First post, by SquallStrife
- Rank
- l33t
Hey guys,
My 486 motherboard bit the dust a few weeks ago. It was an Asus VL/ISA-486SV2, which I was very happy with stability- and performance-wise. It sat unused for a few months, during which time battery leakage set in big time. I cleaned it up as best I could, but the keyboard interface is pretty much cactus.
In the mean time, I'm using a PC CHIPS M919 board donated by the wonderful DonutKing. I like that it's a PCI board with onboard I/O, but the random crashes are a bit annoying.
So I've ordered a replacement board from eBay, the model mentioned in the subject, a Data Expert EXP4044 VLB board. The seller assures me there is no corrosion, but to be on the safe side, I've purchased a NiMH replacement battery to relace it as soon as it arrives.
I just wanted to know if anyone here could let me know if they've used this board, or any other Data Expert board, and if the quality is any good? It has an AWARD BIOS, which I'm pretty happy about, but that's about all I know about it.
Also, do you think it's possible to combine 30-pin and 72-pin RAM on it? I have 1MB 30-pin modules and 4MB 72-pin modules. If I filled every slot, I could have 12MB of RAM on this board, but I don't know if it will boot.
So, when the board arrives, the system will look like this:
EXP4044 mobo
Intel 486 DX/2 66Mhz
8 or 12MB of RAM
Diamond Stealth24 ISA VGA Card
Winbond VLB Multi I/O
Creative SB16 (CT2940) + Roland MT-32
Is there anything glaring here which I should change?
Lastly, what are PC Partner boards like, quality and speed wise? I have a VXB830DS (a 430VX based board) with a Pentium 133 on it, is it any good or should I not bother and look for something "better"?