I got this nice Terratec Maestro 16 along with Terratec Dream GS Wave 4MB wavetable from a friend in exchange for a big tower case. I think it was a good deal.

HanJammer wrote on 2022-05-14, 13:32:

I got this nice Terratec Maestro 16 along with Terratec Dream GS Wave 4MB wavetable from a friend in exchange for a big tower case. I think it was a good deal.

That may have been the very mother of all AT tower cases with PSU, MHz display and all other bells and whistles and including transport, it's still a good deal.
Any waveblaster module has become almost nonexistent in the last years and even the simpler Terratecs are getting rare...
I'm truly happy that there are things like the dreamblaster today.

The Katana from today, and the Prophets from the day before...
Payed 15 euro for the Katana (shitting inc), and 150 euro for the Prophet cards (shitting also inc) for single piece is below 20 euro per card NOS condition.
It is really great to find such things, sadly it is only PowerVR Kyro II, no Voodoo cards, no GEforce high end such as 256, GF II Ultra and others... But i like the Kyro II anyway..
That Katana is very nice cooler, maybe one of the best for cooling old platforms such as s370/ s462, but if not needed there it can go as up to s939.... I was looking for this Katana CU specially for the hot AthlonXP-M (mine is on 2.6GHz OC, cant find better one to OC to 2.7GHz still) .

There is guy that have this ATi Rage Fury MaXX, hope to manage to convice him to trade the Rage MaXX for one of my NOS Prophets...

framebuffer wrote on 2022-05-14, 09:43:

wow that's cool!
I still have mine, original 360 (xeonon?) and I always wondered why it never died with RRoD; it was an overheat related thing, right? is there an approximate amount of use hrs after they are likely to fail?
I used mine definitely less than the avarage console gamers I think, played mostly Halo 3 and Forza 2, somewhere between 100 and 200 hrs I suppose

So the Xenon boards don't have an HDMI port, only the multi-AV port, that's how you can tell. If yours has a 203-watt power supply and an HDMI port on board you have a Zephyr.

The RRoD issue was explained by the Microsoft Xbox head of hardware in this article:
https://gamerant.com/microsoft-xbox-360-red-r … xplanation-why/

So yeah, basically heat, specifically heat cycles and component overheating during use due to poor cooling design. I have also heard the Xbox GPUs were manufactured in two locations, Korea and somewhere else (don't remember) and the Korea GPUs didn't have the defect which causes the issue. Take that with a grain of salt because I haven't been able to verify that, but the Xbox hardware engineer's statement that "connections inside components break" makes it seem likely. Bottom line, do everything in your power to improve cooling of the console and hopefully it will last.

Tetrium wrote on 2022-05-07, 11:35:

And do you even realize that basically the entire reason Vogons is what it is today is because people like us were basically tra […]
Show full quote

Radical Vision wrote on 2022-05-07, 10:55:

SteveC wrote on 2022-05-07, 10:45:

Not working scrap?! Erm... 😁

Well i call working scrap stuff like most ASSrock boards, ECS boards, PChips, Super part, all 478 board aside from the exotic ones (sush as MSI Platinum, ABIT ect), low parts Celerons, Sempron, cards like TNT 2 M64 (jesus i hate this card) GEforce II MX200/400, GEforce 4 MX, GEforce FX5200, Radeon 9200, about most ATi Rage cards and others. These are part that are working but they are just scrap to me, die to them being just low end, not high end or something special. Ofc i dont trow working parts to scrappers, i just sell them to ppl that are not like me collection only the best, and with to money buy cool stuff.

BTW to be PC HW hoarder is hard for most men, die to them having a wife or gf, many did divorse, as they cant collect parts die to their wifes trowing stuff on the garbage, and not accepting the hobby of the men. Got cool parts from ppl that did have no choice but to trow the parts on the garbage or sell them, die to their wifes being females, they will never understand us..

And do you even realize that basically the entire reason Vogons is what it is today is because people like us were basically trashpicking these old boxed games, picked up those sidecurbed PCs, revisited thrift stores and fleamarkets and bought those mass-dumpsaled obsolete junk parts? Do you think we all went to Dubai to get these items? Do you know that the wealth of knowledge and knowhow is accumulated by tinkering with any actual parts or do you think we only started out using ultra this and Collector Edition game that and it all just worked out of the box with no effort put into it and this forum is just one big dick measuring contest or something?

We started out with the what you would call junk parts and build it up from there my dude. Back then others called it all junk and nobody wanted those ultras, could get Voodoo 3 3000 for a can of beer and I mean literally. Elitists didn't really want those cards back then, people like us did.

But anyway, I digress for a bit here.

You also said something about collectors but frankly most of those collectors don't actually use the hardware they purchase. Some may end up using it very briefly for some youtube benchmark footage but some people here buy actual parts with the intent of actually using it. And I mean probably for months or even years on end.

Nobody really cares if the PCB is 'the wrong color' or if it's not the ultra version of your favorite board. What mattes is that people are having fun with what they do and that it works xD

You're just coming across as vain here especially if you trash someone else simply because you think their purchase (with which they also state are perfectly happy and works in every regard they wanted from it) is too smol. or the wrong color,lol. Especially if it's something highly sought after like something 3dfx and is genuinely making somebody happy.
It's fine that you don't like it, but no need to be such a dick about it.

Uuuu oke... So you think i did fly to some rich arabian country to get all stuff i have in here, or i did get them from ebay or something ?!?!? And you think i did not get stuff from dumpsters and shit.. Seems you got the wrong idea about what i mean (or maybe as i speak more harsh about parts that I DONT really like), sure for me such Super "brand"parts or like Acorp and other are crap and working scrap, BUT that does not mean i will trow them to scrappers or destroy them. No i will jsut sell them, trade them and just be happy while doing that and replacing these nasty to me crap brands with some parts with better quality or even PCB if you want.. And yes if someone CANT tell the difference between and low quality par and way better one, look at MatroX cards for example, or ELSA specially Diamond, if i have to choose Diamond Voodoo cards vs Super or some nasty no name dog brands id go every time with Diamond ofc... Here where i am i preserve and safe the good retro HW parts ( shit i even safe crap stuff such as this Super Banshee, ECS boards, Acorp parts, ASSrock and other crap) . I am all about for getting cheap and nice parts, but i never liked, and never will budget brands (hell i even hate ASUS as well they suck for me dont like them, no matter everyone consider them the holy grail of retro brands) they are just nasty to me, to look at them.. Compare Compaq/ IBM PCB quality to lets say these Super cards... Or take a look at S3 for example Trio and Vorge cards, the no name brands are garbage, BUT compare them to Virge/ Trio made by Number Nine, Diamond these cards are better quality and i prefer them.. Damn i can even tell they are beter made then the no name dog brands even when holding them on my hand.. Not that it matters to most ppl, as that Super card may be nasty cheap to me, BUT it will prob work just fine.. Still i am a perfectionist, i hate alsos stuff like if a cool part i find (lets take for example AWE64 Gold) and the previous owner was slappy and did scratch the PCB, chips or something, and even cleaning the card wont fix that scratches i really f**king hate that it piss me more then dog branded parts such as Voodoo... Or when some idiot decide to send me some old/ vintage HW part with original box, and he does not take the care to preserver the f**king original box, and use tape on it for safer shipping DAMN hate that so much, it makes the original box with glue all over, and then need to use isopropyl alcohol and ALOT of rubbing in order to fix the box to its original state FFS....

Whatever as my name suggest i am an Radical person, i see things differently, but that is my point of view.. Even if i find whole box full of some 3Dfx cards and all are some garbage UNDERdog brand i will ofc happily take them and sell/ trade every single one of them.. I also as an old HW enthusiast have some twisted feeling of joy, when i watch some cheap garbage stuff such as KME "300w" PSU, dog brands such as PCchips boards and others, but that is only when i get some for free, i just like how crap and cheap they feel, but ofc i will never collect such things, i have them for sale, but most of the time no one buy that crap... After all everyone is different, some ppl will be happy on a single 3Dfx cards, others like me get disgusted by cheap brands..

Most of my Collection, as you can see i saved ton of parts from the garbage, as many of these was going to end up to the trash, or some idiot was going to destroy them as scrap or, as they dont care about the old HW parts as much as me, or everyone here..

https://imgur.com/a/wWe1b

TrashPanda wrote on 2022-05-08, 06:47:

Edit - Saw a Voodoo3 3000 listed on eBay .. thing is .. its one of them rare Compaq Vodoo3 3500's that doesnt need the silly breakout cable, Ill add it to my Voodoo Collection which is now complete .. aside from a Rush which quite frankly are not worth the bother. (Knowing me Ill likely buy one later when a super cheap one shows up !)

Interesting Rush sure is not very common card, but to have other Voodoo cards, and not rush.. But depend since when someone collects.. The ppl that started like 20 years ago are faaaar from the rest of us, that stared like 7-8 years ago collecting... Well in some local shop you may find some of them if lucky...

Gmlb256 wrote on 2022-05-08, 14:19:

Nice! Compaq does make quality video cards from existing components. Have a S3 ViRGE/GX and nVidia TNT2 cards built by them.

Well tell that to ppl that think Compaq, Dimond, Elsa, Creative, Number 9, MatroX and others high quality cards, are same like UNDERdog garbage ones such as Super, Axle and whatever NOname you can think of, as they are not clearly...

7 bucks for all this

i wanted this board badly because it supports up to athlon XP 2600
also has the P4 power connector
and also has an empy slot for ISA, that i can add it

with a pioneer dvd-rw and a 9400 gt graphics card

SETBLASTER wrote on 2022-05-14, 16:27:

7 bucks for all this […]
Show full quote

7 bucks for all this

i wanted this board badly because it supports up to athlon XP 2600
also has the P4 power connector
and also has an empy slot for ISA, that i can add it

with a pioneer dvd-rw and a 9400 gt graphics card

That's a fantastic deal. That MSI board will make a great platform for some retro fun.

chrismeyer6 wrote on 2022-05-14, 16:44:

SETBLASTER wrote on 2022-05-14, 16:27:

7 bucks for all this […]
Show full quote

7 bucks for all this

i wanted this board badly because it supports up to athlon XP 2600
also has the P4 power connector
and also has an empy slot for ISA, that i can add it

with a pioneer dvd-rw and a 9400 gt graphics card

That's a fantastic deal. That MSI board will make a great platform for some retro fun.

Sadly it lacks the ISA slot.. I hate when they have printed the f**king ISA on the PCBm but yet no one bothered to install one... Not sure if someone try, can solder ISA slot there...

Radical Vision wrote on 2022-05-14, 15:34:

Well tell that to ppl that think Compaq, Dimond, Elsa, Creative, Number 9, MatroX and others high quality cards, are same like UNDERdog garbage ones such as Super, Axle and whatever NOname you can think of, as they are not clearly...

At least I respect the opinion of others if they enjoyed it and telling this to them on this thread is a very futile attempt.

BTW, I have a noname S3 Trio3D/2X 8MB PCI card that has very good image quality (aside from the brightness bug which can be easily dealt with) and it can handle PCI bus clocks that are out of spec unlike my Compaq S3 ViRGE/GX (which suffers from occasional palette corruption if the PCI bus clock is above 33 MHz). Currently using it on my Socket 7 computer along with a single Voodoo2 12MB card from InnoVision.

Radical Vision wrote on 2022-05-14, 15:34:

Well tell that to ppl that think Compaq, Dimond, Elsa, Creative, Number 9, MatroX and others high quality cards, are same like UNDERdog garbage ones such as Super, Axle and whatever NOname you can think of, as they are not clearly...

I still don't get how you define 'high quality'. What are your objective criteria?

Radical Vision wrote on 2022-05-14, 16:53:

Sadly it lacks the ISA slot.. I hate when they have printed the f**king ISA on the PCBm but yet no one bothered to install one... Not sure if someone try, can solder ISA slot there...

I could be wrong, but it's possible the BIOS wouldn't support ISA even if you did solder a connector on, in which case you'd need a modified BIOS for it to work.

Got an ECS 865PE-A7 REV 1.0 with some 2.8GHz P4 on it and various other items salvaged from a dirty and rusty (on the outside) case . It might become a project to try to get PC/PCI working by tapping signals from the ICH5 southbridge . No idea if a BIOS mod would be required .

No idea if anything works yet. The caps are OSTs and others from the bad old days, but that system had extensive cooling (fans) and what looked like a fan controller, so it might still work, but even so, it's probably only a matter of time before recapping is unavoidable.

Brawndo wrote on 2022-05-14, 17:45:

Radical Vision wrote on 2022-05-14, 16:53:

Sadly it lacks the ISA slot.. I hate when they have printed the f**king ISA on the PCBm but yet no one bothered to install one... Not sure if someone try, can solder ISA slot there...

I could be wrong, but it's possible the BIOS wouldn't support ISA even if you did solder a connector on, in which case you'd need a modified BIOS for it to work.

My guess would be that if the board has room for ISA there has to be a variant that has it soldered on and working. Though those days MSI did reuse the same PCB for vastly different motherboards. Like my KM3M-V has the same PCB as the KM4M-V.

ildonaldo wrote on 2022-05-14, 10:01:

Not strictly retro or vintage but a good catch for 20,- Euro (incl. P&P). Just right for my current early 2010 project :-) […]
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Not strictly retro or vintage but a good catch for 20,- Euro (incl. P&P).
Just right for my current early 2010 project 😀

- Intel Core2 Quad Q9505
- Asus P5K Pro Mainboard
- 4 GB DDR2 (4x 1GB)
- Arctic Freezer 13
- 140mm + 80mm Silentwing 3
... plus a load of board accessories

IMG_20220514_104259 (SVGA).jpg

... and the new "home" will be my COOLER MASTER Wave Master TAC-T01-EK

IMG_20220507_180419 (SVGA).jpg

I have never seen a Black cooler master wave case. I have a couple silver and one yellow one.
And I have a bunch of those Lian Li cases.

Gmlb256 wrote on 2022-05-14, 17:21:

Radical Vision wrote on 2022-05-14, 15:34:

Well tell that to ppl that think Compaq, Dimond, Elsa, Creative, Number 9, MatroX and others high quality cards, are same like UNDERdog garbage ones such as Super, Axle and whatever NOname you can think of, as they are not clearly...

At least I respect the opinion of others if they enjoyed it and telling this to them on this thread is a very futile attempt.

BTW, I have a noname S3 Trio3D/2X 8MB PCI card that has very good image quality (aside from the brightness bug which can be easily dealt with) and it can handle PCI bus clocks that are out of spec unlike my Compaq S3 ViRGE/GX (which suffers from occasional palette corruption if the PCI bus clock is above 33 MHz). Currently using it on my Socket 7 computer along with a single Voodoo2 12MB card from InnoVision.

Interesting.. Some times dog brand such as EliteGroup, ASSrock, PcChips, QDI, Acorp ect just tend to die way less, and most of the time they just work, meanwhile good brands such as ABIT, ASUS (dont cosider ASUS premium, but they usually use expensive Rubycon caps) . But normally premium brands work better from what i saw. I think is not good to use overall parts that need to be on less clock speed (for example PCI bus, sometimes from OC the bus rises, better to have a way of not rising the bus in the first place), not on more, and you may end up with some broken parts, usually HDD may get affected and other problems. Some cheaper parts dont have even CPU protection, that does not mean, when an quality board hard shut down to prevent damage, the cheap one wont care, and then ur system my fry, or die from overvolting for example..

HanSolo wrote on 2022-05-14, 17:32:

Radical Vision wrote on 2022-05-14, 15:34:

Well tell that to ppl that think Compaq, Dimond, Elsa, Creative, Number 9, MatroX and others high quality cards, are same like UNDERdog garbage ones such as Super, Axle and whatever NOname you can think of, as they are not clearly...

I still don't get how you define 'high quality'. What are your objective criteria?

If you have Diamond cards compare them, to no name cards, just by putting them next to eatch other, you will see the Diamond card is better build.
Even the parts on the quality brand and PCB look and even feel better when you touch it with hand..

There was also in the past from the "good" brands as ppl claim they are fine, like PChips that used fake cache modules on their 386/ 486 boards. Ypu see the board have cache on it, BUT there are no traces there LMAO.. Brands such as AOpen, Gigabyte (depends on the model) , ASUS (they use most of the time the best brand Rubycon) use high quality caps, specially most AOpen and ASUS boards use mostly Rubycon caps, AOpen uses most of the time mix between ruby and crap ones, other times only Rubycon. Gigabyte boards even in Slot 1 (the more high end only) have DUAL BIOS and better caps and even CPU overvoltage protection.. Wonder why ATi and MatroX cards are one of the very best to par with 3Dfx Voodoo I and II, simple as their cards are of very high build quality and the chipset as well provide better 2D quality, but the components on the PCB will help even further for the image quality.

For you and others that claim about quality and stuff.. Take for example 3.5 inch Floppy drives, normally brands aside from TEAC and panasonic are garbage, SONY also have fine drives, but rest brands are just bad and dont read anyhing.

So you and the rest that claim, there is no difference.. The Hercules Terminator S3 card, is clear it have better PCB, better caps that last way longer, and does not show crap image quality.. While the NOname S3 is clear the PCB is cheap and nasty, and there are caps that are dry AF, and normally on so old cards these electrolytic caps are very dead, and will produce very bad image quality. It is clear they did even cheap out on memory size, you need to find memory chips now, while on the more premium card with the way more premium PCB that is not the case..
I bet every single component aside from the main chipset, is WAY more cheaper on the UNDERdog "branded" S3 card, compared to the Hercules Terminator.
Also there appears to be feature connectors on both cards, but the Terminator card have x2 more connectors on it and an jumper to set something...

Now these
The Gigabyte have superior quality to this garbage Gainward board. Allbig caps are Sanyo quality caps, no need to mention the Dual BIOS that the other board and many lacks, CPU overvoltage protection, speaker and 4 slots of memory supporting max of 1GB SDram total, compared to 700MB on the green board. The Gigabyte have also way more capacitors, more mosfets (keep in mind this board is mostly for Pentium II, while the gainward supports up to 700MHz vs like 450MHz means Gigabyte did overbuild their board)..

Brawndo wrote on 2022-05-14, 17:45:

Radical Vision wrote on 2022-05-14, 16:53:

Sadly it lacks the ISA slot.. I hate when they have printed the f**king ISA on the PCBm but yet no one bothered to install one... Not sure if someone try, can solder ISA slot there...

I could be wrong, but it's possible the BIOS wouldn't support ISA even if you did solder a connector on, in which case you'd need a modified BIOS for it to work.

It is still an option prob, sadly they did not bother to solder an ISA slot..

Radical Vision wrote on 2022-05-14, 19:57:

For you and others that claim about quality and stuff.. Take for example 3.5 inch Floppy drives, normally brands aside from TEAC and panasonic are garbage, SONY also have fine drives, but rest brands are just bad and dont read anyhing.

That is a very subjective take which I don't share, most drives can be brought back to a decent working condition with the right maintenance.

So you and the rest that claim, there is no difference.. The Hercules Terminator S3 card, is clear it have better PCB, better caps that last way longer, and does not show crap image quality.. While the NOname S3 is clear the PCB is cheap and nasty, and there are caps that are dry AF, and normally on so old cards these electrolytic caps are very dead, and will produce very bad image quality. It is clear they did even cheap out on memory size, you need to find memory chips now, while on the more premium card with the way more premium PCB that is not the case..
I bet every single component aside from the main chipset, is WAY more cheaper on the UNDERdog "branded" S3 card, compared to the Hercules Terminator.
Also there appears to be feature connectors on both cards, but the Terminator card have x2 more connectors on it and an jumper to set something...

While it is true there are quality differences between branded and "under dog" cards, I see zero point in making this the primary point of discussion, lots of us don't care whatsoever about PCB colors and sizes (or even quality). If it does the job for a good price, it's fine in my books.

Look at this NOname crap GEforce 256 compared to Creative, the usual shit the PCB is smaller means they did cheap out on that, the caps are also cheap crap, not like that long lasting ones on the Creative card. Also the fan on the yellow card is BAD, the one on the Creative was ADDA i think or AVC, whatever an very quality brand, while the one on the yellow card is just bad i saw many of them broken or spinning , while not being able to produce airflow at all, cuz the fan is bad... Again here are more components on the Quality brand more mosfets, and the caps seem more and prob also better ones.. Connector option on the Creative card on top, while where is the one on the yellow card ?!?! There is Creative model with DVI port, the yellow card does not have even layout in it for DVI KEKW..

And i did safe last crap for dessert, guess what the yellow CRAP have garbage color output very garbage bad coloring, the card works like crap, the image quality is very shit. That is prob from some bad solder joints + bad components on the card (wonder why is that)...

computerguy08 wrote on 2022-05-14, 20:10:

That is a very subjective take which I don't share, most drives can be brought back to a decent working condition with the right maintenance.

While it is true there are quality differences between branded and "under dog" cards, I see zero point in making this the primary point of discussion, lots of us don't care whatsoever about PCB colors and sizes (or even quality). If it does the job for a good price, it's fine in my books.

Yes but even when cleaning the heads of trash brands floppies they still wont work properly. Meanwhile TEAC and Panasonic are just working even dirty AF... As we all know how ppl treat old computers they are all dirty as hell, for me is important stuff that can handle abuse and overbuild..

Well lets put it that way, the life is short, the storage space (the money are precious) is not enough in order to spend them on casual parts and stuff, to waste time and money and effort.. I prefer to sell/trade crap NOname dog parts, and with the money to buy the good stuff... Not sure why others are happy when they find cheap Noname dog brand, i am happy as much as i will sell that crap and with the money i will invest in something good, that i did also find for pocket change.. Ofc everyone is different and free to be happy on whatever they like, but i dont get it, why will someone go for Opel/VW instead of going for BMW or Mercedes...

Again, you're reiterating how X brand is worse than Y, I wasn't questioning that aspect.
However, did you consider a lot of people don't have access to any of those at reasonable prices ? And that some only have the possibility to buy the "shit quality" version ?

Ofc everyone is different and free to be happy on whatever they like, but i dont get it, why will someone go for Opel/VW instead of going for BMW or Mercedes...

This pretty much has the same answer to what I said above, possibility of aquisition.

computerguy08 wrote on 2022-05-14, 20:23:

Again, you're reiterating how X brand is worse than Y, I wasn't questioning that aspect. However, did you consider a lot of peop […]
Show full quote

Again, you're reiterating how X brand is worse than Y, I wasn't questioning that aspect.
However, did you consider a lot of people don't have access to any of those at reasonable prices ? And that some only have the possibility to buy the "shit quality" version ?

Ofc everyone is different and free to be happy on whatever they like, but i dont get it, why will someone go for Opel/VW instead of going for BMW or Mercedes...

This pretty much has the same answer to what I said above, possibility of aquisition.

Whole my collection is build on getting stuff for pocket change... I use the formula of finding whatever i can on local sites ADs, making my own ads, and ask ppl.. Look in old PC repair shops (very old ones that are on market since before 1999) they usually have good stuff, looking in schools, and some goverment very old buildings, and i find stuff there too. But is mostly from ads, some stuff are from scrappers, or ppl that did preserve parts from the 90`s. I dont use ebay or outside of my country, so i am locked, to what is avaible here.. I wont spend stupid amounts of money on any part no matter quality or even crap one.. And here is hard to find good stuff, as once upon a time no one did buy the expensive and good stuff in here. I still wait and get wahatever i can get my hands on. Sell everything i consider crap, or not interesting, get money, then invest small amounts if i find something good, but that costs more.. So if ppl use ebay and similar sites, the joke is on them, as on ebay is hard to find good stuff even crap brands for normal prices. You need to find local stuff, or from closes cities, otherwise some scalper will feast with your money... The formula is, pay small, get as much things as possible, or get free stuff.

(the GEforce 256 from the picture is for free, while i did pay 3 euro for the yellow crap...)

If I see something I can afford that I want, unless I consider the price stupid and know I can get it cheaper next month, I buy it. If I see something you call crap and it's cheap and I don't have that chipset, I buy it to tide me over until I find a better model. I'm not wealthy by any means, but I am better off than some, and can afford a large collection. Doesn't stop me getting stuff off Freecycle as well though, when people are getting rid of old kit that cluttering up their cupboards 😀