Recent content by Xacalite

How many PC machines does one need to play all PC games? Well, *almost* all - I don't care about some crap games that only run on some very specific hardware. I don't care for the games to run to their best - I just want them to run good enough to be fun. It's more important to keep the number...

Yes, I know about XT-IDE. But there's one problem with it: incompatibility with classical XT MFM controllers, like that IBM/Xebec thing found in a 5160, which prevents it from working with systems that bypass BIOS, notably PC/IX and Xenix. So I'm thinking about another approach: a controller...

Oh, and one more Microsoft keyboard from my nightmares... I can understand vertical layout of Home/End/Insert/Delete/PgUp/PgDn keys - space-saving is sometimes a must - but what's the point of the big Delete key, at the cost of the lack of Insert!? Grouping the function keys by three, instead...

Thinking about bad hard drives, there were those Quantum Bigfoot disks - still 5.25", when all others were already 3.5". They were very slow, especially the original series (1.2 GB and 2.5 GB), later series were somewhat better. And they had a hole, covered with just a sticker - must be very...

I've found a card marked "NOVELL INC.", "BOARD 738-61-001 REV. B", apparently from 1987, just like this one - https://www.recycledgoods.com/novell-inc-738-61-001-rev-b-810-61-001/ Seems like a key for some software - but what exactly? Some early Netware version?

It was considered impossible. But now there's this - https://www.ebay.com/itm/Improved-CMS-Upgrade-Kit-for-Sound-Blaster-2-0-CT1350B-compatible-with-CT1336A/283307302605 Can anybody confirm that it actually works?

I've got a card with TVGA 8800CS chipset, 512 KB of RAM, for 8-bit ISA. Thought it would be the perfect card for a fast Turbo XT. But I can't find fully working software for it - there's something on Vogonsdrivers, but SVM.EXE refuses to work, needs 8900 chipset. I've found some Windows 3.1...

I've been thinking about PC history in general, since the very beginning, till now. And it occured to me that many important technologies were introduced (or got common) pretty much together, within short time periods. So, it's possible to draw five eras in PC history, each characterized with...

BTW, it should be noted that - contrary to what Landmark says - according to Topbench, late turbo XTs can be faster than early ATs: That "11 MHz" must be a typo/bad measurment, safe bet it's actually 12 MHz - pretty common for those "Juko Super Turbo" boards. I've seen XTs running at 4.77...

Just tried BGIDEMO with DOSBox machine=svga_et4000 and RIXAI, and all the arifacts I saw on a real ET4000/W32i are visible as well, see the attached picture: Can anybody try BGIDEMO on a real 8514/A and/or XGA? Anyway, this thread - https://www.vogons.org/viewtopic.php?t=16789 suggests that...

One of the display types supported by many BIOSes is "EGA/PGA/VGA". EGA and VGA are obvious, but what's PGA? I heard an explanation that it must be IBM PGC, that 640x480x8bpp card from 1984. However, there's a problem: the "EGA/PGA/VGA" setting seems to expect the card to come with its own BIOS...

IBM PC DOS 7.0 was shipped with IBM Antivirus. Later on, IBM ceased to support their Antivirus, instead licensed Norton AntiVirus, making it available for download for PC DOS users. And it's still downloadable - ftp://ftp.symantec.com/comwrap/navibmdw.exe ...along with the tool to uninstall IBM...

I'm playing with Windows 3.1 and TCP/IP - works OK with Trumpet Winsock 3.0, but requires manual IP address setup, there's also "bootp" option but doesn't work with DHCP server. So, the question: anybody can recommend some TCP/IP package for Windows 3.1 (regular, not "for Workgroups" or 3.11)...

So I'm benchmarking some math software on a 386 with FPU, and want to measure the performance impact of the FPU. But I don't feel like physically removing the chip - anybody knows a program to disable it?

I want to build a modern PC with a bunch of older drives, mostly ATAPI: ZIP, LS-120, etc. Due to shortage of conventional PCI slots, I want them all controlled by a single card. There's plenty of PCI controllers with many PATA ports, up to 12 even, like 3Ware Escalade 7500 or Promise SuperTrak...