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Post by Deleted on Aug 13, 2011 20:04:41 GMT -5
I just realized a problem with my Gigabyte i-RAM suggestion: No PCI slots on a 386 motherboard right? It might still work if you use a separate PCI based motherboard to power the i-RAM + IDE convertor. You'd have 4gb of C drive the speed of a RAM drive..
It would be super old school like the PCjr sidecars ^_^
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Post by Deleted on Aug 14, 2011 15:33:37 GMT -5
don't they make ISA to PCI cards? I could've sworn I've seen some back in the day...
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Post by Deleted on Aug 14, 2011 22:59:19 GMT -5
don't they make ISA to PCI cards? I could've sworn I've seen some back in the day... I've never heard of a slot converter that can make a PCI card into an ISA. Some ISA card to PCI slot devices were made but only for board developers. I'm pretty sure a RAM drive sidecar can be made by putting an i-RAM into a mini-ITX motherboard and case. Hide the SATA to IDE convertor in the case and get a long rubberized IDE cable to reach the 386.
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Post by Tom Maneiro on Aug 15, 2011 18:47:52 GMT -5
don't they make ISA to PCI cards? I could've sworn I've seen some back in the day... I've never heard of a slot converter that can make a PCI card into an ISA. Some ISA card to PCI slot devices were made but only for board developers. I'm pretty sure a RAM drive sidecar can be made by putting an i-RAM into a mini-ITX motherboard and case. Hide the SATA to IDE convertor in the case and get a long rubberized IDE cable to reach the 386. You CAN'T convert PCI cards to ISA, unless you're willing to fab a custom PCI-to-ISA bridge that does not exist anywhere in this world. ISA-to-PCI is doable (just take a look at any modern motherboard and how it handles those legacy ISA devices), but so far, the only ISA-to-PCI adapter cards are from weird manufacturers that make devices for hardware developers, and they cost $$$. Hell, there is even a ISA-to-USB card As for the i-RAM thing... well, why not just shove the SATA-to-IDE adapter into the 386 motherboard? This way, you can use a simple thin SATA cable instead of a bulky rounded IDE cable Be aware that some SATA-to-IDE converters may not work well with old motherboards: for example, i bought this Addonics adapter to plug my new 1TB Samsung drive to Saki (a P225MMX on a i430VX chipset for those that don't remember), and while it worked... it also knocked down one of my IDE channels when using it! Plug on the channel 1, and suddenly drives on channel 2 won't be recognized AT ALL, neither by BIOS nor by Linux
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electronixguy
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Post by electronixguy on Aug 20, 2011 10:33:21 GMT -5
I was under the impression that the i-ram only draws power from the PCI slot (I haven't really looked into this device very much), and if that is indeed the case, then could one not create an adapter that would carry the power? Of course, this idea may be fueled by lack of coffee...
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Post by Deleted on Aug 20, 2011 11:30:44 GMT -5
That is my impression as well. Most mini-ITX boards already have a processor though. I'm sure Tom can think of cool ways to use that extra horsepower with his 386.
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electronixguy
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Post by electronixguy on Aug 20, 2011 19:27:40 GMT -5
I was actually thinking of getting the power to the card without the need for another system at all, not sure if it's possible though... haven't really looked into it much.
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Post by Deleted on Aug 21, 2011 4:41:12 GMT -5
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Post by GiGaBiTe on Dec 12, 2011 5:21:39 GMT -5
don't they make ISA to PCI cards? I could've sworn I've seen some back in the day... PCI to ISA bridge chips are possible, because the PCI bus is fathoms faster and can satisfy all requirements of the ISA bus. The same is not true in the reverse. In order for you to make an ISA to PCI bridge, you'd first have to figure out how to multiplex a 32 bit bus onto a 16 bit bus. This alone would cripple the already paltry amount of available bandwidth (between 4.77 - 11 MB/s depending on the board and ISA clock.) You'd then have to figure out a way to make a clock multiplier to multiply the ISA buses clock to get as close to 33.33 MHz as possible, because most PCI devices are very unforgiving to non-standard clocks. Most PCI cards generally stop working when the clock is below 25 MHz. And if you could satisfy those two requirements, you have to hope that any PCI device you want to use can cope with the crippling amount of limited bandwidth. The PCI bus bandwidth at 33.33 MHz is 133 MB/s, and at best on the ISA bus, 2.38 - 5.5 MB/s. A GPU would be completely out of the question obviously.
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Post by Tom Maneiro on Dec 22, 2012 20:57:04 GMT -5
Welcome to the (Bi)Yearly Service Day 2012!(Sponsored by WesternGate, because HDDs are doomed to suck forever!)Yes, she is still alive ...and dirty... Let's clean this mess: Some notes: - Lenovo L151 LCD monitor SUCKS. I got that one used for relatively cheap from a MercadoLibre seller. Sadly it can't do 1024x768 (its native resolution) when used with most older/VESA-mode videocards (including the "GPUs" on Saki -SiS 6326- and Marika -OAK OTI-077-), - it claims that the refresh rate is out of sync. Unfortunately I had no other options, as I finally had to send my good ol' IBM E54 CRT to a repair shop to get its missing red back into position - I cleaned all card-edge connectors with rubbing alcohol and a pencil eraser. Just what it was needed, because the cards were acting weird (including the AHA-1542 which even refused to initialize). - Sadly the 5.25" FDD drive seems to be gone - it refuses to recognize any inserted disk - Somehow I managed to reset my CMOS... twice. - I suck at DOOM, definitvely. And this thing is so laggy under Win9x that it adds more suckage to my suckyness. - MercadoLibre Venezuela is absolutely useless for vintage computer enthusiasts. Yay for a country full of ignorant consumist morons and scammers
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Post by GiGaBiTe on Oct 28, 2013 5:03:53 GMT -5
Welcome to the (Bi)Yearly Service Day 2012!(Sponsored by WesternGate, because HDDs are doomed to suck forever!) I wonder how a SSD would work on a 386? - Lenovo L151 LCD monitor SUCKS. I got that one used for relatively cheap from a MercadoLibre seller. Sadly it can't do 1024x768 (its native resolution) when used with most older/VESA-mode videocards (including the "GPUs" on Saki -SiS 6326- and Marika -OAK OTI-077-), - it claims that the refresh rate is out of sync. Unfortunately I had no other options, as I finally had to send my good ol' IBM E54 CRT to a repair shop to get its missing red back into position Many of those old VDPs couldn't run at 60 Hz and were limited to the 43-56 Hz range. I don't even think they're supposed to run Windows - I cleaned all card-edge connectors with rubbing alcohol and a pencil eraser. Just what it was needed, because the cards were acting weird (including the AHA-1542 which even refused to initialize). - Sadly the 5.25" FDD drive seems to be gone - it refuses to recognize any inserted disk I had a few cards like that recently. I had a couple of PCI SATA RAID controllers that were causing bus glitches between cards and not working properly, so I ripped them out and used a fat eraser on the card connector and they started playing nice again.
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Post by idisjunction on Nov 3, 2013 4:04:14 GMT -5
I wonder how a SSD would work on a 386? Probably pretty well, other than the wasted capacity. Windows 95 would be a little rough on it with swapping, but as long as you had something with good wear levelling it shouldn't be a problem.
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Post by Tom Maneiro on Nov 10, 2013 0:37:06 GMT -5
Many of those old VDPs couldn't run at 60 Hz and were limited to the 43-56 Hz range. I don't even think they're supposed to run Windows The OTI-077 is from the pre-Windows ages, so you might be right. But the SiS 6326 was clearly intended as a Windows graphics accelerator (some versions even do basic 3D accel and DVD/MPEG-2 decompression). However, I also found a slighty older ATi 3D Rage II+DVD (working pull from another Pentium-MMX box!), and it plays nice with my Lenovo display... under XP, on a Pentium 4 box. If I'm bored, I might slap it into Saki and test... I wonder how a SSD would work on a 386? Probably pretty well, other than the wasted capacity. Windows 95 would be a little rough on it with swapping, but as long as you had something with good wear levelling it shouldn't be a problem. Given that you're limited to 504/512MB anyway, wear leveling would be beyond excellent if not using a braindead SSD controller.
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Post by Tom Maneiro on Dec 8, 2013 22:41:24 GMT -5
Mandatory Yearly update: - Marika: Haven't booted her this year. Might play with it before the end of the year - Saki: Still doing service as my home router, print server, porno stash, backup storage ("cold storage", yeah, whatever), firewall, and anti-goverment censorship/spying protection device. She lost THREE harddrives this year, though (the boot drive, its replacement, and the 40GB scratch drive - a fourth drive also arrived DOA). Now it's rocking dual 250GB HDDs... one of them (a Samsung, what else?) bought used with TWO reallocated sectors (Still, having passed my comprehensive batch of torture testing, I want to believe that it was a case of "power blackout induced reallocations", something very common with the crappy electricity supply here, because the number hasn't grown in months!). Oh, and I migrated her from a old crusty outdated Frankenstein Knoppix to a brand spankin' new Debian 7.0 Wheezy/stable which can receive updates. Still going strong, despite the naysayers (I prefer to spend more on electricity rather than drinking lead in my tap water, thanks) - Asumi: Haven't booted her since... 2010? Gathering dust just below my fancy new color laser printer (I had no other spot to place it) - Everything else: Added an Asus K53SD laptop to the collection. Nice Sandy Bridge i5 rig for all of my Steam(OS?) needs (which basically boils down to indie and japanese games, and Portal at most), but it suffers of that disease called Sega 32X nVidia Optimus . The Dell Inspiron 6400 (built like a tank!) had its screeen replaced due to a dead backlight CCFL (not easy to replace as a single part, and much less in Venezuela because finding a replacement tube is HARD, expensive, and a potential health hazard - tasty lethal mercury!)
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Post by GiGaBiTe on Mar 9, 2014 1:53:01 GMT -5
and a potential health hazard - tasty lethal mercury!) Mercury would only be lethal if you ingested it, or were exposed to significant quantities of it. Just breaking a few CCFLs isn't going to cause too many problems.
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