.

Either way the GPU is going back into storage till I have the time and patience to reflow it.

Shame too as its a nice looking GPU.

Knowing me ill grab another Ti4600 and this one will stay in storage 🤣.

One of those is buried around here somewhere. Back when they were worth about $5 working, I did a low effort dry reflow attempt with a hot air paint stripper, managed to damage some of the caps, derp, so caused myself more work, thermometer said I shoulda got it hot enough, but when caps repaired and re-installed it was just the same. Definitely the RAM on mine though, I could press on them and have the picture improve. Sometime I'm gonna come at it with a hot air pencil and flood under chips with flux to try again. My other thought is to cut out a couple of thick aluminum plates that fit on the RAM chips and use a small C Clamp to mush them into contact 🤣 (Or find slightly less clumsy way to screw it together and apply a lot of pressure)

Installed Debian 1.0 (with 2.0.0 kernel) on 386DX-40. TCP/IP works on 3Com 509B. This machine has 8MiB and while README says only 4MiB is required, it would be like having only 512KiB in DOS. I will try to boot with just 4 once, but I don't want to wear out the CF card with constant swapping.
Also, boy, I'm not exactly a Linux person but I do manage, and I have been using it for quite some time, but I had to brush up on some networking commands and locations of config files. I wonder if there is a version of Midnight Commander ancient enough to compile on glibc5 system?

Also, if anyone know why I can't mount NFS shares please let me know. Is Debian 1.0 still using NFS2? Or is it somehow ext2 vs ext4 issue? Well, next thing to try is to set up local FTP server with the distro packages instead...

Deunan wrote on 2022-02-18, 14:46:

I wonder if there is a version of Midnight Commander ancient enough to compile on glibc5 system?

There must be, I first saw it running on a Slackware 4 486 system in '95

And you are right, there is a package even in 1.0, I just didn't get that far - I have a barebones system and I'm trying to figure out how to feed it packages without a CD-ROM or tons of floppies. Will try the local FTP approach over the weekend (if time permits).

Sorting cpu coolers.
Have a few. Nothing compared to some people here 😀

Don't leave the socket 754 coolers together... they breed.

BitWrangler wrote on 2022-02-18, 22:21:

Don't leave the socket 754 coolers together... they breed.

Triffids or gremlins? I never spin them after midnight.

No, tribbles and graboids, and I thought it was never invite them into the house.... I could be confusing them with policemen... or is it garlic for policemen?

BitWrangler wrote on 2022-02-18, 23:03:

No, tribbles and graboids, and I thought it was never invite them into the house.... I could be confusing them with policemen... or is it garlic for policemen?

Yes, it was trouble with tribbles and day of the triffids...
Good, no trekkies crucified me in the meantime.
On my defense, I'm close to bed time. The older I get the less I can stay up late.

I'm full of stuff I barely use. The pleasure of collecting.

Tried installing Win10 21H2 x86 on an old 2009 vintage netbook (Sony VAIO VPCW126AW / PCG-4V1P) with Atom N280, 1GB DDR2 RAM (one socket only, with no chance of dual channel), and an early model of 64GB SSD.

While the installation completed without problems, CPU usage was stuck at 99% after entering the desktop for many minutes. Even with everything got installed and updated, CPU usage is still between 15-20% under complete idle state, with spikes of 80% or higher every other minute. A bit surprised that 1GB RAM could handle the OS; the bottleneck is solely on the CPU.

OTOH installing WinXP x86 on the same hardware results in just 15 seconds from POST to desktop, making it far more usable than more modern Win7/8.1/10 (for the record, the netbook has a Win7 Starter sticker, a version available though OEM only but upgradable to Win10 Home), but one must search and install each and every device driver manually. I'll probably test Debian on it next.

Also watched LGR's revisit on Computer Reset and TDNC's retro build with new old stocks. Finding new or at least working old components for retro builds is much much easier in US than in Taiwan......

I also watched the Computer Reset revisit. Good to see. Slightly poignant as well, like seeing the parting out of something classic the likes of which won't be seen again. Would I give $150 to get in there and assemble a 'table' full of gear? oh hell yes. Wonder about the length of waiting list. Not that I personally will be within 5000km of there anytime soon/ever.

Shreddoc wrote on 2022-02-19, 03:44:

Not that I personally will be within 5000km of there anytime soon/ever.

That's 12,400 km for me. 😅

In the meantime I tried sorting out and testing my spare RAM modules, from FPM to DDR3. I've got no way to test FPM and SO-DIMM SDR now, but for all other formats (EDO, SDR, regular and SO-DIMM DDR/2/3) I've got MB to test them on, and several have been defective (one 512MB DDR even destroyed the BIOS of two MB). 😟

dormcat wrote on 2022-02-19, 06:01:

I've got no way to test FPM and SO-DIMM SDR now, but for all other formats (EDO, SDR, regular and SO-DIMM DDR/2/3)

Boards that can run EDO can usually run FPM as well.

It's always a good idea to check all your RAM modules.
Don't forget to take a photo of successful Memtest, in case you want to sell.
I have photos of all my sticks, even the ones I intend to keep.

dormcat wrote on 2022-02-19, 02:20:

Tried installing Win10 21H2 x86 on an old 2009 vintage netbook (Sony VAIO VPCW126AW / PCG-4V1P) with Atom N280, 1GB DDR2 RAM (on […]
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Tried installing Win10 21H2 x86 on an old 2009 vintage netbook (Sony VAIO VPCW126AW / PCG-4V1P) with Atom N280, 1GB DDR2 RAM (one socket only, with no chance of dual channel), and an early model of 64GB SSD.

While the installation completed without problems, CPU usage was stuck at 99% after entering the desktop for many minutes. Even with everything got installed and updated, CPU usage is still between 15-20% under complete idle state, with spikes of 80% or higher every other minute. A bit surprised that 1GB RAM could handle the OS; the bottleneck is solely on the CPU.

OTOH installing WinXP x86 on the same hardware results in just 15 seconds from POST to desktop, making it far more usable than more modern Win7/8.1/10 (for the record, the netbook has a Win7 Starter sticker, a version available though OEM only but upgradable to Win10 Home), but one must search and install each and every device driver manually. I'll probably test Debian on it next.

Also watched LGR's revisit on Computer Reset and TDNC's retro build with new old stocks. Finding new or at least working old components for retro builds is much much easier in US than in Taiwan......

About 5 years ago, I put 10 on atom netbooks with 1GB and found it ran better than 7 at that time (Which runs better than Vista on 1GB, but both of them are happier with 2) ... since that seemed usable, as long as you kept your browsing to 4 tabs... I went to the bother of putting 2GB in them when I came across the RAM for cheap/free, which naturally was better still.... they did tend to have episodes of thrash related to updates I think... kinda had to make sure you left them powered on a lot to catch up while you weren't trying to use them.... but 3ish years ago the bloat caught up with them along with very crippling vulnerability patches for those issues I don't even think atom suffers from.. then they'd always be at 50%, and watching netflix on them was no longer viable. One of them got Lubuntu 18.x on it, and is still quite usable with that.

Test and cleaned some dvd/cd-roms.

3 are scsi but I have no 50pin cable to test them except open/close and cd playback (only 1).
Can't find any for cheap. Are those that hard to come by at a fair price?

You can even make your own IDE and older non-twisted SCSI cables if you have the correct tool for installing the plugs (can be done with a vise too I guess). However what you might also need is terminators for both cable ends if the controller or the device doesn't have the option to enable it's own bus termination. So looking for cables, if there is one with terminators and not way too expensive, it's probably worth buying if you intend on using SCSI stuff.

Deunan wrote on 2022-02-19, 16:44:

You can even make your own IDE and older non-twisted SCSI cables if you have the correct tool for installing the plugs (can be done with a vise too I guess). However what you might also need is terminators for both cable ends if the controller or the device doesn't have the option to enable it's own bus termination. So looking for cables, if there is one with terminators and not way too expensive, it's probably worth buying if you intend on using SCSI stuff.

Buy the flat cable and the plugs? Ok, that can be done. I have to see what are terminators like (not T-800, no need to post a pic Bitwrangler 😉)
Might be a cheap solution.
Thanks for the suggestion.

Terminator packs come in 2 flavours: passive (just resistors inside) and active (bit more complicated so involves an IC or two). In theory it's possible to make a passive terminator yourself, but that will be a bunch of resistors and preferably on some PCB - so that will be either expensive for custom PCB or pretty big for universal PCB. I figure it's not worth my time and effort, but I haven't checked the prices lately so, who knows. If you do make one, don't pick too small SMD resistors, pay attention to the power dissipation rating.

At last, i received some crystal oscillators i had ordered, and did my first 386DX overclocking: Re: Post your 386 Speedsys results here

Today I've soldered the mt32-pi midi HAT board for the Raspberry Pi. Tomorrow I'll play a lot of MIDIs on that.