Ouch. Hopefully your DX4-100 system lives.

Re-installed everything on my Thinkpad A20m, due to my attempt to install OS/2, which replaced the partition table with its own proprietary thing, rendering the entire disk unusable.

Thanks, IBM! I expected better. Also, the install process was a pain the rear end, and the OS itself was labyrinthine.

Did get hold of a few NICs with replaceable bios chips, some RAM, a couple of IDE HDs, a Gateway AT keyboard (why can I never find any *without* the L-shaped enter key?)...

Here's something you don't see every day:

Yep, the glint you see through the cracked chip is the PCB's reflection. Ouch.

And speaking of things you don't see every day, though it's not a computer:

Need to find a power supply for this, the battery was removed when I found it (good thing too I bet that was heavy).
 

Lots and lots of trace reconstruction. Leaky CMOS batteries galore!

Reminded myself how much I suck at SC Brood Wars.

radiofreezerg

@orkay

I have the mobo, I'll look what I got tomorrow.

brostenen wrote:

I have begun recapping a Commodore64 motherboard. 50% finished and it have gone too dark to continue working.

I've just done one here too and they're easy to work with because it's all so big! I struggle a bit with those solder points that have all that existing lead around them though - you know all that wrinkled stuff on the back of the board? It takes ages to get those points heated up to melting point I find.

Reasons why my soldering skills suck. In some cases, it takes a long time to get all of the old solder off before a recap and adding fresh solder to the board with flux. I've done some mods on my Packard Bell PB450 motherboard to allow 3.3V CPUs to be utilized and a battery holder for the CMOS to keep the settings (won't boot without a battery installed), and surprisingly, nothing blew up and I still need a 3.3V CPU to test it with to see if it does indeed work.

I've repaired a few cards, a speaker system that has a headphone jack on there, added a 3.5mm jack to an old AM novelty wood radio that looks like an old phone, keyless remote entries for my dad's 2005 Chevy Malibu Maxx LS Hatchback and my mom's 2007 Chevy Uplander LT (now the board is toast as 1 cap is almost off the board, and the other isn't too far behind), and I managed to fix the headphone extension cable twice with a new headphone jack that I bought a couple of years ago (quantity of 100 for sound card repairs and misc repairs/DIY stuff).

Bought a StarTech IDE to SATA adatper and a Samsung EVO 860 512GB, I'm currently installing Windows XP on it in my SL6BY/TUV4X build. It was under $100 for both, I was going to try the SD card route but the adapters seem to have issues with wiping the cards on power down so I'm going to avoid that solution.

I got some noctua fans to replace the ones on my Voodoo 5500, but I need to hit Tacoma screw and find some new screws that are long enough to attach them to the heat sinks. I'm afraid to pull the sinks off and rip the chips off the board or I would replace them.

I might pick up another adapter/evo combo and toss 98SE on it for funsies, I haven't decided.

Finished recapping my Breadbin Assy 250407 Rev. B and it is in perfect battle condition now. The machine is from week 48 in 1983, and because the caps were original, then I think that this machine will work the next 20 to 25 years. And while I was at it, swapping the caps under the VIC-II heatsink-shield, then I gave the VIC-II some new thermal grease. Recapping have solved the following issues:

- Colour bleed are totally gone, if I use the correct cable.
- Colour bleed have been reduced by 50%, when using lower grade cable.
- Light intensity that were pulsating are now gone.
- No "radionoise" in the picture on Giana Sisters.
- Loading are 100% stable again.
- Sound is working 100% again.
- Contrast and overall image sharpness are like new again.
- Letters and numbers are extremely sharp again.
- Few games that would not load, are loading once again.

I am beginning to think on if I should get one of those new cases, that are made on original molds. If I buy one, the machine will not be a breadbin anymore. Else I can go the retrobright route or I can spraypaint the case. As of now, it is only the yellow case, that I need to adres now.

brostenen wrote:

Finished recapping my Breadbin Assy 250407 Rev. B and it is in perfect battle condition now. The machine is from week 48 in 1983 […]
Show full quote

Finished recapping my Breadbin Assy 250407 Rev. B and it is in perfect battle condition now. The machine is from week 48 in 1983, and because the caps were original, then I think that this machine will work the next 20 to 25 years. And while I was at it, swapping the caps under the VIC-II heatsink-shield, then I gave the VIC-II some new thermal grease. Recapping have solved the following issues:

- Colour bleed are totally gone, if I use the correct cable.
- Colour bleed have been reduced by 50%, when using lower grade cable.
- Light intensity that were pulsating are now gone.
- No "radionoise" in the picture on Giana Sisters.
- Loading are 100% stable again.
- Sound is working 100% again.
- Contrast and overall image sharpness are like new again.
- Letters and numbers are extremely sharp again.
- Few games that would not load, are loading once again.

I am beginning to think on if I should get one of those new cases, that are made on original molds. If I buy one, the machine will not be a breadbin anymore. Else I can go the retrobright route or I can spraypaint the case. As of now, it is only the yellow case, that I need to adres now.

That's a grear result! What does it look like now? Any pics?

There was an old Western Electric telephone exchange operator's station (from the 40's, Bell System) up for grabs in Denver over the weekend - someone was just giving it away!

Unfortunately somebody else beat me to it. I think I was about an hour too slow. In any case I would have had to figure out how to transport it; it was about the size of a refrigerator.

I've seen exactly one before in person. They're pretty darn cool.

Cyrix200+ wrote:

brostenen wrote:

Finished recapping my Breadbin Assy 250407 Rev. B and it is in perfect battle condition now. The machine is from week 48 in 1983 […]
Show full quote

Finished recapping my Breadbin Assy 250407 Rev. B and it is in perfect battle condition now. The machine is from week 48 in 1983, and because the caps were original, then I think that this machine will work the next 20 to 25 years. And while I was at it, swapping the caps under the VIC-II heatsink-shield, then I gave the VIC-II some new thermal grease. Recapping have solved the following issues:

- Colour bleed are totally gone, if I use the correct cable.
- Colour bleed have been reduced by 50%, when using lower grade cable.
- Light intensity that were pulsating are now gone.
- No "radionoise" in the picture on Giana Sisters.
- Loading are 100% stable again.
- Sound is working 100% again.
- Contrast and overall image sharpness are like new again.
- Letters and numbers are extremely sharp again.
- Few games that would not load, are loading once again.

I am beginning to think on if I should get one of those new cases, that are made on original molds. If I buy one, the machine will not be a breadbin anymore. Else I can go the retrobright route or I can spraypaint the case. As of now, it is only the yellow case, that I need to adres now.

That's a grear result! What does it look like now? Any pics?

Sure. Why not! Here you go. 😀

Finally almost finished testing all the games that came with the Amstrad CPC 464 that I recently bought.

Just 1 game left to test - Epyx Winter Games. As that's a large multi-load game though, I'll leave it until tomorrow for some joystick wrecking action. 🤣

But out of the other 91 games I tested and played briefly (if they were any good), only 18 cassettes were bad.

One of these days I'll have to get around to recording new tapes from the CDT files, just to put working copies inside the cassette cases. But for now, playing the .CDT directly will suffice for those games.

Just trying out my new mini-hi-fi. Pretty sweet!

appiah4 wrote:

Completely tore down and cleaned an old AT case and a Dell Dimension XPS D333 tower PC. I have also done a (near) complete restoration of the Dell, the only issue being one of the 3.5" expansion bays. The lower bay seems to require some kind of caddy device to install a floppy/zip drive in it? Mine is missing. I also lack the cover for it and standard covers don't seem to work, if anyone has one of these towers and could post photos of what needs to go into the lowermost 3.5" bay I would be very glad.

Something like this? :

Did a much needed recap of an Abit KG7.
Werdly enough it worked (kinda) at 100MHz FSB with a low end 750MHz T-Bird.

Before shots:

And after, Panasonics, yum !:

Leaning cap to leave more room for the cooler:

Couldn't find quality caps of the right height, so just one recap at the AGP slot:

Much better !:

Now purring along happily with an Athlon 1200C (133MHz FSB).
Another part of my Y2K build sorted =)

I was browsing for 3dfx hardware on ebay and came across this Voodoo 4 4500. At first i though it was an obvious scam, but then after googling the model i guess it is real ?

https://www.ebay.com/itm/3Dfx-Voodoo-4-4500-P … &frcectupt=true

I'm baffled.

bofh.fromhell wrote:

Did a much needed recap of an Abit KG7. Werdly enough it worked (kinda) at 100MHz FSB with a low end 750MHz T-Bird. […]
Show full quote

Did a much needed recap of an Abit KG7.
Werdly enough it worked (kinda) at 100MHz FSB with a low end 750MHz T-Bird.

Before shots:

And after, Panasonics, yum !:

Leaning cap to leave more room for the cooler:

Couldn't find quality caps of the right height, so just one recap at the AGP slot:

Much better !:

Now purring along happily with an Athlon 1200C (133MHz FSB).
Another part of my Y2K build sorted =)

Nice... Soldering are actually quite fun. 😀 Congrats on the job.