OrangePC Ram problem

[Sir Foxx]

So, something I tried, my particular card has 4 of the 30pin ram slots, which are the same as the macintosh ram slots. I pulled 64mb from my q950 and popped it into the orangePC card, and while its doing the ram check. it usually fails around 79XXkb at address F300. Other times it will start to do ram check, but characters are missing, then the card crashes and starts giving beep codes.

Is it possible that the card doesnt support more than 8mb of ram..?

 

[Bolle]

386s do not support more than 16MB extended memory.

In fact I couldn't even get my card to work with anything but 4*1MB SIMMs yet.

 

[Sir Foxx]

386s do not support more than 16MB extended memory.

In fact I couldn't even get my card to work with anything but 4*1MB SIMMs yet.

Ahhh gotcha. I didn't grow up when these computers were around, so its news to me

Now mine wont even load the orangepc program with 1*16mb stick in it. Is loading win 3.1 even possible with 1mb (700k useable) of ram? What can you do with 700k of ram..?

 

[Bolle]

The 386 has a 16bit data path. A 30pin SIMM is 8bits, so you'll need at least two matching SIMMs installed at a time.

Not sure on Windows 3.1 and actual RAM usage.

 

[Sir Foxx]

The 386 has a 16bit data path. A 30pin SIMM is 8bits, so you'll need at least two matching SIMMs installed at a time.

Not sure on Windows 3.1 and actual RAM usage.

I tried with 2 of my 16mb sticks with no luck, so I went back to the 1mb of ram,

How does graphics work on these cards? Is it integrated on the orangePC or does it use the mac hardware?

I'd like to get interplay's decent 1 to run on the card. However seeing as it needs 3d acceleration, the likelihood of the happening is slim unless it can share resources with the q950, or I were to get a ISA graphics card, and at least 4mb of ram to work.

 

[Unknown_K]

386s do not support more than 16MB extended memory.

In fact I couldn't even get my card to work with anything but 4*1MB SIMMs yet.

386DX are 32 bit and supports more then 16MB, a 386SX uses a 16 bit path and you are stuck with 16MB or less depending on the board.

 

[Unknown_K]

I tried with 2 of my 16mb sticks with no luck, so I went back to the 1mb of ram,

How does graphics work on these cards? Is it integrated on the orangePC or does it use the mac hardware?

I'd like to get interplay's decent 1 to run on the card. However seeing as it needs 3d acceleration, the likelihood of the happening is slim unless it can share resources with the q950, or I were to get a ISA graphics card, and at least 4mb of ram to work.

Some OrangePC cards (486) have built in video and have a dongle out the back for connecting a monitor directly to the card. The 386 cards I own use the Mac video for display.

Decent 1 came out in 1995 which was socket 5 Pentium 1 era not 386. The game does not need a 3D accelerator, nor were ANY ISA cards made to accelerate 3D. The best you can do is use an original Voodoo 1 (PCI) with a beta driver to play the game accelerated.

 

[Sir Foxx]

Some OrangePC cards (486) have built in video and have a dongle out the back for connecting a monitor directly to the card. The 386 cards I own use the Mac video for display.

Decent 1 came out in 1995 which was socket 5 Pentium 1 era not 386. The game does not need a 3D accelerator, nor were ANY ISA cards made to accelerate 3D. The best you can do is use an original Voodoo 1 (PCI) with a beta driver to play the game accelerated.

Gotcha. I looked through the manual for decent, and it says itll work on a 386-33 processor with 4mb of ram. How good it will run is a whole different question haha.

Are ISA-to-PCI adapters a thing..? 

 

[johnklos]

i80386 are 32 bits, with 32 bits of external addressing, so there's no 16 megabyte limit. The i80386SX has a 16 bit data path and 24 bit address bits, so can only access 16 megabytes.

The OrangePC 200 series have either a 386SX or a 486SLC, which is pin compatible with the 386SX. Both of these can only take up to 16 megs. Whether the four 30 pin SIMMs can be populated with 4 megs, I do not know.

The OrangePC 300 series, from what I remember, have true 32 bit i80486 CPUs which can handle more memory. None of those, AFAIK, have 30 pin SIMMs.

Commodore made the A2386 BridgeBoard with the i80386. It was intended to only take up to 8 megabytes, but a BIOS update and a SIMM adapter makes it capable of taking 16 megs. The same may be doable for the OrangePC, but I doubt it'd be easy. The notes for the A2386 might be helpful because they discuss what needed to be changed.

There aren't any PCI to ISA adapters that I know about. The ISA space and speed is too limiting to tie it to a PCI card. But you might be amazed at what kind of hardware you can get on an ISA card - new video cards, IDE / CompactFlash interfaces, USB and other things are available because of retro-enthusiasts. What kind of card do you want to add?

 

[Sir Foxx]

i80386 are 32 bits, with 32 bits of external addressing, so there's no 16 megabyte limit. The i80386SX has a 16 bit data path and 24 bit address bits, so can only access 16 megabytes.

The OrangePC 200 series have either a 386SX or a 486SLC, which is pin compatible with the 386SX. Both of these can only take up to 16 megs. Whether the four 30 pin SIMMs can be populated with 4 megs, I do not know.

The OrangePC 300 series, from what I remember, have true 32 bit i80486 CPUs which can handle more memory. None of those, AFAIK, have 30 pin SIMMs.

Commodore made the A2386 BridgeBoard with the i80386. It was intended to only take up to 8 megabytes, but a BIOS update and a SIMM adapter makes it capable of taking 16 megs. The same may be doable for the OrangePC, but I doubt it'd be easy. The notes for the A2386 might be helpful because they discuss what needed to be changed.

There aren't any PCI to ISA adapters that I know about. The ISA space and speed is too limiting to tie it to a PCI card. But you might be amazed at what kind of hardware you can get on an ISA card - new video cards, IDE / CompactFlash interfaces, USB and other things are available because of retro-enthusiasts. What kind of card do you want to add?

Mine has an AM386SX, though its soldered directly to the board. I'm fairly certain mine can only take 8mb because the few times it booted with the 64mb of ram in it, it would get to 79XXkb before failing at address F300 along with a bunch of the text being garbled or missing (ram compatibility issue maybe?). Then the mac stopped recognizing the orangepc card all together unless I went back with the two 512kb sticks that I got it with. 

Honestly, that is a good question. Really depends what hardware it is able to share with the mac and what is done directly off the orangepc card. I kind of wanted to get a creative sound blaster AWE64 gold card with a retro ram upgrade, however, whats the point of having good sound when you're limited to 320x180(?) graphics? I'm not looking for wonders out of this card video-wise, just trying to think what would work best, as well as what will fit. The q950 may have several nubus slots, but I am unsure how the orangePC card will fit in the case with another card hanging out of the ISA slot, fighting for space with my thunder/24 card and my 66mhz PDS card.

 

[johnklos]

Here's a SoundBlaster compatible ISA card:

https://blog.tindie.com/2020/07/pci-blasterboard-stands-in-for-a-sound-blaster-on-old-machines/