Another classic Deer recapped, the F&C LC-235ATX. Funny how it's marked 240 on the PCB.

Playing socket 939 today. nF3 based board with a 3700+ San Diego core. RAM is 2GB Corsair Pro 3500LL. 6800GT on GPU duty.

Can I get it up to 3GHz? I'm closing in.

Lostdotfish wrote on 2025-03-29, 17:49:

Playing socket 939 today. nF3 based board with a 3700+ San Diego core. RAM is 2GB Corsair Pro 3500LL. 6800GT on GPU duty.

The attachment PXL_20250329_174234838.MP.jpg is no longer available

Can I get it up to 3GHz? I'm closing in.

Ooh i love that memory. Wish i never sold mine (thought it was defective due to issue's on a DFI lanparty ... only years later did i read those boards were very picky on ram). Have searched alot but almost impossible to find (at a fair price) in DDR 400.

Ah, that reminds me I have to bootblock force-flash my K8NF-9. It's been sitting dormant after a failed Windows BIOS flash (dumb me thought GB's utility would flash it properly.). It still POSTs but hangs on a black screen w/ cursor after IDE enumeration.

G-X wrote on 2025-03-29, 18:44:

Lostdotfish wrote on 2025-03-29, 17:49:

Playing socket 939 today. nF3 based board with a 3700+ San Diego core. RAM is 2GB Corsair Pro 3500LL. 6800GT on GPU duty.

The attachment PXL_20250329_174234838.MP.jpg is no longer available

Can I get it up to 3GHz? I'm closing in.

Ooh i love that memory. Wish i never sold mine (thought it was defective due to issue's on a DFI lanparty ... only years later did i read those boards were very picky on ram). Have searched alot but almost impossible to find (at a fair price) in DDR 400.

They turn up from time to time at sensible prices

I got both of these sets for £25 each last year just by keeping an eye on eBay

We made it, just

Cut a half circle on this bracket for the keyboard socket.

Starting a few projects this weekend...

1. Building myself another Z80-MBC2 using lessons I learned from my first build to make something a little smaller and easier to use. I have all the parts on hand, I just to start soldering and programming.
First Build: https://theclassicgeek.blogspot.com/2022/09/t … w-computer.html

2. Decided I wanted to build myself a fully custom PicoNES. Going to get it started this weekend since I'm off work. Have to wait on the NES controller port to arrive from China to complete it. Will have a full custom 3D printed case. Do I need one? Nope. But, should be a fun build. Picked up a Hyperkin Cadet NES controller to use with it.

3. Going to make myself a new MB "control box". Already have one, and it works, but it was a quick and dirty build with what I had lying around. I want something that looks nicer. Ordered a wiring harness so all I have to do is design and print a case and buttons. I'm thinking classic beige!

Modified the 93.81 driver for 2k/XP to run on my Dell Latitude C810's Geforce 2 Go GPU.

Not sure of that was a bright idea, but it works. If anyone wants some pictures, lemme know.

I've started a new thread with the title: A New AMIGA for a 40-Year Legacy in the subsection "System Specs (Showcase your Retro PC / Build logs.)"

Link: A New AMIGA for a 40-Year Legacy

TL;DR:
To celebrate the 40th anniversary of the AMIGA 1000, I'm creating a custom reimagination of the classic machine using a 3D-printed bezel, modified Checkmate 1500 case, and an A500++ mainboard. This project is a modern twist on the original, not a restoration. Though I’ve struggled to finish it in the past, the anniversary is pushing me to complete it. I’ll be sharing my progress, challenges, and insights as I go.

Dodged a bullet with this one 😵‍💫.

Jaa, that can end pretty bad

Lostdotfish wrote on 2025-03-29, 19:04:

They turn up from time to time at sensible prices

The attachment Screenshot 2025-03-29 190111.png is no longer available

I got both of these sets for £25 each last year just by keeping an eye on eBay

The times i checked on EBAY they were always in the 75-$100 plus range. Though i'm not looking in the US because of shipping cost. I will have to check more frequently (i'm almost always looking in "local" second hand websites).

Tiido wrote on 2025-03-30, 19:11:

Jaa, that can end pretty bad

Yes, I was very lucky. It could damage everything on the system.

Is that DDR2?

Have you ever gotten hung up on trying to fix some random retro item that really isn't anything super special?

I recently got a clean and nice-looking Diamond Stealth 64 DRAM (S3 Trio64) PCI (Rev C1, with BIOS 2.01). It's an old-school model with through-hole tantalum caps, and 1MB+1MB of DRAM, just like the ones shown here.

The thing works 100% perfectly... except at 1280x1024. It should handle 1280x1024 with 256 colors, but I just get this weird dark reddish tinted shaky screen with a line across it when I switch to that res. At all other resolutions it works flawlessly. 1024x768 at 16bit color, 1152x864 at 256color, 800x600 at 24bit color. The behavior is the same on a 4:3 LCD and a 4:3 CRT.

I located one questionable solder joint on the back and reflowed that, along with a few others for good measure. I used a needle to check ALL of the legs on the Trio64 chip and managed to find two that were loose, so I reflowed those too.

There aren't any aluminum electrolytic caps on it to have gone bad, and since the tantalums haven't popped, shorted or completely failed then they should be performing about the same as they were brand new.

So... I mean... I have no desire to use this or any other card at the stupid non-4:3 res of 1280x1024... but I just can't bring myself to consider the card tested GOOD with the max res being broken.

Anyone have any idea what would cause this? I highly doubt it is bad memory, since it looks like the display output is corrupted at that res, rather than the actual "pixel" data being drawn. There is no text or icon corruption or misplaced\discolored pixels.

I'll set the thing aside for now and move on, but if anyone else has any ideas I would love to figure out what it's doing.

Also, it's worth mentioning I'm using the drivers built into Windows 98SE. I doubt there are any newer drivers than that for Win9x since the card is from 1994\1995, but I will double check the drivers just in case.

EDIT: It doesn't seem like there are any 9x drivers out there that would be an obvious choice over the ones included with 98SE, so I am inclined to think it isn't a driver issue.

I think it might be in the analog side, some degradation acting as a low pass filter and not letting the dot clock "get up there" resulting in a brownout.

BitWrangler wrote on 2025-04-01, 03:53:

I think it might be in the analog side, some degradation acting as a low pass filter and not letting the dot clock "get up there" resulting in a brownout.

Thanks for the input.

Do you mean that it's possibly part of the RAMDAC inside the Trio64 failing, or possibly a degraded\failed component between the Trio64 and the display outputs? There are a couple of discrete components on the card, but I'm not sure if they could be related.

It's funny, I'm so used to digital stuff these days that I hadn't even considered that. I was thinking "how is 1280x1024 with 8bit color a problem if 1024x768 with 16bit color is not??" ... but yeah, the analog interface doesn't care about color depth. It's the resolution and refresh rate that matter, and 1280x1024 at the same refresh rate is absolutely going to have stricter signal requirements than 1024x768.

Crazy old computers... 🤭

I bought the Joystic- Saittek ST90 when was missing to me in the mall 2005. From EBay.

Ozzuneoj wrote on 2025-04-01, 05:45:

Thanks for the input. […]
Show full quote

BitWrangler wrote on 2025-04-01, 03:53:

I think it might be in the analog side, some degradation acting as a low pass filter and not letting the dot clock "get up there" resulting in a brownout.

Thanks for the input.

Do you mean that it's possibly part of the RAMDAC inside the Trio64 failing, or possibly a degraded\failed component between the Trio64 and the display outputs? There are a couple of discrete components on the card, but I'm not sure if they could be related.

It's funny, I'm so used to digital stuff these days that I hadn't even considered that. I was thinking "how is 1280x1024 with 8bit color a problem if 1024x768 with 16bit color is not??" ... but yeah, the analog interface doesn't care about color depth. It's the resolution and refresh rate that matter, and 1280x1024 at the same refresh rate is absolutely going to have stricter signal requirements than 1024x768.

Crazy old computers... 🤭

I was not originally meaning the reference dot clock, just scrambling for words to mean pixel transition frequency, pixel clock rate at output, and I thought about an edit, but didn't. However, it could also be possible that there's something amiss with the oscillator/clock side of things.

What most reminded me of the fault though was a few years back when I grabbed "any old VGA cable" to hook up a GF3 to a 17" and 640x480 was fine, 800x600 was fine, 1024x768 was muddy/blurry and 1280x1024 was red/brown, tearing/scrolling and you could maybe make out the odd thing that was meant to be a gui element every few seconds when it nearly lined up. So yeah, that was an old "old VGA" real close to original VGA only cable. So presumable attenuation at higher frequencies. Was fine with a decent cable.