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Thread ID: 33415 2003-05-15 10:57:00 Old motherboard non-Y2K compliant Jen C (20) Press F1
Post ID Timestamp Content User
144524 2003-05-15 10:57:00 I have my Parents old computer which has a dead hard drive. It is a Pent 75 MHz, 850 MB HDD, 64MB RAM. I was thinking of just getting a second hand small HDD as they only want it to play solitaire and other card games on it. However, after researching the motherboard - Elite Group (ECS) SI54P - AIO Rev 2.1, I found that the manufacturer website (www.ecs.com.tw) has this to say about the mobo:

ELITEGROUP SI54 Serial motherboards are not compliant to Year 2000. This is a unsolveable limitation from the BIOS

Does this mean this mobo is going to cause more headaches that it is worth? I am thinking it might be best to just get a second hand box. The 15" monitor plug has only 10 pins - will this also cause compatibility problems with a newer box?

Thanks
Jen
Jen C (20)
144525 2003-05-15 11:16:00 just put the date back....eg to the year 1997 i think 1997 works ok.

however a 2nd hand pc is not a bad way to go. anything from 133-500mhz is cheap and will do everything they will ever want.
tweak'e (174)
144526 2003-05-15 11:16:00 For playing card games, it shouldn't matter. Unless they're specifically worried about the date/time being wrong.

You could acquire an old Y2K-compatible mobo and a low-spec CPU for a very cheap price, and, depending on the mobo, the RAM should still work with it, as well as the HDD.
agent (30)
144527 2003-05-15 11:19:00 Oh, and you might care to try places like http://www.driverguide.com for a BIOS version that some disgruntled user may have made for themselves. Unlikely, but it could happen. agent (30)
144528 2003-05-15 11:29:00 You guys make me feel guilty about the PC I gave my granny..
I was given a 386 (33Mhz I think) and I gave that to her.

Come a year down the track, it died, so I gave her a 486 DX 66 with 24MB RAM and a 220MB HDD.

Runs Win98SE quite well actually, and she was shocked that it had CD-ROM, especially when I gave her a CD along with it ;-)
Chilling_Silently (228)
144529 2003-05-15 11:32:00 Don't see quite how it makes you guilty. agent (30)
144530 2003-05-15 11:37:00 ...'upto 500Mhz'... Chilling_Silently (228)
144531 2003-05-15 11:44:00 It's still less than one sixth of the processing power of today's CPUs. agent (30)
144532 2003-05-15 11:54:00 >...'upto 500Mhz'..

>It's still less than one sixth of the processing power of today's CPUs.

you don't need a GHZ pc to surf the net and write emails. a cheap 2nd hand pc does the job fine.

one of the main reasons i see people upgrading at the mo is due to lack of support for win95.
tweak'e (174)
144533 2003-05-15 12:05:00 Exactly, it prints to an old printer I got cheap.. it does cards.. plays music.. there's a 2.4K modem for her if she wants email (It wouldnt take my 56K one?) so why bother with a 3.06 Hyperthreading P4!?! Chilling_Silently (228)
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