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Manual for the 80286 M-209 motherboard

pianoman72

Experienced Member
Joined
Jul 17, 2007
Messages
78
Location
Denton, Texas
Hello,

Would anyone happen to have a copy of the M-209 motherboard manual? It is a 286 motherboard, with a Harris 20mhz CPU.
I cannot seem to find a physical or digital copy anywhere, after searching online extensively.

I mostly need it to get the exact name of the expanded memory driver that was included initially (along with its command line parameters), which is required for using its hardware C&T chipset expanded memory.

Thank you to all.
 
I tried Qram, about 3 different versions, and while the documentation stated the commands to enable C&T EMS support (as you pointed out), it surprisingly did not work for my motherboard. I also tried the emm.sys driver (generally written for the C&T chipset), which I researched that it may work with the chipset, but the parameters which I tried (documented ones) do not work, although instead of "no c&t chipset found", the message said "wrong parameters".

So, while it may look like emm.sys with the right parameters might work, I have no way of knowing the right commands in config.sys, unless I get some documentation, or manual.

Thanks for your continued help.
 
Thanks, Caluser2000.
I have tried a few versions of the C&T drivers, but have not tried the PC Chips one. I will keep trying them out.
 
Wow, I don't believe it!
The Pc Chips expanded memory driver worked. I had no idea that, after all this time, my motherboard was actually part of the Pc Chips family. The only thing on the motherboard of reference was the C & T chipset, which I pinpointed by searching for it.
Thank you so much to everyone, and especially Caluser2000, for the link of drivers.
 
Good stuff!! Should be useful to someone else in the same situation.

How long have you had the mobo? And what variant of Dos are you using on it? Also a pic or two would be great.
 
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I've had the mobo for almost 4 years. Actually, I have made a post or two on the forum a few years ago (right after getting the motherboard), referring to almost the same problem.

I've been trying since then to make the expanded memory work, first using a Rampage 286 board that I have (with obviously no success, since the bus speed on that cannot handle more than 12mhz). And, knowing that I have some form of a C&T chipset, I tried pretty much all the expanded memory managers that I could find on the page which you linked to, but did not think that it could be the Pc Chips one.

I'm just using Dos 6.22 on the system, because of best compatibility with the games of the era.
I will try to take some pics of it later this weekend. Would you like to see just the bare mobo, or the the whole system?
Thanks again.
 
One of each would be nice thanks. Its always good to see other folks set ups. It's great that you've you've persisted and managed to solve an issue after all these years. Enjoy.
 
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Here you go, enjoy!

The case is originally from a Cyrix 686 computer, but it serves a better purpose for my 286 motherboard, although it is kind of ugly, and some screw slots in the back are deteriorating. I might look for a better case in the future.

The middle picture shows an IDE controller card and VGA card, and the bottom two cards are the original Sound Blaster 1.5, and a Roland MPU-IPC-T interface, which connects with my external Roland MIDI modules.

The motherboard has got 4 megs of SIPP ram, which I love.

M209b.jpgM209c.jpg
 
I meant to attach one more picture with the exterior of the computer, along with my green-eyed dog Ruby.
Somehow it didn't get attached in the previous message.

M209a.jpg
 
Tidy looking setup alright. Thanks. I've personally never seen a 286 over 16MHZ in speed. My Zenith system was the first 286 system I'd seen with simms. My old mobo had sipps and the faultly 286 mobo I have has dimms.

Are you going to slap a nic in it?
 
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Tidy looking setup alright. Thanks. I've personally never seen a 286 over 16MHZ in speed. My Zenith system was the first 286 system I'd seen with simms. My old mobo had sipps and the faultly 286 mobo I have has dimms.

Are you going to slap a nic in it?
Yeah, I am amazed how much faster this 286 performs, compared to my 12mhz system. I am so content to be able to play those games with EMS now.

As far as the NIC, I have thought about it, and it might be a future project, but I would need to purchase such a card, as I do not currently own one. Any thoughts on the most compatible one for my system?
 
I looked at the model number and should have realized this earlier, M-209, as a pc-chips board. Fits into their naming conventions. I'm glad you found what you were looking. I point you to this link, is this the right board?

http://museum.ttrk.ee/th99/m/I-L/30125.htm
Yup, that's the one alright. I can't believe I didn't notice the PC Chips logo, too.
Thanks for the link.
 
As far as the NIC, I have thought about it, and it might be a future project, but I would need to purchase such a card, as I do not currently own one. Any thoughts on the most compatible one for my system?
I'm using a Genius (KYE) GE2000 series in my 286 and one in a 486. Most of my other ISA based systems from a 386 though to a P200mmx use D-Link DE220s series nics without much trouble in Dos, win/wfw3.x, win9x, NT3.x/4, linux and OS/2. All have rj45 and bnc connectors for the times when I want to have a play using Thinnet cable.

I kept reading on the internet that finding drivers for the Genius nics was hard but that turned out to be false. Got them within 5 mins.
 
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Good luck. No dought there's plenty of other ISA nics that'll do the job just fine. As you probably already know it'll also gives you the option for sticking in a XTIDE rom if you want so the system can handle larger capacity hdds or IDE/CF with appropriate larger sized card.
 
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