Vintage Computers

Ok, poked around on the motherboard :

No RAM : beeps = short pause short short pause short short pause short
64Mb = long short short
128Mb = long short short
No video card = long short short (RAM was in)
 
The_Librarian said:
According to google, video card is 1 long 2 short beeps... (but I can distinctly remember it being 1 long and 3 short ones...)

Will have to sniff 'n scratch around a bit more.
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Did you make any progress? Hardware was quite finicky back then and some components would work on one board but not another. Just don't hope the VGA card I sent was a dud, wish I could have tested it first but don't have a motherboard myself.
 
The first game I ever played on a PC was Digger but on a monochrome graphics card. I'm searching google now but no matter what I search for I cannot find a mono screenshot. It's as if google is broken. I've tried:

digger dos xt hercules
digger dos xt mono
digger dos xt monochrome

But every result on google images is in either CGA or EGA. Is this part of retro history lost forever?
 
AnimateX said:
The first game I ever played on a PC was Digger but on a monochrome graphics card. I'm searching google now but no matter what I search for I cannot find a mono screenshot. It's as if google is broken. I've tried:

digger dos xt hercules
digger dos xt mono
digger dos xt monochrome

But every result on google images is in either CGA or EGA. Is this part of retro history lost forever?
Click to expand...
Not as old but these games sure do bring back some nostalgia : ooooooold windows 3.1 games
 
The_Librarian said:
According to google, video card is 1 long 2 short beeps... (but I can distinctly remember it being 1 long and 3 short ones...)

Will have to sniff 'n scratch around a bit more.
Click to expand...
It depends on the BIOS type, but it can be either.
 
gregmcc said:
Latest addition to my collection

Macintosh LC II

View attachment 1826136

Power supply DOA but looks like it's just due to leaky caps. Hopefully an easy fix.
Click to expand...
Hope so too... All of the best.

Look at Adrian's Basement on Youtube, perhaps he did a Mac PSU?

One nice thing is that you have resources on Youtube, and you can get more information about a particular piece of hardware before you jump into the deep end...
 
My_King said:
Ok hear me out....

Does anyone here have a Windows 3.11 CD:

View attachment 1823173
Click to expand...
I've never seen a retail Windows 3.11 CD, I have only seen OEM (HP) versions of the CD. I had quite a few of them in my old office at work because I was responsible for computers running legacy versions of software for old laboratory instruments.
 
What makes microcomputers so different?

They have been optimized for multi-user environments by using hardware, and that's what makes them so efficient.

Today's purdy compootas have no such optimization, and have to rely on software...
 
The_Librarian said:
Apparently the Z80 CPU still kicks some serious ass :

www.theregister.com

Dev ported DB coded in SAP’s ABAP to a ZX Spectrum emulator

: The mighty Z80 processor ran the code at astounding speed, proving retro-tech got a lot of things right
www.theregister.com www.theregister.com
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I used to laugh at my friends 2Mhz XT computers with monochrome displays in the late 80s.

On the ZX Spectrum we had colour displays and peripherals such as floppy drives, modems, mice, tablets, speech synthesizers, printers and network devices. I guess they had the last laugh though because the IBM PC become the de-facto standard but many forget what micro-computer technology we had in the 80s and that a lot of modern tech is just refinements and not much new.
 
geezer said:
I've never seen a retail Windows 3.11 CD, I have only seen OEM (HP) versions of the CD. I had quite a few of them in my old office at work because I was responsible for computers running legacy versions of software for old laboratory instruments.
Click to expand...
This is still burnt into my brain

DEVICE=C:\DOS\HIMEM.SYS
DEVICEHIGH=C:\DOS\oakcdrom.sys /D:mscd001
LASTDRIVE=F
Click to expand...
 
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