Show off your old and retro computer parts

[ApolloX75]

I actually went through and listed a bunch of stuff on eBay tonight that I either can't use anymore or can't be bothered to fix. Or just can't find a use for anymore.

 

That's tough for me, I'm naturally a sentimental person so putting something like my Voodoo 3 2000 that I've had since 1998 is a struggle.

 

I listed a 7870 Hawk that needs a reflow. I could do it... and I might. But I've fixed a half dozen cards the last few weeks and I'm a little burnt out.

 

Spoiler

 

[SimplyChunk]

27 minutes ago, ApolloX75 said:

like my Voodoo 3 2000

I had one of those back in the day.  T'was my first 3D Accelerator card and it used to run Carmaggedon II like a boss   Had it paired with a PII 450

[ApolloX75]

Just now, SimplyChunk said:

I had one of those back in the day.  T'was my first 3D Accelerator card and it used to run Carmaggedon II like a boss   Had it paired with a PII 450

Haha, yeah it was my first real 3D accelerator too. I used it until I bought a 32Mb S3 Savage 3D a couple years later. Had the Voodoo matched to my K6-II 400 until I built my Athlon Thunderbird. I still have that K6-II, it is permanently affixed to it's heatsink and will not release. It is 100% a paperweight now.

 

I also have my Thunderbird. It still works though.

[yellowdog]

Old 256K stick of ram an a sealed windows 3.1 set of 3.5 floppies

[Dabombinable]

The new sexiness, aka the best DOS sound card, bought as "for parts or not working" vs the old sexiness (mono due to one of my first and blatantly terrible soldering attempts - will fix):

Yeah the new sexiness will work fine.

 

Edit: It works perfectly. The Jackon caps need to go still (no idea why both cards have had stretched labels on the caps).

[da na]

Got a CD today with a lovely Socket 478 motherboard printed on the inside. It appears this is an HP/Compaq NR138, an OEM board used in the D200 midtower series among others.

The inside front cover is printed with the pads of an LGA775 chip, although personally I think it would make sense if it were the pins of a Socket 478 CPU.

[Strongit]

On 11/4/2022 at 5:46 PM, tkitch said:

I just scored a BITCHIN deal on craigslist, haven't tested it yet, but I've inventoried:

 

Antec / Chenming Aluminum case, in nearly perfect condition.   Only a couple light scratches on the plastic, even!

 

Mobo:  Abit IC7

CPU:  Intel P4 3.0GHz /512/SLKW6

RAM:  2x 512MB Geil DDR400 CL2.5 DIMMs

GPU:  Hercules Prophet 9800 Pro 128MB 

Sound:  Creative Audigy 2

Other:  10/100 PCI NIC, 802.11 B/G PCI WiFi, Haupage WinTV Tuner

 

All said and done?  40$ on Craigslist!

Damn, that's exactly the rig I'm looking to build for myself for windows 98 gaming. Jealous.

[8tg]

Finally got the Via Artigo 1200 going. This is a super neat machine just because it’s weird, it’s a 1ghz Via Eden x2 processor, and built in Via Chrome9 graphics.

Got 2gb of ddr3 and a 120gb ssd.

 

I tried windows 7 and it wouldn’t play nice so it’s running Xubuntu 18 but with windowmaker/gnustep installed which runs much smoother.

This is by far the slowest machine I’ve posted to this forum from, and I’ve posted here from a Pentium MMX, I know that’s mostly down to a disparity in the operating systems requirements and using modern Firefox and such, but kmeleon on windows xp on a 266mhz processor was faster than this.

it’s a neat form factor, it’s meant to be mounted behind a display so it’s got I/o on both sides of it, including an expansion port and optional usb 3.0 module that can go in it.

currently it’s just hooked up to my regular test surface, my kitchen counter and a basic monitor

I like it though, there’s just something cool about not seeing intel, amd, ATI or nvidia anywhere on a system 

[da na]

2 minutes ago, 8tg said:

Finally got the Via Artigo 1200 going. This is a super neat machine just because it’s weird, it’s a 1ghz Via Eden x2 processor, and built in Via Chrome9 graphics.

Got 2gb of ddr3 and a 120gb ssd.

 

I tried windows 7 and it wouldn’t play nice so it’s running Xubuntu 18 but with windowmaker/gnustep installed which runs much smoother.

This is by far the slowest machine I’ve posted to this forum from, and I’ve posted here from a Pentium MMX, I know that’s mostly down to a disparity in the operating systems requirements and using modern Firefox and such, but kmeleon on windows xp on a 266mhz processor was faster than this.

 

it’s a neat form factor, it’s meant to be mounted behind a display so it’s got I/o on both sides of it, including an expansion port and optional usb 3.0 module that can go in it.

 

currently it’s just hooked up to my regular test surface, my kitchen counter and a basic monitor

 

I like it though, there’s just something cool about not seeing intel, amd, ATI or nvidia anywhere on a system 

Wacky that that's an x86 CPU from not AMD or Intel, had no clue VIA had a license for x86.

[SimplyChunk]

10 minutes ago, Mel0n. said:

Wacky that that's an x86 CPU from not AMD or Intel, had no clue VIA had a license for x86.

It was VIA, by the means of several different transaction trees, that ended up owning Cyrix.  That's where they get their x86 licence from.

 

Edit: Source

 

[da na]

4 minutes ago, SimplyChunk said:

It was VIA, by the means of several different transaction trees, that ended up owning Cyrix.  That's where they get their x86 licence from.

 

Edit: Source

 

Fascinating. Watched that video ages ago, suppose I just forgot.

[flibberdipper]

10 minutes ago, Schnoz said:

How the actual hell did you do that?!

Honestly it wouldn't be hard. I've got a Pentium Pro and an MMX with 128MB and 64MB? of RAM respectively, I could totally just steal the RAM from the Pro and install Windows XP or a super light Linux distro on it. Bam, LTT on a CPU older than me.

[8tg]

18 hours ago, Schnoz said:

How the actual hell did you do that?!

You’d be surprised at what can “technically” do a lot more than one would expect, it’s just gonna be really slow and sometimes unstable.

People get browsers working on ancient hardware, there’s a guy who regularly posts in 4chans /g/ board from an Amiga A1200 with some extensive hardware mods to bring it to 79mhz with 16mb of ram.

To restate, something where a single image from my phone would use every last kilobyte of ram on the system, from 1992, is capable of browsing and fully using a basic web forum.

[abit-sean]

These are my abit iDome DS500 speakers and SW500 SUB. Abit made 3 different sets of speakers over the years and these were the last. Currently using them with my projector for family film nights but have used them on my PC in the past. I think they were given to me in 2007 and were possibly the set I used to lend out for reviews? Never did find out why they called them iDome?  

[Bitter]

@abit-sean

You ever consider making an Abit museum website?

[abit-sean]

32 minutes ago, Bitter said:

@abit-sean

You ever consider making an Abit museum website?

Don't really have the time at the moment but the thought had crossed my mind. At the moment i'm trying to replace some of my lost motherboards, sadly my engineering samples are long gone now.

[S-Ki1156]

Got any space for another one?

 

 

A few specs:

 

Intel Core i7-860

Gigabyte P55A-UD3

14GB DDR3 (3x2GB + 1x8GB)

HD7870 2GB GDDR5

1TB Seagate ST31000524AS

CM Hyper H412R Heatsink

Inter-Tech FP-750 PSU

 

I have a lot of older stuff as well, though they're currently in storage. Here's a older 478 machine. Photo's a bit older as I've since dismantled it due to the case not screwing back properly anymore. (it was a freebie, so can't really complain.)

 

 

[CerealExperimentsLain]

Christmas just came early this year.

 

...This also cost me CAD$149 after shipping. D:

[da na]

School retired a bunch of old 10/100 networking hardware so I popped over to ewaste to see if any is of use to me. I grabbed this 24 port HP ProCurve with dual fiber modules for my room, since it’s free and overkill, two things I like.

Also found this piece of hardware with these boards, pretty cool, not of much use to me but they seem to be worth selling.

Also found an electric typewriter with one of the dry ink ribbons that shows what has been typed backwards 

[da na]

Fun fact, Seagate introduced the Barracuda in the early 1990s as a server drive because of its high spindle speed of 7200 RPM (the first drive to attain that now common speed). They were originally all high performance SCSI drives before moving into the consumer market in the early 00’s.

I got this lot of five new old stock 9.1gb barracudas for $18. They are 80 pin SCSI and full height 3.5, a good deal taller than standard hdds today.

[ApolloX75]

On 12/1/2022 at 3:02 PM, CerealExperimentsLain said:

Christmas just came early this year.

 

...This also cost me CAD$149 after shipping. D:

 Finally. My shelf has relevance.

I have more, these are the older ones.

 

Also a literal stack of demo discs. Probably a foot high or more.

 

[CerealExperimentsLain]

4 hours ago, ApolloX75 said:

 Finally. My shelf has relevance.

 

I have more, these are the older ones.

 

Also a literal stack of demo discs. Probably a foot high or more.

 

Some of those would fill gaps in my collection too.

[Dabombinable]

I don't recommend keeping the original fan on these coolerso, or using them as a replacement/upgrade on old cards. I was wondering where the smell of hot electronics was coming from - the fan, its cable and plug were too hot to touch:

Going to put on the original heatsink which has had a fan screwed into it. These Palit cards are luckily made really well. FX5600XT and 64bit MX440-8x with Rubycon caps - even the 32bit card with 1.2GB/s memory has them in the photos I've seen.

[Dabombinable]

It melted off the shaft...this is why I never leave my retro PC unattended.

 

[da na]

Tried out one of the vintage Barracudas I picked up a while ago and learned quickly it has to be screwed in. It vibrates so much that it'll fall right off whatever flat surface you set it on. Was planning on testing it today, but as not to bother my roommate I'll have to do that tomorrow.

 

I guess the crazy speed of 7200 RPM comes at a price!