appiah4 wrote on 2023-12-05, 20:45:

That is a Terratec Gold 16 and the best ES1868 card there is.

How does it compare to Guillemot MaxiSound 64 Home Studio Pro SC8600 ?

https://www.dosdays.co.uk/media/guillemot/Max … StudioPro_2.jpg
https://www.dosdays.co.uk/topics/Manufacturers/guillemot.php

I bought this GeForce 4 Ti 4200. It ran quite hot with its passive heatsink, and due to my recent experience, I thought it would be best to replace the thermal paste. The paste was very hard and the heatsink was stuck, so I put it into the freezer for a day. It popped off quite easily then.

The paste that was used was more like a glue, or perhaps that's what it has decomposed to. I was unable to remove with rubbing alcohol and acetone had no effect. It looks like I'm going to have to use some manual force to get it off.

Kahenraz wrote on 2023-12-07, 01:34:

I bought this GeForce 4200 Ti. It ran quite hot with its passive heatsink, and due to my recent experience, I thought it would be best to replace the thermal paste. The paste was very hard and the heatsink was stuck, so I put it into the freezer for a day. It popped off quite easily then.

The paste that was used was more like a glue, or perhaps that's what it has decomposed to. I was unable to remove with rubbing alcohol and acetone had no effect. It looks like I'm going to have to use some manual force to get it off.

20231206_203717.jpg

Both 9800 SEs that I have had that exact same situation - both required the freezer trick; I then used Arctic Silver thermal compound remover and a single edge razor blade to remove the fossilized bits of petrified thermal compound.

Kahenraz wrote on 2023-12-07, 01:34:

The paste that was used was more like a glue, or perhaps that's what it has decomposed to. I was unable to remove with rubbing alcohol and acetone had no effect. It looks like I'm going to have to use some manual force to get it off.

Recently I found out that contact cleaners (either from WD-40 or 3M) can soften and dissolve hardened thermal paste much faster than isopropyl alcohol.

I ended up scraping at it very slowly with a razor blade. This seemed to be the only way to remove it. I did this carefully under a microscope, with a puddle of isopropyl alcohol on top to help remove the debris while scraping.

I ended up scraping away most of the information printed on the chip, but at least it's flat and smooth now, and ready for some proper thermal paste.

My advice to anyone trying this is to not attempt it unless you have a steady hand and a lot of time set aside for scraping.

This paste looks like the same stuff as in my ELSA Gladiac 920. Hard to get off unless heated with hair dryer. Nothing else worked.

A001 wrote on 2023-12-07, 06:54:

This paste looks like the same stuff as in my ELSA Gladiac 920. Hard to get off unless heated with hair dryer. Nothing else worked.

Be careful with that, you may end up causing issues with the BGA soldering under the chip if you are too zealous with the heat..

A001 wrote on 2023-12-07, 06:54:

This paste looks like the same stuff as in my ELSA Gladiac 920. Hard to get off unless heated with hair dryer. Nothing else worked.

its a thermal epoxy and a lot of GPU around that era used it, it responds to freezing pretty well if the cooler is still attached. If not attached then ISO will eventually dissolve it but it'll take a bit of elbow grease to remove it all.

Had to do this on a couple of Geforce 4's and a few Voodoo Cards, found the freezing trick is best and safest method of removing both the cooler and epoxy together.

Nothing special just Matrox Millennium G450 16MB and 32MB

r00lz wrote on 2023-12-07, 13:38:

Nothing special just Matrox Millennium G450 16MB and 32MB
IMG20231207151457_2.jpg

Silly story that seeing a pair of Matrox cards remind me of:

When Matrox released the first dual output cards (G400 IIRC), we did a promo with them showing the first PC game supporting 4 monitors (over two cards) and 4 controllers (Sidewinders with the daisy chain passthrough) with Renegade Racers. CPU wasn't really up to the job, but it was playable and had some photos on there website for a while (can't find it now).

I think the retail versions shipped with support, so in theory it should work to this day (assuming you can assemble all the HW in one place 😁). IIRC we also supported using a Voodoo as a separate screen for 2 player games (1 on the primary card, another on the secondary).

Well, I got myself thrown into the world of external midi devices. Got this for relatively cheap.

PD2JK wrote on 2023-12-07, 15:28:

Well, I got myself thrown into the world of external midi devices. Got this for relatively cheap.

What is the difference between this one and Roland MT-32?

Turbo -> wrote on 2023-12-07, 17:42:

PD2JK wrote on 2023-12-07, 15:28:

Well, I got myself thrown into the world of external midi devices. Got this for relatively cheap.

What is the difference between this one and Roland MT-32?

I'm a bit of a n00b at them, but I think extra voicy, different noises.

Turbo -> wrote on 2023-12-07, 17:42:

PD2JK wrote on 2023-12-07, 15:28:

Well, I got myself thrown into the world of external midi devices. Got this for relatively cheap.

What is the difference between this one and Roland MT-32?

Long story, and you can find out a lot of on-line information on this, but long story short: for optimal experience, you want an MT-32 (or even better, a CM-32) for older DOS games (that only support MT-32 for music) and a General MIDI synthesizer for newer games (that support both MT-32 and General MIDI, and sometimes even specifically the Sound Canvas, which is a superset of General MIDI).

This little SocketA PC just arrived from eBay - I bought it because I was weirdly attracted to its kind of ugly early 2000s look, and the fact it was super compact for a case that takes full height expansion cards and has full sized 5.25" and 3.5" drive bays (hidden under the flap at the top).

The eBay photos looked a little more black than grey, and I hadn't noticed that there were also clearly drive bay and front USB covers which are missing, but I still think it has something about it! The notch round the middle feels like it's trying to look a bit like a 90s game console? Does anyone recognise it?

The system itself is pretty dirty, but the Asrock K7VM4 seems in pretty good condition with no bulging caps or anything. It came with an Athlon XP 2500 and 1Gb of DDR RAM and the CD-RW but no HDD or floppy.

It POSTs happily, although the cheap looking little SFX PSU seems to make a really piercing whine the moment it is connected to a socket, even before it boots. I'm guessing that is just being cheap and nasty from the start? Or would it be worth opening it up to clean out and check for failing components to see if that helps?

justin1985 wrote on 2023-12-07, 22:36:

It POSTs happily, although the cheap looking little SFX PSU seems to make a really piercing whine the moment it is connected to a socket, even before it boots. I'm guessing that is just being cheap and nasty from the start? Or would it be worth opening it up to clean out and check for failing components to see if that helps?

I'd open up the PSU and check the caps. It shouldn't be screaming at you, even if it is a cheap old thing.

For $16,I got this, Paradise WD90C33-ZZ, have purchased the V53C8256HP45 chip, ready to upgrade it to 2MB, expecting it to have good performance.

Turbo -> wrote on 2023-12-07, 17:42:

PD2JK wrote on 2023-12-07, 15:28:

Well, I got myself thrown into the world of external midi devices. Got this for relatively cheap.

What is the difference between this one and Roland MT-32?

MT-32 is a Multi Timbre device and not GM compatible. The SC-55 (on this picture) is a GM/GS device and is capable of playing in MT mode (it can emulate an MT-32 with SC-55 samples) but sounds significantly different. Ideally, you want both. Practically, you could just build an MT32-Pi to emulate the MT-32 and use FluidSynth to get better sounding GM than the SC-55 in one device..

justin1985 wrote on 2023-12-07, 22:36:

This little SocketA PC just arrived from eBay - I bought it because I was weirdly attracted to its kind of ugly early 2000s look, and the fact it was super compact for a case that takes full height expansion cards and has full sized 5.25" and 3.5" drive bays (hidden under the flap at the top).

This case screams Sharp X68000 to me. Very nice.

Turbo -> wrote on 2023-12-07, 17:42:

PD2JK wrote on 2023-12-07, 15:28:

Well, I got myself thrown into the world of external midi devices. Got this for relatively cheap.

What is the difference between this one and Roland MT-32?

Also note that not all SC-55s are 100% GM compatible. The early models were GS; I think that GM was not formally ratified just yet? The later models were GS/GM. You can see this by the presence of the General MIDI logo on the front bezel. I think there may also be an issue with the device responding to the GM reset command versus the GS reset command.

The effect seems to be very minor. See here for more information:

Roland SC-55 and MIDI compatibility

The earliest Roland SC-55s simply have a "GS STANDARD" logo on the bottom of the front panel, while slightly later SC-55s have a "GS" logo. Modules with the GS logo may still have General MIDI firmware.

There are also several different firmware revisions of the SC-55, with the latter 2.0 versions sounding slightly different due to a lawsuit from Yamaha regarding the capital tone fallback feature.

Depending on whether the game was made for the SC-88 or the SC-55, you might also run out of instrument polyphony, even though the music is still General MIDI.

Here is some additional information related to your SC-55:

Significant differences with certain MIDI files across Roland synthesizers

PCB destroying adhesive found in my Roland Sound Canvas SC-55mkII (inspect your synthesizer!)

Roland SC-55 Refurbishment

Have you opened your SC-55 to check the battery inside?

Welcome to the rabbit hole.