The DIGITAL (DEC) Venturis FX 5133 Desktop PC from 1996!!
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- Опубліковано 12 кві 2024
- Let's go back in time and explore the DIGITAL Venturis FX 5133 desktop PC! This classic PC from 1996 will pull at your nostalgic heartstrings :) In this video we will give this beautiful Desktop PC the love it deserves by performing a full restoration to bring it back to it's former glory. Can we get it to Post? Let's find out!
#nostalgia #retro #retrocomputing #retropc #digital #quantum #windows95 #pentium #hover #doom #quake #restoration #ewaste #vintage #pc
Game 1 - Hover for Windows 95
Game 2 - Doom 2
Game 3 - Quake 2
Link to Venturis FX 5133 Specifications:
www.zx.net.nz/mirror/h18000.w...
Link to Venturis FX 5133 on TheRetroWeb:
theretroweb.com/motherboards/...
What most people dont understand is that DEC never intended to sell lots of personal computers or even be competitive. This started with Rainbow and Professional (Pro325, Pro350, Pro380) platforms that I personally sourced from DEC. You see, DEC needed to simply have something to sell, because many contracts (Govt and Corp) were most easily won if the players could source everything from a single supplier and especially a single source of service. It's as simple as that. RIP DEC AND KEN OLSON.
Valid point in a market where ibm, dell, etc were getting in their doors.
this was great.. you really did a great job
Thank you as always!
Awesome! Loving the restoration vids👍🏼👍🏼
Thanks!!
Another excellent video, thanks! :)
Wow, I appreciate that, thank you!! I'm glad you enjoyed :)
Fantastic. It is almost the machine I had for my first own PC (Pentium 133, S3 Trio 64+) 😊❤
Nice!!! Great memories
Around 2002 my brother picked a similar one from trash with a 166 MHz CPU. I gave it to a class mate because at the time we already had way faster machines at the time and this combination of SIS chipset and integrated S3 Trio graphics was old very quickly. But it was a nice machine, everything considered, he enjoyed it.
Nice find!!
The Blockbuster in my town used to have one of the same machines when I was a kid. I remember it only had a floppy drive - no CD-ROM and it was running DOS and whatever program BB used at the time.
That's a neat memory. I imagine a lot of these were used in POS applications where they were aimed at the business market and not residential.
Awesome PC Resto video so far!😊
Thank you!
good we got to see it go
Yes, finally haha!
Nice computer system and restoration. Keep up the good job. Greetings from Steven from the Netherlands
Thank you, I hope all is well!
36:43 I used to have that printer which this computer has installed on, EPSON C60 (probably nobody cares, but here we are). I did not even remember that model number, but when it showed up I instantly recalled. It was a model from 2000 or thereabouts, so a tad newer than the system.
There was a lot of joy people got when setting up a new printer back in the early days of computers. That is u til they realized the cost of ink lol.
Since i subbed i enjoyed theretrorecall
❤️
I am currently Gaming on my External Sun SCSI 10K RPM Hard drive with my AMD3000+ and GF6600GT playing Half-Life Blueshift and Opposing Force on my 19" CRT Monitor with my IBM Model M keyboard. in my book this is real retro Gaming. I recently gave my Sun a good ol re-cap and it was needed as I got that nasty fishy smell when I took off the old caps even if you could not see anything under them. it was on good time to do this. I like my old computers
That sounds absolutely bliss. I love when everyone shares their hardware configurations and experiences. You always seem to have really cool hardware!
@@TheRetroRecall yes. The truth is that I never thrown away anything. I been collecting stuff ever since the 90s. And now all that stuff is “cool” again and all I have to do is to keep use what I already got all these years :)
100%!!
This was a very interesting video about the sad ending of Digital Equipment Corporation bought by Compaq. I mean, DEC was the creator of the famous PDP11, the VAX, the great operating system VMS and the incredible Alpha processor. They were on par with IBM! But they were not known for cheap desktop PCs.
I first came into contact with DEC machines during my studies (DECstation 5000) and I loved them. I owned a computer with a DEC Alpha 21066 in the late nineties. In the last few years I have acquired a few VAXstation 3100 and 4000 running under VMS.
I'm starting to realize this now. I knew DEC was quite a force back in the day, however when I started to do this video - I came accross the page (linked in the description) showing they were now Compaq. What would have DEC become?
@@TheRetroRecall Probably nothing! There was a reason Compaq was able to buy DEC. The era of DEC's core product, minicomputers (i.e. midrange systems, refrigerator-sized computers between mainframes and desktops) were over in the 1990s. The market for this was wiped out between microcomputers (PCs) and mainframes. DEC also produced some very nice workstations in pizza box format, but they also cost 10 times as much as a PC.
But Compaq didn't survive the overpriced purchase of DEC and they were swallowed up by HP. The only surviving midrange system is IBM i, formerly known as AS/400.
The processor development division that created the Alpha architecture was sold to Intel. Alpha's ideas had quite an influence on further processor developments (at least the good ones) at Intel.
Ah, thanks for the clarity makes sense. Yes I do remember the AS/400 Systems... You couldn't kill them.
Nice video. You can open the cd drive tray with a clip like the old days.
Thank you!
Nice video! I have alot of memories of that DIGITAL computer back from the days. The Public Library here in Malmö third biggest city in Sweden did use them so peoplke could go on internet. And that was my first time on the internet. Remember they did run a locked down frontend called WinU to stop users access the OS and only stuff that was allowed like search the librarys database, Microsoft Office suite or the internet browser. I think they did run Netscape Navigator or Internet Explorer. I do have that WinU software in my old software archive on a harddrive. I have a other model that is older then that one called Venturis 575. I am on the look after Venturis FX 5133 here in Sweden. Not found any yet. Maybe have not looked deep enough.
Always keep an eye out. This was my first real experience with a Digital system. I tended to build my own PC's back in the day. Good luck on the hunt!
Well saved!👍👍
Thank you!
Loved the Digital PII pizza box machine.
But now the oldest machine I have is a dell P4 workstation, but I think that can go and I'll just hold onto the itx Q9400.
Def hold onto the older hardware. I always liked the P4 systems.... Good or bad!
I used to fix the later P200 MMX based Venturis for a contract, it was used as a Till server/back office PC. I used a P133 with 32Mb RAM back in the Win 95 days, originally a Cyrix 6x86 but I had compatibility issues with my Gigabyte GA586HX board. I later moved to a Cyrix 6x86L PR200+ with a Chaintech 5TTM1.
Thanks for sharing this, I love hearing where these systems would have been in use.
I totally went into this video expecting it to be one of DEC's Alpha-based systems. For some reason, the fact that it wasn't made me keep watching.
It was quite a nice system when it was all repaired and cleaned up. My first experience with a DEC Desktop. From what I understand, Compaq owned them at this point?
My first VGA color monitor was from the company "Digital". I even remember what model it was and it's hard to find information about it on the Internet. It was a PCXCV-C3. A 14 inch monitor with a maximum resolution of 640x480.
Wow, I think I may have seen one of those in my lifetime and that was it. Funny how we remember the hardware we first started using. My first was an IBM 14R MS 14".
Nice! My Win98/DOS machine of choice is a DEC Venturis/Multimedia 5120 also from 1996. As the name implies it has a 120 MHz Pentium processor, and over the years it has received many upgrades. When I originally got it in 2003 it already had its RAM expanded from 16 to 32 MB, and I think one of the onboard ROM chips had been upgraded as well. In the past year or two I've kept working on it, most recently by expanding the RAM further to 48 MB of EDO (instead of the slower FPM), installing an ATI Rage II+ 3D card and replacing the old failing CD-ROM drive. In a twist of irony, the replacement CD-ROM drive is Compaq-branded. :P
Hahaha nice!! Even nicer that you are keeping it going. Awesome retro gaming rig
neat!
Thanks!
I was so excited to see Win95 pop up after POST. True fact; I never do a reinstall unless the o/s is corrupted. I want all of the programs previous users installed, because it's part of the computer's history. I do delete any personal files, though. And wow, a leaking coin cell battery---yikes! I've never seen that before. This was a fun video, thanks
Agreed, it was crazy to see the coincell do that!! And you are welcome. Glad you enjoyed!
Great job once again. Yeah, coin cells don't normally leak. Maybe bad factory or so. I caught button cells leaking inside of those electronic games from the 90s or from decoration items that use button cells.
I'm not so a fan of bathing motherboards but I tried bathing 2 slot-1 motherboards. Water, soap, and long brush was what was needed. All the hard-reaching dust was washed away. A towel to dry the excess of water and I let the boards sitting next to those halogen heaters.
My concern with bathing boards was that water usually starts a slight oxidation and it will starts to get worse. Some metals can't stand water. Also the green coating that boards have may have some micro cracks and water can start corrode traces.
Some years later, I tested the boards and they still work fine.
For sure! Don't get me wrong, I love the look of them and how they turn out and I would also say it is probably less work. However for the points that you have highlighted especially for retro hardware, I'll stick to my brushes, IPA and lots of cleaning lol.
I had a second hand 486 Digital DECstation of some kind in the 90s that I used all the way into the early 2000s as a secondary PC. Ran Windows 3.11 for workgroups for the 32 bit support and even remember running early versions of Mozilla on it. PSU let the smoke out at some point and it sadly ended up in a dumpster. Some of the DEC desktops were actually built under license by Tandy if I remember correctly.
That's pretty neat (not the magic smoke part). From what I understand this particular unit was under Compaq at the time.
Have I ever mentioned that I love your He-Man/MOTU figures (I open all mine but respect if you want to keep yours in package) I've even been buying the Origins characters for my 5 YO nephew, he even asked me for Snake Mountain for xmas last year so I got it for him as soon as it was released :D
Haha thanks! Yes, I keep all of my figures sealed because I'm crazy lol. What you see in the video is 2% of what I have. I collect way too much - I'm surprised the family still let's me stay in the house :)
I asked my wife what she thought of my MOTU collection, she said she loves it, so I'm good, the computer stuff not as much....@@TheRetroRecall
I had an Aztech sound card in my old Pentium 120MHz with 16MB of EDO RAM back then. Also had an S3 Virge 2D VGA card and a Voodoo accelerator. The Aztech card was quite good at Adlib and Sound Blaster Pro compatibility.
It's great to hear from someone who actually had experience with it. I personally never had. I will definitely play around with this a bit more however for the limited stuff that I did, it sounded pretty good!
Video and CGI programs used to come in three or four flavors back in the 90s - Windows, Mac, Amiga, and DEC Alpha.
I never knew much about DEC until this video let alone a DEC Alpha. I knew DEC was mostly used for commercial systems but never home based units.
Looks exactly like a used Compaq desktop I bought from my employer mid-2000s. They were selling off old machines to employees. I believe it was $40. They didn't even wipe the drive. Wild. Refurbished it and gave it to a family member as their first PC.
It's funny you say that as when I googled the system, a Compaq website comes up!!! (linked in the description)
@@TheRetroRecall Ive got a really cool mac actually thats in a case for ultrasound stuff it was made for virigna tech instead of a floppy disk it has an optical floppy disk to
No way, that's so cool! I would love to see a pic of it.
@@TheRetroRecall do you have ig or x I’ll show you sometime
Never knew digital made home computers, digital was mainly making terminals, huge servers and mainframes for data centers back in the 80's but not known by most people. Founded in 1957, bought by Compaq 1998, HP bought Compaq (and digital) 2001, and the brand digital was gone after that.
Love this insight, thank you. I agree, I never heard of them, it was an interesting journey!
Interesting design, I never saw a system where the power went to the riser board, then was fed to the M/B from there. I also thought it was going to ATX, not AT looking at the connector, but the all to familiar "It's now safe to off your computer" message had me standing corrected.
Actually, I have another system - a Compaq that has a similar design where the power through the riser card feeds the MB. Definitely a rare sight. Glad you watched until the end to see the nostalgic bonus screen!
@@TheRetroRecall Your videos bring back a lot of memories, since I started building and modding systems in the mid 90's. My first mod was to trick a Tandy 1000 into running an aftermarket IDE hard drive, which I used to learn MS DOS. My first build from the ground up was a 386SX.
That's amazing.. Glad to hear this brings back those memories for you. I feel similar as I make these videos.
I used to do a lot of hardware work on DEC servers back in the early 90's. Never got to see any PC's. Kind of surprising they used a SiS chipset, as they were utter rubbish. The bargain basement of all chipsets.
For sure, and here it is! To be honest I've never seen any of these on the market..
I second that. My very first pc I got from my uncle way back in '98 was a Pentium mmx 200 and it used a SiS chipset/onboard vga the 5595 if I recall correctly and it sucked major ass. Had loads of instability issues with it as well as crashes and inexplicable system resets while trying to run games
@@ANN1H1LATE89 Yeh they were popular in cheap unbranded PC's with "PCChips" motherboards.
I think Packard Bell was notorious for utilizing those chipsets in their systems.
It was a pcchips board yes. Can't remember the exact model or branding on the case but it was called ProLine
Those memory chips be thiccc!
(from the perspective of someone who only really got into pc hardware 'round 2010.)
Haha! Yes! Old skool!
Decent sound card that Aztech from memory with onboard wavetable and a 1mb rom I think.
I've had mixed reviews but I guess it depends on the end user experience!
Great✌
Thank you!
@@TheRetroRecall thanks
That is cool. But I want to see it running Basilisk II
I never heard of this until now. Is this a MAC emulator for a PC?
Yeah. Been around just about as long as the pentium 2 or 3 as I recall. There are builds for windows 9x
I have a Digital Venturis GL 6200 with Pentium Pro 180 MHz. I have expanded and modernized the device a bit. 128 MB RAM, LAN, USB 2.0, 120 GB SSD, SB AWE64, RIVA TNT2 PCI, newer ENERMAX power supply. Personally, I prefer it quiet; the old circular saw hard drives give me tinnitus. 😂 It runs well with Win2k Pro, DOS and 16bit Parts are not recommend on this CPU and slow.
Hahah the tinnitus is part of the experience, the glory!! 😂
I have Venturis 575/FR-920WW-CC and it uses SiS5502/SiS5503 chipset. The case itself is very different, more compact, better looking front panel.
I'll have to look them up a little more as I never knew Digital sold these systems to consumers.
This memory showed up in my head about these type of systems. It seemed like any name brand system was $$$ against a generic built clone. So I remember asking around why these companies bothered with this. Some place along the line I was told it was more for the existing customers who already had say a DEC environment. As time went on you can see who survived and who died again the whole consumer market. Though, I have not checked in years. But, is dell still #1 in the U.S.A? and they was not one of the larger older companies who started out making mainframes or mini computers.
DEC I believe was much more Enterprise centric while Dell is all over and yes I think they are number 1 in North America.
Nice!
Would this have been a more expensive computer to buy considering that its a DIGITAL system or a more general system that one would have bought in a general computer store?
My understanding of the brand Digital is that they sold higher end equipment in the more commercial or industrial sector. I have never really seen anything for the consumer market but here we go. I would say these would have been a bit more expensive.
All 6 of my old computers run actual hard disk drives. I personally like the sound of spinning hard drives
Yes!!!
I'll always agree with comments like this & I'm glad TRR supports this sentiment! 😄
Call me nuts.. But the overall feel of how the system works is exactly how it would have performed back in the day. Add those clicking, spinning sounds and bam, I'm sold! Haha!
@@TheRetroRecall If people think you're nuts well we can all be nuts together! 😝
Some more technical things - do these old harddrives support s.m.a.r.t and if, what are the (usage) hours?
I do not believe that they do, nor would the system CMOS at this time.
I think Digital sold exclusively through more business-centered channels at the time. My high school had one lab of Digital PCs... trying to remember if they were DOS/Netware or Win95, maybe they got upgraded at some point.
I actually had one of these (or at least a Digital system in the same case), but a 200MMX model, that I got in 2002 to run FreeBSD and use as a router. The main thing I remember:
1) it was a huge mess getting the BIOS updated. I think I had to go sequentially through 6-8 updates, all on floppy naturally. Wouldn't let you skip any of the in-between versions.
2) the upgraded BIOS improved RAM support. I had random RAM lying around that wouldn't work with the original BIOS but did with the last one. But I feel like that RAM would have been SDRAM... and yours doesn't look like SDRAM?
No, the ram in this system is EDO. I think you are correct about selling through busi ess channel partners. It makes the most sense as you didn't see these systems on shelves. Similar to the Tangent systems I've shown on the channel.
Why didn't you press F1 to bypass the warning message about the battery being low ?
Haha I get it, I messed up lol! Hey, at least this video was a result of it!
35:50 and it’s now running because of you :) better go
catch it! win95 flys!
Haha!
link to Freeroms on the desktop.. Hmm, now what could this system have been used for i wonder.. :D
Haha I think the snes.zip also have it away lol
Not all desktops were proprietary OEMs. I have a couple that are custom builds, one of them being P3 450 in an Enlight case. The other is a smaller 486 build.
Understood. I meant to imply that most were. I have about 30 desktop PC's here and 28 of them are proprietary to their specific OEM. Only two have any sort of standard to them - one of which I featured on the channel.
I bought a Digital laptop for the floppy drive some time ago. I ended up not parting it out since it was a rare unit.
I actually had just one coin cell leak. It was also a Sanyo cell. It was still bubbling when I pulled it.
Yikes. Again, my first time with a coincell leaking. Now to check everything else I have lol. Nice that you kept that Digital together...
39:17 lol, wonder what came out! I think I gave you a CD ROM drive hopefully that one still works :-)
Yup, I have it in the stash! :)
A leaking *COIN* cell? Surprised the battery brand wasn't VARTA, their Ni-Cad rechargables were notorious! Great to see the ol' spinning rust holding up strong 😁
Yes I was quite shocked!! Love these Quantum drives.... The 2.1 has a special place in my heart lol.
@@TheRetroRecall The Quantums & Western Digital Caviar drives have distinct start up seek tests!
Ive seen many leaking coin cell type batteries in old quartz games and SNES cartridges with save function.
Now I have to go check out my SNES carts and see, that worries me.
@@talos86 Quartz games??? Maybe you mean LCD handhelds like Nintendo's Game & Watch series?
Honestly i wouldn't retrobrite the case front. White plastic paint would work just fine. They should have done it from factory anyway.
I never thought about a good spray, that may make all the difference VS retro brite, great thinking!
Who else seen the face in the old thermal paste when the heatsink was removed ??
Now I have to go back and look.... Creepy...
Yes lol
Thanks? :)
Keep driving like you did in Hover and you'll get your license suspended 🤣
Haha, link your video!
@@TheRetroRecall I never had the game
Let me know when you do and we can compare notes 😏
ventus? is that the company name? curious
Venturis is the model, Digital (Equipment Corporation) is the company.
@@TheRetroRecall i have heard of digital but only in software.
@@TheRetroRecall i wonder if it's the safe company that made the portable cd players in the 90's
Not too sure to be honest.
@@TheRetroRecall Fidelity Information Services renamed from Fidelity National Financial
This Desktop need a big cleaning especially the front side. 😅 This dark yellow to be honest really bad 😊
Haha did you watch the vid? :)
a custom built AMD k5 pr 133 was my windows 95 pc
Nice!
X86 dec system? Oh yeah, definitely e waste
To each their own :)