Show off your old and retro computer parts

[SimplyChunk]

This is where I learned of it.  I know he's formatting an old HDD with it but the tool should still work for your SSD for Windows 7.  If you get the .exe from Major Geeks like I did and in this video you should be fine

 

[Average Nerd]

5 minutes ago, SimplyChunk said:

This is where I learned of it.  I know he's formatting an old HDD with it but the tool should still work for your SSD for Windows 7.  If you get the .exe from Major Geeks like I did and in this video you should be fine

 

I´ll need to buy a CD, since flash drives don´t seem to be supported, but maybe I´m lucky and I find a stray CD in my stash of random storage media.

I´ll edit an update in when I have it working.

[SimplyChunk]

23 minutes ago, Average nerd said:

I´ll need to buy a CD, since flash drives don´t seem to be supported, but maybe I´m lucky and I find a stray CD in my stash of random storage media.

I´ll edit an update in when I have it working.

Good luck.  Another alternative I've read is Gparted.  Which I think is a Linux thing.  Maybe one of the guys here will have more experience with it?

[flibberdipper]

3 hours ago, SimplyChunk said:

Good luck.  Another alternative I've read is Gparted.  Which I think is a Linux thing.  Maybe one of the guys here will have more experience with it?

@Average nerd I'm using Xubuntu here because it's one of the most lightweight distros out there, but this is the basic process you'll need to do to get that good ol' MBR style back.

 

 

 

[Average Nerd]

@flibberdipper, @SimplyChunk I ended up taking an entirely different route, (couldn´t find a CD) in the form of a software called 'Partition Wizard' from MiniTool, the process was simply connecting the SSD to my laptop via an adapter, selecting it in Partition Wizard, and clicking "Convert GPT to MBR".

And it worked flawlessly, currently I am staring at the Windows 7 Desktop in amazement.

[flibberdipper]

43 minutes ago, Average nerd said:

@flibberdipper, @SimplyChunk I ended up taking an entirely different route, (couldn´t find a CD) in the form of a software called 'Partition Wizard' from MiniTool, the process was simply connecting the SSD to my laptop via an adapter, selecting it in Partition Wizard, and clicking "Convert GPT to MBR".

And it worked flawlessly, currently I am staring at the Windows 7 Desktop in amazement.

Nice! Yeah if you were just trying to convert an existing install and not nuke it my route would have very much made you upset lol

[ElaVeTed80]

[ElaVeTed80]

Just now, ElaVeTed80 said:

Whole lotta old ram and a Intel duo core CPU in a mario 3DS case LMAO

[Average Nerd]

2 minutes ago, Mark Smith said:

do you have any ideas please share them with me.

You could do what I did and build a "retro" computer with them, simply continue to show them off to people, or, if you don't have enough and you need to get rid of them, try to put them on ebay or similar. 

[Average Nerd]

Found this Creative soundcard from 1998 while looking for a part in one of my many boxes today. Installed it into my Windows 7 computer, it seems to work, apart from missing drivers.

[SimplyChunk]

3 minutes ago, Average nerd said:

Found this Creative soundcard from 1998 while looking for a part in one of my many boxes today. Installed it into my Windows 7 computer, it seems to work, apart from missing drivers.

Might be an 'SBXXXX' number on it somewhere.  That'll point us towards what model it is

[Average Nerd]

1 hour ago, SimplyChunk said:

Might be an 'SBXXXX' number on it somewhere.  That'll point us towards what model it is

It´s an ES1373, I managed to find old drivers on a website called "OEM Device Drivers", and after transferring them to the Win 7 PC via a flash drive, I could install them, and it now shows up in device manager under "Audio-, Video- and Gamecontroller"

Edited December 6, 2023 by Average nerd
Corrected misspelling

[SimplyChunk]

1 minute ago, Average nerd said:

It´s an ES1373, I managed to find old drivers on a website called "OEM Device Drivers", and after transferring them to the Win / PC via a flash drive, I could install them, and it now shows up in device manager under "Audio-, Video- and Gamecontroller"

Yeah game controller cause of the Joystick/midi port

[Spindel]

I've had it for almost 15 years so it should be classified as retro, right? 

 

I still use it as my main mouse at home, it's the best mouse ever made. 

 

Things that have been fixed: 

• Pointer jitter (blobs of glue to fixate the laser)
• Double click issue with left mousbutton (cleaning of the contact surfaces in the switch) 
• New slip pads (originals had to be removed to open up the mouse) 

 

[SimplyChunk]

4 hours ago, Spindel said:

Double click issue with left mousbutton (cleaning of the contact surfaces in the switch) 

Might try that on my other G305

[SimplyChunk]

Is this bad boy retro yet?? it's 10 years old at this point...

[TheDutchGinger]

Not that old as it's from 2011 but never seen it before i got this one from a relative. (Don't know what but something is wrong with the screen as it's extremely dark and can only see it when shining light directly on it)

[da na]

2 minutes ago, TheDutchGinger said:

Not that old as it's from 2011 but never seen it before i got this one from a relative. (Don't know what but something is wrong with the screen as it's extremely dark and can only see it when shining light directly on it)

Dead backlight, not hard to fix.

[TheDutchGinger]

16 minutes ago, da na said:

Dead backlight, not hard to fix.

Took the screen off and put it back on and now it's for some reason working again.

[Kilrah]

Cool, bad contacts are frequent in old machines, got lucky

 

[TheDutchGinger]

7 minutes ago, Kilrah said:

Cool, bad contacts are frequent in old machines, got lucky

 

Yep back up and working just doesn't want to work with external devices, and the ferrari startup sound startles me every time.

 

 

[SimplyChunk]

2 hours ago, TheDutchGinger said:

Not that old as it's from 2011

If it's a 4000 it's from 2005.  Like the one in this video

 

[TheDutchGinger]

1 minute ago, SimplyChunk said:

If it's a 4000 it's from 2005.  Like the one in this video

 

Yep i read the wrong sticker... i read the one my relative put on there when he used it for work in 2011 don't know how i didn't notice his name on the sticker heh...

[Kilrah]

Took the U101 back out... somehow with the peripherals it looks even more like something I'd have drooled sooooo much over in 2005, so cute... and still kinda do 

 

 

Also installed Debian 12 alongside XP with the Sony PCMCIA drive (most VAIOs of that era will only boot from USB if it's a floppy, not a CD, for CD boot you need the blessed drive) so it's notoriously difficult/impossible to load an OS if you don't have one

 

 

 

Except that I then had a crack at finding a workaround for running it from a USB CD drive...

 

FreeDOS boot floppy

usbaspi.sys driver to find the USB device
usbcd.sys driver to... load it
mscdex.exe to mount it
linld.com to launch the kernel/ramdisk from DOS using the options from grub.cfg found on the CD

 

 

and it somehow worked with a bit of massaging

 

Bonus: 2 floppy drives on a 13900K Win11 PC

 

[da na]

11 minutes ago, Kilrah said:

Also installed Debian 12 alongside XP with the Sony PCMCIA drive (most VAIOs of that era will only boot from USB if it's a floppy, not a CD, for CD boot you need the blessed drive) so it's notoriously difficult/impossible to load an OS if you don't have one

Often a workaround for that is flashing the OS installer image to a hard drive partition, then deleting that partition once the OS is installed