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[Grinder]

I've found a good 2-button mouse (Microsoft Basic Mouse Serial and PS/2 Compatible)
and now I'm looking for the Roland LAPC. I'm still wondering about the SB/LAPC
Combo thing. Even if you got both of them to work, how would you get both cards to output into the same speakers?
Anyway, I am now collecting the software. I was thinking about FreeDOS, Cutemouse, SHSUCDX (The FreeDOS CD expansion), The Creative manager and lots of others. I was going to open another thread about these things in the technical section soon.

[The Fifth Horseman]

I'll be trying to jury-rig a PS/2 socket, so that I can use a PS/2 mouse with my PC until the local electronics store gets the actual component.

Accidentally, I came up with an idea that might be quite useful with my current config - see, my 800-meg DOS HDD has some weird jumper configs that make it work as Master - WITHOUT a jumper. That given, I came up with an idea of installing a jumper-switch connected to both HDDs - thus, I can swap DOS and Windows HDD's without much hassle, and have access to both.

Will see how it will work out, but I'm not thinging of this idea as a permament thing - only an experiment.

[The Fifth Horseman]

Jury-rig: failure. The mouse works as before - doesn't budge, but the buttons work. Tested with two different mice.

Jumper-switch: failure. The switches don't seem to work.

[Grinder]

sad to hear. Anyway, I found out what that thing about the roland mt-32 was. When you take a look at the spellcasting 301 manual, it says there that you can hook up your lapc to a roland mt-32 and the amp of your stereo. you hookup your speakers to your soundblaster or other soundcard, and voila! you have roland for music and creative for sound.

[The Fifth Horseman]

Great to hear that.

After a little testing, these two switches seem to be faulty in general, so I'll try with some other ones tomorrow.

[The Fifth Horseman]

Jeez, I'm dumb...
I thought the switches were wired this way:
1---2

3---4

5---6

While actually they are wired that way:
1 . 2
| . |
3 . 4
| . |
5 . 6
And alternate between the pairs (so, pins 3 & 4 are always on, and the pairs are 1&3 and 2&4 OR 3&5 and 4&6, depending on the switch position). :eeeeeh:

It came to my mind accidentally, but in the end worked out. right now, I've placed the jumper-switch inside the PC's case - now if I want to switch between OS'es I pop off the case and punch the switch. Works flawlessly.


Thinking of further electronic enchancements inside the PC. Putting in circuit boards with more easily accessible shortcuts to HDD jumpers and motherboard clock/FSB controls, is one good example - great for overclocking, eh?. :evil:

I'll try to wire up another LED so that I'll see right away if the HDD priority is switched or not, without opening the case.


I'm still unable to locate a PS2/COM connector, maybe I'll have to make one by myself.


The flat IDE cabling is annoying me - it just takes too much space inside the case. And it looks like all the computer stores in nearby area have ran out of round ones - I'll have to buy some normal cables and mod them.

[Grinder]

Just a question: What do you do for a living? You seem
to know an awful lot about computers. Are you some
kind of computer mechanic? Anyway, It's nice to hear
you solved the problem. How can you make a PS2/COM
connector by yourself? And how do you get the LED to
show wether the switch is turned on?

[The Fifth Horseman]

I don't do anything for a living - yet (I'm only 18). I know this much because - like for many Abandonians - computers are my hobby. I just love fiddling with complicated stuff.
For last year and a half, I am sort of practicing being an IT at office of a certain political party - they've got several PC's, all old (or horribly old), and there is a lot that needs to be done just to keep them running.

And - given that - saying I'm a sort of a computer mechanic is quite good way of describing it.

How can you make a PS2/COM connector by yourself?

Since such connectors exist, it's only logical that with some effort one can be constructed by anyone with some basic skills.

I'll try figuring it out today, with one of those ready connectors and a voltage probe.

Or maybe I won't even have to: this looks like what I was looking for! Now just let's hope that an electronics monkey like myself can put that together...

And how do you get the LED to
show wether the switch is turned on?

Easy - by patching the LED between the switch and hard drive.

[Grinder]

Originally posted by the_fifth_horseman@Jan 20 2006, 07:24 PM

Since such connectors exist, it's only logical that with some effort one can be constructed by anyone with some basic skills.

I'll try figuring it out today, with one of those ready connectors and a voltage probe.

Or maybe I won't even have to: this looks like what I was looking for! Now just let's hope that an electronics monkey like myself can put that together...

I have two of those lying around here. Give me your Address and
the money for shipping and I could send you one of them .
Kidding. Anyway, I'm still thinking wether to get a laptop or a tower. I have
a TFT with both a DVI and a VGA input. I use the DVI for my Mac mini. Do
you think I could hook up a dos pc to the VGA input and use it with the screen when my
mac mini is not running? That way, I would have better expandability and a far better
screen than with a dos laptop.

[win98]

Hi guys yesterday I got an old pc from a school that was chucking it out. It's a Hp with the following specs

Intel Pentinum 166 MX
32 MB Ram
2.5 GB HDD
Three and a half inch floopy
Modem (56k I think)
1USB Port
Network card
32x Cd-rom (That I Installed Myself)
Windows NT4 Workstation (need to change that to Windows 95 c for now)And a 14inch screen

What I will do to make it a dos gaming Pc

1 Reformat
2 Install windows 95c
3. Check harddisk for errors
4. Reformat again
5. Put Ms-dos 7.10 on
6. Install windows 98
7. get an old sound card for it.
Note I am going to reformat twice so I can use scandsk to check the harddisk in windows after the first windows install. I also found an old error filled installation of windows 95b in the boot menu I skipped the password logged in and found that it had been installed when the computer had been built used for awhile and then windows Nt4 Workstation was put on when the got a network.
Any Opinions

Edit left out what I planned to do to it.