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Help Identify ISA card

R

roadrash

Experienced Member
Joined
Aug 17, 2011
Messages
128
Location
Huntingdon, U.K
I have been sorting through a crate of old ISA cards I have and there are some very interesting and unusual cards in there as well as some I just cant identify.
One of these I cannot find any info on and cant find anything like it in TH99.
I think its a video output card of some kind but I cant tell what type MDA/CGA and w who make it. There are 2 (female) D connectors on the back, a 25 way and a 9 way. There is one row of 6 header pins at the top that have no marking and there are 3 main chips that will probably help identify what this is.
the 3 chips are~;
1) UM2301 (socketed) (Maybe a 20V P-Channel Power MOSFET)
2) UM6845R (40pin DIP) aparently it looks like it may be a CRT controller.
3) National semiconductor SCX6212RUL/V4 (PLCC-68) which maybe a Gate array.

The only markings the card has is number (YU-2008) and the 2 stickers one which is like a red globe with the letters WI in the centre. The other is just a plain white label with ATK-757726.
Nothing is found on a search of these.
Pln you take a look at the picture and see if you recognise what this is. I dont want to try it in any machine until I know for sure what it is.

20180108_204002.jpg
 
Your guess seems reasonable to me. I expect it's probably MDA, as the board has its own oscillator. The UM2301 is probably a mask programmed ROM containing the character set. Doesn't look like it has enough memory to be Hercules compatible (actually it looks like it only has 2 KB? which isn't even as much as the IBM MDA -- not sure what that's about).
 
Looks like a Hercules Graphics Card clone to me.
The DE9 is the monitor connector, the DB25 is the printer port, and 6 pin header is the light pen connector.

The 24 pin socketed IC (UM2301) is the ROM with the font.

Thanks,
Sergey
 
bear said:
Doesn't look like it has enough memory to be Hercules compatible (actually it looks like it only has 2 KB? which isn't even as much as the IBM MDA -- not sure what that's about).
Click to expand...

If you look closer, there are two additional DRAM ICs, likely 64 Kbit x 4 - second from the left column, fourth and fifth from the top.
The 2 KiB SRAM chip you're referring to (Sony CXX5816P-12) is apparently used for the smooth scrolling.
 
Good spot, I couldn't see enough detail to make out the markings on the smaller chips. If they're 64k x 4, that'd make it a likely Hercules compatible.
 
Thanks I will have see if I can spot a Hercules card like this now to find who made it. Not sure if I have a monitor for this card though as I only have CGA EGA & VGA type displays. The only monochrome monitors I have are on old Amstrad Cp/m computers (8512 & 9512 etc) and a Apricot I repaired and restored last autumn and the Apricot monitors only work with Apricots as I found out. I do have some others but they are Multisyncs etc and some Commodore monitors. What is the difference between Monochrome & Hercules?
 
Thanks for that info Sergey, Seeing as you are good at identifying these boards I have another I just fished out that has no identity and could be MDA, CGA or EGA. Can you halp work out what this other one is. Here is a picture of it:

20180114_193010.jpg
 
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