it probably doesn't help that my CPU fan died.
it's for a pentium 1, so it's slightly old
OH MAYBE THIS IS WHY
this is not how 3 pin fan connectors work! This is going to try to undervolt your fan backwards while putting +12v down the tach-out pin
amazingly it turns out I didn't fry my fan. after adapting to the Weird Pinout here, it works fine.
well, relatively "works fine". the fan spins.
I still haven't managed to get this computer to respond to any keyboards and when I boot it, it's started looking like this:
yeah there's maybe a problem with the VGA chip or the VRAM
the weird part is that this wasn't doing this prior to the whole fan issue.
So... did I somehow damage the RAM trying to get my fan working?

but the PS/2 pinout in the manual (both of them) seems to be wrong, since the voltages are in the wrong places and it doesn't work.

theoretically this motherboard has early USB keyboard support, but, uh... it's a non-standard header. and I don't trust it in the slightest

you'd think I could use one of my many scratch keyboards, but unfortunately they've all gone missing in my last attempt at cleaning my office

you should count your blessings every day that you don't have to live with Foone. I do.

That is my crime, it is also my punishment.

after testing the voltage polarity, I risked a real keyboard on it.
no luck.
I think I'm gonna have to just mark this board as "totally fucked" and give up on it.
FAREWELL, PCM-5894!
I tried switching to this WinSystems SAT-DX, but it's got no VGA out (and I don't have a PC/104 VGA card on hand) and it's beeping an impossible pattern for the award BIOS it supposedly has.
WHY DO NONE OF MY QUARTER-CENTURY OLD ELECTRONICS WORK

Fuck it, go big or go home.

So, two things about this you may notice:
1. it doesn't seem to have a CPU
2. it seems to be slightly floating off my desk.

These two things are related.

@foone oh dear