The gods are smiling at my Socket A build. I'm now using a generic Chinese Socket A cooler that I bought on Ebay a while back. It works okay, but it isn't exactly top quality, and I was wishing I still had my Thermalright AX7 or SLK900. I had a look on Ebay, and I spotted an unbranded Socket A cooler; it's an AX7! Including shipping, the price was pretty close to what I paid for the generic Chinese cooler I now have.

darry wrote on 2020-09-03, 17:39:

yawetaG wrote on 2020-09-02, 16:14:

dionb wrote on 2020-09-02, 06:35:

Just a regular eBay auction for about the regular JP prices for these things. But instead of the usual (and understandable) costs to get stuff from the other side of the world, it said free shipping. Did a double-take, checked that country was correctly listed and it was still free. So bought it on Wednesday, with estimated delivery on September 23rd. Then on Sunday I got a message from FedEx that they were going to deliver the next day at my home address. Which was a problem as I hadn't exactly counted on it being so fast and I was still four countries away at the time traveling by train, so redirected to my work address, where it arrived yesterday about the same time I did.

That was seriously quick courier service. No idea who paid for it, but it certainly wasn't me 😜

And in about two weeks time you'll receive a letter from Fedex for the import taxes (which thankfully do not include the crazy handling costs the Dutch Postal Services add).

That sounds sketchy . If a courier can delivery a package, and have you accept it without telling you about import taxes or giving you an option to refuse the packages based on those taxes, it feels at least unethical, maybe even illegal (depending on jurisdiction, I have no idea TBH) . It's also likely ripe for abuse, like if somebody sends you an unsolicited package with a false sky-high stated value just so you get a delayed fat tax bill . With so much stuff going through mail because of COVID-19 , someone might not even notice a given unsolicited package among their normal orders .

The IBAN (international banking number) was at my own bank and matched out with the real thing (local Fedex branch) - and so did the parcel serial number and other information. So it was legit (in the Netherlands).

Besides, it was ±15 Euros...

The max amount of import taxes* is defined by law as 21% of the value. The problem is that the shipping company may add a handling charge, which the Dutch Postal Services (USPS equivalent) exploit to add a 20 Euro or so handling fee...Fedex Netherlands apparently doesn't.

BTW, this was for a package from Japan containing a Yamaha Motif ES Rack that the shipper undervalued at 70 bucks (I did not ask them to do that; I paid approx. 450 bucks for the thing).)

* Does not apply to EU countries.

Miphee wrote on 2020-09-04, 17:14:

90% of my purchases are outside the EU so it doesn't give me much comfort. People in the EU are selling the same items for profi […]
Show full quote

vetz wrote on 2020-09-04, 17:02:

You can still buy from the whole EU marked so I dont feel sorry for you.

90% of my purchases are outside the EU so it doesn't give me much comfort. People in the EU are selling the same items for profit anyway so why would I buy from them? They act as the middle man and their prices are often many times higher.

Panasonic caps from China: 10 € cent.
The very same Panasonic caps from the UK: 75 € cent.

No way.

Chance the China ones are fake: High.

yawetaG wrote on 2020-09-05, 06:01:

Chance the China ones are fake: High.

China =/= fake, it's just a popular misconception spread by people who can't compete with their prices & free shipping so they try to convince their customers that Chinese (imported) products are all bad. No. Business owners always shout fakes when people buy directly from the manufacturer and not from them. Cutting out the middle man greatly reduces costs for the buyer and I can buy a single capacitor with free shipping. That simple.

Miphee wrote on 2020-09-05, 06:23:

yawetaG wrote on 2020-09-05, 06:01:

Chance the China ones are fake: High.

China =/= fake, it's just a popular misconception spread by people who can't compete with their prices & free shipping so they try to convince their customers that Chinese (imported) products are all bad. No. Business owners always shout fakes when people buy directly from the manufacturer and not from them. Cutting out the middle man greatly reduces costs for the buyer and I can buy a single capacitor with free shipping. That simple.

That just means you've not yet encountered defective parts from China or used them for a purpose that brings out that their tolerances aren't according to the spec sheets of the real thing. The moment you encounter diodes that are actually resistors encapsulated in a diode exterior or a "Yamaha" chip that is actually a rebadged CMI chip you'll start to think otherwise. Obviously there are legit items from China, too. But they have a long history of making fake versions of about anything.

And of course buying straight from the manufacturer is going to be cheaper than buying via a shop, it cuts out a lot of overhead. That is valid outside China too.

Miphee wrote on 2020-09-05, 06:23:

yawetaG wrote on 2020-09-05, 06:01:

Chance the China ones are fake: High.

China =/= fake, it's just a popular misconception spread by people who can't compete with their prices & free shipping so they try to convince their customers that Chinese (imported) products are all bad. No. Business owners always shout fakes when people buy directly from the manufacturer and not from them. Cutting out the middle man greatly reduces costs for the buyer and I can buy a single capacitor with free shipping. That simple.

I have seen counterfeit branded SD/CF cards, counterfeit Prolific brand USB serial chips, a counterfeit branded high end car stereo head unit and that's just off the top of my head personal or first-hand accounts (friends), and confirmed by the manufacturer whose good's were couterfeited ( through direct communication or software tools provided) or by comparing product packaging/appareance/performance . Even chinese companies like Autoelectric (TL866) have info on their site about identifying counterfeits . There are many other documented counterfeit products, often originally from China (obviously not exclusively from there).

China is the manufacturing hub of the world, it makes sense that a lot the products we buy, both genuine and counterfeit originate there .

As for genuine Panasonic capacitors being available from China, and cheaper, I have no doubt about that . The problem I see is that, unless you are buying from the actual manufacturer, a subsidiary, an authorized distributor (or at least a known reliable one), whether in China or elsewhere, how do you know that you are getting the real thing ? Counterfeit (re-branded) capacitors are a well documented phenomenon, AFAIK .

Today I've got some real good input devices:

a) a Logitech "Pilot Mouse" (serial) with box etc. - Mouse is in perfect condition, no discolouring or signs of wear.

b) a AT-Keyboard "Ergo-Touch", ergonomic design, with dustcover - also in perfect condition, no discolouring or signs of wear.

((according to the previous owner the Keyboard is from around '97/'98, the "€"-Key is a later add-on sticker that I will probably remove))

Moar stuff:

MSI MS-6191 slot A board with Japanese capacitors

MSI 6390LE-L socket 462 board with Prosavage DDR

New PC CHIPS socket 462 board (hopefully this one is compatible with my Sempron 2600+ and Geode NX 1750)

MSI PM8M3-V LGA775 board with AGP

Got an ASUS P5S800-VM/S board and a Pentium 4 HT 3.4 GHz.

The board comes with an AGP slot and paired with my HD4650 this will be the perfect Windows XP machine.
The manual claims the board can boost the AGP8x transfer rate even more by using something called "Ultra-AGPII".

Guess I'll see if that's just marketing BS or if it really works. 😜

It also looks like that CPU might even support Windows 10 - I will be testing if I can actually run an AGP graphics card on Windows 10, that would be great.

What the frick?

Did someone spray-paint that Model M? Oh god. Poor thing.

Turpentine time ?

looks like a unicomp keyboard

Warlord wrote on 2020-09-06, 23:27:

looks like a unicomp keyboard

Unless the paint can be removed cleanly, it's more like Unicrap .

EDIT: It sure looks painted, with uneven finish and paint chipped off .

Warlord wrote on 2020-09-06, 23:27:

looks like a unicomp keyboard

No, this is original model M keyboard, painted by some idiot.

today i bought this, i have not tested it yet, but board looks brand new. I bought it because i had never seen anything like this in a long long time

its a MICRO ATX pentium2 and pentium3 motherboard that has AGP2x, PCI, and ISA SLOT.
when i tried to search online for "DFI PA33 C2" , i found practically nothing, not even at vogons.

searching archive i found out that this version supports PC133, it supports pentium2 and Pentium3 processors up to 733mhz, the maxium memory it can take is 512mb and it does accept ECC memory

VIA VT82C693A
VIA VT82C686A

I think a lot of people hate VIA since they love intel 440bx. Im wondering if the board sucks or not.

what do you think, does it suck for a mini pentium3 machine?

That should make a nice little 98se/2000 system

chrismeyer6 wrote on 2020-09-07, 00:41:

That should make a nice little 98se/2000 system

indeed, a small matx case, a voodoo card, a SB16 isa
that should to a micro retro machine

PReyes wrote on 2020-09-07, 00:25:

today i bought this, i have not tested it yet, but board looks brand new. I bought it because i had never seen anything like th […]
Show full quote

today i bought this, i have not tested it yet, but board looks brand new. I bought it because i had never seen anything like this in a long long time

its a MICRO ATX pentium2 and pentium3 motherboard that has AGP2x, PCI, and ISA SLOT.
when i tried to search online for "DFI PA33 C2" , i found practically nothing, not even at vogons.

searching archive i found out that this version supports PC133, it supports pentium2 and Pentium3 processors up to 733mhz, the maxium memory it can take is 512mb and it does accept ECC memory

VIA VT82C693A
VIA VT82C686A

I think a lot of people hate VIA since they love intel 440bx. Im wondering if the board sucks or not.

what do you think, does it suck for a mini pentium3 machine?

I wonder if you got one with SoundBlaster emulation? Using VIA VT8231 southbridge for sound blaster pro emulation (edit : sound blaster emulation available using software !)

PReyes wrote on 2020-09-07, 00:45:

chrismeyer6 wrote on 2020-09-07, 00:41:

That should make a nice little 98se/2000 system

indeed, a small matx case, a voodoo card, a SB16 isa
that should to a micro retro machine

That would make a great system. Small and compact. Hell if you can find a retro LAN party it would be perfect for that.