Never give up -- never surrender!

[Tom]

When I went to work yesterday, I happened upon about 15 or so old PC's, sitting on the floor near the hospital's maintenance department, all marked "Destroy".  Not being one to want to see an innocent computer murdered, I inquired about them and was told to "help myself" ... which I did.  

I took four of the PC's, all Compaq Deskpro 4000 Pentium 166's with no hard drives.  Strangely enough, they all had CD-ROM's (one Iomega CD-R drive), RAM, sound cards, video cards, and diskette drives in them.  Since I have extra hard drives laying around the house, as well as old monitors and keyboards, this was okay by me.  I gutted three of the PC's and took their RAM and sound cards.  Surprisingly, one of them even had a Yamaha WF192XG card in it...which I plan to give away in the next Quest Studios contest.  It works just fine.  Two of the others have built-in ESS music, and I can't figure out what the other sound card is -- there's absolutely no writing on the circuit board.  

I ended up creating a P166 system with 128MB RAM, with a CD-R, 2.1 GB hard drive, which I've installed Win311 on.  I also installed a MPU-IPC (for the MT-32 and CM-500), AWE64 Gold, and my Yamaha SW60XG card.  FOUR ISA SLOTS!  WHOO-HOO!  The system works perfectly for old Sierra game playing, sequencing MIDI, and recording digital music.  Best of all, it didn't cost me a cent -- and I ended up with a Yamaha soundcard prize give-away for an upcoming contest.  Though the WF192XG isn't great, it still beats a SB Live! or Audigy any day of the week.

But the point of this story is what I had to do to the Compaq Deskpro 4000's CMOS in order for it to recognize what was in it.  In all my years of computing, I've never experienced anything like this before:

First off, pressing "F10" (or some other key combo) had now effect towards getting into the systems CMOS setup.  I came to learn that the "4000's" setup, as well as other Compaq PC models, can only be accessed via software.  So after cursing about how stupid of an idea that was,  I found the software setup program on the 'net, downloaded it, and was able to access the 4000's CMOS.  The MPU-IPC was not recognized by this system and I couldn't figure out why.  After examing my limited CMOS options, I learned that I had to physically tell the CMOS that there was an IRQ 2 & 9 -- it didn't list them as possible IRQ's, but accepted them.  Then I had to tell it that the I/O address of IRQ 2 was 0330-0331.  I've never owned a PC that didn't recognize the MPU-IPC, or IRQ 2 (IRQ 9 came later), for that matter.  Anyway, that did the trick and the MPU-IPC, AWE64, and SW60XG are all co-existing happily in this new system.

The moral of this story...

"Never give up; never surrender!"  (Wait, that's from "Galaxy Quest", isn't it.)

[Ghost_Rider]

Pesistence usually pays off  

I agree that is WEIRD and pretty silly that you had to download software to get into the CMOS setup.  Not really the same thing, but I remember trying to figure out how to get a CD to eject out of a Mac.  No button on the drive, no eject command or button anywhere... finally discovered you had to drop and drag the icon in the trash.  But then again, that's Mac vs. PC.  You'd think a Compaq would be similar to all other PCs, or most from that timeframe anyway - especially for just getting into the CMOS.

It is amazing what gets thrown out.  A pentium 166 is not that fast anymore compared to a P4 3.2GHz , but man, some people still have 386 and 486's at home, or even older.  Why not donate the P166's?  I'm sure some charity would take them.  Some people out there that can't afford a computer would love to have a P166.  Good to hear you grabbed those four, you built a decent computer and found some good stuff inside too that you wouldn't expect.  Hey better than letting it go to the dump, if I was there I would have grabbed a couple too.

[Ari]

I love old computer stuff. Sadly, I hardly ever run accross equipment that is sentenced to death, even though I work in places you'd think this was a routine. Maybe I should start asking a little more...  :wink:

[Tom]

The hospital probably figures that without hard drives, nobody would want the computers.  They did "sell" some old PC's recently, with hard drives, and donated the money to a local charity.  I bought one of them for $11 which is now serving as my primary music computer:





Blurry images, I know....can't even really tell what anything is, but this is, for all practical purposes, Quest Studios.  We have four PC's in this room, two of which now serve as our "new" music computers, costing a total of $11.   To the right of Music PC #1 is the MT-32, with the SC-8820 sitting on top.  Inside the PC is a MPU-IPC (for the 8820),  SCB-55, SB AWE32, SB Audigy, and WF192XG card.

Music PC #2 is sitting on the floor behind the Roland HP-3000 digital keyboard.  (That's a full-size, 88-key MIDI piano.)  PC #2 has another MT-32 and a CM-500 connected to another MPU-IPC.  You have to really strain to see them sitting under the computer's keyboard; and my Yamaha SW60-XG and AWE64 are inside.

My PC acts only for digital recording (via a Turtle Beach Santa Cruz), and is conncected to both music PC's.  (Currently, it's burning a DVD.)

[Wodball]

Looks like a nice network. Perhaps you should make a "Behind the Music" for Queststudios.

I have to say, that was a lucky find. I only know one dealer of junk computers, and I'm not sure anything really works anymore. Maybe I should search the used computer store here in Berkeley for some deals. Maybe that have MIDI cards lying around...

--Woody

P.S. You said that you're burning a DVD on your comp. That's Nero all right.

[Tom]

You can make out NERO?  Damn...sharp eyes!  Yep, it's burning a backup copy of "Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope".  I had just finished preparing the back up of the main movie with my favorite DVD utility, "DVD Shrink".



I really should invest in a digital camera, but I would probably rarely use it.  Anyway, this is a little (not much) better pic of all four PC's and MIDI devices.

[MusicallyInspired]

Is that a Star Wars soundtrack cd I see at the bottom??

[Tom]

Yes...No.  It's one of the DVD cases I made for my Star Wars Trilogy backup copies.     Geezzz....how can you guys make out the details on this stuff.  There's a dime on the floor near the keyboard....anybody see that?  

I'll give you $500 if you can READ what's on the screen of Music PC #2!!!!   :smt017

[robertmo]

By the way Tom from the gaming point of view you don't have Gravis Ultra Sound

[HondaSiR]

I'll give you $500 if you can READ what's on the screen of Music PC #2!!!!   :smt017

I think its a copy of the love poem you wrote when you were still courting Diane...ages ago hahaha. Pay up Tom.  :mrgreen:

[MusicallyInspired]

I'll give you $500 if you can READ what's on the screen of Music PC #2!!!!

That's a trick question!! It's not words it's a BLURY LINE! HAHAH OH YES I FEEL THE VICTORY!!

..ahem...so about the money...

[Tom]

Wrong!  I win -- Yes!  (Good, 'cause I don't actually have an extra $500 to give away.)  It's the MS-DOS boot up screen while loading various drivers:  XG, AWE64, CD-ROM drive, mouse, HIMEM, etc.  Maybe if I would have made an animated GIF out of it, you would have seen the little C:\>_ flashing cursor.