Let's repair a Socket 7 mainboard: Biostar MB-8500TVX-A

[@djdano2k]

Great repair & rescue! Loved the close-up operation on the broken chip, very interesting! Thanks for all the information.

[@SaltyMeatHook]

"Which torture I have in mind for this board." Dude has methods.

[@yosemite-e2v]

Your soldering skills inspire me to get better. I had one of these (though a different revision; from images online it seems to have been a Rev 2.1) and I used a 200 MHz Evergreen Winchip upgrade CPU. Later on I tried a 450 MHz K6-2 (6x66=400) and I used it for a while that way. Blissfully ignorant of the issues with linear voltage regulators, one hot summer evening I heard a loud pop, and the board was dead. I had no idea why at the time, but years later I found out about how linear regulators heat up when run outside of their design specifications and I realized why the board died.

[@yosemite-e2v]

This was in early 2001 and I knew little about computers at the time. When I bought the Evergreen upgrade CPU, the board wouldn't POST with it. Though I had purchased it on Ebay, I sent Evergreen an email, and they answered me right away, recommending a BIOS update. I tried updating it to the latest BIOS Biostar offered, but it still wouldn't POST. They then sent me a BIOS as an email attachment, and that one worked. That happy moment when you hit the power switch and hear the POST beep!

[@necro_ware]

Yes, one day we all learned this in the one way or another :)

[@tennickjestzajety69]

One of my favorite repairs channel uploaded a video again!

[@Stratotank3r]

Bester Mann um Boards zu retten! Good job as always.

[@necro_ware]

Danke 🤙

[@WarPhotographer1974]

I worked on a mom and pop computer shop in the late 90’s, and I built so many computers using that motherboard. Good memories 😊

[@badrolix]

You are one of the best!

[@the1990kman]

I never thought it was possible to repair broken ic chips like that. Great work!

[@smartperson1]

I've never seen anyone cut into a package like that wow! You're a real necromancer!

[@MrVipeg]

Great repair video! Exactly as we all like. Thank you.

[@LeeMc007]

Excellent repair again, love your channel, your knowledge and skills are just brilliant.

[@marceloaug]

I am really impressed with your skills in reparing the controller chip. Awesome work. Greetings from Brazil.

[@JosepsGSX]

I will be waiting for the next one, as you indeed have my curiosity about the test. Thanks for sharing!

[@edmil1616]

Excellent board repair! A masterful work! Congratulations from Brazil.

[@AJComputerServicesUK]

Good Video as always: “Mr Necroware!”, I had a pleasant surprise a few days ago, I popped round my Brother’s as I had left some Old Computer Stuff at his about 25 years ago, I’d completely forgot that I’d left a box of Motherboards round there including 286, 386, 486 & Pentium 2, They were all destined for the Car Boot Sale back then and they had been priced at £2 & £3 each except the 486 which had a Price-Tag on of £8 and the P2 was up for £20, I was chuffed to bit discovering my lost Treasure after all those years, 2 of the 386 Motherboards have suffered from leaky Batteries but I think I’ve caught the 1 just in time and the other one doesn’t look too bad, I’ve been on the hunt for a good 486 Motherboard to replace my Poorly 486 that I’ve got here & I can’t believe it actually has a CR2032 Socket installed on the Motherboard, No signs of any Damage so just hope it will drop into my 486 Chassis without any problems, The only negative is that it doesn’t have any VESA Slots, Oh well, It could be worse I suppose! Anthony - Birmingham/UK 🙂🇬🇧

[@AJComputerServicesUK]

I’ll definitely be uploading Videos of them on here as soon as I get chance! 🙂

[@glitchwrks]

Nice save! I had to dig out four pins in a Voodoo2 FBI that had broken off flush with the package a few months ago. I usually seal those repairs with some two-part epoxy.

[@janbeck8269]

Thank you for another great video

[@pc-sound-legacy]

Großartig✌️

[@Luke-rr9po]

Excellent video! I also have this board revision 2.1, needs a new clock chip like all the others. Thanks for another excellent video! 😊

[@pavelmusiyenko]

Nice!

[@FeArhsma21]

Love this channel thank you for the things that you do. God Bless my friend!

[@pavelfara9333]

There is one interesting thing about this board. It has 2x PS/2 port which is quite nice feature for a retro build!

[@bundesautobahn7]

Ein weiterer Tag, eine weitere Hauptplatine auf dem OP-Tisch.

[@danielpetrov9179]

Another great restoration video. I have the same board with some missing components, can you please tell me the values of CT28, CT29, CT20, CT13 and what RAM TAG do you use?

[@scrap_computing]

Nice! Great job dremeling the chip :D

[@gherosh]

Great revival video!

[@CallumFaulds1]

Nice repair!

[@dedicatedmusiclistener2301]

you are a repair wizard

[@LauncherMax]

Hi Necroware! Great repair as usual! I made my own bios for motherboards based on sis 85c496/497 chipset. It can run msdos just on L2 cache without ram at all. Sounds crazy but it works. Ping me if you want to try it

[@necro_ware]

Wow, that sounds cool! I'll keep your offer in mind.

[@teknologyguy5638]

Hope to see what is in store for part 2

[@bassbustingman]

nice socket 7 on board hdd /fdd support isa and pci plus ps/2 for mouse and keybord on the board nice

[@Soup_it]

Thank you!

[@sebastian19745]

I have the same motherboard that I used for a Win95 PC build. As you said, the Dallas RTC battery was dead and I solderd a coin cell on the module to make the motherboard boot again. The BIOS on my motherboard have the HDD capacity limitation to 8G and is not Y2K compliant. However, it works ok. The -A in the motherboard name means that the keyboard connector is AT not PS/2 (as I remember to have seen in an old pdf. manual that I found on a old CD with a BIOS upgrade for it). I removed the AT keyboard socket and replaced with a PS/2 connector like your motherboard have, so I can use any regular keyboard without an adapter. It seems to me that your moterboard had the same mod from the factory or made by previous user. Mine is rev 2.1.

[@curtisator42]

Theres a newer version of Phil's benchmarking suite that includes a Doom bench that's been modified to give you FPS results so you dont have to do the conversion yourself. :)

[@Hessi]

03:30 Eier aus Kruppstahl. Respekt.

[@TheChimeraMan]

Fantastic video as usual. I have the same board but is dead. 😢

[@necro_ware]

Then you know what to do ;)

[@TheChimeraMan]

Probably dead RTC module

[@clintcolombin]

Socket a 12885 & add a CR2032 battery holder next to it where it's currently unpopulated? I've seen others do the same with mixed results.

[@peachgrush]

The working BIOS images seem to have "-F" at the end of their BIOS string (the leftmost column in the table). Wondering if it corresponds to the UMC I/O chip's designation ending with "F" :)

[@ajax700]

9:00 What is that VIA-II chip on the left? Best wishes.

[@necro_ware]

Keyboard controller

[@GameBacardi]

Coming look this later

[@tellyjoossens4186]

Although you mention it as not very special, these boards were one of the most reliant and quite versatile (and fast) boards at the time and at a very small form factor. At the time, there was a lot of crap on the market. Mostly the big brands computers were less interesting. You were better off owning a clone pc with decent components.

[@FOIL_FRESH]

whats your tool to grind the plastic away near the legs? i have a cheap dremel. i need to repair a voodoo 2 in a similar fashion. 3 chips all with fatal pin leg breaks.

[@necro_ware]

I use dremel, or engraving tool.

[@FOIL_FRESH]

@@necro_ware thanks

[@dirkruppol3850]

@necroware what type of eeprom reader do you use for reading/writing eeprom modules?

[@pwissink1]

Good video as always. But I really like the music around 4-5min. Which song is it?

[@g4z-kb7ct]

What's the part number on the 28 pin cache tag chip? Thanks.

[@necro_ware]

Any 32K SRAM chip would fit, it just has to be fast enough. I tried 15ns, but less would be better.

[@dapperwounded]

I love your work. I need to find out if any e waste facilities by me sell "functional" bits. I've been trying to find anything i can at rummage sales but nothing good pops up lately.

[@rodhester2166]

LOL torture for this board.. that is too funny.

[@glenncaughey5044]

At 3:42 anyone else instinctively blow on the screen to clear the dust? 😅

[@necro_ware]

LOL :)

[@tigheklory]

To the Iron Maiden with that board!!! LOL

[@MarkusQu]

Nice repair! Sadly, no Ami Winbios :)

[@whalesurfs]

The Biostar MB-8500TUC-A is virtually the same board, just with the better i430HX chipset and an extra PCI slot. The only downside compared to your MB-8500TVX-A is that it doesn't support dual-voltage as required by MMX, and as far as I know, no room for a VRM. Ever consider making a VRM like on the one on the PODPMT66X200 ???

[@brotherdg1]

Hi! CF may not work in LBA mode. You could try normal CHS

[@nogokam]

In one of your videos you are using hand to find overheated element. Why don't you use a thermal camera? It would be so much easier and much more fun to watch😊

[@AncapDude]

Which osci do you use?

[@necro_ware]

I get this question almost every video :) It's Fnirsi-5012H

[@AncapDude]

@@necro_ware I thought so ^^ Make a standard description block with these infos and paste it under every video xD

[@FROGGS01]

I bet he's attaching an analog clock power by a lemon or two.

[@necro_ware]

Everybody knows, that it needs at least three lemons.... and a potato ;)

[@FROGGS01]

​@@necro_warewould be fun if the next thumbnail picture would actually show lemons. :op

[@ljrretropcs]

Likely those other bios images would have worked if the tag chip was present

[@necro_ware]

Unfortunately no. I didn't mention it in the video, but that was my first assumption as well.

[@ljrretropcs]

@@necro_ware Ahhh thats a shame!

[@der.Schtefan]

Wasn't there the scandal where Cache was not used because so many boards did not provide the tag SRAM?

[@D4rk4ng3l83]

Der Kanal hat eindeutig zu wenig Abonnenten. The channel clearly has too few subscribers.

[@necro_ware]

Danke für das Lob!

[@SireSquish]

Cliffhanger?! NOOO

[@nerdmeister2]

This mainboard was used in my first PC, a 1996 „network“ branded (Mediamarkt) Pentium 150, 32MB RAM, a slow & noisy 1.6GB Seagate HDD, a 4MB VGA with a weird Cirrus Logic chipset, totally useless for the upcoming 3D games. Spent 1999 DM for this spec sheet blender 😢

[@Santia558]

Your next video will be to install a battery socket, rtc chip, crystal, and capacitor in the existing, but empty pads on the motherboard.

[@necro_ware]

Almost, let me surprise you ;)

[@beastworm]

@@necro_ware @TheParallelPort did this in his last video (second channel of the serial port) Funny enough, he shows your clock in the video

[@rallyscoot]

You said MSI MB... mainboard on 0:34 seconds? Its a biostar.

[@necro_ware]

Yeah, sorry, fixed it later at 6:29. I was fixing two mainboards simultaneously, one was MSI, the other Biostar, so I confused myself.

[@5mf1nc]

how that 16000KB memory comes to be? it should be 16384KB (technically KiB but that is so stupid) as that is 16x1024KB (or if they use the "HDD-type KB" then it would be 16777KB) -- oh, later with the 32Megs it counts to 32384KB so where is the missing 384K?

[@ville_syrjala]

I'd assume it's not counting any of the memory in the 640KB-1MB range as that's where the ROMs get mapped.

[@OscarSommerbo]

Drillling into an IC was nervewracking to watch.

[@necro_ware]

:)

[@blackwidowrsa]

watching you solder makes me disheartened, i can't even desolder a capacitor

[@necro_ware]

Don't be disheartened, it's all a question of practice. Keep in mind, that I'm actually a software developer and couldn't solder at all at one point back in time.

[@scottrich976]

Why put so much effort into a mediocre board ? Top of the range maybe, but these boards were bad at the time they came out.

[@necro_ware]

Nothing you see on this channel make a lot of sense :) This is just a hobby, however this board gives a good opportunity to experiment with something, what I would like to talk about in the next video.

[@amirpourghoureiyan1637]

Looking at all these old boards, it's all mediocre if we compare it to even slightly newer stuff. If something can be repaired and brought back to life for a new use then it's worthwhile in my opinion.