Monday night fun - all's well in Solaris land 😊

I've a lot of funky old video cards, but this one tops them all. This is the MDS Genius VHR-400 from 1985, an absolute powerhouse from 1985, made completely from discrete logic as off the shelf parts were running less than 25% of the speed. This card is to drive my Portrait CRT

I may have made some progress with my CPT / Micro Display Systems "The Genius" Portrait Monitor, I also found a brightness dial right inside the back and it's now WAY more brighter. There's some hope yet to get working full screen & at the right resolution! 👍🤓

Not holding my breath for this repair, might be too far gone, but I'll do my best to try to revive it. MSI MS-5108

Intel Pentium 66Mhz - Socket 4 CPU (1993)

I'd absolutely love the challenge of refurbishing this Commodore PET, but there's no way I'm paying £363 for it! 😮 ebay.io/m/MOTqsu

Well, the CPT Genius Portrait CRT is working, but unfortunately the video card that drives it does not. However I got some wonky action out of it using an 8-bit ISA Hercules video card (obviously the resolution is not right), the picture is so crisp, looks like E Ink!

'that's why they call me big popper!'

🥷

Today I picked up this curio: CPT / Micro Display Systems "The Genius" Portrait Monitor and Genius ISA Graphics Card, with printed manual, drivers and software. I love usual tech and this fits the bill! 😍

A couple of boards for me to have a go at repairing: - Socket 4 OG Pentium (Battery Leak) - 286 (Tantalum Explosion)

Here is the Phoenix Jr.

I'm picking up this cool, curious Portrait CRT tomorrow, it should be fun to check out!

I have a bunch of CPUs that I bought in a joblot a while back, I'd only had a brief look through, today I had a proper rummage. I was very happy and surprised to find this gem! The fastest Intel Pentium III CPU with 100 MHz FSB: SL5QW (Intel Pentium III 1.1 GHz) 😍😍😍

A non-working Commodore VIC-20 that I picked up for £20; I've repaired it and I've cleaned the case up. All that's left is to refurb and clean the keyboard 😍 Here's the fresh case: Before & After

Wow, that looks super fresh!

Been fine-tuning the VIC-20 retro-bright, a few small bits edges were not whitening, but I've applied more gel and sweating it out - seems to be all good. I'll give it a wash down tomorrow and see what the results are like.

My workshop is a bit too hot today 🥵

I bought this Dual Slot 1 Pentium II / III board for £10, it was sold as untested as it has a non-standard power connector and the sell couldn't test it. It's from Dell Poweredge 1300 (1999), should be fun for experimenting with if it works.

"It means fasten your seatbelt Dorothy, 'cause Kansas is going bye-bye."

My eldest son bought me a present 😊

I swore, no more radios Couldn’t leave this behind though. Dansette for staters, and beautifully hacked into a Tandy AC adapter that’s outputting the wrong voltage (to be confirmed), coupled with a vintage plug. A wonderful thing. Will be great to get this going.

Sunday - Retro Fun Day

I picked up a functional retro purchase for my workshop: Sony Bravia KDL-15G2000 [2007] - DTV - VGA - Composite - Component - Svideo - RGB Scart - Picture-in-Picture Literally my ideal bench monitor! 👍

Philips CD-i CD450 (1994)

HP DeskJet 500C (1991) *I remember printing the Tutankhamen picture off using Delux Paint on my Amiga 500 and being absolutely blown away, awesome memory* 😊

Today I decided to have a play with the Commodore VIC-20 that I repaired a few months back. I need to revisit it and finish it off: - Clean and refurb keyboard, as some of the keys have to be pressed very hard to work. - Clean and retro-bright the case and it looks like a Banana.

Amstrad PPC640 [1987] CPU: NEC V30 8 Mhz CPU MEM: 640k RAM ('all you'll ever need') STORAGE: Dual 720kb DD Floppy Drives

New PlayStation 5 Exclusive! 😂

Sorry for the lack of retro posts this week, I've been doing other 'things'. One of the 'things' (Red Sea), absolutely mind blowing how much sea life there is here 😮:

I got up early today to watch the Egyptian sunrise, absolutely breathtaking 🌄

I made a new friend at a coffee shop in Egypt! 🇪🇬 'Romero' 😺

Most probably movies weren't 'purchased', but rented - in the same way you don't own any of the music paid for on iTunes.

Flashback on the Acorn A4000, both from 1992.

StarCraft (1998)

Stunt Car Racer on a recreated version of my first PC, powered by an Intel 386 DX-25.

Back in 2003 I didn't even have a desk, but I still had the best of times on my Athlon PC with Voodoo graphics card. (Also a cute cat called Smudge, R.I.P little crazy dude).

What was your favourite game based on the Unreal 1 (1998) engine?

Microsoft Windows Install CD's/DVD's for workstations over the past 30 years. Wondering if 11 be the last one on physical media?

That early 2000's aesthetic is *chef's kiss*

Let's have some retro fun and install MS-DOS and Windows 3.1! 👍

Flashback memory, remember Gordian Knot for encoding DVDs into Xvid/DivX?

Remember Backtrack Linux? This is a snap of mine from 2005, I 'was' a naughty boy! 😂

The Windows 95 CD, featuring Weezer's - Buddy Holly Music Video. Remember the first time you played this banger tune?

Work Colleague: "Are you watching the world cup game tonight?" Me: "No, I'm doing something really fun though!" Me:

This is by far one of my favourite 386 machines, the Acer AnyWare 1100LX (1990), complete with detachable mechanical keyboard. I've upgraded the ram from 3MB to 5MB, so I'm running memtest on it, love how clear the screen is.

I've decided to build a retro website like I used to do back in the day, using Macromedia Dreamweaver 3, with FTP transfer. I may just keep it as a local internet for my retro computers, but we shall see where it goes.

Do you remember: Defraggler (Awesome 3rd Party Defrag Tool)

A photo from a while back, of one the random things I like to do in my workshop: Setup retro Intel powered laptops from 286 right through to Core 2 Duo

Does anyone else like their laptops THICC! 🫪