Trashbytes wrote on 2024-01-20, 00:11:

There were a good number with this silk screen error, usually they have an orange sticker over the BF6 relabeling it as a BE6 II, this sticker is specific to the Rev2 model only, since your board has the 370 HP controller you have the best version of the BE6II.

The board I picked up had some sticker residue which I cleaned off, but the majority of sticker was missing. I might design and print a replacement.

Rev2 is one hell of a board and you can happily run a 1.133 Ghz 133 FSB Coppermine on this board with a Slotket. The Rev2 went on to become the ABIT BX133 Raid with the addition of a Raid controller.

That's good to know! I may have to pick up another one of these boards. 😁

Kahenraz wrote on 2024-01-20, 14:29:

Thermalwrong wrote on 2024-01-20, 00:41:

I found that Isopropyl alcohol didn't touch it but melamine sponge did, then I found that regular old soap gets it all very clean. I think it's cigarette smoke stuff attached to the outside of the case?

Citrus based cleaners like Goo Gone are your best friend for things that isopropyl won't break up on its own. I've also used Dawn dish soap for anything that has a lot of grease.

Once you find what works for you, it would be advisable to disassemble everything to bits to make sure you've gotten everything clean.

It cleaned up very nicely: Re: What retro activity did you get up to today?
In the end instead of stripping it all I just used one damp microfibre cloth with soap on it to scrub most of the dirt off, then another damp non-soapy microfibre cloth to clean up the rest, then paper towels / clean MF cloth for drying. Rinsing the MF cloths after was horrendous, I'm pretty sure this was in a smoking area for a very long time - but it's quite clean now. The Standby / RTC NiMH batteries hadn't done much damage and have been removed.
Really if not for the smashed screen I'd say this Tecra 750DVD is more complete than my original one which took a very long time for me to source the DVD-ROM drive.

Kahenraz wrote on 2024-01-20, 18:37:

Beware of IBM "Deathstar" drives. […]
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AlessandroB wrote on 2024-01-20, 16:22:

I try to have all IBM Branded in my IBM computer, even Hard disk and RAM. This is for my PentiumII/III class IBM

Beware of IBM "Deathstar" drives.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deskstar

I used to buy IBM branded drives in the 90s, believing that they would carry the brand reliability. I don't remember the details of the failure exactly, but I think my 80GB drive suddenly began reporting itself as having a capacity of 8MB everywhere, including my bootable partition manager. All data was lost.

Oof - kinda funny after enough years since HGST was very highly regarded in recent years til the WD acquisition. I fell prey to the 75GXP deathstar too though, lost whole drives a couple of times over since the first drive was RMA'd and the reconditioned one failed not long after. It was a good lesson for keeping backups 😀

At this point though, I think it was only the 60GXP and 75GXP that had issues, later models if they're still running are likely to keep running for a long time still, if you can put up with the bearing noise

I have some Deskstars as well, though IIRC all are post 60/75GXP era - well into Hitachi's merger, with some reading Excelstor (which I seriously don't understand why were they seen as bad - they're actually just as good Hitachis as the standard Hitachi drives.)

Kahenraz wrote on 2024-01-20, 18:37:

Beware of IBM "Deathstar" drives. […]
Show full quote

AlessandroB wrote on 2024-01-20, 16:22:

I try to have all IBM Branded in my IBM computer, even Hard disk and RAM. This is for my PentiumII/III class IBM

Beware of IBM "Deathstar" drives.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deskstar

I used to buy IBM branded drives in the 90s, believing that they would carry the brand reliability. I don't remember the details of the failure exactly, but I think my 80GB drive suddenly began reporting itself as having a capacity of 8MB everywhere, including my bootable partition manager. All data was lost.

not all models are buggy, only few. I remember that the frist 7200 was very fast and with a nice seeking sound. i currently use:

286 ps/2 -> Microdrive IBM with xt-ide
386 ps/1 -> Original 300mb IBM drive from factory
486 -> ultrastar 15k47
Pentium 60 -> still lookinh wich
Pentium 200 -> -> ultrastar 15k47
Pentium II/III -> -> ultrastar 15k47
Pentium IV -> Velocitaprot 10k

No photos for now but these landed today:

- Bekom 2440 XL DVD-R/RW - nice ECS laptop, runs on VIA chipset I think (Uniwill N251C1) and has a mobile Athlon XP 2400+, Radeon 9000 as well as 512MB of RAM - @3lectr1c I will get some photos of it later this day, maybe in the evening as I need to charge up my phone. It's similar to Gericom's Blockbuster series, design wise. (and has a nice SXGA+ display, ooh la la!)
Boots into German XP Home SP1, and the COA sticker reveals this as indeedc being a Gericom machine.
- 1GB worth of SDRAM + free CT4810 soundcard
- 4.3GB SCSI 68pin IBM Ultrastar DDRS-34560
- PS2 SCPH-39004 which I suspect being mod-chipped.

zuldan wrote on 2024-01-06, 10:32:

Just bought an ASUS CUR-DLS fitted with 2x 1Ghz PIII’s and 512MB 133Mhz ECC memory for $67. Thought I could use it has a Retro LAN File Server and maybe a Quake 3 server running Windows 2000. If anyone has any other ideas, let me know 😀

E6B6BD95-0EA1-480C-8E56-F4349A5AABB5.jpeg

Good board. I had one of those, I also used it in a file server.
I dont remember that brown slot on the end of the PCI slots being there though.

AlessandroB wrote on 2024-01-12, 08:28:

The last controller after: 486-1452CF and Pentium 2940U2W. This one fit in the Pentium 2/3 slot1

Why would you buy a low profile card with a high profile bracket?
Wouldnt you have been better going with the standard height 29160?

ElectroSoldier wrote on 2024-01-21, 16:15:

AlessandroB wrote on 2024-01-12, 08:28:

The last controller after: 486-1452CF and Pentium 2940U2W. This one fit in the Pentium 2/3 slot1

Why would you buy a low profile card with a high profile bracket?
Wouldnt you have been better going with the standard height 29160?

i find that at 10€

2x BFG GeForce AGP 6800 GT OC 256MB

One sold as parts, the other as untested, and both work just fine. They are great looking cards to boot!

Meatball wrote on 2024-01-21, 22:42:

2x BFG GeForce AGP 6800 GT OC 256MB

One sold as parts, the other as untested, and both work just fine. They are great looking cards to boot!

I never trusted the twin fan designs of these cards, have seen far too many of them with one or both fans dead and they are a pain to fix or worse try and replace.

I owned one of these cards back when they were new and it ran both cool and quiet. I bought it specifically for the stellar BFG warranty and for the fact that it was a single-slot card.

This was a long time ago, however. I do not know how easily replacement fans can can be sourced. But there are plenty of compatible dual-slot heatsinks available.

Finally managed to buy a 3.5 inches USB floppy drive. I direly needed one to salvage the BIOS of my P200MMX setup which got corrupted because of a failed upgrade. I had to borrow one from a friend and at that moment I decided to look for one.

Surprisingly difficult to find one at a reasonable price where I live. This one cost my around 10$.

I picked this up last night for the low low price of FREE! Gateway G6-400 system in its original box, with its original keyboard and mouse, documentation, and software bundle (although the recovery media is missing). The system is in its original shipping configuration (minus hard disk) but is untested. Seems to be in really good shape with very little yellowing. Manufacturered in November 1998. Looking forward to getting it up and running.

Got to love those cow-print boxes!

Good find! Great little machines, were pretty popular.

I obtained one of my ‘grail’ items:

Quantum3D Raven

Actually, I’m smitten over just the box artwork; everything else is gravy.

The card, paperback, and discs appear to be unused.

Managed to find an Intel Pentium II 450 SECC1 for my 1998 PC.

Meatball wrote on 2024-01-23, 13:19:

I obtained one of my ‘grail’ items: […]
Show full quote

I obtained one of my ‘grail’ items:

Quantum3D Raven

Actually, I’m smitten over just the box artwork; everything else is gravy.

The card, paperback, and discs appear to be unused.

There were one or two games that were hard coded to only work on this card, if I remember correctly. Probably something that was included in the box.

Shadzilla wrote on 2024-01-23, 08:56:

I picked this up last night for the low low price of FREE! Gateway G6-400 system in its original box, with its original keyboard and mouse, documentation, and software bundle (although the recovery media is missing). The system is in its original shipping configuration (minus hard disk) but is untested. Seems to be in really good shape with very little yellowing. Manufacturered in November 1998. Looking forward to getting it up and running.

Got to love those cow-print boxes!

I did phone tech support for those around the time this one was manufactured. I can't remember if it was that case, but some designs had a problem where the power button didn't correctly push on the actual switch underneath.

I had a friend with one of these. It came with a Voodoo Banshee. Maybe you'll get lucky with this one.

eesz34 wrote on 2024-01-23, 14:07:

I did phone tech support for those around the time this one was manufactured. I can't remember if it was that case, but some designs had a problem where the power button didn't correctly push on the actual switch underneath.

Nice! I can well believe that, the mechanism is a bit rubbish. Appears ok on this one though, not tested yet mind you.

No Banshee sadly, it has an onboard 'AGP' Riva 128 chipset with 8MB, and onboard Creative ES1373 Soundblaster-ish sound. A distinctly mid-range system. This is the board - https://theretroweb.com/motherboards/s/intel- … ster,-micro-atx - part 4000431 which through some serious archive.org digging and research here I've managed to find the latest Gateway BIOS image in case it needs an update. Next job is to open up the PSU for a clean and inspection, test that, then see if it fires up. Last used about 18 years ago the owner told me.