Linux kernel 7.3 is now released, and I'm back with more updates on SHORK 486, my Linux distribution for 486 and 586 vintage PCs!

Firstly, SHORK 586 is now technically a thing! I recently added the option to optimise SHORK for various 486 or 586 CPU revisions, and selecting a 586-related option grants the "SHORK 586" nameplate. Right now, the difference is purely optimisation and cosmetics. I anticipate SHORK 486 and 586 will diverge as I test and add things that can make better use of Pentium and Pentium MMX.

I decided to have another crack at getting the vga16fb driver to work so that SHORK can have a framebuffer device on general ISA, VLB and non-VBE2+ PCI display cards, and found some success! I found that Linux text modes (vga=normal, vga=3841, etc.) took precedence, so the driver never bound. I added a kernel command line parameter that allows the driver to be force-bound. The driver is also supposed to work with EGA cards too, yet I found its support of such lacking, so I took care of that too. This means I can finally use SHORKGUI on my 365ED, and a much wider range of pre-PCI PCs! That said, I'm not going to lie, it doesn't run well right now, but it's certainly a start... I'm trying to optimise the stack (TinyX and TWM) and be creative with it to try to improve performance, but at least for ISA, it seems the issues are quite bus-bound. Nano-X is an alternative I'm keeping in mind, if needed.

Finally, I added more ways of getting remote access and transferring files to SHORK. FTP, SCP/SSH, Telnet and TFTP daemons are now available! (I also added a cool splash screen that I forgot to photo, hence the screenshot at the end...)

I was also delighted to see SHORK featured on the This Week in Retro podcast 288! Much thanks to Veronica Explains for their enthusiasm, as always!

My retro battlestation I've built over the last year in my office. Originally it was just the 2 flat panels and my laptop for work, but eventually added the Sun X7149A, PVM 14M2MDE and a basic NECH CRT for retro gaming.

All I know about this machine is it was used by Ryder Truck rentals from 1997 to 2004 in Tennessee, it has two different Ryder CDs with it, along with two floppy disks that came in the computer bag, along with a good bit of Ryder documentation on it.

Parts I have:

• Fully working HP Media Center m1050y with recovery partition

• HP 5187-4424 5219URF wireless keyboard

• HP 5187-6121 5219URF2+ wireless mouse

• HP-Harman Kardon 5187-2106 subwoofer

• HP-Harman Kardon 5187-2105 speakers

• HP 5042-8791 Photosmart M-Series dock faceplate/bracket

• HP 5042-8775 Photosmart R-Series dock faceplate/bracket

• HP-Apple 5733748006/5733748007/5733748008 iPod 4th generation dock faceplate/bracket

• HP Photosmart R707 with everything original including the R-Series dock

Parts I need:

• HP Pavilion F2304 23" monitor-TV hybrid

• HP Pavilion F1903 19" monitor

• HP-Apple iPod 4th generation with original driver/software disc

• HP Photosmart 930 with everything original including the 8886 dock

• HP Photosmart M407 with everything original including the M-Series dock

This was my office at a major university. On the left was a Sun Ultra 2. In the rack was an SGI Indy, hooked to the gray monitor / keyboard setup. There was a sparc 5 and maybe a Netra in the rack as well as some BoxHill drives.

In October 2001, I worked in Tokyo for a month. I had worked at Sony Electronics in California for a few years and in the Fall of 2001 my team had a new project starting up reporting to the project owners in Tokyo. In Tokyo I would work on development and to be a liaison with my team in the project's early days. The first week I had a small desk near the supplies and printers but was moved to a cubical afterwards. I brought my VAIO Z505JS (it's got some papers on it) and I think the other laptop they provided was a VAIO 707 series. I also brought some accessories from home including a Logitech mouse, Belkin USB hub, and an Evangelion mouse pad. It was an exciting time of my career and I miss those days where tech was new and changing constantly.

Ein paar Alte neu verpackte Produkte Tastatur und Maus,
Dazu nen Gehäuse vom Schrott und nen Bildschirm von Kleinanzeigen

Und schon steht das setup :)

CF-30 Panasonic Toughbook
XP SP3
Core Duo 1.6ghz
3GB Ram

I’ve been working on putting this 2000-ish PC together for a while now, and it’s almost where I want it to be. When I was a kid my first computer was a Dell Dimension L800r Pentium 3 system running Me, but it was a budget box with no real expansion options. The Dell marketing materials at the time showed off the Dimension 4100, which was higher performance and had a lot more options. Fast forward 25 years, and I picked up a Dimension 4100 for myself and have upgraded just about every aspect of it. I’ve shoehorned the whole thing into my (modern) office setup with converters to make things work with a modern monitor and wireless keyboard/mouse.

Specifications:
-Dell Dimension 4100, dual booting 98SE/XP
-1.0 GHz P3 133 MHz FSB
-Seagate 160GB 7200.7 Plus drive
-512 MB PC133 RAM
-ATI Radeon 9600 XT 128 MB
-SB Audigy SB0090
-48x CD-ROM drive
-VIA USB2.0 card with front panel
-Realtek gigabit Ethernet card
-HIDman USB—>PS/2 converter
-OSSC 1.8 video converter

Future Upgrades:
-DVD+/-RW drive (need to find a good cheap one)
-PicoIDE (preordered)

I can't seem to solve the following problem on my MSI GT60 OEM clone (Intel HD 4000 iGPU and Quadro K4100M dGPU, Windows 7 x64, driver 416.78).

When I launch Minecraft 1.21.11 using Java 21 64-bit or Java 25 64-bit (BellSoft or Oracle, doesn't matter), javaw.exe only uses the stinky HD 4000, regardless of whether I've configured javaw.exe to use NVIDIA in the NVIDIA Control Panel and/or additionally launched the game by right-clicking it and selecting "Run with graphics processor" and choosing the NVIDIA GPU (and including the Option "OpenGL rendering GPU"=NVIDIA). The iGPU cannot be disabled as it is used for video output to HDMI and internal flat panel (so there is also no option to do so in the BIOS).

With the 32-bit version of Java 21, it uses the NVIDIA GPU as intended (Java 25 is no longer available as a 32-bit version, of course).

However, with the 32-bit version, I can only allocate 1 GB of RAM for the JVM. Assigning more causes the JVM to crash with a heap-size error. 1GB is not enough for playing MC 1.21.

Therefore, I'd like to get Java 25 (64-bit) to use the NVIDIA GPU under Windows 7 as well.

Has anyone encountered this issue before and found a solution for this problem?

There are ancient threads like these:

• https://minecraft.fr/forum/threads/nvidia-optimus-nutilise-pas-le-gpu-nvidia.151981/
• https://www.minecraftforum.net/forums/support/java-edition-support/1858959-nvidia-graphics-card-will-not-use-java-64-bit

where people seem to have encountered the exact same issue with their Optimus setups, but without finding a solution. The former thread was what led me to discover that 32bit Java works as intended. All other (including both 32bit and 64bit) applications use the NVIDIA GPU when forced to do so, e.g. Spyro Trilogy or Mirrors Edge Catalyst.

My retro Apple 1’s.

Hey everyone!

I've got this crazy idea of rebuilding my very first gaming PC from back when I was about 13. I actually built the whole thing myself.

Unfortunately, all my old hardware ended up in the trash about 10 years ago, thanks to my ex-girlfriend. Still kicking myself for that one. :D

Back then I had an AMD Athlon Thunderbird 1200, overclocked to a stable 1366 MHz, and an ATI Radeon 9500 Pro, which I BIOS-flashed to get 9700 Pro-level performance.

But the real star of the show was my Thermaltake Dragon Orb 3 in orange/purple.

That absolute monster had a 7000 RPM fan and was LOUD AS HELL! At our LAN parties, everyone knew the second I turned on my PC. We still laugh about that thing over 20 years later. xD

Since 2023, we've actually started having LAN parties again, twice a year, with the same guys from back in the day!

So here's my plan: I want to rebuild that old PC before our next LAN party, secretly bring it along, fire up that screaming jet engine and play some Quake III Arena! Just imagining my buddies' faces makes me laugh. :D

Anyway, I'm looking for:

- Thermaltake Dragon Orb 3 (Orange/Purple) – my holy grail!

- AMD Athlon Thunderbird – any model! Wouldn't mind something faster than my old 1200. xD

- ATI Radeon 9500 Pro / 9700 Pro / 9800 Pro

- Socket A motherboard

- Cold cathode lights, because no early 2000s gaming PC was complete without them!

- Any other cool hardware from that era

If anyone has some old parts collecting dust and would be willing to sell them, please send me a DM! I'm in Germany and happy to pay for the parts and shipping.

Especially that Dragon Orb 3. It just wouldn't be the same without that ridiculous screaming fan.

Maybe I'll actually get to drive my old LAN buddies crazy with it one more time. :D

This is my Windows 98 system. I had bought this entire computer for only 100 bucks back in 2015! I was in high school at the time so when my parents heard the door bell ring with a massive box on the pouch they definitely were “happy” to say the least.

I’ve had this system for over 10 years now. I’ve made some upgrades to it over the years. It’s got 224mb of ram with 266mhz pentium II. The graphics card is a TNT2 Riva Model 64. It’s such a great system to enjoy DOS games and tinker around with. I have a lot of different software for it such as Microsoft office 2000. Doom 2 quake and blood. This system is great for everything I need.

I just got my hands on this relic from the past. I'm so happy! A transparent case, real neon lights, water cooling powered by… an aquarium pump. A true work of art!

I have to say this vintage 300 dpi scanner is pretty good!

medion erazer x6821 (core i7-3610qm, nvidia gtx 670m, 16gb ddr3, intel HM77, 2x sata hdd, 1x dvd, 1080p led) budget gaming laptop.

A while ago I made a post on my socket 939 Windows XP battle station, but much has changed about the little guy since then! I was able to make a little space for a dedicated set-up, and I snagged a better monitor (used up all my FBM luck for the year). I also filled out the drive bays with a media card reader and a neat little hard drive cooler from Coolermaster. The culmination of one whole year of gathering stuff for this has payed off. Very proud of this thing!

Specs:
AMD Athlon 4000+ (OC’d 2.8ghz)
ATI Radeon X850 XT (OC’d to PE speeds)
ASUS a8n-sli deluxe motherboard
OCZ DDR400 2gb, 2.5-3-2-5 T1 timings
Antec Truepower 550w power supply
Antec p160 ATX case (modded with brighter front LEDs)
Sound Blaster Audigy 2 ZS with front pannel IO
WD Caviar 74gb sata HHD
Sony Trinitron Multiscan 420GS monitor