dominusprog wrote on 2025-08-01, 11:56:

DarthSun wrote on 2025-08-01, 11:09:

dominusprog wrote on 2025-08-01, 04:26:

That it wasn't a factory item, it was designed by a small manufactory, and it was available to order for a while. They asked in […]
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That it wasn't a factory item, it was designed by a small manufactory, and it was available to order for a while. They asked in a domestic topic if I needed it, because group orders are available.
It works fine, even though it was turned on a long time ago.

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Got it 🙂. Nice build by the way, I'm currently working on my SS7 and I just bought a case similar to yours, post a pic of the front if you can.

I didn't bleach it, it's such a beautiful yellow, as if it came from the factory 😀

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No, the bezel is different, but inside was very similar. By the way, I would kill for one of those Creative drives 😁.
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Occupational injury. I used to work a second job at a computer repair shop, then I saw the Creative remote-controlled optical drive on the counter at the supermarket, so I have to say I need it at a wholesale price.

Installed Turbo C++, TASM, Turbo Profiler and Turbo Debugger onto my Pocket 8088 laptop.

I plan take to take it with me on family holiday and do a bit of programming on it in the mornings before family is up (I am an early riser - wife and daughter are not!).

I have no doubt that I will struggle with that tiny keyboard and lack of mouse (don't want to bring peripherals). But will be an exercise in patience I am sure. This machine is slooooow! 😀

PcBytes wrote on 2025-07-31, 23:34:

Upgraded a 128MB GF6600 to 256MB, using a donor card - both are PNY, both use the same RAM.

Awesome, any pictures? Was it BGA or TSOP memory? Does it overclock better now?

Thermalwrong wrote on 2025-07-28, 13:53:

Wahoo Vogons is back :) I was concerned that it might have been caused by the age verification stuff going on in the UK but perh […]
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Wahoo Vogons is back 😀 I was concerned that it might have been caused by the age verification stuff going on in the UK but perhaps it was a hosting problem?

Uh, I modified one of my Toshiba Libretto 50CT to have a way to hook up a PS/2 mouse directly without the port replicator - using a USB port for USB mice that are compatible with PS/2 signalling. Since I've done this using the port replicator previously this time I wanted it to be inside the case and using a CF card for storage and a custom caddy, the plan is to have a USB port mounted in the 3d printed HDD caddy with a hole in the also 3d printed HDD cover.
First thing was tracing the signals back from the port replicator connector:

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Not sure if the ground I've selected is an analogue ground for the sound chip or a main one but it works.

The casing is so tight that wires can't fit from the topside of the board into the underside where the hard drive fits though, so I used this flat flex cable that I'd salvaged off something instead.

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How the wiring works is the mouse data and clock go into the corners of the Toshiba 471HP chip which afaik is the combo mouse and keyboard controller. But the pull up resistors and inductors / ferrite bead that the signals need would normally be inside the port replicator, so it's necessary to put those in here as well.
There are 10k resistors soldered directly to the points for mouse clock and mouse data with a 30AWG wire-wrapping wire running from each to the 5v source. Then there's a separate wire with the 600 ohm ferrite bead (what I have available) connected in line to the flat flex connector and awkwardly these had to be flipped around to match the pinout for a PS/2 to USB adapter.

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Careful application of kapton tape to stop it all shorting out. Should still be able to fit the memory expansion board.

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Now to re-design the HDD caddy 3d model to accomodate a USB port mounting so it can all fit flush 😀
It worked first time and the libretto is way more fun to use with a real mouse.

Aand now it's done - the HDD caddy 3d model was modified with a USB port - I got it wrong on the first print and designed it the wrong way up / around but this one is good:

The HDD cover is also a 3d print so that got cut to fit a USB port:

The USB mouse isn't USB and requires a mouse that supports a USB to PS/2 mouse adapter. It's not hot pluggable but it was hot plugged without breaking things and it detected on an OS reboot:

It's attached to a junk top-half right now but it's so much nicer to use that I'm very very tempted to put the top half from my keeper Libretto 50CT on it instead, then overclock the CPU to 100MHZ. My Libretto 70CT is nice to use because the dock has been modified with a keyboard & mouse ps/2 port on the dock, but being able to use a mouse with no dock connected makes this thing so much more convenient 😁

Sorting out and testing some motherboards to put on AmiBay, but first board was a dud to some extent. Spent half a day, not getting nowhere

Intel SE440BX-2 motherboard memory issues.

TSOP memory. I still need to iron a few issues - artefacting once I flash the 256MB BIOS from Leadtek. I'll look a bit more into it sometime later (I'm waiting on my 1366 Gigabyte X58-USB3 to return from my dad) and maybe try mixing the existent Hynix with Infineon RAM from a dead N6600 (ASUS) and see where that gets me.

I also have a rusty (quite literally) 9800SE AIW to figure out so yeah the 6600 uograde may be postponed until further notice. (and until I get a proper tweezer to pick RAM 🤣)

After much internal debate, I've decided to part with my "Mini Windows 95" build, along with my spare EPIA-800 board. I need to move out stuff to bring in new stuff. 🙁

https://theclassicgeek.blogspot.com/2023/03/m … -with-epia.html

So, going through and making sure it's all still in good working order before it gets listed. Taking photos. Etc.

Moving forward, I'm only going to keep my DOS and Win98SE systems for my own use. Those are the only two I use on a regular basis and all I need to play all the old games I want. Beyond that, everything else will be repaired, built, and passed on. I just don't have the room for a large collection of machines at the moment, and much of my space is currently taken up by parts and components.

StriderTR wrote on 2025-08-03, 17:28:

After much internal debate, I've decided to part with my "Mini Windows 95" build, along with my spare EPIA-800 board. I need to […]
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After much internal debate, I've decided to part with my "Mini Windows 95" build, along with my spare EPIA-800 board. I need to move out stuff to bring in new stuff. 🙁

https://theclassicgeek.blogspot.com/2023/03/m … -with-epia.html

So, going through and making sure it's all still in good working order before it gets listed. Taking photos. Etc.

Moving forward, I'm only going to keep my DOS and Win98SE systems for my own use. Those are the only two I use on a regular basis and all I need to play all the old games I want. Beyond that, everything else will be repaired, built, and passed on. I just don't have the room for a large collection of machines at the moment, and much of my space is currently taken up by parts and components.

Nice build! Those badges are also great 🙂, I'll order them in near future.

dominusprog wrote on 2025-08-03, 21:45:

Nice build! Those badges are also great 🙂, I'll order them in near future.

Thanks! I really like it. Simple, clean, and works like a charm. Sadly, it's just collecting dust. I spent most of my time on my DOS and 98 machines, and the 98 machine can do everything the Mini 95 can. I would keep it just becasue I like it, but like I said above, I just don't have room. Hopefully someone else will get a kick out of it and make use of the hardware.

I do live Geekenspiel's stickers and badges. I've bought from him many times and have always been more than satisfied with the product. Call me old, call be tacky, but I still love case badges and stickers! 🤣

I tried to fix a TV. I think that counts as a retro activity, even though it was a modern TV.

Of course, the backlight LEDs are the only parts that ever fail on modern TVs. Everything else lasts forever, including the LED driver.

Don't kid yourself.
Pick any 50 random youtube TV repair videos and you'll probably get 20 different fixes.

I found one once that required flicking the Mylar circuit occasionally.
I had it down to an art. Just enough missing bezel screws to make jamming a piece of cardboard in to flick it.

StriderTR wrote on 2025-08-04, 01:23:

dominusprog wrote on 2025-08-03, 21:45:

Nice build! Those badges are also great 🙂, I'll order them in near future.

Thanks! I really like it. Simple, clean, and works like a charm. Sadly, it's just collecting dust. I spent most of my time on my DOS and 98 machines, and the 98 machine can do everything the Mini 95 can. I would keep it just becasue I like it, but like I said above, I just don't have room. Hopefully someone else will get a kick out of it and make use of the hardware.

I do live Geekenspiel's stickers and badges. I've bought from him many times and have always been more than satisfied with the product. Call me old, call be tacky, but I still love case badges and stickers! 🤣

Yeah, these badges are great! I loved them more than the RGB light, back then I used to make my toys (mostly futurist cars 😁) and I put these LEDs on them. At the time, blue LEDs doesn't exist yet, and most common colors were red and yellow. So anyway, the issue I have with these RGB cases is that inside them is more like a disco rather than a computer.

Today I took apart some industrial electronics to see if there is anything of use inside them.

A 486DX2-66, some memory and a some bus controllers. 2 PCMCIA slots on the other side. I really do wonder if I could use this for something...

lti wrote on 2025-08-04, 05:01:

I tried to fix a TV. I think that counts as a retro activity, even though it was a modern TV.

Of course, the backlight LEDs are the only parts that ever fail on modern TVs. Everything else lasts forever, including the LED driver.

myne wrote on 2025-08-04, 06:11:

Don't kid yourself. Pick any 50 random youtube TV repair videos and you'll probably get 20 different fixes. […]
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Don't kid yourself.
Pick any 50 random youtube TV repair videos and you'll probably get 20 different fixes.

I found one once that required flicking the Mylar circuit occasionally.
I had it down to an art. Just enough missing bezel screws to make jamming a piece of cardboard in to flick it.

I've had 1 or two dead backlights, but half a dozen with bad caps in the PSU section.

Susanin79 wrote on 2024-01-11, 21:52:

Playing with my new 486 EISA build,
second run was successful, I was able to find the proper config files for all my boards, all boards are works well.
It looks like the cache modules are not good, it didn't works well with the WS0, see screen below. Will have a look for the replacement.

Hi Susanin79
Did you still have self-created .CFG file for 486E EISA board ?

PTherapist wrote on 2025-07-28, 14:57:

Spent hours over the past couple of days trying to fix a Sega Mega CD Model 1. […]
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Spent hours over the past couple of days trying to fix a Sega Mega CD Model 1.

It needed a replacement laser but no matter how much I calibrated the new laser, it wouldn't reliably read CD-R backup discs. Original discs were no problem, but CD-R was so hit and miss. Games would either not boot, or boot fine and develop glitches later. I got it to a point where it would read some backups temperamentally, then I decided to just give up and reassemble the console.

After putting everything back together I thought I'd just test it one more time - only to discover that it's now working perfectly fine and reading all discs. WTF!!!!

The only thing I can think of here is that the issue may have been RF interference between the Mega CD & the Mega Drive, which impacts the much noisier CD-R media more heavily. Though I've never seen anybody reference this as an issue before and the consensus always seemed to be that the shielding was irrelevant.

Either way, once the console is reassembled, the internal metal shielding and external shielding between the Mega CD & Mega Drive is now present. Prior to this, I was testing it out without both sets of shielding, with just the Mega Drive sitting awkwardly on top, directly above the disc drive.

Either that, or the console is just cursed. 🤣

nice ive been wanting a mega cd for my mega drive 1 since i was like 7yo, now 32yrs on i still dont own one. 🤣 would also like a multimega and a mega pc, thought looking at current prices prob should have bought them years ago, anyway the problems you've been having with the cdrs is probably down to the speed you're burning at, i had the exact same issues with my sega saturn and dreamcast cdrs, with the saturn the games would be jumpy and just not load right, i sold my saturn (this was before ode's) then found i had the same issues with dreamcast, i eventually realised it was down to burn speed,

it was 50/50 whether the console would recognise the disc or not and 50/50 if it would detect it as a game or audio cd, when the games did load they were jumpy as shit and just not working right, at first i was burning at 12x since it was the lowest my drive would do, i then found a drive that did 10x, it was better but still unplayable, i then found a drive that will do 8x and since then every disc loads no problem and plays perfectly, im also using cheap as shit discs like £3 for a 10 pack.

i know ps2 dvdrs need to be burned at 4x, xbox360 at 2.4x, or you'll end up with the same problems you mentioned, so for cdr games 8x is probably the maximum you want to go, since mega cd is older you may need to burn lower, also good luck finding a dvd drive that burns that low, you'll probably haver more luck with a cd writer.

also i heard the metal plate is to shield the megadrive from the mega cd's radiation, or shield the mega cd from the megadrives radiation i forget.

Finally tracked down issue with my recently built AWE64 memory expansion module - two memory chips pins were bridged under the chip.

Also note to myself - Diagnose.exe 4.04 requires default A220 I5 D1/1 for memory test routine. Initially I had my AWE64 card on A240 I7 D3 H5 since I have on board Yamaha audio on standard A220I5D1 - while it detected card correctly it skipped memory test sequence. After disabling on board audio and letting unisound settle with default parameters Diagnose.exe started to behave correctly and asked for DRAM test.

myne wrote on 2025-08-04, 06:11:

Don't kid yourself. Pick any 50 random youtube TV repair videos and you'll probably get 20 different fixes. […]
Show full quote

Don't kid yourself.
Pick any 50 random youtube TV repair videos and you'll probably get 20 different fixes.

I found one once that required flicking the Mylar circuit occasionally.
I had it down to an art. Just enough missing bezel screws to make jamming a piece of cardboard in to flick it.

Yes, any part can fail, but backlight LEDs seem to be the most common failure (aside from a physically broken LCD, at least where I live). I just found one video where the complaint was that half of the screen was black (bad LCD panel), but when displaying solid black (on the working half), you could see a dark spot in the backlight bleed where some LEDs failed (nicer TVs have zener diodes across the LEDs so one failing open doesn't take out the whole series string like this one did). There are a bunch of big 85" conference room TVs where I work that have dark spots.

Those driver chips dangling off the side are annoying. I've broken a few of them.

BitWrangler wrote on 2025-08-05, 17:21:

I've had 1 or two dead backlights, but half a dozen with bad caps in the PSU section.

Bad caps were common several years ago. I replaced a lot of CapXon to get through college.

In this case, it was a cheap 720p TV, so it wasn't really worth repairing. I shorted the worst LEDs to make it work for the day and got a replacement after the big sporting event that someone else needed to watch. If it was 1080p or higher, I would have ordered a full set of new LED strips.

Mov AX, 0xDEAD wrote on 2025-08-05, 17:22:

Hi Susanin79
Did you still have self-created .CFG file for 486E EISA board ?

Hi, sure
Let me find it. Will try to send it this evening.

Just finished rebuilding the battery for my Panasonic Toughbook CF-28 using brand-new cells — and it was a success!

Fortunately, the BMS module wasn’t locked, so I was able to run a full calibration through the BIOS utility without any issues. That alone felt like a small victory, considering the age of this machine.
The initial discharge test ran for over 5 hours, which is impressive for such an old laptop. I haven’t tried it in real-world use yet, but if it holds up for even 3 hours of battery-powered runtime, I’d call that a win.

Studied some DIP components. Hex inverters, bidirectional stuff...
Just to understand how signals travel through a 286 board.
I started wondering how a BIOS works. What happens, step by step, when power on occurs.
I'd really love to learn more about this.