r/vintagecomputing • • 23h ago

A 3D card for the Packard Bell

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112 Upvotes

Earlier this year I posted about a 1998/99 Packard Bell desktop I bought, with the intention of adding some period appropriate bits to it to make it an authentic (if modest!) gaming machine of its day.

An I-O Data Voodoo Banshee came up for sale in Japan complete with box, driver floppies and demo disks and after some finagling (i.e. learning I had to switch a jumper on the motherboard to disable the onboard VGA) I finally got it working.

As expected it doesn’t run things very smoothly by modern standards, probably around 30 fps with some stutter and drops when the action heats up, but I think someone would have been pretty chuffed by the upgrade back in the day.

Have also included a picture of the sound card I put in - I fancied something with EAX support, maybe I’ll check how well Thief: The Dark Project runs one of these days!


r/vintagecomputing • • 10h ago

IBM ViaVoice 98

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81 Upvotes

Local thrift find! Never heard of it before


r/vintagecomputing • • 7h ago

Another barnfind! 😍

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55 Upvotes

Got this for free from an old guy clearing out the loft on his barn. Irs an AST Bravo 386/16 with 4mb of ram and 70mb quantum disk! No battery leakage amd it fired right up! Only thing was the disk was stuck.. gave it a horisontal smack while powering it up and it spun right up 🤩


r/vintagecomputing • • 13h ago

How vintage does this group get?

22 Upvotes

Any S100 fans out there?


r/vintagecomputing • • 11h ago

What exactly is happening….

Enable HLS to view with audio, or disable this notification

16 Upvotes

I tried removing the Keyboard to take out the CMOS but the screw is stripped


r/vintagecomputing • • 9h ago

Royal Alphatronic PC

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9 Upvotes

This machine has been in my storage in the box for 20+ years, I had forgotten about it, just pulled it out and it powered right on and works perfectly. It is from 1983 and was made in Japan.


r/vintagecomputing • • 17h ago

Star Trek: Quadrant Command - a reimagining of the original 'Star Trek' mainframe game

10 Upvotes

If you grew up gaming in the 70s or 80s, you likely crossed paths with the granddaddy of all space simulators: the original 1971 Star Trek text game. There was a unique thrill to typing coordinates into a glowing green terminal, hunting down "K"s on an 8x8 grid, and carefully rationing your energy reserves. It was a groundbreaking experience that laid the foundation for the entire tactical genre.

I wanted to capture that exact feeling of sitting in the center seat, but elevate the mechanics with the kind of strategic depth modern players expect. Enter Star Trek: Quadrant Command.

This is a complete tactical evolution of the classic formula. It takes the foundation you remember, the ticking stardate clock and the delicate power grid, and turns the galaxy into a living, hostile ecosystem. You aren't just clearing empty sectors anymore; you are triaging a quadrant actively under siege. The game forces you to make hard, high-stakes decisions. You might have to choose between warping across the map to rescue a civilian freighter desperately trying to escape its attackers, or holding the line to defend a critical Starbase from a coordinated enemy assault.

The combat rewards careful positioning and resource management. You can calculate photon torpedo chain reactions to wipe out clustered fleets, or divert your dwindling power to focused phaser beams and wide-arc cone dispersals when things get close. And you will need every tool in your arsenal, because you are up against methodical Klingon wolfpacks, Romulan ambushers that cloak to hide their energy signatures, and relentless Orion pirates.

Even the environment is out to get you. To secure the quadrant, you will have to navigate blind through sensor-jamming nebulae, weather shield-battering ion storms, and sometimes take the ultimate risk of dropping your shields entirely to siphon emergency power directly from a star.

The Enterprise has the tools, but the math of the universe is working against you. If you love deep, turn-based strategy and have a soft spot for the retro classics, I'd love for you to take command.

Do you have what it takes to save the galaxy before time runs out?

Play it for freehere: https://www.cygnus-x1.net/links/sttr1/

Please note, much like the main viewscreen on the Enterprise, this game runs best on a large monitor


r/vintagecomputing • • 9h ago

Getting non-sun branded drive working with V250

3 Upvotes

I am trying to get a drive (68pin) working with a V250 by adding it to the unused connector at the top of the system 5.25" drive bay. I have set the id to 4 which isn't used by the backplane. While the system sees the device (sd4), it doesn't show up as available when I used the format command. The drive works in an SGI Fuel and with an adaptec card in a PC.


r/vintagecomputing • • 4h ago

Pictur (My PaintShopPro 7.04 inspired image editor)

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0 Upvotes

Pictur - my PaintShopPro 7.04 inspired image editor

Got that retro Windows98 look with color schemes.

It's using Gimp/Krita effects. It supports webp, jpegxl, old Amiga image formats, any format you like to read?

I'm using SVG for vector and have support for HTML layers (create layer,

add html code - it gets rendered), svg layers, glsl (shader) layers.

It's still (buggy) in development but I have Windows 10/11, Linux appimage and Intel macOS binaries.

Development: C++ 20, Claude, Ubuntu, litehtml for layout, OpenGL Gles3 and NanoVG for drawing.