"Vintage" 1990s PCs

[Hairy-Joe]

The one thing I hated about computers of that era was the initial noises the modem made when connecting. I heard it last night when watching Terminator 3 (ya it's a shite film). One of the terminators was using that to communicate with a police computer.

Apologies for the off topic......

[GrowlerG]

Like finger nails on a black board.

[95438756]

Nothing compelling for a use case with 1990d PC except the ultimate DOS Boxes.with MS DOS 6.22
To play grand prix 2 and x wing vs tie fighter

[BrianD3]

The 286 is "working", well it is booting from its 3.5 inch floppy drive but not from its 5.25 inch. I also think the hard drive is flakey/dead. Next job is to run a generic BIOS setup program (gsetup.exe) and see if I can do anything with the hard drive.

The 386 , contrary to what I thought doesn't have a dead power supply. However it is not getting through its POST, no video output, error beeps etc. There is a lot of corrosion on the motherboard near the battery so this may be the issue.

I took the 5.25 inch floppy drive out of the 386 and had it working on a Pentium III running Windows 2000. Seems to have gone flakey now after I continued to mess with it and swap drives around from one pc to another.

Brings back lots of memories of the issues with floppy disks, even when they were current 20+ years ago. Bad sectors, strange noises and lost files. The younger generation would be bemused by this - and jumper settings, floppy cable twists and so on.

[GrowlerG]

Wiping out your floppy by putting your walkman and headphones beside it.

[BrianD3]

Staged but still funny, I particularly like the rage inducing jingle at 1:10. I well remember back in college when there were constant frustrations with floppy disks/drives. Keyboards pounded in temper and comments about how I'm going to fcuk this thing out that window.

[Hairy-Joe]

The use of the sledgehammer was impressive.......

[GrowlerG]

Not often you find a sledgehammer in office.

[BrianD3]

I actually got the 286 working with the help of gsetup.exe, Now booting from a floppy and from the (MFM) hard drive.

I'm now trying to install Windows 3.1 on it and am having a lot of trouble with floppies. Bad sectors, intermittent read and write errors. Probably dirty drives. Brings back memories of the 1990s and the years that have passed since won't have improved things.

"Abort Retry Ignore Fail"

I am just doing this for the craic but if this was for work or college, I'd be thinking about reaching for the sledgehammer

[GrowlerG]

I don't miss that. Lol.

[jmcc]

I actually got the 286 working with the help of gsetup.exe, Now booting from a floppy and from the (MFM) hard drive.

I'm now trying to install Windows 3.1 on it and am having a lot of trouble with floppies. Bad sectors, intermittent read and write errors. Probably dirty drives. Brings back memories of the 1990s and the years that have passed since won't have improved things.

"Abort Retry Ignore Fail"

I am just doing this for the craic but if this was for work or college, I'd be thinking about reaching for the sledgehammer

Probably need one of those head cleaner floppies though the media may be the problem. Though it is not recommended, you could always try tapping the case to see if it dislodges any dirt on the heads.

Regards...jmcc

[jmcc]

My point is, you can in theory fix it, but what's the actual cost in doing so and before you commit to it, consider if recycling is the appropriate and responsible course of action to take.

The one thing that hardware/engineering heads had to learn as part of working with hardware is the concept of an economical repair.

If parts+labour+time > cost of replacement then junk it.

It is a completely different mindset to that of a hobbist. A lot of the people who are into vintage computers as a hobby generally don't have a hardware/engineering background and are doing it for the sheer joy of getting an old PC or computer working again. And they don't have to worry about labour costs and time as it is a hobby.

Some old hardware such as the old IBM era chicklet keyboards and cases were incredibly well engineered compared to the disposable stuff of today.

Regards...jmcc

[BrianD3]

I have one of those IBM clickety keyboards, it's one of the few items in my hoard that was bought new - from PC World of all places circa 1997/98. It was sold as a Typist's keyboard and was not cheap..

Anyhow I got Win 3.1 and Word 1.1 installed on the 286 after a few hours messing with floppies. I used my pII 350 that I've had without any issues since 1998 for this but this use seems to have killed it . No video output, error beeps diring post and the ram sticks got extremely hot during this. I've reseated, cleaned and tried different ram and different psu, no joy. I think it is fcuked.

[GrowlerG]

Rip...

[BrianD3]

I've started thinking about my collection of 80s and 90s PC junk again and was looking on donedeal and adverts.ie for parts and systems. Could find nothing on either and ebay asking prices are bonkers. e.g. this ould 486 base unit in Slovakia for 1139 euros (albeit with postage included) and the listing says that 16 people are watching it.

https://www.ebay.ie/itm/264310329634?mk ... media=COPY

[GrowlerG]

Vintage gear has a collectors market now.

[BrianD3]

486s seem to be particularly sought after? Probably many people's first pc during the 90s boom, memories of playing Doom and using the Internet for the first time etc.

Would have been easy enough to hoard a good few of them. Easier than hoarding Mk1/2 Ford Escorts anyway.

Sony Trinitron CRTs are another item that seem to have gone from junk to sought after.

[GrowlerG]

A lot are destroyed due to leaking components and batteries. Repairing them is expensive. So they are disappearing. I'd like an old Mac. But it's just clutter and hoarding.