Mastodawn

Soyo SY-6VBA-133
I picked this up as faulty not working for a few pounds a while back and managed to repair it.
It's a lovely board, I've still got to get a Northbridge heatsink that the previous owner scavenged, I'll test it but not push too hard yet (heatsink ordered).

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Gammitin (Ben) 💾3d ago

So I got this FortéMedia FM801 card and with it installed, it stops the PC from booting. I could see anything physically wrong with it, so decided to give it a good scrub and wash, then dried it with hot air. Now the PC boots, whether it will work or not, we'll find out.

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Gammitin (Ben) 💾3d ago

Linux on a nearly 30 year old CPU is just like magic!

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Gammitin (Ben) 💾

Well, this looks promising, maybe the easiest fix ever for a soundcard:
It was really bizarre that it was stopping the PC booting, I checked and cleaned with Isopropyl Alcohol first but it didn't work.
But a wash in the sink with fairy liquid and a brush, rinse and dry?! 😂

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Gammitin (Ben) 💾2d ago

Well, I couldn't get any drivers to work with the card at all, so yeah, I have to come back to it in the future.
But what I did manage to do was find 4x 256MB PC133 sticks of RAM that work in this, so I can have some fun with a 1GB RAM Pentium II 😉

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Gammitin (Ben) 💾2d ago

So the previous owner, when they failed to repair the board, decided to steal the Northbridge heatsink.
Very limited space, max 5mm height, let's sort that out!

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Gammitin (Ben) 💾2d ago

The chipset has not been more than just warm, but just in case I've decided to fit a heatsink. It's not square, but the narrowest part is as wide as the chipset and only 5mm high, so it will do.