best cheap/free scores 1.1

[Ami Sapphire]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

Last month, I was looking to obtain an old beige ATX case for my FIC PA-2013 board because I wanted an old system in my room, instead bought an entire system for ~$3.40.

System contained:

• a generic CD-ROM drive, 50X speed

• a Sony floppy drive, since used in my second Socket 7 build (PCChips M520), which has a Sony CD drive

• a FIC AZ11 Socket A/462 motherboard with its I/O shield. Partially recapped some capacitors: 8 VRM (few were bad, one dented), 2 between third RAM slot and two smaller chips; third RAM slot's locking tab and side were broken off, since delicately epoxied on. The third RAM slot is still fully functional. An AMD Duron CPU at 800MHz was installed. This is the third FIC motherboard I encountered.

• 2x 256MB SDRAM. Sadly, those no longer work, but I have extras, anyway.

• a cheap "Mitsuko" KC-250 ATX power supply supposedly rated at 250W, more gimped version of my old King Case KC-250 ATX power supply.

After replacing the dead RAM, the entire system does boot. I then took apart the entire system. Not going to use the original board, either. The FIC PA-2013 Rev. 2.1 board takes its place.

[Phaihn]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

As mentiond before a Dell Dimension E521 i got for free replaced the amd sempron cpu it came with, with a Athlon 64x2 2.5ghz cpu and upgraded the memory to 4gb total cost $30.

[LLLlllou]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

more scores today:

$10- logitech momo wheel. complete unit, in box, with all the goodies. works great. I twas originally $20 but it had sat so long that it was qualfied to be 50% off... it must have been hid behind a dorm fridge or something.

$6- netgear WGR614 v1. if I can, I will linux it up, if not, I'll do something cool with it.

Ugh, have you played with many 614s? I find them to be THE crappiest router ever released. Had at least 2 dead out of the box, 1 new out of the box that was transferring data at near dial up speed even when connected through ethernet, and I run into allot in the field with a wonderful sizzling noise, like someone was frying bacon inside it. The sizzling is probably bad caps, but not worth it to repair these guys. I usually recommend a new router whenever I run into a customer that has one even if it's currently running fine. Still for $6 it's worth it just for the fun of blowing it up.

[LLLlllou]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

As mentiond before a Dell Dimension E521 i got for free replaced the amd sempron cpu it came with, with a Athlon 64x2 2.5ghz cpu and upgraded the memory to 4gb total cost $30.

I have one of these somewhere in my shop. Got it for free, cost me about 30 cents for a new front USB port off eBay. Don't remember the specs on mine but I remember being happy with it's performance.

It's one of the VERY few models Dell ever sold with a non Intel chip.

[LLLlllou]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

Not any more. RadioShack sells components and other hobby stuff, Dick Smith is now just full of cheap Chinese TVs and other junk.

Then they're more alike then you know. Have you been to a Radio Shack lately? Batteries, cellphones and overpriced cables. That and the little suitcase display of resisters and caps. Oh how I miss what RS was 25 years ago!

[Phaihn]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

Found beside dumpster today a HP Pavillion a6403w today only issue i know of is the power supply having a blown cap had 500GB hard drive in it in good condition too.

i should of posted this in the dumpster finds thread. ill post it there.

[Phaihn]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

Found beside dumpster today a HP Pavillion a6403w today only issue i know of is the power supply having a blown cap had 500GB hard drive in it in good condition too.

[ben7]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

Found beside dumpster today a HP Pavillion a6403w today only issue i know of is the power supply having a blown cap had 500GB hard drive in it in good condition too.

You forgot the picture of the blown cap

[Phaihn]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

You forgot the picture of the blown cap

didnt think to take pictures of it lol.

[J Riff]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

Spooky, Phaihn - I found the same PC a couple days back. Going to try and fire it up tmorrow. 500GB HD. Maybe there's a reason people toss them. *
Found a Toshiba Satellite Laptop - BIOS password locked. Took an hour to read up online, jumper a pin and presto.
LOts other stuff, gotta know where to look*

[SuperDuty]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

Just picked up this big boy hidden between two washing machines :


Awesome beast, it's working but the battery is dead as usual with those Dallas chips I need the reference disk.
It's an IBM PS/2 Model 80 (8565) with a 386SX-16, an SCSI card (MCA), an 60Mb SCSI disk, a memory extension card and that's about it. It doesn't seem to have had any upgrades besides the memory card and some SIMM sticks.

[ben7]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

Damn, could we get some pics of the inside of that beast?

[retiredcaps]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

@ben7, if you like looking at IBM PS/2 stuff, uxwbill's youtube channel has some teardown videos.

http://www.youtube.com/user/uxwbill

He also does a lot of videos on what you call "vintage" or "retro".

[momaka]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

Nice! Totally worth saving an old rig like that. It may only have 60 MB of disk space, but it's reliable 60 MB that you can trust with your life .

[SuperDuty]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

I have found a working Dallas DS1287 on a 486 board I have, and I've managed to make it work perfectly ! It has Windows 3.11 on the hard disk, but with less than 3Mb or RAM, it's very slow. I have plenty of physically compatible EDO SIMM modules, but I don't which will work or if there are limitations.

I've taken it apart completely to thoroughly clean it. Those get very dirty. I've put a random dead µATX motherboard as a size comparison :

[ratdude747]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

Scored a JVC hr-xvs44u dvd/svhs combo unit for 14 bux. Made november 2003

Seems to work on the svhs side. The dvd side may need work. But heck, its svhs...

[GadgetmaNZ]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

Couple months ago I got a free Shuttle XPC SN95G mini PC from Wanaka Wastebusters.
It was missing the top cover, caddy for HDD and DVD-ROM.
When I got back to the shed in Nelson, I tested it. First no picture into monitor but pulled another RAM stick off and tried again. Now I got to BIOS screen, yehaa!
Had some trouble to get the BIOS to recognise the HDD but it must have been the Master/Slave lug in wrong spot?
Installed HDD and DVD-ROM and installed latest Ubuntu Linux. I had problems with display card. I cleaned the display card with methylated spirits as the unit had been outside at the recycling center some time. Luckily Central Otago climate is dry and far away from sea so no salt water corrosion or acid rain there for that matter. That did not fix the display fault and I tried older version of Ubuntu which worked. Must have been some driver issue?
Later I reinstalled Windows into another HDD and everything works now

My plan is to make this into a carputer. I would spend some money and replace the power supply with 12 V DC-DC power supply which is more economic and has no fan.
Also I would put a SSD drive into it which would further reduce the power consumption and make the carputer shock proof.
Has anyone made a carputer? I drive a Mercedes Sprinter van which has 85W solar panel and separate house battery, I might need to add another panel and another battery to compensate to the use of my carputer?
I am looking for a 15" 12V LCD TV/monitor to go with the carputer but those are pretty rare and more expensive. I hope to score a faulty one with bad caps for free.

[ratdude747]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

Scored a JVC hr-xvs44u dvd/svhs combo unit for 14 bux. Made november 2003

Seems to work on the svhs side. The dvd side may need work. But heck, its svhs...

Found the culprit:



(sorry for the quality, too lazy to reshoot)

Capxon strikes again

[ratdude747]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

Found the culprit:



(sorry for the quality, too lazy to reshoot)

Capxon strikes again

Repair successful!

The only bummer is that it had no remote... I guess this is why harmony remotes exist.

If we consider this to be the going price, for $15 and 4 caps, I didn't do too bad?

[rollme]

Re: Your Best Dumpster Finds

Just picked up this big boy hidden between two washing machines :

Awesome beast, it's working but the battery is dead as usual with those Dallas chips I need the reference disk.
It's an IBM PS/2 Model 80 (8565) with a 386SX-16, an SCSI card (MCA), an 60Mb SCSI disk, a memory extension card and that's about it. It doesn't seem to have had any upgrades besides the memory card and some SIMM sticks.

That brings back many (not so) fond memories.