myne wrote on 2025-07-16, 17:05:

PcBytes wrote on 2025-07-16, 12:58:

Thanks! I got it to work with a mild 365*C reflow on the southbridge. No preheating as I don't have one nor the means to get/DIY one.

Nice! All good now?

Pre heating is recommended because spot heat can warp a board pretty severely. I tried to replace an lga socket once without one and the board bowed easily 3cm

I use an old desk lamp with a cheap infrared bulb for pre heating. I check the temps with a laser thermometer and move the lamp around a bit. Works great for the few times I need it.

PcBytes wrote on 2025-07-16, 18:17:

myne wrote on 2025-07-16, 17:05:

PcBytes wrote on 2025-07-16, 12:58:

Thanks! I got it to work with a mild 365*C reflow on the southbridge. No preheating as I don't have one nor the means to get/DIY one.

Nice! All good now?

Pre heating is recommended because spot heat can warp a board pretty severely. I tried to replace an lga socket once without one and the board bowed easily 3cm

Yeah, all is working now. Tested IDE ports as well to make sure they both register, and they do. Will install 98 or 2k with a GF256 and see what scores do I get 🤣.

I didn't get any warping. Not sure but maybe the nozzle size helped?

Probably other rigid things like isa/pci slots held it.

Found some cheap goodies from Wallapop.

A nice Texas instruments TX486DLC/E @ 40mhz for the low price of 6€ (seller's photo):

Next, a PCchips M326 V5.2, a very late 386 DX motherboard. The date on the stickers puts it in October 1994. Had the obligatory "varta" plague, but , not being a true Varta it did minimal damage. Couldn't resist the temptation @35€, a somewhat reasonable price for a speedy 386 MB.

At last a key pad for my Zx Spectrum 128K that I was still missing in my collection, a bit on the expensive @30€, but they are hard to find:

Well, not bought today but rather arrived.

Interesting times ahead.. anybody wants to go to Venice?

tehsiggi wrote on 2025-07-18, 15:38:

Interesting times ahead.. anybody wants to go to Venice?

Well, sometimes I still feel the urge for the 3.0 shaders, but was told by some good Vogons ppl to stay away - too hot and picky 😉

Halofiber86 wrote on 2025-07-18, 19:01:

tehsiggi wrote on 2025-07-18, 15:38:

Interesting times ahead.. anybody wants to go to Venice?

Well, sometimes I still feel the urge for the 3.0 shaders, but was told by some good Vogons ppl to stay away - too hot and picky 😉

My goal is to sail where nobody ever went before with that. We'll see how that works out 😁

Bought one of the last Zalman VF900 coolers that are available online in new condition. They've drastically improved the temperature on my GeForce 7900gt card. The temp was normally around 61 degrees on idle but with the new aftermarket cooler, it went down to 42 degrees at idle. Was the best decision I've ever made considering that you can't find it anywhere else. There were two listings of it on ebay and ONLY on ebay.

Another bit of fairy dust acquired :DD So excited for this beauty to arrive.

This is a MSI K8N MASTER2-FAR dual socket 940 motherboard. I have two Opteron 285s ready for it, just have to get some DDR ECC memory. It's rare enough for a 940 mobo to have PCIE support, this is even SLI capable. One of the rare crossbreeds between server and HEDT. Plus it can run 12GB of DDR memory and is complete with the original packaging and (hopefully) two coolers.

The Asrock 775i65PE from ebay arrived late last night and it's working nicely.

I currently have a P4 661 in it overclocked to about 4.2GHZ, I'm using a Coolermaster Hyper 212 for cooling that was just sitting around. Had to move things out of one of my beloved Enlight cases into a Deer brand beige case due to the height of the CPU cooler.

Still waiting for the D0 P4 651 processors to show up, I'm hoping one of the two will run stable with a 1066 FSB in here.

A dead Radeon x1600Pro AGP from ebay. For science!

Today's haul:

- ASRock 4CoreDual-SATA2 + Pentium D 805 + X550
- Gigabyte G41MT-S2PT
- ECS NFORCE3-A939
- several HDDs including 2x Deskstar 120GXP
- Jou Jye PSU

Masterchief79 wrote on 2025-07-19, 19:20:

Another bit of fairy dust acquired :DD So excited for this beauty to arrive.

This is a MSI K8N MASTER2-FAR dual socket 940 motherboard. I have two Opteron 285s ready for it, just have to get some DDR ECC memory. It's rare enough for a 940 mobo to have PCIE support, this is even SLI capable. One of the rare crossbreeds between server and HEDT. Plus it can run 12GB of DDR memory and is complete with the original packaging and (hopefully) two coolers.

And besides all of the above, you might want to recap that one too. I can see bulging brown KZG caps on quite a few spots.
Rubycon ZLH/ZLQ it or Panasonic FR/FS it. I think Nichicon HW might work too. Whatever. Just anything but the bulging KZG. And even the ones that aren't... probably aren't far behind. They will likely be from the same or similar date codes, so similar failures can be expected soon.

tehsiggi wrote on 2025-07-20, 09:11:

A dead Radeon x1600Pro AGP from ebay. For science!

You monster!

Hey, want a dead X1650 too for that? 🤣

MrSegfault wrote on 2025-07-19, 02:28:

Bought one of the last Zalman VF900 coolers that are available online in new condition. They've drastically improved the temperature on my GeForce 7900gt card. The temp was normally around 61 degrees on idle but with the new aftermarket cooler, it went down to 42 degrees at idle. Was the best decision I've ever made considering that you can't find it anywhere else. There were two listings of it on ebay and ONLY on ebay.

Yeah, and people wonder why these bumpgated cards die all the time. 61C at idle is... about average for these cards... and pretty terrible. Under load, they run in the 80+ range, at which point the underfill is a goey mess, not really doing anything for the card.
That said, I wonder what temperatures you are getting under full GPU load with that VF-900. FWIW, I have a few HIS HD5770 cards with similar-looking coolers, and those pull off around 60-65C under max load. While the TDP of the 7900 GS/GT cards is rated lower, their conduction within the core is not the best. So I suspect you'll be close to getting 60-65C under load too, if not more. In any case, try to stay under 70C at all times. Watch your room temperature too! If you're getting 65C in a room temperature of 20C, expect to easily hit 70C when the room goes to 25C. With these old GPUs, the relationship between room temps and GPU temps variation is almost 1:1.

tehsiggi wrote on 2025-07-18, 15:38:

Well, not bought today but rather arrived.

Interesting times ahead.. anybody wants to go to Venice?

Oi!
Good luck with that one. Hope it's not a dead one pulled off by some China scrapyard. I guess we will see.

momaka wrote on 2025-07-21, 21:55:

You monster!

Hey, want a dead X1650 too for that? 🤣

I'm very tempted. But for project "Little Venice", the two dead cards I've ordered should suffice.. for now. However I might take you up on that offer in the future, if you don't mind! (Depending on my workload etc.)

momaka wrote on 2025-07-21, 21:55:

Oi!
Good luck with that one. Hope it's not a dead one pulled off by some China scrapyard. I guess we will see.

They appear to be coming off of a regular reel/belt. The BGA balls look like factory (similar to RV280 NOS GPUs I have) and the IC overall is in a flawless state, which gives me hope.

I think I have a few dud X1950s and a X1300, whose bridge chips were pretty mauled to say the least.

momaka wrote on 2025-07-21, 21:55:

Masterchief79 wrote on 2025-07-19, 19:20:

Another bit of fairy dust acquired :DD So excited for this beauty to arrive.

This is a MSI K8N MASTER2-FAR dual socket 940 motherboard. I have two Opteron 285s ready for it, just have to get some DDR ECC memory. It's rare enough for a 940 mobo to have PCIE support, this is even SLI capable. One of the rare crossbreeds between server and HEDT. Plus it can run 12GB of DDR memory and is complete with the original packaging and (hopefully) two coolers.

And besides all of the above, you might want to recap that one too. I can see bulging brown KZG caps on quite a few spots.
Rubycon ZLH/ZLQ it or Panasonic FR/FS it. I think Nichicon HW might work too. Whatever. Just anything but the bulging KZG. And even the ones that aren't... probably aren't far behind. They will likely be from the same or similar date codes, so similar failures can be expected soon.

Yeah, no worries, I know my way around capacitor replacements (and more complicated BGA jobs). The board will get a full recap before I power it on. I know it works since the seller showed me a picture with a windows install running on it so that's good enough for me. Currently waiting for UPS to receive the package and then I even might get it tomorrow even.

Unfortunately today of all days my desoldering station decided to stop working so I have to wait for a new desoldering gun to arrive.

Also just acquired: XFX 6600GT. Adding pics later cause files are too big on my phone.

Edit: Here they are, with and without Recap. The 470/16 didn't need to be polys, but I liked the look better. I know 6600GT are usually done with ultra low ESR 330/16 polys so I assume this will work. Still untested though.

Bought a pair of hydro copper 2 gtx 580's, one 3gb and one 1.5gb along with a air cooled 3gb 580. Hoping this will fix the bugs I'm getting with dx5 and older games with the gtx titian x

PcBytes wrote on 2025-07-22, 13:18:

I think I have a few dud X1950s and a X1300, whose bridge chips were pretty mauled to say the least.

I'll be doing a lot of testing with Rialto in the upcoming weeks. A little side project, while i can't motivate myself to continue working on Argus.

Once i got something to show, there will be a thread about it.

Yeah, I'm waiting on a "dead" X1950 as well. I have a plan of trying to keep it running as long as possible, and it involves a few "ghetto" tricks I've learnt along the time. None too ugly, but just enough to classify as ghetto.

Nice retro looking ATX desktop case...

Sapphire AMD HD7970 Dual-X 3GB