Yard Sale Find - What would you do?

[GoYouSalukis]

Hey Guys,

I picked up this beauty for $5 at a yard sale. At first, I thought it was just a display, and maybe I could hack it, but once I turned it on, it turned out to be a working 586 with windows 95 loaded. It boots up quick, and seems to work fine. Here are the specs:
Processor: Am5x86(X5)
Base Mem: 640K
Ext. Mem: 31744K (32M total)
One VGA port, two serial ports, one parallel port, one funky looking floppy port, one PS2 port.

It has a touchscreen interface that works fine.
I'm trying to come up with some ideas to use it for. The biggest drawback is that it has no sound, just beeps from the onboard speaker.

The only idea I have so far is to find an old version of MS Access and write a quiz program for the kids with big buttons for them to press.

Anyone have any ideas?

[404]

I'm working on a similar project using a point of sales unit. Mine however runs on socket 370 architecture. Someone gave it to me. Was going to use it as a jukebox but unfortunately the screen membrane was shot.

Easiest thing you can do at this point is use it as a dedicated mame machine running a severely limited romset, ie: .036 Donkey kong style era games, tops.

[GoYouSalukis]

Originally, I was thinking along those lines, but with no sound, I'm not sure the experience would be that great.

[404]

ah yeah, reading derp. Missed that part.

Not sure, i guess your idea of a quiz game is better than any at this point.

[Skivt68]

Maybe you could see if hooking up a cheap set of pc speakers would work.  If there's no 3.5mm/rca jack, you could always gut the speakers and hook them up directly (obviously taking proper precautions/using speakers you don't care about to test it).

[spoot]

Too bad there is no isa slot on that.  Would be kinda cool for a jukebox.

[kahlid74]

Oh how I don't miss the days of non-standard PC builds where you don't have slots of modularity.

There are some cool things you can do with a parallel ports but your primary limitation is Windows 95.  The sun has set on that OS and your use of the touchscreen for another device would require a newer OS.

Stuff like a Kitchen console (recipe lookup, etc.). A Daily organizer/whiteboard.

It's a cool find but without sound, it's real only use being a jukebox, you're kind of a tough spot.

[ChadTower]

I would set it up as an Aurcade score submission station.  That's a very application specific use, though.

[SavannahLion]

There are some cool things you can do with a parallel ports but your primary limitation is Windows 95.  The sun has set on that OS and your use of the touchscreen for another device would require a newer OS.

Not in the mood to really explore this idea but there are some links of interest at http://hackaday.com/2005/10/25/audio-output-from-a-serial-port/

Look in the comments section for the more interesting stuff.

[paigeoliver]

I used to have something similar that I found at a pawn shop when it was a lot more .... current.  I installed it in my car as an mp3 player/winamp setup.

[Nightbring3r]

That's what used to be called an SBC or biscuit pc back before integrated video and whatnot were the norm.

I'd check check the board for an audio header - you may still be able to use some google-fu to find the manual. Unfortunately, even if it does have audio I think you're going to be pretty disappointing running mame on it. The LCD probably looks like absolute hell between the low res and ghosting. That's beyond the fact that you're looking at 486 class processor on an ACER chipset. It does have 32megs of RAM and a PCI video card so it can't be all that bad. Maybe try to find a smallish linux distro that can still run on 486?

I have a slightly more modern POS type board (it's socket 7 with 1 PCI slot and a PCMCIA slot) but I never did find anything useful to do with it. If you do something cool, make sure you post it!

[GoYouSalukis]

Thanks for all the ideas folks. I looked at the board pretty closely for an audio header, but I'll open her up again just to make sure.

I've thought about using it to control some stepper motors. I wouldn't mind building a one axis automated box joint jig for my table saw or a two axis add-on for my wood lathe. I just have to research controlling stepper motors using a serial port or parallel port.

If only it had USB and I could get it to run XP, it would be ideal for running my CNC machine. No place for sawdust to accumulate!

Thanks again!

[404]

Thanks for all the ideas folks. I looked at the board pretty closely for an audio header, but I'll open her up again just to make sure.

I've thought about using it to control some stepper motors. I wouldn't mind building a one axis automated box joint jig for my table saw or a two axis add-on for my wood lathe. I just have to research controlling stepper motors using a serial port or parallel port.

If only it had USB and I could get it to run XP, it would be ideal for running my CNC machine. No place for sawdust to accumulate!

Thanks again!

No cdrom support in the bios? I think the minimum XP requirements (pre-service pack) is a 300mhz processor anyway.

[GoYouSalukis]

I would need USB for the interface I have to the CNC.

[bkenobi]

Powerful enough to run a cnc?  That would be a nice interface for something like that.

[paigeoliver]

Vantage should run on something like that, however the screen on the one I had was totally unsuitable for gaming, major ghosting of anything moving.

[lilshawn]

if you got the room height wise you could always toss in a mini/nano itx board in there.

[Gray_Area]

You might [look for and] re-install the audio drivers...or win95 itself. I got a free dual core laptop from my brother who said he and his IT guy, after a year and a half of duking with it, couldn't figure it out. Might've been a Vista issue....  I wiped it and put XP on it. Presto!

In any case, 133mhz isn't TOO slow if you want to play about ten or twenty games.....   The quiz game or similar idea is probably the way to go.

[lilshawn]

you should be able to bring up the device manager and see what win95 has installed for divers. if there is a USB hub device or even a yellow exclamation marked "unknown device", you might have some kind of header or unpopulated spot in there for one.

[ark_ader]

Stick puppy arcade on it.

[404]

Some quick searches on these Javelin systems units, they literally come with no audio chipset at all. 

[knave]

Stock Win 95 didn't support USB yet, but there were drivers until the win95 SE with USB support came out. It was still iffy back then.

I would check under the drive and that metal panel for an ISA or PCI slot. If you find one you can install a soundcard. Shoot I just donated a box full of old ISA cards that I had been hoarding for years.

Back in the day for a proof of concept I had win2k running on a 486. so you may be able to try other os options.