In the 386 era ROhS (no lead solder regulations) was not yet invented so all those board were soldered with SnPb solder. I worked in a huge factory that assembled PCBs and lead-free solder was just introduced in 2002 for some PACE sat receivers with HDD storage. The Seagate HDD had the CHS specs on the label (22:56). Also, if you know the capacity of a HDD, you can choose from the predefined HDD types in BIOS one with the same or the closest capacity. However, after partitioning, that drive will not work in a modern system wit HDD autodetection (the data will be mostly seen as corrupted) unless you put the same CHS geometry again. I did that often with larger HDDs in 286 system that lacked the user type 47.
There actually were some non-SnPb solders going back, but they all were either specialty (e.g. for heat-sensitive applications), or not designed for electronics (at least the early-2000s non-lead solders were partially or entirely derived from jewelry silver solders- there's quite a number in that field, and if you can get up into their temperature range they offer conductivity, and variations on color and strength).
Holy cow I must be blind, I didn't see that 😂 Ahh good to know they were still using lead solder back then. The removal process was rather easy. Good tip re HDD types there, I'll keep that in mind
@@absalomdraconis You are right, but the regular electronics were made with leaded solder, mainly in RF I saw non leaded solder (some silver alloy) and that only in some professional modules (motorola StarTac and Panasonic DECT had some modules that HAD to be soldered with that special alloy or QC dont pass). I meant the ROHS directive that enforcedthe use of non lead solcer alloy to all consumer electronics. I remember after a shift NEAR the solder wave, my white clothes were gray with leaded solder vapors.
Thanks Chris! Glad you enjoyed the video :) Now I've done my project I can sit back and watch everyone else's. Happy #DOScember2022 to you too and have a good holiday season!
In the future you can jumper the leads for the power switch and just use the built-in switch on the atx power supply. It will save you from having to drill another hole. Love the case! Also I do have the correct i/o backplane for your Athlon build and I left my email in the comment thread of that video if you want it.
3:25 when you try to make a hole template, use a paper scratch it with pencil... and now you can line it up with other object.... this technique will fit better IMHO
HI Cool Project The case reminds me of the australian made Ipex 386/486/Pentium 70 PC's ( 486 etc has screw down case not the 286/386 style metal push button release yours has ) i only done 1 Pc with power supply fit and i did not want to drive to work to use tools, so i just installed a small generic AT or ATX external brick style power supply that was recycled from some european printer servers that were no longer used Regards George
Ahh yes the old ipex systems. I think some made it to NZ. Good idea with the power supply modifications, it can be a bit tricky to make some of these fit
19:55 for future reference, that momentary power button uses ATX signal PS_ON#, which is a TTL level signal of 5v at 1.6mA for a short period of time, so a tiny switch would have worked just as well. But the big button is easier to find and looks cooler. I have seen on ebay a standard card slot blank with power-on and reset buttons put in holes drilled in them, so that's another option.
It been a while since I last had any working 386 parts, when I was a kid I had a slow little board but it died and back then it was just useless junk by definition so I got rid of it unfortunately. But I never really thrown away anything that is working so I got plenty of 486 stuff instead and not that long ago I revived my IBM computer after it died by age caused by bad caps in all parts with also a completely dead PSU, and I have it working again, even the PSU so now it is a happy 486 again :)
Yeah I think we've all done that, I used to have more retro parts but my family made me throw them away when I was much younger. At least now this stuff is being repaired or restored! Nice work on the IBM PSU, Those parts often make the whole system!
@@thesmokingcap yes indeed, I was always complained on for saving too much “junk” back then. And I had limited space too so I had to get rid of some stuff but luckily I managed to save this much stuff I still have today and these people are not laughing at me anymore because now it is real assets instead of junk. The IBM PSU is really good I could actually fix because it is as of IBM a custom form factor. The caps had badly leaked electrolyte inside the device but had not mad any fatal corrosions but rather quite some visible damage on component legs and stuff but most was possible to clean off and it worked perfectly again. I am really glad I found out before the corrosion went too far. I am planning on making a video from the recordings I made encountering this problem. It is just to begin made as a quick shot to send to friends but was a genuine reaction experience so I find it rather funny when I was like, huh? It’s dead? he’s dead Jim! I might just do a video on what I got and show it for what it is some day. It could do for a memorial video. :)
@@Pulverrostmannen Wow! sounds like you were rather lucky with that PSU! When they get damaged like that it can be hard to fix traces etc. Just in time aye!
@@thesmokingcap yes indeed it was a very close call. If that computer would spend another year in storage the outcome would been very different. Glad I took it out and checked it out. Actually I had the same thing going on with my P1 Siemens computer that I am using in my living room but that had leaking caps on the motherboard instead so I had to re-cap that one too but it had just began to leak and had only gotten absorbed in the dust around the caps fortunately :). I hate it when old nice stuff have to die because of bad capacitors. I wish there was a less involving way to know when you need to care for it than to wait until it gets this far. But re-capping dozens of caps is not necessarily a good thing for a device either. It is a line you have to draw
Nice build. This has inspired me to look at the IBM PC board sets using modern parts and an 8088, runs standard MS-DOS & has ISA slots. You order the PCB's like you did for the voltage blaster, then a whole lot of soldering.
Don't worry about using a lighter for the heat shrink! Anything sufficiently hot will do. Earlier today, I watched a video where some guy used his soldering iron to do this! He just gently massaged the heat shrink with the side of the iron's tip for a second or two. :D
12:23 : While standard aluminum electrolytics are commonly treated as "the" electrolytics, at least a lot of tantalums are _also_ electrolytics, and as far as I recall _are_ polarity sensitive, so that was some well placed caution. I think there's at least two other types of electrolytics as well, and maybe more than one type of aluminum electrolytic _(and_ you could argue that super capacitors are electrolytics too), but as far as I know only standard versions of tantalum and aluminum electrolytics are common- you'd have to dig a fair amount to even find the other types.
Ahhh interesting! Thanks for the info there. I'm not that great with electrical components but this is good to know. I made sure to check the ground side before and after swapping the capacitors out as I've mixed that up once before
Great video! My first PC after my AMIGA years was a 386-25 in 1992. I'm looking to get one now of course, so this came in handy as for what to keep in mind! Have a great holliday!
@@thesmokingcap Extremely hard to find. Seems to be rather more common to find 286 and 486 PCs for some reason. Tip for Arkanoid: Press space or mouse button when you get the red "L". You can now fire guns at the bricks!
I spent about (not about, exactly) 1850 GBP on an Eleonex 386SX in early 1990's when studying. Didn't have enough money for driving lessons, or a car, or beer. Sad old me, but I loved that Elonex. Luckily I already had a partner. I loved that Elonex. 40 years later, still quite fond of my partner (joke). Takes me way, way back ... Thesis writing and Doom ... Andy 🙂
Ahh those were the days, expensive gear as well! You did quite well getting a computer while studying back then! Hopefully it served you well over the years. And glad I could provide a small trip down memory lane
Thoughts: 1) DOS version for a 386: Technically, MS-DOS 5.0 would be more era-appropriate, but eh... DOS was stuck in the mid-late 80s for its entire existence. You just got more licensed utilities in the later versions. ;-) 2) Using too-large HDDs: For drives that have a reported geometry with equal or less than (each) 1024 cylinders, 16 heads, 63 sect/track, your BIOS will probably use the label geometry as-is. If there's no auto-detect, then you have to input the geometry (of course), but the values would be the same either way. With drives that have more than 1024 cylinders, if the BIOS was made to support large (>500MB) drives, it will translate these values to something else. A common scheme is to use 128 heads up to a certain size, and 254/255 heads beyond that, and then divide the cylinder count by a corresponding factor. (2x heads = 1/2 cylinders, and so on.) It's the BIOS' responsibility to do the translation, so it has to make up the scale factors. It's not up to you, and it's not portable across computers -- unless they happen to use the same algorithm. Another thing to note is that the total number of sectors may not be 100% identical between label geometry, advertised sectors accessible via LBA, and the translated CHS geometry. They all have to culminate in a value that is less than or equal to the LBA size, which is probably the true size -- more or less, not counting spares or otherwise hidden sectors. The leftover count is usually not much. The easiest way to determine what the BIOS is _actually_ translating to, is to use some kind of disk utility from DOS that shows the geometry. The IDE Info tool here is one example. I use Norton Disk Edit, which has a Drive Info panel that displays it. If your BIOS does NOT support translation, then it might hard-cap the values itself. If not, you can always enter them manually. You will limit the accessible size to ~500MB, most likely, but that's all that BIOS can use anyway. You don't have to halve the cylinder count, you can just truncate it at 1024 (or 1023, depending on if the BIOS is counting from 0 or 1, or just limits the range to 1-1023.) 3) For sticker residue, I have best luck with Goo Gone. It seems to eat the adhesive really well, without harming the plastic. WD-40 also works OK. I then clean up with isopropyl alcohol. Sometimes alcohol is enough by itself, but it doesn't neutralize the adhesive as much, so you end up with a sticky mess that's hard to completely clean. But it cuts the oily residue left after the Goo Gone. I also use Krud Kutter to remove stubborn stains, grime, and filth. Only after all three of those fail, do I resort to the Magic Eraser. Magic Eraser is almost always effective, but sometimes you have to remove the higher texture to get to the little pockets between, and that of course changes the surface irreparably.
Some good information there re the Hard Disk values. Usually the machines I work with can auto detect the values. Someone else suggested using a more modern machine to get the values to note down. That IDEinfo did a good job but will try Norton Disk Edit if I get any more of these machines. I believe this machine is the oldest I've built yet so not sure if I'll ever encounter such an issue. I've heard Goo Gone works great, I don't think I can buy that in New Zealand but will try WD-40 as I can get that. Thanks for taking the time to write that up as well!
@@thesmokingcap Be careful using other computers to get the CHS parameters. This only works if: 1) ...the BIOS is using the true label CHS values. It will *not* be usable if the BIOS is using a translated geometry, unless... 2) ...the two computers just happen to use the exact same algorithm to derive the translated geometry. TBH, I've never used IDE Info before. I'm not sure what it reports. It might be helpful to understand something about IDE device probing: You can query the IDE device and get the "real" (well, it's not actually "real," but...) geometry directly from the drive. But, that's not necessarily what your BIOS is presenting to the OS. You have to query the BIOS for that. If the drive is not configured in the BIOS yet, you can only get the "real" geometry, because OSes that use BIOS services doesn't see the drive at all yet, ergo, there's no virtualized / translated geometry to enumerate. For older BIOSes that don't support translation anyway (particularly true if they don't even support auto-detect), then the queried geometry is still helpful, you just have to cap the values to a max of 1024/16/63. If your BIOS *does* translate, then this is not useful, because it will be abstracted in a potentially incompatible way across computers.
Ohh, how i love the initialization sounds during POST from the good old days.. Almost as audioporny as the sounds a 56k modem makes when dialing to the internet.
@@thesmokingcap nothing beats the old days. These days, we are lucky to get a BIOS error code on a display. In the old days we could diagnose errors based on sound. :) (long live PC speakers)
@@thesmokingcap it didn't 😁 i had 5 1/4" 1,2MB drive installed where you have 3,5", 20MB MFM hard drive, it was 286 but with coprocessor; 1MB of RAM and Hercules graphics card. I was so proud of it, prince of Persia on green monochrome CRT with this huge motion shadow 🔥 great times
@@thesmokingcap mine was IBM PC XT/286 with an 8 Mhz CPU and 20 Mb HDD. At least this is what I remember about it. I searched for XT/286/386 but could not find any images of machines with this case. The case seems to be really rare! I'm so happy that I found your video displaying this specific case!
Nice channel, good content and comprehensible to do it similar. How could I miss this channel? You got a new subscriber. Btw, if you got a system with auto detection and you don’t got the specifications, just let the bios from the newer system do the work. For my Compact Flash I do it the same, then writing the specs on it.
Thank you! and glad you're enjoying the content. Might be a TH-cam algorithm thing but that's how all these small channels start :) Anyway, onwards we go! And good trip re drive settings, If the IDE Tool doesn't work that's always a good option
Oh really? That's good to know! What sort of Power Supply did it have fitted? It doesn't appear to be a standard AT Layout in terms of spacing for the screws, some from of XT clone?
@@thesmokingcap Have you tried without doskey loaded? I can't speak from experience or knowledge but it sounds like the kind of program that would hook into the keyboard buffer handler to provide its services and interfere with old games that don't expect it.
A trick I use with old drives missing the parameters, I have a Pentium 1 machine that will auto detect the drives, and fills the parameters. I use it to work out the parameters for other machines.
The power supply had a hard switch on it, so why not just short the two pins on the ATX header and use the existing switch? It also prevents the ATX from drawing any power for standby while the system is off.
Yep indeed! That's always a good option, I liked having an external switch so I can put all the wear on that. Since I move machines around it would be unplugged most of the time from mains
@@thesmokingcap Thanks for the reply. I was just curious what your use-case for having the extra switch was, so thank you. The ATX power supply that I am using in my Pentium 150 build does not have a rocker switch on it, so I had to use an external switch as well.
no way , my old computer case... well at least identical one only we had small floppy in the vertical bay, hard drive on top, nec 4 cd changer in the middle and big floppy on the bottom oryginal power suply was 250w L shaped unit where keybard connector went under the power suply and we had 2 of those kind of cases , one had little folding limiter to how much it could open i honestly thought having 2 cases like that they would be more prevelent and some of them would be left but even for me one of those poert suplies exploded a mains cap power switch is suposed to be on the side in that big cutout on when fliprd towards the user off when fliped away from the user , black with white print on it similar size to what bog switches on surge protection extension cords are mounted voltage on the switch in atx is just 5v and almost no current so any switch would work hard drives were usually mounted in metal 5,25 to 3,5 inch metal bay adapters in the later days we had 2 mounted this way in middle and lower 5,25 bays with color led indicators on the fronts and we used smoked plexi glass as a bay covers
Thanks for the comment! I was wondering what sort of power supply fitted such a case, it's not a standard AT one. And good to know where the power switch was mounted. I was thinking I should get myself a 5,25" adapter for the hard drive, but at least all the cables reach to my CF adapter. But that info was useful as I had no idea what sort of components were in this case. Did you guys have a XT class machine in yours?
@@thesmokingcap well i had wierd late 486 motherboard with umc chipset 3 pci slots integrated ide and fdd controllers and graphical bios that resembled windows 3.1 with mouse support amd 5x86 (486 dx5 133mhz) name might be wrong but thet the basics of it and how windows 3.1 programs recognized it 2x 8mb of simm ram graphic sard named "tiga" (ega) sound card named trump audio wave 32 22k modem 50mb quantum harddrive 4 cd changer made by nec later we changed it to amd k6 166mhz 48mb of ram and bigger harddrive, s3 virge+voodoo 2 and soundblaster 16 pnp we also had 2nd computer at that time both were hand me downs from family and friends of family the secund ne was 286 arras pc with 1mb of ram and hercules mono graphics and swaping parts around started our computer moding life the case other than front panel was the same and the power suply also so i thought it was a standard of a sort, my younger brother later refered to it as "baby at desktop" as for the switch it was mounted on the power suply and only extended trough the openingand was flush with the outside case other than the fliping part itself
12:14 - you sure those caps were marked wrongly? Maybe those were for negative 5 and negative 12V? Then you do have the positive side of the cap to the ground... 23:30 - you may want to search for MR BIOS for your board - you would then have hdd autodetection with it.
Yeah I thought I was wrong but under testing continuity to ground I toned them out. Also double checked while in place. Ahh good idea! I need to buy some tools to read and write the Eproms. So I can backup the BIOS if I flash a bad image, I've done that before haha
@@GigAHerZ64 Yeah I've been wanting one of those for a while, I've got a few machine's I'd like to update or change the BIOS on, but need a safe gard with such a device. I'll add it to my shopping list for next year
Ahh yes, I saw Necroware had done the same thing. That would have been a good option for this build, but I would have to order in one of those power supplies
Oh man! Why didn't I think about doing that! ;) I would have except good luck funding one in little NZ, but I can always use one if needed as it will still mount up no dramas
In the 386 era ROhS (no lead solder regulations) was not yet invented so all those board were soldered with SnPb solder. I worked in a huge factory that assembled PCBs and lead-free solder was just introduced in 2002 for some PACE sat receivers with HDD storage.
The Seagate HDD had the CHS specs on the label (22:56). Also, if you know the capacity of a HDD, you can choose from the predefined HDD types in BIOS one with the same or the closest capacity. However, after partitioning, that drive will not work in a modern system wit HDD autodetection (the data will be mostly seen as corrupted) unless you put the same CHS geometry again. I did that often with larger HDDs in 286 system that lacked the user type 47.
There actually were some non-SnPb solders going back, but they all were either specialty (e.g. for heat-sensitive applications), or not designed for electronics (at least the early-2000s non-lead solders were partially or entirely derived from jewelry silver solders- there's quite a number in that field, and if you can get up into their temperature range they offer conductivity, and variations on color and strength).
Holy cow I must be blind, I didn't see that 😂 Ahh good to know they were still using lead solder back then. The removal process was rather easy. Good tip re HDD types there, I'll keep that in mind
@@absalomdraconis You are right, but the regular electronics were made with leaded solder, mainly in RF I saw non leaded solder (some silver alloy) and that only in some professional modules (motorola StarTac and Panasonic DECT had some modules that HAD to be soldered with that special alloy or QC dont pass). I meant the ROHS directive that enforcedthe use of non lead solcer alloy to all consumer electronics. I remember after a shift NEAR the solder wave, my white clothes were gray with leaded solder vapors.
Moja ulubiona retro obudowa. Dokładnie w identycznej zetknąłem się pierwszy raz w życiu z PC i był to 286.
Cieszę się, że film Ci się podobał! Rzeczywiście świetny przypadek do wykorzystania Mam nadzieję, że Google to przetłumaczył!
It's a beauty 🙂
Cheers Phil! Hope you guys have a good holiday season as well :)
Those case latches are AMAZING😮
Makes it quite easy to access the inside!
What a great build! Fun to see the steps you took to make everything work together. And your game choices are great too! Happy #DOScember2022
Thanks Chris! Glad you enjoyed the video :) Now I've done my project I can sit back and watch everyone else's. Happy #DOScember2022 to you too and have a good holiday season!
DOS 6.22 is almost always the way to go.
Nice! Good to know, I don't believe there would be an advantage on such a machine to go with anything older
I'd completely forgotten about DOSCember. This is the first video that's has come up with tit. Nice little build, thanks for sharing.
There's a playlist on my channel that gets updated as videos get released!
No worries! Glad you enjoyed the video! yeah there's heaps of videos in Chris's playlist
In the future you can jumper the leads for the power switch and just use the built-in switch on the atx power supply. It will save you from having to drill another hole. Love the case! Also I do have the correct i/o backplane for your Athlon build and I left my email in the comment thread of that video if you want it.
Ahh yes, that was an option as well! I'll go back to the comments and find your address, otherwise mine is on my Channel about page :)
3:25 when you try to make a hole template, use a paper scratch it with pencil... and now you can line it up with other object.... this technique will fit better IMHO
Ahh yes, good tip! I should have thought of that haha
HI Cool Project
The case reminds me of the australian made Ipex 386/486/Pentium 70 PC's ( 486 etc has screw down case not the 286/386 style metal push button release yours has )
i only done 1 Pc with power supply fit and i did not want to drive to work to use tools, so i just installed a small generic AT or ATX external brick style power supply that was recycled from some european printer servers that were no longer used
Regards
George
Ahh yes the old ipex systems. I think some made it to NZ. Good idea with the power supply modifications, it can be a bit tricky to make some of these fit
19:55 for future reference, that momentary power button uses ATX signal PS_ON#, which is a TTL level signal of 5v at 1.6mA for a short period of time, so a tiny switch would have worked just as well. But the big button is easier to find and looks cooler. I have seen on ebay a standard card slot blank with power-on and reset buttons put in holes drilled in them, so that's another option.
Good to know! I was worried there was higher current on that switch. Good idea with the Card slot bracket!
Just found your channel. Really great content, subbed! 😁👍
Thank you! Glad you're enjoying the content 😊
It been a while since I last had any working 386 parts, when I was a kid I had a slow little board but it died and back then it was just useless junk by definition so I got rid of it unfortunately. But I never really thrown away anything that is working so I got plenty of 486 stuff instead and not that long ago I revived my IBM computer after it died by age caused by bad caps in all parts with also a completely dead PSU, and I have it working again, even the PSU so now it is a happy 486 again :)
Yeah I think we've all done that, I used to have more retro parts but my family made me throw them away when I was much younger. At least now this stuff is being repaired or restored! Nice work on the IBM PSU, Those parts often make the whole system!
@@thesmokingcap yes indeed, I was always complained on for saving too much “junk” back then. And I had limited space too so I had to get rid of some stuff but luckily I managed to save this much stuff I still have today and these people are not laughing at me anymore because now it is real assets instead of junk.
The IBM PSU is really good I could actually fix because it is as of IBM a custom form factor. The caps had badly leaked electrolyte inside the device but had not mad any fatal corrosions but rather quite some visible damage on component legs and stuff but most was possible to clean off and it worked perfectly again. I am really glad I found out before the corrosion went too far.
I am planning on making a video from the recordings I made encountering this problem. It is just to begin made as a quick shot to send to friends but was a genuine reaction experience so I find it rather funny when I was like, huh? It’s dead? he’s dead Jim! I might just do a video on what I got and show it for what it is some day.
It could do for a memorial video. :)
@@Pulverrostmannen Wow! sounds like you were rather lucky with that PSU! When they get damaged like that it can be hard to fix traces etc. Just in time aye!
@@thesmokingcap yes indeed it was a very close call. If that computer would spend another year in storage the outcome would been very different. Glad I took it out and checked it out.
Actually I had the same thing going on with my P1 Siemens computer that I am using in my living room but that had leaking caps on the motherboard instead so I had to re-cap that one too but it had just began to leak and had only gotten absorbed in the dust around the caps fortunately :).
I hate it when old nice stuff have to die because of bad capacitors. I wish there was a less involving way to know when you need to care for it than to wait until it gets this far. But re-capping dozens of caps is not necessarily a good thing for a device either. It is a line you have to draw
Nice build. This has inspired me to look at the IBM PC board sets using modern parts and an 8088, runs standard MS-DOS & has ISA slots. You order the PCB's like you did for the voltage blaster, then a whole lot of soldering.
It was heaps of fun soldering the parts onto the voltage blaster, usually I'm fixing stuff instead. Also was rather cheap to make
Hello again. And Another Great Video Once Again
Why thank you! :)
Don't worry about using a lighter for the heat shrink! Anything sufficiently hot will do. Earlier today, I watched a video where some guy used his soldering iron to do this! He just gently massaged the heat shrink with the side of the iron's tip for a second or two. :D
Years ago I used the area away from the tip of my soldering iron for heat shrink - worked great
Ahh yes, I've done this before as well. I got the element quite close without touching it and managed to shrink it down
12:23 : While standard aluminum electrolytics are commonly treated as "the" electrolytics, at least a lot of tantalums are _also_ electrolytics, and as far as I recall _are_ polarity sensitive, so that was some well placed caution.
I think there's at least two other types of electrolytics as well, and maybe more than one type of aluminum electrolytic _(and_ you could argue that super capacitors are electrolytics too), but as far as I know only standard versions of tantalum and aluminum electrolytics are common- you'd have to dig a fair amount to even find the other types.
Ahhh interesting! Thanks for the info there. I'm not that great with electrical components but this is good to know. I made sure to check the ground side before and after swapping the capacitors out as I've mixed that up once before
Great video! My first PC after my AMIGA years was a 386-25 in 1992. I'm looking to get one now of course, so this came in handy as for what to keep in mind! Have a great holliday!
Wow! Rare machine to find these days aren't they? I've never seen one in the wild, must be at the end of the AMIGA series I take it?
@@thesmokingcap Extremely hard to find. Seems to be rather more common to find 286 and 486 PCs for some reason. Tip for Arkanoid: Press space or mouse button when you get the red "L". You can now fire guns at the bricks!
@@prockrog5219 Ahh yes, I should have noted down the info that it tells you, but good tip!
That case is the spitting image of one of our first PC’s in around 97 or so, think it had a 486 in it
Was that the main family PC back in 97? I do like the case now I've finished modifying it a little haha
I spent about (not about, exactly) 1850 GBP on an Eleonex 386SX in early 1990's when studying. Didn't have enough money for driving lessons, or a car, or beer. Sad old me, but I loved that Elonex.
Luckily I already had a partner.
I loved that Elonex. 40 years later, still quite fond of my partner (joke).
Takes me way, way back ... Thesis writing and Doom ...
Andy 🙂
Ahh those were the days, expensive gear as well! You did quite well getting a computer while studying back then! Hopefully it served you well over the years. And glad I could provide a small trip down memory lane
Congrats for 1k!!!! :)
Thank you! Yeah this time last year I passed the 500 mark, so onwards from here!
Thoughts:
1) DOS version for a 386: Technically, MS-DOS 5.0 would be more era-appropriate, but eh... DOS was stuck in the mid-late 80s for its entire existence. You just got more licensed utilities in the later versions. ;-)
2) Using too-large HDDs: For drives that have a reported geometry with equal or less than (each) 1024 cylinders, 16 heads, 63 sect/track, your BIOS will probably use the label geometry as-is. If there's no auto-detect, then you have to input the geometry (of course), but the values would be the same either way.
With drives that have more than 1024 cylinders, if the BIOS was made to support large (>500MB) drives, it will translate these values to something else. A common scheme is to use 128 heads up to a certain size, and 254/255 heads beyond that, and then divide the cylinder count by a corresponding factor. (2x heads = 1/2 cylinders, and so on.) It's the BIOS' responsibility to do the translation, so it has to make up the scale factors. It's not up to you, and it's not portable across computers -- unless they happen to use the same algorithm. Another thing to note is that the total number of sectors may not be 100% identical between label geometry, advertised sectors accessible via LBA, and the translated CHS geometry. They all have to culminate in a value that is less than or equal to the LBA size, which is probably the true size -- more or less, not counting spares or otherwise hidden sectors. The leftover count is usually not much.
The easiest way to determine what the BIOS is _actually_ translating to, is to use some kind of disk utility from DOS that shows the geometry. The IDE Info tool here is one example. I use Norton Disk Edit, which has a Drive Info panel that displays it.
If your BIOS does NOT support translation, then it might hard-cap the values itself. If not, you can always enter them manually. You will limit the accessible size to ~500MB, most likely, but that's all that BIOS can use anyway. You don't have to halve the cylinder count, you can just truncate it at 1024 (or 1023, depending on if the BIOS is counting from 0 or 1, or just limits the range to 1-1023.)
3) For sticker residue, I have best luck with Goo Gone. It seems to eat the adhesive really well, without harming the plastic. WD-40 also works OK. I then clean up with isopropyl alcohol. Sometimes alcohol is enough by itself, but it doesn't neutralize the adhesive as much, so you end up with a sticky mess that's hard to completely clean. But it cuts the oily residue left after the Goo Gone. I also use Krud Kutter to remove stubborn stains, grime, and filth.
Only after all three of those fail, do I resort to the Magic Eraser. Magic Eraser is almost always effective, but sometimes you have to remove the higher texture to get to the little pockets between, and that of course changes the surface irreparably.
Some good information there re the Hard Disk values. Usually the machines I work with can auto detect the values. Someone else suggested using a more modern machine to get the values to note down. That IDEinfo did a good job but will try Norton Disk Edit if I get any more of these machines. I believe this machine is the oldest I've built yet so not sure if I'll ever encounter such an issue. I've heard Goo Gone works great, I don't think I can buy that in New Zealand but will try WD-40 as I can get that. Thanks for taking the time to write that up as well!
@@thesmokingcap Be careful using other computers to get the CHS parameters. This only works if:
1) ...the BIOS is using the true label CHS values. It will *not* be usable if the BIOS is using a translated geometry, unless...
2) ...the two computers just happen to use the exact same algorithm to derive the translated geometry.
TBH, I've never used IDE Info before. I'm not sure what it reports. It might be helpful to understand something about IDE device probing:
You can query the IDE device and get the "real" (well, it's not actually "real," but...) geometry directly from the drive. But, that's not necessarily what your BIOS is presenting to the OS. You have to query the BIOS for that. If the drive is not configured in the BIOS yet, you can only get the "real" geometry, because OSes that use BIOS services doesn't see the drive at all yet, ergo, there's no virtualized / translated geometry to enumerate.
For older BIOSes that don't support translation anyway (particularly true if they don't even support auto-detect), then the queried geometry is still helpful, you just have to cap the values to a max of 1024/16/63. If your BIOS *does* translate, then this is not useful, because it will be abstracted in a potentially incompatible way across computers.
Enjoyed it mate.
Thank you! Glad you enjoyed the video
Ohh, how i love the initialization sounds during POST from the good old days.. Almost as audioporny as the sounds a 56k modem makes when dialing to the internet.
Classic sounds aye, especially with the RAM counter sounds
@@thesmokingcap nothing beats the old days. These days, we are lucky to get a BIOS error code on a display. In the old days we could diagnose errors based on sound. :) (long live PC speakers)
@@anumeon did POST cards exist back then? I remember having to Google the post code sounds haha
@@thesmokingcap depended on mobo manufacturer. Some had clear dokumentation. :)
@@anumeon ahh yep. I wish people still kept the boxes with the manuals
I had the same case back in the days 😊
Did it trap your arm as well? haha I've heard of a few people that have had this case, I didn't think it was that common!
@@thesmokingcap it didn't 😁 i had 5 1/4" 1,2MB drive installed where you have 3,5", 20MB MFM hard drive, it was 286 but with coprocessor; 1MB of RAM and Hercules graphics card. I was so proud of it, prince of Persia on green monochrome CRT with this huge motion shadow 🔥 great times
my very first computer was in that case! amazing!
Mine too! Don't you remember the brand of the case? What model did you have back then? Gosh! It was 30 years ago :D
I've heard a few people that had this case. I assumed it wasn't very common! What sort of machine was inside of yours?
@@thesmokingcap mine was IBM PC XT/286 with an 8 Mhz CPU and 20 Mb HDD. At least this is what I remember about it. I searched for XT/286/386 but could not find any images of machines with this case. The case seems to be really rare! I'm so happy that I found your video displaying this specific case!
@@romanallen Ahhh yes, it does explain the power supply shape, very XT/AT like, no worries! Glad you enjoyed the video :)
Nice channel, good content and comprehensible to do it similar. How could I miss this channel? You got a new subscriber.
Btw, if you got a system with auto detection and you don’t got the specifications, just let the bios from the newer system do the work.
For my Compact Flash I do it the same, then writing the specs on it.
Thank you! and glad you're enjoying the content. Might be a TH-cam algorithm thing but that's how all these small channels start :) Anyway, onwards we go! And good trip re drive settings, If the IDE Tool doesn't work that's always a good option
Cant believe it, I had one in an identical case back then.. Had a 5 1/4 drive as well.... Ahhh memories.
Oh really? That's good to know! What sort of Power Supply did it have fitted? It doesn't appear to be a standard AT Layout in terms of spacing for the screws, some from of XT clone?
I would have made a paper template of the psu and layed it on the backplate for a much easier way to line up the screw holes etc.
Yeah I was a big dummy and should have done that! I'll keep that one in my back pocket for next time
Looks like AT case with keyboard slot in the back.
Man, i have one 386 board, with vesa local bus slots! And 72pin memory slots, Wonderboard
Wow! That's a fancy motherboard!
The beeping sounds like the keyboard buffer overflowing, and may explain the "stuck" key issue, it’s clearing the buffer slowly
Ahhh, I wonder if there's some wait states or something I need to change within the BIOS
@@thesmokingcap Have you tried without doskey loaded? I can't speak from experience or knowledge but it sounds like the kind of program that would hook into the keyboard buffer handler to provide its services and interfere with old games that don't expect it.
@@complexacious Good tip, I tried it with booting a pain MS-DOS disk, it worked a bit longer but ended up doing the same thing
Nice case!!!
Thanks! It was a little tricky to work with but has worked out great in the long run
A trick I use with old drives missing the parameters, I have a Pentium 1 machine that will auto detect the drives, and fills the parameters. I use it to work out the parameters for other machines.
Good solution there! I was thinking that could be a good backup plan as both drives I had tested in a socket 7 machine
@@thesmokingcap That would work too.
@@communalnoodle1356 that tool IDE info worked a treat however. Might be worth a shot next time you need those values
@@thesmokingcap I'll have to give it a shot thanks!
386s are good retro computers, but stick to DOS 6.2. Windows takes too much resources. Lovely build, clean and uncluttered.
I don't think I have enough hard drive space for Windows anyway haha
The power supply had a hard switch on it, so why not just short the two pins on the ATX header and use the existing switch? It also prevents the ATX from drawing any power for standby while the system is off.
Yep indeed! That's always a good option, I liked having an external switch so I can put all the wear on that. Since I move machines around it would be unplugged most of the time from mains
@@thesmokingcap Thanks for the reply. I was just curious what your use-case for having the extra switch was, so thank you. The ATX power supply that I am using in my Pentium 150 build does not have a rocker switch on it, so I had to use an external switch as well.
@@wintermute740 No worries! The switch I used was just a cheap one I picked up while in a city I was visiting
Like!
Thank you! Glad you enjoyed the project :)
no way , my old computer case... well at least identical one
only we had small floppy in the vertical bay, hard drive on top, nec 4 cd changer in the middle and big floppy on the bottom
oryginal power suply was 250w L shaped unit where keybard connector went under the power suply and we had 2 of those kind of cases , one had little folding limiter to how much it could open
i honestly thought having 2 cases like that they would be more prevelent and some of them would be left but even for me one of those poert suplies exploded a mains cap
power switch is suposed to be on the side in that big cutout on when fliprd towards the user off when fliped away from the user , black with white print on it similar size to what bog switches on surge protection extension cords are mounted
voltage on the switch in atx is just 5v and almost no current so any switch would work
hard drives were usually mounted in metal 5,25 to 3,5 inch metal bay adapters in the later days we had 2 mounted this way in middle and lower 5,25 bays with color led indicators on the fronts and we used smoked plexi glass as a bay covers
Thanks for the comment! I was wondering what sort of power supply fitted such a case, it's not a standard AT one. And good to know where the power switch was mounted. I was thinking I should get myself a 5,25" adapter for the hard drive, but at least all the cables reach to my CF adapter. But that info was useful as I had no idea what sort of components were in this case. Did you guys have a XT class machine in yours?
@@thesmokingcap well i had wierd late 486 motherboard with umc chipset 3 pci slots integrated ide and fdd controllers and graphical bios that resembled windows 3.1 with mouse support
amd 5x86 (486 dx5 133mhz) name might be wrong but thet the basics of it and how windows 3.1 programs recognized it
2x 8mb of simm ram
graphic sard named "tiga" (ega)
sound card named trump audio wave 32
22k modem
50mb quantum harddrive
4 cd changer made by nec
later we changed it to amd k6 166mhz 48mb of ram and bigger harddrive, s3 virge+voodoo 2 and soundblaster 16 pnp
we also had 2nd computer at that time both were hand me downs from family and friends of family
the secund ne was 286 arras pc with 1mb of ram and hercules mono graphics
and swaping parts around started our computer moding life
the case other than front panel was the same and the power suply also so i thought it was a standard of a sort, my younger brother later refered to it as "baby at desktop"
as for the switch it was mounted on the power suply and only extended trough the openingand was flush with the outside case other than the fliping part itself
@@kokodin5895 ahh yep. Must have been a very late 486 machine to have integrated IDE, but sounds like a awesome machine!
12:14 - you sure those caps were marked wrongly? Maybe those were for negative 5 and negative 12V? Then you do have the positive side of the cap to the ground...
23:30 - you may want to search for MR BIOS for your board - you would then have hdd autodetection with it.
Yeah I thought I was wrong but under testing continuity to ground I toned them out. Also double checked while in place. Ahh good idea! I need to buy some tools to read and write the Eproms. So I can backup the BIOS if I flash a bad image, I've done that before haha
@@thesmokingcap tl866-ii plus - one of the best investments I've done for retro machines. (Y)
@@GigAHerZ64 Yeah I've been wanting one of those for a while, I've got a few machine's I'd like to update or change the BIOS on, but need a safe gard with such a device. I'll add it to my shopping list for next year
i use pico power supply with my 286/386 boards with adapter to AT connector
Ahh yes, I saw Necroware had done the same thing. That would have been a good option for this build, but I would have to order in one of those power supplies
how about buying a power supply that fits instead of butchering the case?
Oh man! Why didn't I think about doing that! ;) I would have except good luck funding one in little NZ, but I can always use one if needed as it will still mount up no dramas
Too old, and great 386
Who's too old? Haha yeah it was a fun build!