#Tower case
31 messages in this thread
I needed a power supply and case for my tapedrive and
another harddrive. I kinda went overboard and bought a real
nice black jumbo tower.
I have some PC clone parts laying around. If I buy one of
these 486 mother boards for $600, what else would I need
besides a floppy drive to build my own clone?
–Paul < Motorola Inside >
Well, I would guess a video board, drive controller, RAM, hard disk,
mouse, serial parallel and game ports, monitor, and cabling. Don't forget
the DOS, windoze, and software.
Chris
a keyboard would come in handy too! 🙂
About all you need to put together a working clone is a case, keyboard,
motherboard, monitor, floppy, vga card and a combination serial, parallel, ide
and floppy controler card. Opps, allmost forgot Dos. IF you have a multisync
monitor you're half way there.
I picked up a 486 33sx with case, keyboard, floppy & combo IO card for about
$400.00. The HD and Monitor are the most expensive parts.
When you do buy a motherboard, make sure there is a 486 chip on it. I've heard
of vendors selling 486 motherboards with cpu but not telling you the cpu is a
386 or a Cyrix wanabe 486.
Darren
Darren,
Wow. Did you pick that stuff up in this area?
I picked up the Computer Shopper in this area. Does that count.:)
Darren
Darren, let me let you in on something….Intel CPU's suck
A Cyrix DLC 40MHz gets better then a 486-33SX….and that is a 1k cache
compared to an 8k cache…..not to mention the Cyrix is half the price.
Also, by definition, any chip with the 486 instruction mix on it, is a 486.
Dave
Elite MicroComputers – via Whap!
I think questions about how to build a clone would get some good answers
from folks in the IBM forums. You should probably ask about it over
there.
Steve
Paul,
There's a book available called 'How to Build Your Own PC and Save a
Bundle' or somesuch. If you don't get any other answers here (I know you
won't get any from me <g>) maybe the book will be of help.
-Sean
Don't build a PC…..It is ALOT harder then you would think.
You can't compair a warranty to saving a few $$$. Not when you don't have any
experience with systems.
Dave
Elite MicroComputers – via Whap!
Not to mention that fact that, if you shop around good, you can usualy
find an assembled clone for just a few buck more than buying all the parts
individually.
Mike
You are absolutely correct, Mike. I'm a hardware manufacturer and *I* could
only save myself about 10 percent on the price of a clone by assembling it
instead of buying it built and warranted. I bought a nice 486 DX 33MHz with
very good monitor last year for a (then) very good price of 2400 bux. Works
great and no problemo's. Now I could buy a 66MHz DX2 for the same price or
less. –Redmond
Dave,
I'm not building a PC. I was just offering a little help to someone
who sounded interested in doing it himself. There are other reasons to do
things on your own besides saving money. For example, I don't brew beer
to save money, I do it because I enjoy using a product that I've made
myself (besides that it's better than most of the swill on the market
<g>). Another reason for building a PC would be to gain '…experience
with systems'.
-Sean
Or some people have a bunch of PC parts and just got a big tower.
It's not the money….
–Paul < Motorola Inside >
That's what I would think too.
-Sean
Sean: I'd then suggest buying a packaged system and taking it *apart*!
😎 –Redmond
Redmond,
No thanks! <g>
-Sean
Paul:
It sounds like you did what I did! I needed a home for my 5.25" drives, so
I got a PC tower case to put them in. I then added a 486/33 motherboard,
and made the machine a PC clone. You will need at least a Floppy drive,
preferably a Hard drive, an IDE/SER/PAR card (to run the HD, and give you
a COM1 port and LPT1 port) a Keyboard, and some form of monitor. If you
already have a multisync monitor on your Amiga, you can get a VGA card
(make sure it's one of the one that doesn't autocheck what type of monitor
is attached) and a switchbox to use the one monitor on both machines.
Keyboards are fairly cheap in the clone world, I just bought one for
$20.00, but will be replacing it soon with a Northgate (I have a Northgate
on my Amiga, and I've been spoiled!) that's gonna run me $80.00. There is
also a company that makes a really small kb that you can use (I originally
used one of these, but I couldn't get used to the compressed placement of
the keys). I also have removed the switchbox from my system, and picked up
a 9" monochrome VGA monitor for the PC, and have mounted a keyboard drawer
on my computer desk, so I can use both machines at the same time. (When I
was using the small KB & switchbox on the monitor I usually locked the
Amiga kb (with a keylock program I have), placed the PC kb on top of the
Amiga one, switched the video, and was using the PC, OR the Amiga. With my
current setup I can use both at once.)
I don't think I left anything out. Oh, another thing you could do,
although most folks will tell you it can't be done is to get a PC SCSI
controller, reset it's ID from 7 to some unused on in your current SCSI
setup, and add it to your SCSI bus so you can access your tape drive, and
other SCSI drives from either machine. I have a CD-ROM drive, Tape drive,
and SyQuest drive that I access from either machine this way.
If you're like me, and don't really want to have DOS running on your PC,
there are several free Unix clones available. 2 of the most popular are
Linux, and 386BSD. I'm currently running 386BSD that I bought on CD-ROM
for $70.00 (the Unix is free, I paid for the service of getting it on a
CD-ROM, I could have also downloaded it from GEnie, or soon from here as
well.) If you have any further questions, please feel free to ask.
// -Mike Schiller
\X/ AMIGA! On AutoPilot in sunny Fort Lauderdale
OK….don't everyone start telling about your systems…I will have to put you
all to shame :>
Dave
Elite MicroComputers – via Whap!
Dave:
I didn't even mention my Amigas 🙂
// -Mike Schiller
\X/ AMIGA! On AutoPilot in sunny Fort Lauderdale
OK….lets go
486 DX 50
!!!Viper VESA local bus w/2mb !!! My newest baby
660mb seagate (CDC)
1.36 gig seagate (hooked to both IBM and Amiga's)
Mitsumi CD-ROM (ok cheesed out with this one)
DPT SCSI controller
AdapCRAP SCSI controller (for scanner)
Sharp JX-320 scanner
Everex ethernet card
Wangtek 5525 525mb 1/4" tape drive !!!!! FOR SALE !!!!!
Just Making the Minimum at the Bank…
Dave
Elite MicroComputers – via Whap!
How much do you want for the tape drive?
Can you tell me what to look for in busses while I put together my tower
project? I haven't bought the motherboard yet and I'll be using an Idek
17" multisync.
–Paul < Motorola Inside >
Nice monitor….I may keep the tape drive…I will know in about 2 weeks if I
need it. If not I am looking for about $700 including $125 worth of tapes.
You need a mother board…your taking to the right guy…give me a call at
908-541-4214….and I can quote you some prices.
Dave
Elite MicroComputers – via Whap!
Very useful info Mike, thanks. The SCSI bit sounds like a trick set-up, I
had no idea.
Where does the keyboard cable eventually end up?
I see various busses like VESA and EISA. What are your thoughts on this?
–Paul < Motorola Inside >
Paul:
Which keyboard cable? The Amiga one goes from the kb to the right side
connector on the A3000, and the PC one goes from the kb down around the
back of the desk, and over to the connector on the tower case. Most new
kb's have longer cables then they used to as towers are becoming more and
more popular in the PC world.
// -Mike Schiller
\X/ AMIGA! On AutoPilot in sunny Fort Lauderdale
On the PC, is the cable connector on the mother board? There is only a
hole in the case.
–Paul < Motorola Inside >
Paul:
Yes, the connector is on the mb. When you buy the mb, make sure that you
have them give you the little plastic standoffs that the board mounts into
the case with, they're a small often overlooked detail.
// -Mike Schiller
\X/ AMIGA! On AutoPilot in sunny Fort Lauderdale
The northgate dosen't work…….was ok for about 5 mins….after that R1
started to fail and the KB died.
Elite MicroComputers – via Whap!
Dave:
Call Northgate, and return it. The keyboards have a 5 year warrantee on
them. For some reason they do seem to have a quality control problem
similiar to Commodore's! My first kb had a bad circuit board in it that
had to be replaced after having the kb for a month. The second replacement
kb they sent me now was DOA, I gotta call them about that in the morning,
but I've found that once the kb is working good, it's likely to stay that
way. The reason they had to send out a second replacement was that the
original one they sent me was the same style as my old one, and they both
had the latest ROM they could (6.05) To get 7.03 you need to have the
newer style kb, and that's why they sent out the second one, they called
it an upgrade, and were nice enough to do it for free, and I'm sure
they'll replace the DOA one ASAP.
BTW, even with the 7.03 ROM kb I still need to use the ticknorthgate
program with my 040 accelerated A3000, so in all this was an excercise in
futility, although I did manage to get a newer style kb out of the deal
🙂
// -Mike Schiller
\X/ AMIGA! On AutoPilot in sunny Fort Lauderdale