Kahenraz wrote on 2022-06-21, 02:03:

That's a nice build. I've always been fond of the vertical 3.5" floppy drive. It's only awkward because I've never seen anything else that can be mounted vertically to complement it.

I agree... I'm thinking about adding a Gotek and making this a floppy archiving machine- seems like that might not look too weird. Both floppy drives are working great, so maybe it's time to finally go through my drawer of 30 year old floppies and backup what I can.

CrFr wrote on 2022-06-20, 21:23:

Today I made a wooden USB floppy drive 😀

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That looks so cool.

CrFr wrote on 2022-06-20, 21:23:

Today I made a wooden USB floppy drive 😀

20220620_205239499_iOS_.jpg

a thing of beauty 😀

Getting this Tyan Tsunami BX board up an running... What a clean layout for this board.

holdencars11 wrote on 2022-06-21, 12:02:

Getting this Tyan Tsunami BX board up an running... What a clean layout for this board.

Love Tyan. I used them for a Dual PIII 3dsMax workstation build back in the day. Rock solid stable render machine.

If only 3D Studio MAX could be stable itself. Once I started it up fresh, made a cube, and it crashed.

Broke oout the Versa M/75 and the old Words+ System 2000 Commpac AAC device and finally got some more stuff working. I'm writing some new tunes for band lab and my "lead singer" needs a health checkup, 🤣

I Got AudScan utility working in DOS, and got the joystick working with it (posted to my Instagram) - I used my regular Atari 2600 CX-40 Joystick for this, lead to some hilarious speech tree call-response stuff, 🤣. I might need to try this out on EZ Keys once I swap FreeDOS for DOS 7.1 and put Windows For Workgroups 3.11 on there.

"(Perfect Paul)Home......Greetings......Hello......(billy the Kid) Hi There!"

Also went shopping again for 5-wire 3M MicroTouch 10.4" (256mmx178mm) glass panels. Did more reading, apparently this is an early "TouchPen" system and likely an early Capacitive touch (one wire for each corner and one for a "hoop" that goes around the digitizer). I think I'm getting warmer on obtaining either a original replacement I can modify - or a chinese replacement. Seriously toying with using up some Credit card for one.

Doing more digging on the Words+ part of the equation, I found out there's a way to edit the menus - might be able to write some songs that way....or by using other user profiles in Talking Screen.....since that's how "Chicken Nuggets and Honey Mustard" was written. Also looked at how the "switches" are wired and I'm thinking I could build my own set of switches. Looks like audscan lets me write my own vocabulary too so looks like our "singer" is getting expanded dialog. Now if only autotune in BandLab would let me rewrite the melody it tends to default to.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SDPJtzF1pwc&t=13s

CrFr wrote on 2022-06-20, 21:23:

Today I made a wooden USB floppy drive 😀

20220620_205239499_iOS_.jpg

I hope for you the floppy drive will work 😀 (knock on wood 😜 )

I have been diving into Windows dev materials, specifically the stuff about DirectMusic. I learned that the Microsoft System Synth is it's own separate DirectMusic entity and can't really be messed with. However, I also learned that you can take the Roland GS DLS set (SC-55 equivalent) from that and use it with a different, properly designed DirectMusic synth that will give you correct MIDI output, with reverb and chorus and all that. Unfortunately, nobody has apparently made any DM synths outside of what's integrated into music editing programs, so the potential for DirectMusic use has pretty much fallen by the wayside.

Kahenraz wrote on 2022-06-19, 14:19:

Run it as "UnrealTournament -safe". Does it work with the software renderer?

I tried any manner of -safe option and nope.
It doesn't support software rendering either.
So i tried with the older OpenGL beta drivers that support Matrox cards to no avail, and 3rd party drivers for Nvidia cards with OpenGL support using Mesa, Quake2 worked fine, Quake3 ran with issues and UT didn't work at all...

Anyone with a Voodoo2/3/4, a Pentium3/4 or Amd AthlonXP of the same era and some hdd space (1GB should be enough but 2 would be better) willing to have fun with BeOS?

The new 2203 date coded Dallas RTC is on the way for the 1994 Gateway 486DX2-66 Desktop. This system is one of those odd 486's equipped with PCI slots. It also has a CT2800 OPL3 Vibra16S from the previous owner. Good taste in sound cards that one.... considering getting a MIDI daughter board for it. I've had this system for a year or so but I never got around to pulling the trigger on a $30 RTC. This will be the oldest functioning PC I have and hopefully a break from my horrible luck with 486 (having had 3 previously that all near immediately failed)

I'm trying to decide if I want to install the Trio64V (1995) or the S3 Vision968 (1996) as a video card. It has some form of Cirrus Logic integrated, but I want something more powerful yet still somewhat era appropriate. I could see the CL holding this PC back in games like DOOM II or especially in Windows 95. The Trio64V is a more widely known chipset and has great compatibility, where as the S3 Vision is slightly less known and less well tested but it has S-Video and Composite out which means I could display games on my 27" JVC CRT TV as well.

TheAbandonwareGuy wrote on 2022-06-26, 04:13:

This system is one of those odd 486's equipped with PCI slots.

I'm finding these are much less obscure than I thought. I went through my mobo stash a year ago and realized that one of the boards I assumed was socket 7 was actually a late pci socket 3 board. The unicorn I want is one that has VLB and PCI.

TheAbandonwareGuy wrote on 2022-06-26, 04:13:

I'm trying to decide if I want to install the Trio64V (1995) or the S3 Vision968 (1996) as a video card. It has some form of Cirrus Logic integrated, but I want something more powerful yet still somewhat era appropriate. I could see the CL holding this PC back in games like DOOM II or especially in Windows 95. The Trio64V is a more widely known chipset and has great compatibility, where as the S3 Vision is slightly less known and less well tested but it has S-Video and Composite out which means I could display games on my 27" JVC CRT TV as well.

The Trio64 may perform slightly better in DOS, while the Vision is considerably faster in Windows, especially at higher resolutions. Also the Vision line of cards usually have a better image quality due to the use of higher end DACs, while the more budget-oriented Trio chipset has an integrated DAC. Both should be very compatible though, and for a 486 they're about as fast as you can get (if we're talking about period correct stuff).

TheMobRules wrote on 2022-06-26, 04:59:

TheAbandonwareGuy wrote on 2022-06-26, 04:13:

I'm trying to decide if I want to install the Trio64V (1995) or the S3 Vision968 (1996) as a video card. It has some form of Cirrus Logic integrated, but I want something more powerful yet still somewhat era appropriate. I could see the CL holding this PC back in games like DOOM II or especially in Windows 95. The Trio64V is a more widely known chipset and has great compatibility, where as the S3 Vision is slightly less known and less well tested but it has S-Video and Composite out which means I could display games on my 27" JVC CRT TV as well.

The Trio64 may perform slightly better in DOS, while the Vision is considerably faster in Windows, especially at higher resolutions. Also the Vision line of cards usually have a better image quality due to the use of higher end DACs, while the more budget-oriented Trio chipset has an integrated DAC. Both should be very compatible though, and for a 486 they're about as fast as you can get (if we're talking about period correct stuff).

I actually won a Diamond Stealth64 (S3 Vision 968) today, was curious about the IBM branded IC on it, would that be the DAC ?

Rather nice looking GPU, even has the 2mb expansion module on it, also wondering what the Feature connector was used for?

Get a TV with VGA input or an adapter and split the video signal using a passive cable. You'll get a better picture without all of that luma chroma garbage.

TrashPanda wrote on 2022-06-26, 05:10:

I actually won a Diamond Stealth64 (S3 Vision 968) today, was curious about the IBM branded IC on it, would that be the DAC ?

Yes it is.

TrashPanda wrote on 2022-06-26, 05:10:

Rather nice looking GPU, even has the 2mb expansion module on it, also wondering what the Feature connector was used for?

The feature connector was used for various types of cards like MPEG decoders, or even rare stuff such as the Creative 3DO Blaster. Basically its purpose was to enable direct data transfer between the VGA and the other card without being constrained by the system bus, memory or CPU speed.

TheMobRules wrote on 2022-06-26, 06:20:

Yes it is. […]
Show full quote

TrashPanda wrote on 2022-06-26, 05:10:

I actually won a Diamond Stealth64 (S3 Vision 968) today, was curious about the IBM branded IC on it, would that be the DAC ?

Yes it is.

TrashPanda wrote on 2022-06-26, 05:10:

Rather nice looking GPU, even has the 2mb expansion module on it, also wondering what the Feature connector was used for?

The feature connector was used for various types of cards like MPEG decoders, or even rare stuff such as the Creative 3DO Blaster. Basically its purpose was to enable direct data transfer between the VGA and the other card without being constrained by the system bus, memory or CPU speed.

If one were to hunt for a Mpeg decoder what models would be compatible >

Wont bother with the 3DO Blaster . .last one I saw with complete kit+CDrom drive was well over 3.5k USD

Today activity is an attempted to repair Radeon HD2600 PRO but it failed. 😓 The card is running untill you install the drivers but than the OS will crash on boot. I found one missing elyt capacitor - replaced and replaced the other electrolytics but it did not help. Thinking if reflowing the chip makes any sence or not - wanna try my best before "scorching" the GPU with hotair.

Check for missing surface mount components. If all else fails, replace the rest of the capacitors and see if that helps. Low-ESR are the best choice for video cards.

I had a GeForce 4 MX that exhibited graphical corruption, very characteristic of faulty memory. It ended up being the capacitors. After replacing them, I could even overclock the memory without any problems.

Repair shops hate me. I fixed defective memory on my video card with this one neat trick.

TrashPanda wrote on 2022-06-26, 06:23:

TheMobRules wrote on 2022-06-26, 06:20:

Yes it is. […]
Show full quote

TrashPanda wrote on 2022-06-26, 05:10:

I actually won a Diamond Stealth64 (S3 Vision 968) today, was curious about the IBM branded IC on it, would that be the DAC ?

Yes it is.

TrashPanda wrote on 2022-06-26, 05:10:

Rather nice looking GPU, even has the 2mb expansion module on it, also wondering what the Feature connector was used for?

The feature connector was used for various types of cards like MPEG decoders, or even rare stuff such as the Creative 3DO Blaster. Basically its purpose was to enable direct data transfer between the VGA and the other card without being constrained by the system bus, memory or CPU speed.

If one were to hunt for a Mpeg decoder what models would be compatible >

Wont bother with the 3DO Blaster . .last one I saw with complete kit+CDrom drive was well over 3.5k USD

Yeah the ship for rare stuff like the 3D0, NV1 or V5 5500 has sailed. Those are the realms of the uber rich TechBros now.

I hate how every hobby I enjoyed got "discovered" during the Pandemic and prices exploded due to brand dead morons that spend triple digits on stuff that would literally otherwise end up being broken down for the $0.10 of gold in it.