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Bought these (retro) hardware today

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Reply 47880 of 52357, by RandomStranger

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Don't know. I also always struggled to get 3DMark scores as high as they are supposed to be, but this never translated to decreased gaming performance compared to official hardware reviews from reputable sites. Like for example my X800 XT AGP (with a 3GHz Prescott) scored close to 17000 points in 2001SE which should have been a score appropriate for an X700 series card. This lead me to not give a crap about 3DMark scores.

sreq.png retrogamer-s.png

Reply 47881 of 52357, by Babasha

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Shagittarius wrote on 2023-02-02, 23:17:
Babasha wrote on 2023-02-02, 19:45:

Powerhungry AGP monster

What CPU are you using in that rig, those scores seem low to me.

My ATI 9800 scores 22k

Yep! This “rig” is overbottlenecked))) AMD AthlonXP 1733MHz based system assembled just to check 6800 Ultra health 😀

Need help? Begin with photo and model of your hardware 😉

Reply 47882 of 52357, by BitWrangler

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Ah yeah, 133FSB and below 2GHz. Socket A needs to get the FSB/DDR speed high and clock over 2Ghz to keep up with later DX9 cards. 3DM2001 is a graphics heavy system benchmark rather than a pure pure graphics benchmark.

Unicorn herding operations are proceeding, but all the totes of hens teeth and barrels of rocking horse poop give them plenty of hiding spots.

Reply 47883 of 52357, by Nexxen

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BitWrangler wrote on 2023-02-03, 15:20:

Ah yeah, 133FSB and below 2GHz. Socket A needs to get the FSB/DDR speed high and clock over 2Ghz to keep up with later DX9 cards. 3DM2001 is a graphics heavy system benchmark rather than a pure pure graphics benchmark.

IIRC it was a line of benchmarks vs 754 and 939, clock per clock results and why go with 939.
I could be wrong, but at least this is why I didn't go for a used socket A and bought a 939 system instead.
If this keeps happening I might build some 939 system just for the sake of it 😀

PC#1 Pentium 233 MMX - 98SE
PC#2 PIII-1Ghz - 98SE/W2K

Reply 47884 of 52357, by BitWrangler

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Ozzuneoj wrote on 2023-02-03, 01:40:
Just wanted to mention, this "AST Advantage! Plus 486DX2-66" arrived yesterday and sure enough, the CT2760 and WD90C31 match the […]
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Ozzuneoj wrote on 2023-01-25, 22:09:
Also, I'm pretty pleased with this purchase (sellers photos)... […]
Show full quote

Also, I'm pretty pleased with this purchase (sellers photos)...

1.jpg
2.jpg

Sticker on the computer says the system has a Paradise SVGA card of some sort. And that top card definitely looks like a mid-90s Sound Blaster...

Soo... after spending a little time comparing this photo to photos online...
6a.jpg

I determined that this computer absolutely has an AWE32 CT2760 (Rev. 1).
(pic from batyra.pl)
Sound-Blaster-CT2760-AWE32-Awers (Custom).jpg

... and the VGA card looks to be identical to this fantastic Paradise WD-90C31 card, which is also an awesome score. I believe these do 16bit color, unlike the older models.
wdc_wd_90c31_lr_f (Custom).jpg
I'm sure the board has battery damage and will need some work, but for the price I paid (especially after the shipping was adjusted by the seller) it was well worth it for these really nice parts, plus a really neat 486 ISA system that runs.

This detective work was a lot of fun. 😁

Just wanted to mention, this "AST Advantage! Plus 486DX2-66" arrived yesterday and sure enough, the CT2760 and WD90C31 match the ones I found pictures of above exactly. Then... I realized that CD-ROM drive was an original Creative "Sound Blaster" CD-ROM, model CR-563-B 😮!! So... I'm very pleased. Does anyone know if the CT2760 ever came in a CD-ROM combo set? The drive is actually attached to the sound card in this PC, which is something I honestly don't see too often, despite the fact that most cards back then had CD interfaces on them.

On top of that, it looks to have minimal battery damage. I haven't pulled the guts out of it yet for a thorough inspection, but I only see a little bit of white crud on the end of the battery facing the keyboard port. The other side is clean.

This thing is built like a TANK by the way... I've never seen such a premium\expensive feeling PC chassis. The metal is razor sharp, but I'm pretty confident that you could use the frame of this thing as a jack stand. 🤣

As for functionality, I can get it to POST but sadly I cannot seem to get it to boot from the hard drive or from a floppy. Even when I set the hard drive parameters properly it won't boot from that... and none of my boot floppies are recognized as bootable, despite the drive light coming on to check them. Is it possible that it's one of those quirky machines that just cannot function without a CMOS battery? This is, admittedly, the first time I've ever tried diagnosing a 486 system like this. I'm more familiar with older PCs with no BIOS setup, and newer PCs that have a lot more options than this one. I can't even figure out how to boot from the floppy without telling the system there is no hard drive, because it has no boot order selection. There's probably a key to press to make it do that, but I can't seem to find any info about this model online.

I can get you to the front door of a support site here https://web.archive.org/web/20080325101727/ht … com/default.asp but a lot was handled with server side scripting, so there's not too much you can find unfortunately

Unicorn herding operations are proceeding, but all the totes of hens teeth and barrels of rocking horse poop give them plenty of hiding spots.

Reply 47885 of 52357, by Ozzuneoj

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BitWrangler wrote on 2023-02-03, 15:45:
Ozzuneoj wrote on 2023-02-03, 01:40:
Just wanted to mention, this "AST Advantage! Plus 486DX2-66" arrived yesterday and sure enough, the CT2760 and WD90C31 match the […]
Show full quote
Ozzuneoj wrote on 2023-01-25, 22:09:
Also, I'm pretty pleased with this purchase (sellers photos)... […]
Show full quote

Also, I'm pretty pleased with this purchase (sellers photos)...

1.jpg
2.jpg

Sticker on the computer says the system has a Paradise SVGA card of some sort. And that top card definitely looks like a mid-90s Sound Blaster...

Soo... after spending a little time comparing this photo to photos online...
6a.jpg

I determined that this computer absolutely has an AWE32 CT2760 (Rev. 1).
(pic from batyra.pl)
Sound-Blaster-CT2760-AWE32-Awers (Custom).jpg

... and the VGA card looks to be identical to this fantastic Paradise WD-90C31 card, which is also an awesome score. I believe these do 16bit color, unlike the older models.
wdc_wd_90c31_lr_f (Custom).jpg
I'm sure the board has battery damage and will need some work, but for the price I paid (especially after the shipping was adjusted by the seller) it was well worth it for these really nice parts, plus a really neat 486 ISA system that runs.

This detective work was a lot of fun. 😁

Just wanted to mention, this "AST Advantage! Plus 486DX2-66" arrived yesterday and sure enough, the CT2760 and WD90C31 match the ones I found pictures of above exactly. Then... I realized that CD-ROM drive was an original Creative "Sound Blaster" CD-ROM, model CR-563-B 😮!! So... I'm very pleased. Does anyone know if the CT2760 ever came in a CD-ROM combo set? The drive is actually attached to the sound card in this PC, which is something I honestly don't see too often, despite the fact that most cards back then had CD interfaces on them.

On top of that, it looks to have minimal battery damage. I haven't pulled the guts out of it yet for a thorough inspection, but I only see a little bit of white crud on the end of the battery facing the keyboard port. The other side is clean.

This thing is built like a TANK by the way... I've never seen such a premium\expensive feeling PC chassis. The metal is razor sharp, but I'm pretty confident that you could use the frame of this thing as a jack stand. 🤣

As for functionality, I can get it to POST but sadly I cannot seem to get it to boot from the hard drive or from a floppy. Even when I set the hard drive parameters properly it won't boot from that... and none of my boot floppies are recognized as bootable, despite the drive light coming on to check them. Is it possible that it's one of those quirky machines that just cannot function without a CMOS battery? This is, admittedly, the first time I've ever tried diagnosing a 486 system like this. I'm more familiar with older PCs with no BIOS setup, and newer PCs that have a lot more options than this one. I can't even figure out how to boot from the floppy without telling the system there is no hard drive, because it has no boot order selection. There's probably a key to press to make it do that, but I can't seem to find any info about this model online.

I can get you to the front door of a support site here https://web.archive.org/web/20080325101727/ht … com/default.asp but a lot was handled with server side scripting, so there's not too much you can find unfortunately

Ah, yeah, I think I found the part number they want on that page but as expected there is no archived page available for it. Too bad. 🙁

Thanks for the link though. I'm kind of surprised just how hard it is to find manuals for things like this online. I guess it's just old enough that it would have been obsolete by the time people were digitizing lots of manuals.

Now for some blitting from the back buffer.

Reply 47886 of 52357, by BitWrangler

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Ozzuneoj wrote on 2023-02-03, 17:15:
BitWrangler wrote on 2023-02-03, 15:45:
Ozzuneoj wrote on 2023-02-03, 01:40:
Just wanted to mention, this "AST Advantage! Plus 486DX2-66" arrived yesterday and sure enough, the CT2760 and WD90C31 match the […]
Show full quote

Just wanted to mention, this "AST Advantage! Plus 486DX2-66" arrived yesterday and sure enough, the CT2760 and WD90C31 match the ones I found pictures of above exactly. Then... I realized that CD-ROM drive was an original Creative "Sound Blaster" CD-ROM, model CR-563-B 😮!! So... I'm very pleased. Does anyone know if the CT2760 ever came in a CD-ROM combo set? The drive is actually attached to the sound card in this PC, which is something I honestly don't see too often, despite the fact that most cards back then had CD interfaces on them.

On top of that, it looks to have minimal battery damage. I haven't pulled the guts out of it yet for a thorough inspection, but I only see a little bit of white crud on the end of the battery facing the keyboard port. The other side is clean.

This thing is built like a TANK by the way... I've never seen such a premium\expensive feeling PC chassis. The metal is razor sharp, but I'm pretty confident that you could use the frame of this thing as a jack stand. 🤣

As for functionality, I can get it to POST but sadly I cannot seem to get it to boot from the hard drive or from a floppy. Even when I set the hard drive parameters properly it won't boot from that... and none of my boot floppies are recognized as bootable, despite the drive light coming on to check them. Is it possible that it's one of those quirky machines that just cannot function without a CMOS battery? This is, admittedly, the first time I've ever tried diagnosing a 486 system like this. I'm more familiar with older PCs with no BIOS setup, and newer PCs that have a lot more options than this one. I can't even figure out how to boot from the floppy without telling the system there is no hard drive, because it has no boot order selection. There's probably a key to press to make it do that, but I can't seem to find any info about this model online.

I can get you to the front door of a support site here https://web.archive.org/web/20080325101727/ht … com/default.asp but a lot was handled with server side scripting, so there's not too much you can find unfortunately

Ah, yeah, I think I found the part number they want on that page but as expected there is no archived page available for it. Too bad. 🙁

Thanks for the link though. I'm kind of surprised just how hard it is to find manuals for things like this online. I guess it's just old enough that it would have been obsolete by the time people were digitizing lots of manuals.

There's this site too, but don't see manuals per se, http://www.sandyflat.net/digerati/ast486/index.htm look at menu on left, lot of varios AST drivers and files pulled from ari or older AST sites not just for the system on title page.

Unicorn herding operations are proceeding, but all the totes of hens teeth and barrels of rocking horse poop give them plenty of hiding spots.

Reply 47887 of 52357, by Ozzuneoj

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BitWrangler wrote on 2023-02-03, 18:01:
Ozzuneoj wrote on 2023-02-03, 17:15:
BitWrangler wrote on 2023-02-03, 15:45:

I can get you to the front door of a support site here https://web.archive.org/web/20080325101727/ht … com/default.asp but a lot was handled with server side scripting, so there's not too much you can find unfortunately

Ah, yeah, I think I found the part number they want on that page but as expected there is no archived page available for it. Too bad. 🙁

Thanks for the link though. I'm kind of surprised just how hard it is to find manuals for things like this online. I guess it's just old enough that it would have been obsolete by the time people were digitizing lots of manuals.

There's this site too, but don't see manuals per se, http://www.sandyflat.net/digerati/ast486/index.htm look at menu on left, lot of varios AST drivers and files pulled from ari or older AST sites not just for the system on title page.

Wow, there's a lot of misc stuff on that site. Really wish they had manuals, but maybe something will turn up that will help me get this thing booting. It's also possible that the hard drive and floppy are both just bad, or at least the floppy is and the hard drive just needs to be formatted and set up properly.

Now for some blitting from the back buffer.

Reply 47888 of 52357, by Horun

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Bought a SiiG brand metal HD USB enclosure for cheap ($5) claiming to be PATA/SATA compatible but is not, only SATA and exactly like this:
https://www.siig.com/superspeed-usb-3-0-to-sa … HBoCmzQQAvD_BwE
Still usable but not what I wanted. Oh Well was worth a try 😀

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. https://archive.org/details/@horun

Reply 47889 of 52357, by vetz

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TrashPanda wrote on 2023-02-02, 12:29:

Just a quick one, nabbed this Tekram DC-690CD Cached Raid card for my 486 box, Having trouble finding the manual for it so if anyone has a link that would be awesome, comes with 4mb of cache which I will upgrade to 16Mb. From what little I have found it supports 4 HDDs of up to 4gb each in a raid or 2 HDDs and 2 optical drives ..not sure on this last bit.

I have a Tekram SCSI card in the box already but its only use it to support the internal ZIP drive ..hopefully the two can get along ok.

Tekram DC-690CD.jpg

I own this card fully boxed, so if you cant find the manual, I can scan it later this year when I empty my storage shed.

3D Accelerated Games List (Proprietary APIs - No 3DFX/Direct3D)
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Reply 47891 of 52357, by buckeye

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HanSolo wrote on 2023-02-02, 15:14:

One of the few things I was still looking for is a Slot1 or S370 Board in Baby AT-format. I finally found one: Gigabyte GA-6VA7+. According to the seller unused, so I hope it still works.

Nice board, wonder how the sound is for DOS games with the ISA slots? Like to get one myself until I saw the prices on Ebay that is.

Asus P5N-E Intel Core 2 Duo 3.33ghz. 4GB DDR2 Geforce 470 1GB SB X-Fi Titanium 650W XP SP3
Intel SE440BX P3 450 256MB 80GB SSD Radeon 7200 64mb SB 32pnp 350W 98SE
MSI x570 Gaming Pro Carbon Ryzen 3700x 32GB DDR4 Zotac RTX 3070 8GB WD Black 1TB 850W

Reply 47892 of 52357, by PD2JK

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Why would the sound be different from any other board with ISA slots. Bus clock speed or just plain instability can make a difference, or a missing negative voltage rail perhaps....

i386 16 ⇒ i486 DX4 100 ⇒ Pentium MMX 200 ⇒ Athlon Orion 700 | TB 1000 ⇒ AthlonXP 1700+ ⇒ Opteron 165 ⇒ Dual Opteron 856

Reply 47894 of 52357, by Windows9566

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Got myself some Aztechs
fDxJNlo.jpg

R5 5600X, 32 GB RAM, RTX 3060 TI, Win11
P3 600, 256 MB RAM, nVidia Riva TNT2 M64, SB Vibra 16S, Win98
PMMX 200, 128 MB RAM, S3 Virge DX, Yamaha YMF719, Win95
486DX2 66, 32 MB RAM, Trident TGUI9440, ESS ES688F, DOS

Reply 47895 of 52357, by PD2JK

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The bottom one looks like the most powerful. In terms of driving some nifty speakers with that built-in car amp.

The second one however... Oof. How does that sound. One chip to rule them all? 😁

i386 16 ⇒ i486 DX4 100 ⇒ Pentium MMX 200 ⇒ Athlon Orion 700 | TB 1000 ⇒ AthlonXP 1700+ ⇒ Opteron 165 ⇒ Dual Opteron 856

Reply 47896 of 52357, by TheAbandonwareGuy

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Found 2 5:4 aspect ratio displays from 2013, complete with Displayport. I imagine these must be some of the last high end square aspect ratio monitors produced. I actually bought 3, but one upon testing had a cracked screen and its getting returned. $15 each, solidly B grade monitors. Each has a single mark towards the outside of the display and some very light scratches.

The good ones are a Dell Professional Series P1913S and a HP Compaq LA1956X. Both are 19". 1280x1024, 1000:1 contrast LED edge-lit displays. They blow my 2 Dell 1903s out of the water. These trade blows with a modern monitor in terms of color and contrast. These are legit the only LCDs I would consider over a CRT for an XP machine. Still not as good of contrast, but these IMO would be usable in most games.

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I used to own over 160 graphics card, I've since recovered from graphics card addiction

Reply 47897 of 52357, by Demetrio

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Got this IBM ThinkPad (Pentium II 333MHz) for free 🙂

Unfortunately, the screen metal holders are broken, the CMOS battery is dead and, in general, it is really slow.

Had to do some maintenance.

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Reply 47898 of 52357, by Baleog

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Ozzuneoj wrote on 2023-02-03, 06:14:
Just got this in the mail today. Had the opportunity to get it dirt cheap in "non-working" condition, and after reading the spec […]
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Just got this in the mail today. Had the opportunity to get it dirt cheap in "non-working" condition, and after reading the specs online it seems like it should have about the same playback capabilities as an SC-55? I figured it would be worth fixing.

Turns out, the period-correct looking, Japan-made 9v power adapter included with it was actually center positive. Oops! I hooked it up to a proper 9v center negative adapter and it works perfectly. 😮

I haven't tested it with retro games yet, but I played the demo songs and it sounds really nice.

20230203_005203 (Custom).jpg

20230203_005349 (Custom).jpg

I will be making a thread about it shortly since there is very little mention of this thing on VOGONS. 😀

Nice looking unit! According to the manual it has 226 voices which means that it is most likely based on the SC-50. And the SC-50 is essentially a SC-55 MK II without the MT32 emulation (which is not super useful anyway).

Edit. I just found your thread about it!

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Reply 47899 of 52357, by LewisRaz

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Won this for £10 last week. Should be fun to mess with..

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