Today, I replaced my tired old oven-repaired simm-slot-replaced SB32 CT3670 for a lovely AWE32 CT3990 in my P166 setup. Fits, but only just...

assasincz wrote on 2021-03-27, 06:49:

Today, I replaced my tired old oven-repaired simm-slot-replaced SB32 CT3670 for a lovely AWE32 CT3990 in my P166 setup. Fits, but only just...

20210327_074252.jpg

So you give up bug free midi and clean sound and don't even get genuine OPL in return?

kolderman wrote on 2021-03-27, 07:27:

assasincz wrote on 2021-03-27, 06:49:

Today, I replaced my tired old oven-repaired simm-slot-replaced SB32 CT3670 for a lovely AWE32 CT3990 in my P166 setup. Fits, but only just...

20210327_074252.jpg

So you give up bug free midi and clean sound and don't even get genuine OPL in return?

Yup 😁 well the CT3670 does not have a OPL on board either, and my particular one has a few repairs already (oven-baking included), so actually the CT3990 sounds bit better

Preparing a second leg to my Tualatin Chipset Competition, taking into account the different remarks and adding a few outsiders to the competition.
>edit<And doing the same for S478.

Byrd wrote on 2021-03-27, 02:14:

brostenen wrote on 2021-03-26, 23:34:

Googling vintage computer information, for a new and awesomme project. That is about all I can say at this point.
I can reveal, that the project is a combination of technologies, that most people would not think about.

Wow thanks for posting I can't wait

Well.... You will know within some month's. 😀

I remembered I had a Permedia 2 (Tech Source Raptor GFX) PCI and as I'm looking to benchmark some early (non ati-nvidia-3dfx) 3D accelerators and I never tried this, I thought I at least check if it works.
Turns out, my universal AGP motherboard doesn't boot with it. Tried having it alongside an AGP Millennium II, but won't post either.

I took that Raptor GFX out of a Sun server and I guess there is probably some kind of vendor lock. Or the card is just dead.
Either way I'm disappointed. Maybe later I'll try it in another system.

RandomStranger wrote on 2021-03-27, 12:24:

I remembered I had a Permedia 2 (Tech Source Raptor GFX) PCI and as I'm looking to benchmark some early (non ati-nvidia-3dfx) 3D […]
Show full quote

I remembered I had a Permedia 2 (Tech Source Raptor GFX) PCI and as I'm looking to benchmark some early (non ati-nvidia-3dfx) 3D accelerators and I never tried this, I thought I at least check if it works.
Turns out, my universal AGP motherboard doesn't boot with it. Tried having it alongside an AGP Millennium II, but won't post either.

I took that Raptor GFX out of a Sun server and I guess there is probably some kind of vendor lock. Or the card is just dead.
Either way I'm disappointed. Maybe later I'll try it in another system.

I wrote a few posts ago, I have a SKT7 with VGA PowerColor with Chip Permedia, it is very similar to yours, but I haven't tried it yet.
Some time ago it went to that PC, if I remember correctly it was Permedia, not Permedia2 which would be the successor.
In days I will be able to be more precise, and remove the doubt whether it is the first or the second.
The card is very similar, it has 8MB of SGRAM, and it is PCI.

RandomStranger wrote on 2021-03-27, 12:24:

I remembered I had a Permedia 2 (Tech Source Raptor GFX) PCI and as I'm looking to benchmark some early (non ati-nvidia-3dfx) 3D […]
Show full quote

I remembered I had a Permedia 2 (Tech Source Raptor GFX) PCI and as I'm looking to benchmark some early (non ati-nvidia-3dfx) 3D accelerators and I never tried this, I thought I at least check if it works.
Turns out, my universal AGP motherboard doesn't boot with it. Tried having it alongside an AGP Millennium II, but won't post either.

I took that Raptor GFX out of a Sun server and I guess there is probably some kind of vendor lock. Or the card is just dead.
Either way I'm disappointed. Maybe later I'll try it in another system.

Don't be so sure about it being dead. For some odd reason the graphic card planets have been aligning with me lately resulting in graphic card incompatibilities. I had an ALR dual Socket 8 board that hated a NOS 1MB S3 Trio64 PCI video card regardless of what I tried. Graphic corruption everywhere. I put it into any other board and it works perfectly. Coincidentally I am now using a Permedia 2 card (Diamond Fire GL 1000 Pro 8MB PCI model) in the same board without issue. It really is the first time I have ever had a S3 Trio64 card not like a board. I mean it's one of the most agreeable graphic card models I have. Then one of the ALR 6x6/Unisys Aquanta HS/6 server recipients tried a 256MB FX5200 PCI card in said server and got constant crashing/freezing. Card was fine and the server was fine they just didn't agree. Definitely give it a go on another board before giving up on it.

liqmat wrote on 2021-03-27, 15:23:

Don't be so sure about it being dead. For some odd reason the graphic card planets have been aligning with me lately resulting in graphic card incompatibilities.

My main suspicion is still the vendor lock and that this specific Permedia 2 won't work in anything other than Sun PCs and servers.

RandomStranger wrote on 2021-03-27, 15:53:

My main suspicion is still the vendor lock and that this specific Permedia 2 won't work in anything other than Sun PCs and servers.

Look forward to hearing what your results are. Good info to know.

Trying to track down the source of the screeching in my recently acquired Sharp X68000 Super... I've already replaced the fan in the PSU with a quiet Noctua, which reduced the fan noise significantly (bearings were shot on the original), but the PSU squeals when in use. Which is a shame, as it works perfectly and, otherwise, the system is in tip top condition. It's just the noise that's an issue:

Every electrolytic has been replaced, but common wisdom says to up the capacitance of the two 5600uF filtering caps to 6800uF. So I'll try that.

megatron-uk wrote on 2021-03-27, 16:05:

Trying to track down the source of the screeching in my recently acquired Sharp X68000 Super... I've already replaced the fan in the PSU with a quiet Noctua, which reduced the fan noise significantly (bearings were shot on the original), but the PSU squeals when in use. Which is a shame, as it works perfectly and, otherwise, the system is in tip top condition. It's just the noise that's an issue:

img_1917.jpg

Every electrolytic has been replaced, but common wisdom says to up the capacitance of the two 5600uF filtering caps to 6800uF. So I'll try that.

Such a beautiful system to gaze upon. Very nice!

liqmat wrote on 2021-03-27, 16:07:

megatron-uk wrote on 2021-03-27, 16:05:

Trying to track down the source of the screeching in my recently acquired Sharp X68000 Super... I've already replaced the fan in the PSU with a quiet Noctua, which reduced the fan noise significantly (bearings were shot on the original), but the PSU squeals when in use. Which is a shame, as it works perfectly and, otherwise, the system is in tip top condition. It's just the noise that's an issue:

img_1917.jpg

Every electrolytic has been replaced, but common wisdom says to up the capacitance of the two 5600uF filtering caps to 6800uF. So I'll try that.

Such a beautiful system to gaze upon. Very nice!

It has taken the purchase of THREE X68000 systems to get one in a fully working condition; the first two having spent a significant amount of time trying to resurrect (eventually getting one to the point of reliable power on, full recap and bootable... but no keyboard, mouse or joystick IO, making it unusable).

I paid "through the nose" for this one in a guaranteed working condition, and everything I have tried on it has indeed worked: video is crisp, sound is loud and clear, case plastics are virtually unmarked, both disk drives read and write okay, soft power control works... and the PSU works, but is unbearable in terms of the high pitched screeching. If the worst happens and I cannot solve the PSU noise, I'll simply replace it with a modern alternative, since the rest of the system is now known-good.

Messing around with my IBM PS/1 486 DX2-66. I just love this box, although it's more or less an off the shelf 486 in an IBM chassis. Something about it feels just right for me.

Get a straw to pin point the source of noise, or a plastic or wooden chop stick and touch individual part in turn till you find the source of sound.

Back in the day when RCA and other including CTC203 chassis (this is shown printed on the back's label), was in production and in use we figured out those screech is coming from were small ferrite beads on the SMPS (power supply) diodes and transistors vibrating; easy fix was dab them with silicone RTV (clear one preferred), paying attention that glue is forced through the bead's ID hole.

Cheers,

paying attention that glue is forced through the bead's ID hole.

But seriously, its the correct answer. I had a coworker that used a drop of epoxy and that worked just as well.

the bead's ID mean inside diameter. BTW.

😀

RTV saves time and softer and is best one in limited time of repair on easy types. Epoxy is wasted on these small parts, for complex parts like transformer, coils etc sure, and is needed to have a vacuum chamber and potting epoxy that resin makers uses to degas their projects if you know of one locally. Then head out there and prepare the resin pot and put the whole thing in and degas it and pull out and let it cure then scrape the pins clean or put it on stand so pins is not wetted by resin. Best way since you cannot get to all the cavities without the vacuum pot method.

I know this as I had some loose transformers needs this but takes long time to get this right.

Also, I had to prepare the removed deflection yokes that were noisy by carefully cutting few holes inside for varnish dip. Heat the yoke coil then dip. Takes 2 days to do, three dips.

Cheers,

Well I did something really way out. I tried to install and run a DOS comms program on a Win10 machine in a DOSBOX window.

I just got a SD-to-IDE adapter in the mail so that I could reinstall Apple Rhapsody DR2 on my Pentium 4 overkill machine. My SATA-to-IDE adapter does not play well with others, and Rhapsody insists on installing from a CD-ROM drive on the Primary/Slave IDE channel. This SD-to-IDE adapter works just fine with the attached CD-RW drive.

With Rhapsody installed to a 16GB SD card and the Secondary IDE channel properly configured in the OS, I can now go back to using my SD-to-SATA adapter via my usual SATA-to-IDE adapter (this makes it a lot easier to use an external SATA enclosure to swap out drives/cards).

It’s a bit of a pain to get Rhapsody on a SD card this way, but it worked. I can reuse the SD-to-IDE adapter for other projects as well.

After retrobriting the 486 eBay PC, washing the board (some corrosion) and re-badging it (it was labelled a 386,now just AT 1800), I cut a hole in the case plastics and fitted a three 7 segment display. The tint piece is out of an 80s Corolla I got earlier this week when I went to a nearby wreckers. I grabbed a few more for upcoming conversions.

Think it came out rather nicely:

I also tested out a Chinon 5.25 a client sent in - I will have to do a write test later on.

This computer is ready for the Grand 486 test of CPUs (something like 15 CPUs will be benchmarked). Now I just need to find the time between finals to record and edit it all 😉