Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2023-02-02, 10:53:

Finally decided to set up a dedicated LAN for all of my retro rigs. No internet access, just network shares.

I should have done this earlier, it's so much better than dealing with crappy USB 1.1 speeds, or the system slowdowns and IRQ conflicts caused by some USB 2.0 cards. Currently, I have everything hooked up to an old TP-Link TL-WR740N router that I had left over from a previous ISP. Transfer speeds are averaging around 9-10 MB/s on my faster machines and 2-3 MB/s on my DOS system. I'm ok with that, though I imagine it might be possible to reach slightly higher speeds with better gear. For now, I'm just happy that everything works. 😀

Network sharing files is honestly the best. It makes life simpler without having to use a floppy, zip, CD, or USB drive just drag and drop your files and your all set. If you want to get deeper into the weeds you can store your CD ISO's on one machine and just mount them on the system you want to use.

chrismeyer6 wrote on 2023-02-02, 14:09:

Network sharing files is honestly the best. It makes life simpler without having to use a floppy, zip, CD, or USB drive just drag and drop your files and your all set. If you want to get deeper into the weeds you can store your CD ISO's on one machine and just mount them on the system you want to use.

You mean like mounting an ISO using Daemon Tools and such from a network share? I thought about that, but I never tried it.

Most of my games are from GOG or on physical discs, but I did backup some of my originals to prevent the discs from wearing out.

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2023-02-02, 16:20:

chrismeyer6 wrote on 2023-02-02, 14:09:

Network sharing files is honestly the best. It makes life simpler without having to use a floppy, zip, CD, or USB drive just drag and drop your files and your all set. If you want to get deeper into the weeds you can store your CD ISO's on one machine and just mount them on the system you want to use.

You mean like mounting an ISO using Daemon Tools and such from a network share? I thought about that, but I never tried it.

Most of my games are from GOG or on physical discs, but I did backup some of my originals to prevent the discs from wearing out.

Yup that's exactly right. It's very convenient and with good networks speeds can make loading times quicker.

chrismeyer6 wrote on 2023-02-02, 16:24:

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2023-02-02, 16:20:

chrismeyer6 wrote on 2023-02-02, 14:09:

Network sharing files is honestly the best. It makes life simpler without having to use a floppy, zip, CD, or USB drive just drag and drop your files and your all set. If you want to get deeper into the weeds you can store your CD ISO's on one machine and just mount them on the system you want to use.

You mean like mounting an ISO using Daemon Tools and such from a network share? I thought about that, but I never tried it.

Most of my games are from GOG or on physical discs, but I did backup some of my originals to prevent the discs from wearing out.

Yup that's exactly right. It's very convenient and with good networks speeds can make loading times quicker.

Agreed with this, it's exactly what I do for all my disc based games. I keep all the ISOs on my modern PC and share the folder over the LAN and let Daemon Tools mount them. Much more convenient than having to swap and change discs and saves me having to find decent working condition DVD/CD-ROM drives for each of my retro gaming PCs. The only drawback is that some games will require cracks to function this way, but not really a big deal.

I've gone a step further and with the commandline options of Daemon Tools I created batch files for each installed game, so all I have to do is double click on the game icon and the disc image will auto mount and present with it's autorun menu. For those games that don't have an autorun menu, the batch file simply launches the game.

My later XP-onwards builds use Launchbox to essentially achieve the same task of auto mounting images over the LAN and starting the game.

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2023-02-02, 10:53:

Finally decided to set up a dedicated LAN for all of my retro rigs. No internet access, just network shares.

I should have done this earlier, it's so much better than dealing with crappy USB 1.1 speeds, or the system slowdowns and IRQ conflicts caused by some USB 2.0 cards. Currently, I have everything hooked up to an old TP-Link TL-WR740N router that I had left over from a previous ISP. Transfer speeds are averaging around 9-10 MB/s on my faster machines and 2-3 MB/s on my DOS system. I'm ok with that, though I imagine it might be possible to reach slightly higher speeds with better gear. For now, I'm just happy that everything works. 😀

Transferring files with Ethernet is something that I never regret doing, much more convenient than using USB on older computers. 😉

Same here. I also thought mounting ISOs over network would be convenient, but never tried. I'm using the same switch for my retro network as I use for my modern with the last 8 ports assigned to a retro VLAN.

Two days of depressing search for this Aztech I38-MMSN850 AZT2316 DOS config & drivers. Every time I get "Card not found" slap on my face.
In other system running Win98 it works fine. I could try to set it on different IRQ once more...

fool wrote on 2023-02-02, 19:06:

Two days of depressing search for this Aztech I38-MMSN850 AZT2316 DOS config & drivers. Every time I get "Card not found" slap on my face.
In other system running Win98 it works fine. I could try to set it on different IRQ once more...

That Aztech sound card is the Multimedia Pro 16ABO, I do have a working DOS driver for that one if you need it.

Edit: The drivers can be found on the following thread: Re: Identify this Aztech card..?

I’ve finally realized that my generic need for retro shifts around but usually stays contained to late DOS, so I’ve chosen to put old reliable back together. Originally it was gonna use a voodoo 3, but I was having the horizontal lines problem that couldn’t be fixed via tweakBIOS. So instead it’s running the less compatible but oh so nice Matrox Millennium. It’s a 233MMx, 64MB of EDO, and my Yamaha/AWE64 Gold 12MB combo that allows me to have zero issues in Duke3D using 44.1k audio and MIDI, and the same for TIE fighter.

The only problem I’m having at this point is Windows 3.11 not working right, nor the Yamaha drivers for that sole purpose. Apparently they can’t write to the board. It’s not too big a deal all things considered, as the windows install is for WSS and playing canyon.mid as a joke.

fool wrote on 2023-02-02, 19:06:

Two days of depressing search for this Aztech I38-MMSN850 AZT2316 DOS config & drivers. Every time I get "Card not found" slap on my face.
In other system running Win98 it works fine. I could try to set it on different IRQ once more...

looks like my I38-MMSN824 Packard Bell OEM i have

Installed the IPX protocol (Microsoft version) on my Win9x rigs to test how DOS games like Doom would handle on my new retro LAN. To my surprise, this worked great out of the box. No special configuration was needed, at least for Doom, Duke3D, Quake and WarCraft 2. I went to Setup > Network Game > IPX and the games just ran. Very happy about that.

I imagine this might be more difficult to configure properly under pure DOS. Maybe I'll play around with that someday as well, but for now, I'm happy with these results.

Testing some RDRAMM.
Bought 4 x 256MB and made a MEM test: 100% OK

Decided to test them on another board.
No boot. Fan spin for a 0.1s and shuts down.
2nd, 3rd, 4th tries nothing.
5th yields the beep of missing ram. I turn off the PSU: 3 caps explode!

That was something!! 😀 It scared the shit out of me! 🤣 and more 🤣

My new “ASUS-mania” case recoloring and start of assembly.

Part II.

Nexxen wrote on 2023-02-03, 22:37:

5th yields the beep of missing ram. I turn off the PSU: 3 caps explode!

Oh man! That's never fun! 🤣 🤣

Motherboard or PSU caps?

adding ray dream cgi letters to a stopmotion project compiled in movie maker like its 2001:
https://youtu.be/UWe0TTJHRz0

Vic Zarratt wrote on 2023-02-04, 01:38:

adding ray dream cgi letters to a stopmotion project compiled in movie maker like its 2001:
https://youtu.be/UWe0TTJHRz0

Holy cow, that was genuinely funny. 🤣

I love your shout out to your fancy camera equipment at the end too... 🤣

Nostalgic music + graphics and well produced. Well done.

Ozzuneoj wrote on 2023-02-04, 02:59:

Holy cow, that was genuinely funny. :lol: […]
Show full quote

Vic Zarratt wrote on 2023-02-04, 01:38:

adding ray dream cgi letters to a stopmotion project compiled in movie maker like its 2001:
https://youtu.be/UWe0TTJHRz0

Holy cow, that was genuinely funny. 🤣

I love your shout out to your fancy camera equipment at the end too... 🤣

Nostalgic music + graphics and well produced. Well done.

Thank you for your kind compliment, it pays of the hard work put into it 😊

Made a 386SX build.

Unfortunately, the HDD does not work so I have to wait the new one I've ordered to install MS-DOS 5.0

I will also buy a CRT monitor for it, like this IBM

MT32-pi fun:
Got my "reasonably priced" replacement Pi 3A+ today since I smoked my late Pi 4 by powering it up with 12V instead of 5.
It appears only Pi burned down. Both LCD and external DAC seems to be survived extra 7V

Anyways good news is that Pi3a+ clearly requires less power to run than pi4 but it seems to be more sensitive to voltage drops. I need to find good quality power brick with slightly higher than 5.00V output in order to compensate voltage drop due to my poor wiring setup.