Added an MX400, MX420 PCI, and GeForce2 Ultra to the collection. All are 64MB/128-bit cards. The MX420 has 4.5ns RAM, and it clocks up to 233MHz before blowing out. The default clock of 166MHz really holds this card back. Without adjusting the core, 3DMark 2000 scores improved from about 5400 to 6600. Boosting the core to 280MHz provides the ability for basically free 2x Aniso. The score was about 6500. The Ultra clock goes to 290MHz without any problems, and I didn't push it any further.
The RAM is 4ns, but I can only get it to 247MHz for artifact-free performance. 250MHz shows just a bit of pixel flicker and by 260MHz, I'm basically getting scanlines.

mrfusion92 wrote on 2023-10-14, 07:49:

My frenzy for subnotebooks strikes again.

Bought an HP Omnibook 800CT with full gear of accessory (external floppy and cdrom) and original boxes from original owner.

All for 30€ because the laptop shows only a white screen. But it actually boots, because Windows sounds can be heard. So I'm hoping it is just a dodgy cable inside.

Nice ! I think that external cdrom is a Panasonic (looks near similar to my Pana 4x scsi for my Toshiba 110cs, left end of the cable looks like same micro scsi of that era). That alone is worth the money if it works....
Mine has the PCMCIA scsi card too so can use it on other non-cd older lappy's. Good find and hope you get the 800ct working !

appiah4 wrote on 2023-10-14, 19:29:

I got these two in return for a trade where I gave away a high end Socket 754 PC and a 3dfx video card. I think it was a fair trade, and I hope to have a dual Socket 8 motherboard for these some day. Currently I own only a single single socket Socket 8 motherboard, which is a shame. I'd love to try NT 4.0 with these.

Nice ! am always a sucker for Pentium Pro's and those are 512k versions.

Latitude C600.

Was in worse shape than what you're seeing...

Specs:

P3 1GHz (Coppermine likely)
Rage Mobility 128 8MB (not bad I guess)
440BX
40GB HDD (Samsung)
originally had XP, wiped and installed 2k Pro SP4.

Also one of those goofy JNC-Nokia styled cases, out of which an A64 3000+ and a Geforce 6600GT came out of.

misterjones wrote on 2023-10-14, 19:18:

Found this at a local thrift shop yesterday. Still shrink wrapped and everything. […]
Show full quote

Found this at a local thrift shop yesterday. Still shrink wrapped and everything.

What a cool find! I remember back in the day wanting an Xpert@Play 98, don't recall if I ever got one.

@PcBytes - Here's your obligated warning that the C600 has a VARTA NiMH CMOS battery located directly on top of the motherboard, under the keyboard. Get it out before your C600 is destroyed!

3lectr1c wrote on 2023-10-16, 02:14:

@PcBytes - Here's your obligated warning that the C600 has a VARTA NiMH CMOS battery located directly on top of the motherboard, under the keyboard. Get it out before your C600 is destroyed!

Sometimes it doesn't even need to be a direct leak. I had a Sony Vaio laptop ruiend from the corrosion creeping all the way down the CMOS battery wire, onto the power supply circuit, where it ate into and destroyed it.

3lectr1c wrote on 2023-10-16, 02:14:

@PcBytes - Here's your obligated warning that the C600 has a VARTA NiMH CMOS battery located directly on top of the motherboard, under the keyboard. Get it out before your C600 is destroyed!

It hasn't leaked yet... and I found it near the RAM slots, not the top of the mobo. I think it was the C610 that it had it under the keyboard?

Speaking of which... maybe I can use the CMOS battery in the C600 to revive the 610? The 610 wouldn't detect HDDs no matter what though I remember the VARTA battery missing and someone here did suggest it could be due to it.

Ah, I was not aware that the C600 had it in a different location. I've heard that someone had it destroy their system, so the difference in location doesn't mean it's safe in this case.
I've only seen firsthand the C610 and the C640.

@PcBytes - the C610 doesn't need the battery installed for it to detect drives. Mine has had it removed for many years now and it's fine. Yours must be some other fault unfortunately.
I wouldn't put the C600's battery back in any computer at all. It's just not safe now given their age.

New in-box ESS Solo-1 (TerraTec 128i PCI) obtained for really cheap a few weeks ago. Unfortunately, despite all the good things said about its DOS compatibility (and ESFM working fine), I couldn't get its PCM output working reliably on the machine I bought it for, and ended up implementing SBEMU support for its on-board (SIS7012) sound chip instead, which - despite the software overhead - seems to work much more reliably than the Solo-1, so that machine isn't in need of that PCI sound card anymore. On Linux, both PCM and FM are fine, so the card works perfectly fine.

@thp
May be due to version of the card? This is the most equipped one:
https://www.phc.sk/resize/e/800/800/files/imp … o-1-500x500.jpg

More:
https://www.pc-schnulli.de/hardw/skpci/trskpci.html

thp wrote on 2023-10-17, 05:41:

New in-box ESS Solo-1 (TerraTec 128i PCI) obtained for really cheap a few weeks ago. Unfortunately, despite all the good things said about its DOS compatibility (and ESFM working fine), I couldn't get its PCM output working reliably on the machine I bought it for, and ended up implementing SBEMU support for its on-board (SIS7012) sound chip instead, which - despite the software overhead - seems to work much more reliably than the Solo-1, so that machine isn't in need of that PCI sound card anymore. On Linux, both PCM and FM are fine, so the card works perfectly fine.

Very surprising box art.
Was that creepy deep sea fish supposed to convince me to buy this sound card ?

acl wrote on 2023-10-17, 07:22:

Very surprising box art.
Was that creepy deep sea fish supposed to convince me to buy this sound card ?

Fish are silent, so it perfectly matches a sound card with dysfunctional PCM 🤣

acl wrote on 2023-10-17, 07:22:

Very surprising box art.
Was that creepy deep sea fish supposed to convince me to buy this sound card ?

Even more curious, at the back of the box in the lower left corner it says "Did you know? - The latin name for the fish on the front is ANOPLOGASTER CORNUTA", so it seems like TerraTec's marketing team was at least self-aware that they were putting fish art onto the front of the box.

thp wrote on 2023-10-17, 05:41:

New in-box ESS Solo-1 (TerraTec 128i PCI) obtained for really cheap a few weeks ago. Unfortunately, despite all the good things said about its DOS compatibility (and ESFM working fine), I couldn't get its PCM output working reliably on the machine I bought it for, and ended up implementing SBEMU support for its on-board (SIS7012) sound chip instead, which - despite the software overhead - seems to work much more reliably than the Solo-1, so that machine isn't in need of that PCI sound card anymore. On Linux, both PCM and FM are fine, so the card works perfectly fine.

These cards are generally very compatible, but I have also had the odd occasion where they didn't work. It's rare, but it does happen. It has to do with chipset incompatibility with how they are routing DMA over the PCI bus, I believe.

Here are instructions on how to use ESS drivers, along with the latest versions:

Guide for configuring ESS PCI Audio cards for DOS (Solo, Maestro, Allegro, etc.)

Note that these cards need to be configured from within Windows. You cannot just copy an INI file over from another machine, since it sets itself up based on what feature for DMA is most compatible with the hardware of your machine.

Today I got those!

-2 PCI risers (PCI-X or 64bit PCI maybe, I don't know)
-Trendnet Realtek RTL8139D PCI 10/100 network card

Any opinions?

RetroPC_King wrote on 2023-10-17, 18:13:

Today I got those! […]
Show full quote

Today I got those!

-2 PCI risers (PCI-X or 64bit PCI maybe, I don't know)
-Trendnet Realtek RTL8139D PCI 10/100 network card

Any opinions?

1- Those tends to be very mainboard/brand specific
2- very generic card.

Usually if the contact count on the bottom is the same as on the socket you are okay. If the slots are positioned different or there seems to be a lot more than decoupling capacitors on the board, then YMMV.

Grzyb wrote on 2023-10-17, 07:53:

acl wrote on 2023-10-17, 07:22:

Very surprising box art.
Was that creepy deep sea fish supposed to convince me to buy this sound card ?

Fish are silent, so it perfectly matches a sound card with dysfunctional PCM 🤣

😄 But it works on Linux so the fish is not always silent.
(I personally consider Linux sound to be a total mess. ALSA, PulseAudio, PipeWire... )

thp wrote on 2023-10-17, 07:59:

acl wrote on 2023-10-17, 07:22:

Very surprising box art.
Was that creepy deep sea fish supposed to convince me to buy this sound card ?

Even more curious, at the back of the box in the lower left corner it says "Did you know? - The latin name for the fish on the front is ANOPLOGASTER CORNUTA", so it seems like TerraTec's marketing team was at least self-aware that they were putting fish art onto the front of the box.

They take their job very seriously 😁
I googled a bit and i could not find any other Terratec package featuring animals.

acl wrote on 2023-10-17, 21:00:

They take their job very seriously 😁
I googled a bit and i could not find any other Terratec package featuring animals.

The 512i just has a toy rocket racecar on the front and no explaination on the back...
Strange they only did this for the 128i.