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Is this actually a re-branded Intel Inboard 386/PC adapter?

Quadram's design was completely separate from the Intel design. $200 more, about 5% faster on 386 workloads, and with support for 287, 387, and Weitek. The Ebay listing seems to be missing sockets for all the coprocessors so it must be a different version from what I remember. I am 90% sure that different drivers from Intel's design will be needed.
 
krebizfan said:
I am 90% sure that different drivers from Intel's design will be needed.
Click to expand...

What kinds of things would the drivers cover? I was under the impression that most accelerators were transparent. The only driver/utility I can remember being associated with an accelerator is something to control onboard cache, so if they did more I'd love to learn more.
 
That card just sold for $200! Amazing; you can get a real 386 for $50 which will outperform that card by ~30-50%

I'm all for upgrading older PC's in unique ways but wow; that's a lot of money.
 
They're not common, and I think they throw a gut-punch to the nostalgia plexus. I remember seeing adverts for accelerators at the time and coveting them. I have only one accelerator in my collection (Orchid Tiny Turbo 286) which I have only because I was able to get it for relatively cheap, and because of the aforementioned nostalgia factor. (I should probably test to see if it works someday!)
 
Trixter said:
They're not common, and I think they throw a gut-punch to the nostalgia plexus. I remember seeing adverts for accelerators at the time and coveting them. I have only one accelerator in my collection (Orchid Tiny Turbo 286) which I have only because I was able to get it for relatively cheap, and because of the aforementioned nostalgia factor. (I should probably test to see if it works someday!)
Click to expand...

I've also got a 286 accelerator in my collection, but I obtained it by accident when I got my 5160. I didn't even know it was installed in the machine for ages as I assumed it was an IBM thing. I also find them fascinating and was considering bidding on the aforementioned 386 accelerator but decided since I have a 386 there would be little point. Turns out the decision was moot as my maximum bid would have been $60.
 
Trixter said:
What kinds of things would the drivers cover? I was under the impression that most accelerators were transparent. The only driver/utility I can remember being associated with an accelerator is something to control onboard cache, so if they did more I'd love to learn more.
Click to expand...

I know the Intel ones came with some special Windows 3.x drivers/patches. Windows didn't run out-of-the-box on them.
 
Trixter said:
What kinds of things would the drivers cover? I was under the impression that most accelerators were transparent. The only driver/utility I can remember being associated with an accelerator is something to control onboard cache, so if they did more I'd love to learn more.
Click to expand...

I wonder if this Quadram board can run Windows 3.0/3.1. I vaguely recall the Intel board needed a hacked version of Windows 3.0 because of various peculiarities compared to a real AT bus machine.

(Edit: Woah, talk about timing. ^^^)
 
Several of us run Windows 3.1 using InBoard/386 PC boards on 5150s/5160s. Windows 3.1 will run unmodified just fine in real mode. To run in enhanced mode you need to take a few drivers from a special version of Windows 3.0 made for the InBoard by Intel and make a few changes to the system.ini, after which it runs fine (the detailed instructions for how to do that are in another thread here). That's the easy part. The harder part is having enough memory on the Inboard to make Windows 3.1 sing - either a (rare) 2MB or 4MB daughter card for the InBoard/386 as the base InBoard comes with only 1M and that might be OK in real mode, but doesn't provide enough extended (not expanded) memory to run well in enhanced mode (I run with a full 5MB of extended memory of the Inboard with an additional 8MB of expanded memory from an Intel AboveBoard in the same IBM PC). It also helps to goose the CPU - I've replaced the InBoard's 386DX 16MHz CPU with a pin-compatible Cyrix clocked doubled 20/40MHz 486DX CPU ($26 USD) that runs at an effective clock of 33MHz, but with only 1MB of cache - some have done better but doing so requires replacement of the board's oscillator. Also, running off a XT-IDE CF card really helps as well - disk I/O is fast, leaving only the native bus as the bottleneck which is more than sufficient to run Win 3.1 and all apps pretty darn fast.

Regards,
Mike
https://pcpartpicker.com/b/krYrxr
 
Hi Mike,

I am still braking my head trying to install either Win 3.0 or Win 3.1 since Xmas!, ....still stalls on the 4th floppy disk right where the installations seems to be copying the VGA drives.
Tried it with the 3.5" floppies and the HxC images but no success. Also I tried with a Mono and CGA card, and no luck.... I had to give it a rest after spending a week over the holiday trying.
Next attempt scheduled for spring brake :)
 
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