VOGONS


Reply 15480 of 27171, by brostenen

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And so it begins....
I am still missing to buy parts, however I have enough to start this build. When finished, I will have a newly build Commodore64 1986-Model-C in nearly exclusive black. Systemboard in black, case in black plastic and keyboard in grey'ish black. Mmmmm.... Black and gold.

So far, I have only soldered the sockets. Missing a few of them. Tomorrow I will solder the resistors, then the cartridge connector.

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Don't eat stuff off a 15 year old never cleaned cpu cooler.
Those cakes make you sick....

My blog: http://to9xct.blogspot.dk
My YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/brostenen

001100 010010 011110 100001 101101 110011

Reply 15481 of 27171, by EvieSigma

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I tried once again to get my AST Premium Exec 386SX/20 to boot off its factory Conner 40MB hard drive but even with the correct CHS settings in setup I still get "ERROR INITIALIZING HARD DISK CONTROLLER" so I can only assume the drive is just...bad. It's not a CMOS battery thing, I already removed the CMOS battery, unless it needs a working one to save the drive settings properly.

Reply 15483 of 27171, by lolo799

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henk717 wrote on 2020-05-23, 02:13:

If you are feeling lucky you can try Scitech Display Doctor 7. It's abandonware and freely available if you search for it. Best case scenario you get 3D Accel and OpenGL going. Worst case scenario it screws up your entire install and you have to start over.

Tried it, OpenGL works, the samples work at various speeds, the larger the window the slower they run, not suprisingly.

Tried HalfLife Uplink, software mode is still faster than any of the possible OpenGL settings in the Scitech setup.
Decided to be fearless and tried the Jedi Knight 2 Outcast demo, averaged 0.1fps using the lowest ingame settings...

PCMCIA Sound, Storage & Graphics

Reply 15484 of 27171, by RetroLizard

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Mister Xiado wrote on 2020-05-23, 08:03:
Remade or tweaked all of the Win95 icons I made last year so they're now 8 bit icons. Left the 4 bit versions in, just because i […]
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Remade or tweaked all of the Win95 icons I made last year so they're now 8 bit icons. Left the 4 bit versions in, just because it's proper to do so.
Before and after.
icxw26.gif icxw26.jpg

icxw27.gif icxw27.jpg

How do you make those icons, anyways? I'm curious.

Reply 15485 of 27171, by Almoststew1990

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Today I've been messing with my first AM2 system in about 10 years - my first "own" (as in non family) PC.

I was going to make an Oddball PC - Athlon II x3, 5GB of RAM, an ATI 4830, using an motherboard with an usual layout, stuffed in a tiny Tiny PC case, but I've been having loads of issues with software installing, and it runs very hot! Windows 7 is rapidly becoming a pain to use (more so than XP and 10) with software (e.g. display drivers) needing VCredist which needs Service Pack 1 which needs the Windows Update to be functioning which needs various updated to be applied manually otherwise WU will just say searching forever which needs downloading through a browser which barely functions because the build in certificates in Windows 7 are not up to date / sufficient in some way so I get privacy errors everywhere (which is fixed through an Windows Update update).

Then the display drivers were flipping my resolution to 768*1024 (which my monitor did a marvellous job at displaying with no stretching or anything) even with display drivers installed. I had 1440*2560 going at one point which my monitor really struggled with, squishing pixels everywhere.

Eugh. I think I'll just dump XP on it and not use Steam, which is a shame as I think the CPU will have more grunt than my XP / DVD game collection will know what to do with.

mAITD9th.jpg?1
(downgraded to 4GB RAM incase the 5Gb was causing the issues)

Ryzen 3700X | 16GB 3600MHz RAM | AMD 6800XT | 2Tb NVME SSD | Windows 10
AMD DX2-80 | 16MB RAM | STB LIghtspeed 128 | AWE32 CT3910
I have a vacancy for a main Windows 98 PC

Reply 15486 of 27171, by Mister Xiado

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RetroLizard wrote on 2020-05-23, 18:27:

How do you make those icons, anyways? I'm curious.

Paint Shop Pro 7 for the drawing of the icons, Axialis Icon Workshop for making the icon files and/or libraries. The refresh I did was adding 8 bit versions of the original 4 bit icons to their files. Icon Workshop makes it so much easier to manage icon formats within a file, and even edit the icons if something was missed in the transfer.

Screenshot I unintentionally took while working on a bunch last night, as AMD's software takes over a lot of the keyboard shortcuts that Paintshop uses. I have to get around to changing them.

9K2WCXfm.png

Last edited by Mister Xiado on 2020-05-23, 19:00. Edited 1 time in total.

b_ldnt2.gif - Where it's always 1995.
Icons, wallpapers, and typical Oldternet nonsense.

Reply 15487 of 27171, by henk717

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Reinstalled my T5710 and this time with the generic Microsoft driver instead of the VIA driver to see how compatible it would be.
End result? Its compatible, but will bluescreen every now and then. So not recommended and its obvious why my favorite USB stack which is the one hidden in SP3.CAB from the unofficial service pack (U98SEUSB.EXE) offers a seperate option for VIA users based on the official VIA drivers combined with the usual improvements like Xbox 360 Controller and USB Stick support.

I plan to eventually have a working install package that installs all the software and updates i'd install on Windows 98 automatically and wanted to know if i could automate USB driver installation. But with the instability this is a nogo. Ill either have to offer it separately or keep that part manual just like the SP3 did.

Reply 15488 of 27171, by henk717

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Almoststew1990 wrote on 2020-05-23, 18:49:
Today I've been messing with my first AM2 system in about 10 years - my first "own" (as in non family) PC. […]
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Today I've been messing with my first AM2 system in about 10 years - my first "own" (as in non family) PC.

I was going to make an Oddball PC - Athlon II x3, 5GB of RAM, an ATI 4830, using an motherboard with an usual layout, stuffed in a tiny Tiny PC case, but I've been having loads of issues with software installing, and it runs very hot! Windows 7 is rapidly becoming a pain to use (more so than XP and 10) with software (e.g. display drivers) needing VCredist which needs Service Pack 1 which needs the Windows Update to be functioning which needs various updated to be applied manually otherwise WU will just say searching forever which needs downloading through a browser which barely functions because the build in certificates in Windows 7 are not up to date / sufficient in some way so I get privacy errors everywhere (which is fixed through an Windows Update update).

Then the display drivers were flipping my resolution to 768*1024 (which my monitor did a marvellous job at displaying with no stretching or anything) even with display drivers installed. I had 1440*2560 going at one point which my monitor really struggled with, squishing pixels everywhere.

Eugh. I think I'll just dump XP on it and not use Steam, which is a shame as I think the CPU will have more grunt than my XP / DVD game collection will know what to do with.

mAITD9th.jpg?1
(downgraded to 4GB RAM incase the 5Gb was causing the issues)

There exist ways to run Steam on Windows XP by using an older client and blocking it from auto updating.
Internet Archive has a copy of a Steam compatible XP if you need one, although you do need to clean it up a little before use given the author failed to wipe the config and account data, if you can't find it i can also send you mine which is already cleaned up.

For Windows 7 i personally like to use a newer DVD with Service Pack 1 already in it, but another tool that might help you is the WSUS Offline project which can make an update CD with all the updates in it. They did drop support for Windows 7 so i am not sure if it can still be used if you use an older version, but i do have an ISO from 2018 laying around. Updating Windows 7 takes ages, but it can totally be done offline just fine.

And another tool to lookout for is Cert_Updater.exe which works on XP and higher. This will update your system certificates for you, no need to have Windows update do it.

Reply 15489 of 27171, by RetroLizard

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Mister Xiado wrote on 2020-05-23, 18:53:
Paint Shop Pro 7 for the drawing of the icons, Axialis Icon Workshop for making the icon files and/or libraries. The refresh I d […]
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RetroLizard wrote on 2020-05-23, 18:27:

How do you make those icons, anyways? I'm curious.

Paint Shop Pro 7 for the drawing of the icons, Axialis Icon Workshop for making the icon files and/or libraries. The refresh I did was adding 8 bit versions of the original 4 bit icons to their files. Icon Workshop makes it so much easier to manage icon formats within a file, and even edit the icons if something was missed in the transfer.

Screenshot I unintentionally took while working on a bunch last night, as AMD's software takes over a lot of the keyboard shortcuts that Paintshop uses. I have to get around to changing them.

9K2WCXfm.png

I see. Sadly, I don't have any of those programs, which is a shame.

Reply 15490 of 27171, by Mister Xiado

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RetroLizard wrote on 2020-05-23, 19:10:

I see. Sadly, I don't have any of those programs, which is a shame.

You don't have to use 20 year old software to do it. GIMP is free, fully featured image editing software, and I have no doubt that there are a billion and a half free icon editors out there, since even I made one back in like 1995 in VisualBasic 3, as it was one of the tutorial projects. I just use Paint Shop because PSP 3 had such a powerful impression on me when I first used it, and 7 was the last version that had the UI I had grown accustomed to. I have PSP X, from when Corel was giving it away, but you can't hide/show the menus with the TAB key in it, and that is a dealbreaker for me. They make you go through a series of dropdown menus to hide or show each individual menu. So, I use 20 year old software.

b_ldnt2.gif - Where it's always 1995.
Icons, wallpapers, and typical Oldternet nonsense.

Reply 15491 of 27171, by mR_Slug

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Mister Xiado wrote on 2020-05-23, 19:49:

You don't have to use 20 year old software to do it.

I can't believe it's been 20 years. I've been telling my self PSP7 is just a few years old for way too long. Tried all sorts of other things, always go back to PSP7. BTW love your site, how do you join the webring? We need more webrings.

The Retro Web | EISA .cfg Archive | Chip set Encyclopedia

Reply 15492 of 27171, by Mister Xiado

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mR_Slug wrote on 2020-05-23, 21:41:

I can't believe it's been 20 years. I've been telling my self PSP7 is just a few years old for way too long. Tried all sorts of other things, always go back to PSP7. BTW love your site, how do you join the webring? We need more webrings.

It's not a real web ring, and "Coolguy90" is a former coworker of mine. It's set up randomly, but if you like, I can add you to it, and make a "fake" ring index. You could possibly get tens of extra hits per year! Wowsers! It's not easy finding sites that fit the theme of "oldternet", since they can't just be sites from the era, but have to be recent sites emulating the older ones, or at least celebrating them. Most people can't even be bothered to make images, never mind a website.
I'm still trying to come up with new era-appropriate content without just re-uploading other people's stuff (and giving credit, natch). Alas, forcing creativity is like trying to pour water uphill.

As it is, the site is kinda' chaotic, having icons, wallpapers, NES ROM hacks, DooM maps, and software downloads on it. If I spread it too widely, I'll have to rebuild the menu into a nested nightmare of subdirectories.

b_ldnt2.gif - Where it's always 1995.
Icons, wallpapers, and typical Oldternet nonsense.

Reply 15493 of 27171, by AmiSapphire

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My MCS-48/41 adapter for my Willem programmers just arrived and I managed to dump the data of an old American Megatrends keyboard controller IC. That and its corresponding BIOS HI/LO data dump are still on my EPROM burning desktop PC. I also have a Holtek HT6542B IC from a semi-dead PC Chips M520 board, and reading it, unsurprisingly, showed all 00's.

Site update: cwcyrix.duckdns.org -> cwcyrix.nsupdate.info due to the former no longer working.

Reply 15494 of 27171, by SodaSuccubus

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I just got my 586 build in its new house. Not sure if its gonna stay though, my desire for games like Descent/BUILD Engine and Screamer have me thinking maybe i should just head back to Pentium town. There's just this awesome feeling of having a rig in the 94-96 era though. I don't need over 30fps frame rates but this 5x86 isn't cutting it as is. Maybe a proper P90 would suffice me?

I swear i see videos out there with DX4-100's running faster then this thing (https://youtu.be/1B1jPkPjqgE?t=6073)
Im only seeing around 34FPS in Doom, and that's with the ram optimized as much as low as i could get it in the bios. Im no AMI Winbios expert though, my previous boards have been AWARD so maybe im missing something?

Because otherwise either Tseng ET6000 that guy is running is really make that much of a FPS difference, or that Intel chipset is smacking the SIS's rear on the LS486.

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Last edited by SodaSuccubus on 2020-05-24, 00:17. Edited 2 times in total.

Reply 15495 of 27171, by PTherapist

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Today - With the aid of my multimeter, I spliced together a proper AV cable for my Commodore VIC-20: 5-pin DIN to Phono. Saved me having to buy a ready-built one, this works just fine.

Also been re-organising the contents of the SD card for my SD2IEC to seperate games by RAM size requirements and learning all about the VIC-20's weird RAM mapping in the process. I'm actually having a lot more fun with this VIC-20 than I thought I would, so that's a bonus. Still stuck playing unexpanded games at the moment though, should receive a 35K RAM expansion cartridge this week and try out some Doom. 🤣

Additionally today, I was using my Sinclair ZX81 briefly to make some slight adjustments to some BASIC code I'd written. I was having the usual issues saving and then having to adjust the amplification etc, so I cheated and edited my program on the emulator instead. Only 2 lines needed adding and it saved me some time haha. Tested it out afterwards on the real ZX81.

Reply 15496 of 27171, by mastergamma12

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Was messing with an HP Vectra VLI8, unfortunately, both of it's IDE controllers died.

NNH9pIh.png

The Tuala-Bus (My 9x/Dos Rig) (Pentium III-S 1.4ghz, AWE64G+Audigy 2 ZS, Voodoo5 5500, Chieftec Dragon Rambus)

The Final Lan Party (My Windows Xp/7 rig) (Core i7 980x, GTX 480,DFI Lanparty UT X58-T3eH8,)
Re: Post your 'current' PC

Reply 15497 of 27171, by bjwil1991

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Does it have PCI? If so, a dual IDE controller card would suffice, however, you would need to install the drivers first on another computer to play it safe.

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Reply 15498 of 27171, by mastergamma12

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bjwil1991 wrote on 2020-05-24, 04:23:

Does it have PCI? If so, a dual IDE controller card would suffice, however, you would need to install the drivers first on another computer to play it safe.

It was one of those low profile systems with limited expansion slots.

NNH9pIh.png

The Tuala-Bus (My 9x/Dos Rig) (Pentium III-S 1.4ghz, AWE64G+Audigy 2 ZS, Voodoo5 5500, Chieftec Dragon Rambus)

The Final Lan Party (My Windows Xp/7 rig) (Core i7 980x, GTX 480,DFI Lanparty UT X58-T3eH8,)
Re: Post your 'current' PC

Reply 15499 of 27171, by Caluser2000

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mastergamma12 wrote on 2020-05-24, 04:26:
bjwil1991 wrote on 2020-05-24, 04:23:

Does it have PCI? If so, a dual IDE controller card would suffice, however, you would need to install the drivers first on another computer to play it safe.

It was one of those low profile systems with limited expansion slots.

You didn't answer bjwils question.

There's a glitch in the matrix.
A founding member of the 286 appreciation society.
Apparently 32-bit is dead and nobody likes P4s.
Of course, as always, I'm open to correction...😉