Question IDE controller

[tcsenter]

Donate them to some computer museum. If they are still working, they deserve to stay alive.

Yeah none of these models would be considered museum pieces. They are all common, no "firsts" in a technology type or capacity barrier, none of them 'game changer' products. You can find nearly all of them or similar models/specs used on Ebay.

 

[jamesdsimone]

Still waiting on the add in card.

 

[tcsenter]

I noticed the CPU was operating much lower frequency and realized the board has the jumpers to set the CPU base clock, it was set at 100MHz. Set it at the correct 166MHz, now we're cooking with gas... 😀😆😂






Graphics is Radeon 9600 "LE" 128MB AGP. It is somewhat painful but not stepping on Legos pain level. I also discovered that Windows 7 updates released/dated early 2018 and later would not install or support processors that did not support SSE2, which the Athlon XP did not. And Firefox stopped supporting processors without SSE2 as of v48. Oh well I didn't intend to actually use this setup other than for checking out all my IDE/ATA drives. It's been fun, some memories were refreshed, I laughed, I cried.....

 

[tcsenter]

Aaaaand just like that, something has gone kaput. No display or boot. Changed graphics card, no change. Gonna try, well, everything else. WEEEEEE!

 

[jamesdsimone]

An XP 2500+, that was my main computer for a long time. I had a pair of Voodoo II's and a TNT in it. I have a functioning Phenom II system I'm using at work with 2 IDE connectors running Linux Mint and WinXP. I'm about to replace it with an HP z240 with Linux Mint and Win7. My card showed up with absolutely no documentation so that will be fun.

 

[kschendel]

I think my first drive that dad got for me with the 386 DX-40 was a 30MB Conner drive.

I did not get into the innards of a computer until my 486DX2-66 died and I opened it up to see if I could fix it. A corner of the mobo near some port had been covered in dust and mold and I think that caused a short circuit. I cleaned it up but it still wouldn't run. Then I did something truly stupid. I plugged the 220V naked cables directly in the mobo. A capacitor launched into the air and got incinerated in front of my eyes. If I had been even more stupid to have been looking at the mobo from directly above, I most likely would've died from a serious injury or badly disfigured.

LOL this reminds me of a true story from many many years ago. I was working at a computer timesharing company. Everyone used serial terminals to connect to the computers, and we had our own field engineering department to keep the computers running.

One engineer had a serial terminal in for repair that would intermittently glitch out. He sent it to the manfacturer 3 or 4 times and each time it came back "no problems found". He finally connected an AC power cord to the +5V / ground inputs on the terminal mainboard and plugged the cord into the wall (at a safe distance!) He then sent it back to the manufacturer with a note "It's broken."

They sent a new (working) terminal. The other FE's thought it was hilarious except for the lingering stink of burnt resistor magic smoke in the engineering lab.

 

[manly]

LOL you needed to move a jumper to set the FSB frequency? I believe that's a Barton core, my last desktop CPU before I started using laptops as daily drivers.* That old PC is still here, and hasn't been turned on since Obama was still president. I intend to pull the data off of it some day. 🤣

* I fibbed, I must have used an OG Mac mini for about a year in 2005.

 

[tcsenter]

Welp I happen to find THREE more 3.5" IDE drives, bringing total to 16. One had some digitized/scanned photos on it that I did not have backed up, but still have the original photos so it's probably why I didn't bother with it.

 

[igor_kavinski]

Welp I happen to find THREE more 3.5" IDE drives, bringing total to 16.

Oh no! You appear to suffer from IDEHDDism! Seek help ASAP!

 

[tcsenter]

Well our semi-annual electronics and scrap metal pickup event was this morning and off to ewaste/recycle went:

11 IDE/ATA hard drives
2 SATA hard drives
1 IDE DVD writer
1 SATA DVD writer
1 ATX and one TFX SFF power supply
1 ATX chassis the dogs and cats pissed all over
58" HDTV
~300 feet of really good Lucent/Agilent CAT5e cabling on spool in box (leftover from 500' spool) that I bought like 17 years ago for project that didn't come to fruition
2 dead graphics cards
Four or five old DC fans