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Firsty I installed a Voodoo 2 3D blaster card to my system. Then I upgraded the memory to 96MB. However, now I want to install a CD Writer and keep my CD-ROM drive as well. Not sure if it'll work though ?? Has anyone successfully installed a CD -RW drive on their Packard Bell? Let me know please. I'm desperate.

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Hi everyone I just bought a ati expertr 98 vid card I know its not the best but I got a best buy gift card for 50 bucks!! they wre all out of 3dfx cards so they only had the expert 98 cards and geforce 2 gts for 499!! hell no not in this pb i got that on y thunderbird 1 gig system but this packard bell is my back up computer and I love to tinker with it. But best buy probably wont order anymore since 3dfx is gone but maybe I'll see A used one someone might have lying around. well got to go!!! keep packard bell alive by upgrading!!!

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Could someone please help me? Have an old Packard Bell Force 3570 and have just installed DSL modem and software. It took along time!! Seems I only have 16MB RAM and 100MHz. Takes about a minute for a page to load!! So I need to upgrade. Saw somewhere that the Max RAM for this PC is 72MB. Would this be enough with 100MHz to use really only for internet purposes and if so where would I get this additional memory. I am having trouble finding info about th Force 3570. Any help will be appreciated

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One of the most frequent comments on this board is about Packard Bells that don't recognize the full size of the memory upgrade. In my case, I've tried to replace my 32MB DIMM SDRAM with 128MB DIMM SDRAM, but the machine will only see it as 32MB. The mach ne boots up fine, accepts the new RAM chip, everything, but it won't see the correct amount. There have been several people documented on this site with similar problems. Can some wise soul out there put an end to this dilemma once and for all? I've tried to look for a place to change the settings for RAM in my BIOS, but I don't see any option to do it. I'm stumped.

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I am looking for help in removing my case. I cannot find my original manual and I have never had it off. I am in the process of adding a DSL modem and I need Help. jb

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Hi havent done anything to the old pd yet I just bought a creative annilator2 geforce2gts for my amd 1gig tbird computer it kicks but!!!!!!!!!! I previously had a voodoo 4 4500 but I got rid of it as soon as I heard they are being bought out! so what I'm laning on doing is waiting for prices to drop on voodoo 5 from 199 to dirt cheap so I can drop it in the packard bell. I know it's overkill but what the hell! thanks ray for the great site!

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I have an NEC computer with a cpu speed of 233mhz. Just bought a digital camera that requires Windows 98 and installed the upgrade. No apparent problems with the computer except that the modem (Win4 Sound) is not detectable or is not turned on. Researched the Microsoft and NEC web sites and found a perfect description of my problem and a referral to Packard Bell for info on how to get my modem back on. I'm marginally computer literate I suppose from a tech standpoint but am quite comfortable with Windows a d it's way of doing business. Would appreciate any help. My "shot-in-the-dark" would be to just buy a new modem with its installation CD-rom but that doesn't make sense to me right now as being necessary. Live in a small town of 1200 souls with nearest co puter tech sources 50 miles away. Would appreciate help.

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Since I have owned my PB, I have upgraded the processor to 233MMX (very easy) w/oversized heatsink AND fan, added 98MB RAM, new 32x CDROM, IBM Deskstar 13GB HD, added Intense 3d Voodoo Rush PCI card/6MB chipset, Altec speakers (didn't bother with the soun card yet since the speakers are really nice), and a shiny new NEC Multisync75. I've updated Win95 with all the correct service packs, IE 5.5 which seems to have most of the bugs worked out, Outlook Express, Front Page, Office97, Word97, Excel97, MSMoney etc. Most of the upgrads and additions went in smoothly and without many errors. Microsoft came out with a Y2KScan utility that was very useful and simply confirmed that PB's product was already Y2K compliant. I've only recently encountered errors with my video card but I attribute that to a driver conflict and/or a damaged and overheated video card and am looking to get another one once I settle one the model I want. Several warnings bear mentioning in this little tribute to PB; 1) Make sure you have the CORRECT CPU fan size and consider adding another case fan if you add anything on the PCI slots. I've found that the case is a little cramped and the Voodoo Rush ca d almost sits right on top of the fan which I'm sure causes some havoc with the chipset and/or board components. 2) I've run Norton and McAffee AV on this machine and have found it to be somewhat troublesome with this setup, though I'm not sure why. I ave a friend in the NT biz and he recommended InnoculitPE as an all-round AV program. I've installed it and have not had one problem with it. Moreover, during the recent "LoveBug" scare, Innoculit was the first AV firm to have the ID and solve. Best of all, it's free and provides free AutoDownloads which you can manually do or schedule as needed. And yes, this program runs real-time macro/file and boot sector monitoring. I highly recommend it ESPECIALLY if you have Outlook as your mail program. Finally, I assume the riser card has only PCI and ISA slots, not AGP for Voodoo 3/4/5 cards. Am I correct in this assumption? Which recent PCI vid card is best for this aging machine? Thanks again for an awesome site.

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I need help upgrading my PC. I don't have any information on what I can do to upgrade and if it's cost effective. What are peoples thoughts of upgrading this PC? Please feel free to email me any and all info on my PC. I can't find any in Newsgroups of the Internet. I have no documentation. Can I disable the Video and buy another card? Take care and have a great day. Best Regards, Thomas Lentsch

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Where do you go to upgrade memory on this system. I can't find anyone who sells the 32mb memory chips. I would like to upgrade to a total of 64mb. Regular memory from Best Buy doesn't seem to work.

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Hi Ray - Great site ! I'm a UK Packard Bell 640 Motherboard owner and I originally bought my PC as a "Manager's Special" for a bargain £200 since I knew nothing about PC's and decided to go in at the deep-end and learn. Running Win95, IE5, MS Office 2000 t is silky smooth at the moment. Upgrades / changes I've made are as follows : Processor = from 120Mhz to a 233Mhz MMX (UNDER(!)clocked to 200Mhz). RAM Memory = from 16MB (4x4MB) to 72MB (2x32MB, 2 x4MB) - Hard-Drive = added a second drive (Western Digit l 8.4Gb) since the "tattoo file" gave me a nightmare. Partitioned the drive into 4 x 2.1Gb partitions using the WD software. Added a RICOH MP7080A CDRW since I do a lot of digital photography and also have a CD Player in the car. Also added a second Paral el Port to ease the congestion with my HP820Cxi Printer, UMAX Astra 1220P Scanner and CompactFlash card reader. Also changed the keyboard to MS Natural to give my wrists help !! I also changed the monitor to a SONY 17" Trinitron. I am so happy with it now that my next move will be to a laptop. I don't feel I need to improve things much as it's got as far as it can realistically go now................. My tip :- lots of RAM, don't overclock, have plenty of storage and back up your files regularly as Windoes 't 95 now and again !!

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after parts for 486s, or maybe Pentiums for peanuts/ free? Chec out my new web site dedicated to find discarded computers. http://website.lineone.net/~dustbin2000/ I'd appreciate any feedback and your experiences. Ray, this is a cool site! I've added a link to you, as this is the best PB resource on the net. :o)

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NEED HELP ! I have a Packard Bell legend 2440 whose hard drive crashed! I would like to replace it but not sure which kind I need to get. Any information would be appreciated! All I know is I was told to stay away from SCUZY drives whatever that is.. p ease Email me if you can help.. Thank you happy holidays

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After a couple of emails this week about PB upgrades I thought I'd just mention a fantastic addition to the PC, a Voodoo 4500. I was suprised they did this in PCI format and I could have even had a Voodoo 5500. My original posting here on 11/02/00 06:46:5 mentioned I'd like a 3000 but this is better. Not as efficient as the AGP but still a good asset to move to a better spec'd PC in future and not just dead money like 32Mb, 72p EDO SIMM. What I especially liked about the Win98 upgrade was that I could use the USB ports with which I now have USB Trackball and MicroS*fts Intelli-Pro keyboard. brilliant! Need a USB camera and scanner to plug into them! Need 19" monitor and thats it for this museam piece. Now; 20Gb HDD, 1.6Gb HDD, 32Mb Voodoo 4500 graphics, 48Mb RAM, 233 MMX Mhz CPU, CD (dont really need/want a CD-RW). Expensive upgrade but fun to achieve.

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First I added 32 MB RAM for a total of 48 MB. BIG difference in performance. Next I found a 512 KB COAST module at a computer show for $5. that also made a noticeable improvement. Traded the original 2 sticks of 8 MB RAM plus $10 for 2 more sticks of 16 M RAM. Total of 64 MB now. 32 in Fast Page and 32 in EDO. Works like a charm. PB says to use TIN plated SIMMS. I have tin and gold mixed for over a year now with no ill effects. Just today I upped the CPU from the original P120 to a PII 200 MMX w/heat sink and fan. PB says it won't work, but with the Mr. BIOS upgrade to recognize it, I don't see any problems yet. POST sees a Pentium MMX CPU at 199 Mhz. We'll see how it does. So f r I have noticed a definate performance increase with the new processor. Now it's on to buy a larger HD and get rid of the 1.2 GB that came with it and a CDRW for my little 'puter. I also have a Canon BJC-210 printer, a Mustek 1200 LS flatbed legal size s anner and a NIC for Road Runner cable modem, all working great. Windoze 95, patched to the "a" version. I have a '95 "b" disk, just need time to insatll it and everything else after formatting. Then I'll have the larger HD dropped in. Can't wait to get ri of the PB trash they think we need. Don't know if I like all I hear about Win '98, SE, or Millenium. Sounds like too many bugs. Hell, '95 is bad enough, but I am familliar with it. Would like to get better sound and video cards, but that's going to have o wait. Maybe after Christmas. Any questions or comments, email me. Ray, GREAT site, thanks.

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OK..I'll be honest...i know nuthing about fixing computers. All i know is how to use them. Anyways...My mom has a PB .75pentium and it is really screwed up. It does not remember it has a CD-Rom (ask her about that) I have looked for downloadable software or the memory but have been unsuccessful...if anyone knows of a site or sumthin PLEASE HELP

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Hi got this PC as a hand me down when my sister upgraded I have since added a 20 gig Maxtor Hardive and a IBM wbcam,Memmorex Scanner,56 k Us Robotics,48x memorex cd,32 x creative CDRW. HELP I have a 166 mmx CPU I want to install and overclock but I cannot find the jumpers or DIPP switch on the Motherboard

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My first computer was an 8088. I proceded to throw it out the window and built my own. AMD K6-2 500, 256meg RAM, Voodoo 5 5500, TV Tunner(with built in radio), 17" montior, nic card, yamaha sound card, 8x 4x 32x CD Burner, and a nice Britney Spears Sticker on the case. =) under $1200 =) bye

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Hi everyone. I just found Ray's page a few days ago, and have been reading like mad. This place is a wonderful wealth of info. Here is my dilemma, I have been able to upgrade everything. It is no where near the same computer I got 3.5 years ago. I kno am running a P166Mhz, 64Mb of memory, ATIxpert@play 98 w/8Mb, 56k modem, and a maxtor 2.7gig hard drive. Every thing works fine, but I would like to push the CPU. I was trying to overclock it to 200Mhz but it would not work. The system would boot up u but then I would grt odd error messages. At this point I have pushed it to 180Mhz by putting it on 60Mhz and multiplying that by 3.00. My question is does anyone have any ideas why I am not able to set the bus speed to 66Mhz and multiply that by 3. Oh and I do have the latest Bios 1.00.12DNOR, I think thats it. Any help would be appreciated Thanks in advance.

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I replaced the 16mb and 8mb memory dimm's with two 32 mb (64 total), but the system only reads 8mb. I have tried combinations with the old memory, but no luck. I have seen some other posts with the same problem. Any ideas? This is driving me nuts! I tried the most recent flash BIOS, but still no luck, HELP!

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I have not had any problems with my system since I upgraded the mem to 72Mb, I alos put in an actiontech 56k modem, and a cheap digital reseach 16 bit sound card. But I still run most programs fine. Run realplayer 7, fine, AIM, yahoo messanger, MSN messan er, ICQ, all at the same time fine. Well that's about it....

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Started off with memory upgrade to 96mb. Added a Voodoo 3 2000 pci video card. Changed the cpu with an Evergreen Spectra 400mhz cpu. Changed the modem to 56k. And just recently installed a Western Digital 30 gig 7200rpm hard drive and a 50x Cd rom. My PC ow runs great. The last thing I'm waiting for is my DSL to be delivered. If you like toying around with do-it yourself upgrades, this is the way to go. E-mail me if you have any ?'s.

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Trying to upgrade memory by adding 64m more. It will only recongnize 32m. Need help, should I up date BIOS or what to get it to see memory. Thanks

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I was given this computer, and try to fix it... there is a beep pattern 1-3-1-3 when I power it on. Anyone could help, or know where I should look ? Thanks from tahiti.

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I need some help from anyone out there! I need to know if I have to disable the on board video, I want to put a Trident 8900 Video Card in for better display resolutions! E-mail me if you have a anwser! pjberg@yifan.net

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I am trying to install the Sound Blaster PCI512 and I can not get any sound from the card when I connect my speakers to it. I have to switch my speakers to my old card on the mother board in order to hear anything. Infact, nothing on the card works, like the mic, joy stick and so forth. The card in installed correctly and it shows up on the computer as being installed, but nother happens. Someone told me that I have to remove my sound card from the motherboard before this will work. If any one can help e, please do. I am stuck and would like to upgrade my sound on my computer. Please help! Thank You!

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I wrote here a few days ago I finally put an 8.4 seagate hard drive(big improvement) and also put a used daimond monster2 3d card 8mb I bought at a computer store for 29 bucks! also installed 2 16mb simms bringing memory to 48mb. I planing on ditching the 2 other 4mg simms and puting 2 more 16mg simms bringing speed up to 72(4 16mg simms + onboard 8mg). The odd upgrde I did last night I put my old 233mmx chip I had lying around and just for the hell of it I put it in. When bootig up bios still says 133(ex ected) but when runnig norton sys works 2000 bench marking system speed increased by 33%. without a powerleap adapter. lets see how long this last, but so far so good. I might buy the spectra 333 chip but one step at a time. tried to install win 98 se but computer(bios) dont like it so I install win 95b works great! I love tinkering with these old systems. my other system Tbird 1.1gig voodoo 5 5500 smoking (I'm so proud). hey i only paid 20 bucks for this packard bell with original configuration(I cant spe l) sorry =) Well if anybody has any questions email me and I'll try to answer them.thanks

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Hi, i'm upgrading a Packard Bell Legend 402CD for a friend. i'm going to put a 1.7 gb hard drive in to add to his 540 mb stocker. He was trying to download AOL 6.0 onto his hard drive, and cancelled out before the download was complete. it trashed his ideo drivers...can anyone tell me what video drivers to use to restore his computer? he doesn't have the restore cd, so i can't do it that way. btw, what are the hazards of trying to install a 1.7 gb ibm hard drive into a packard bell? any help would b appreciated...

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Okay: Added some ram (taking out 8mb to put in 16), now has 32mb ram. HDD currently is 1Gb, 100MB free, slow as a dog :-( Also got given seperate comp. P166 no CDROM, shocking (0.5mb) HDD, but ***3COM Network card*** Aim: Add a new/old/ different HD and increase the speed. format 0.5gb and add 1gb hdd to the 1st system put the 4gb sweety in the 166 Add a CDROM, Internal Modem. I was gonna add a 20gb HDD, but is it easy to do (I have LTD time and Patience). Can anyone help? One of the computers is to be 4 the kids 4 games, the other 4 my gf for work. Gonna Try: My 4.3gb drive. If that works, then sell/give it to the owner (my gf). CDROM transplant. Memory switching. HDD Switching. (Hopefully not bios implant) Thanks in advance for any advice/help yiu can give

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I just bought this pb monday for $20.00. It was a steal so I took it does anybody know how to diable onboard video? and can I just drop a 233mmx chip without the evergreen adapter? my other system is a 1.1mhz tbird with a7v with voodoo5 5500 256pc133 30 g g maxtor 7200rpm> pb is for my wife so she can let me play my games without taking me off to web surf!!!!!!!!! thanks:]

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I just received this machine minus a hard drive last night. I want to beef it up and install a hard drive but didn't want to screw anything up. What is the theoretical maximum processor I could install to replace the P75 Chip, what is the maximum amount of RAM it would utilize (i.e can I add 128mb as two x 64mb to maintain parity) and finally what is the largest theoretical maximum hard drive I could add. Is the BIOS upgradable? Can I replace the chip with a later to version to improve the maximums? T anks for any help offered.

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I want to put in a new video card. I just bought a new Trident 3D 9880. I need to know how to disable the old video card and enable the new one.

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Upgraded the memory with two SIMM chips to 32Mb. Upgraded 3.1 to Windows 95. Put a Soundblaster in there, and then had to overcome conflicts with the factory sound/modem card. Put a 56K modem in one of the ISA slots, no prob. But recently, I have been try ng to upgrade to DSL internet. I took the modem out, and put an ethernet card (PnP) in its place. For some reason, though the computer recognizes it; it won't automatically connect it to the net. Has anyone heard of this happening with Packard Bell's excl sively? In addition, I never messed with the Cd-Rom or processor speeds, though I should probably get to it sometime.

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Pc came with Win 95. I was told to upgrade to Win 98 to avoid Y2K problems, but have received nothing BUT problems since. My Comm Central no longer has sound. It will allow me to dial phone numbers, but there is no sound through the speakers. I have a so noticed that some games no longer have sound. However, there is sound announcing I have new mail or when I exit the system, etc. Any suggestions how to get my Comm Central back to normal and still keep Win-98 ??

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Upgraded to 96MB RAM, Voodoo3 3000 PCI, Sound Blaster Live! Value and added Aztech v.90 USB modem. Trying to get an upgrade to AMD k6-2. Can the powerleap upgrade goes beyond 500MHz? I need to upgrade badly coz i am a hardcore gamer with tight budget. can anyone email me the mrbios upgrade since i am in a tight budget. thanx.

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Well, I've done another upgrade. I've replaced the old 150W power supply with a new 230W. To do this I bought a 230W AT Power Supply manufactured by StarTech.com. Prior to doing this I measured the old one and then checked out the new one for size to be s re they were close to the same dimensions. The new one fits prefectly. After unplugging the machine and everything connected to and removing the cover, disconnect all the wires running from the existing power supply. Then unscrew and remove the tray containing hard drive, floppy and CD rom (or whatever you have) this will ive you more room to work. The existing power supply is attached to the case by four screws on the back. the on/off switch is a little trickier. You have to remove some of the plastic panels from the front of the case to get at the screw and bracket th t holds the switch. Read your manual about removing these panels because I found the tabs a tricky and I broke one. Unscrew and remove the bracket it is easier to install the new switch on the bracket that way and then attach the bracket to the compter. nce you've removed the old power supply slip the new one in and go in reverse. I found the StarTech power supply holes lined up with the ones in my case (lets here it for standardization) attached the on/off switch as I indicated above, reinstalled the t ay, attached all the wires (there are more power sources comming out of the new power supply then the old one, put the cover back on and plugged everthing into the back (actually I might of done the last thing before the second last just to test that ever thing worked). Well, everthing powered up and is working great.

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system came with 75mhz pentium, pb sound card-14.4 modem, 850mb h.d., 8 mb ram,4x cdrom, left it that way till about '97, then: upgraded memory to 64 megs, hard drive to maxtor 5.7 gb hard drive, had to use the maxblast h.d. install software that came wi h it cause system wouldn't recognize h.d. over 2.1 gb, removed pb sound card/modem, installed diamond 56kmodem, and soundblaster sound card, upgraded to a 50x cdrom, and a s.i.s. 16 mb 3d graphics card, finally, upgraded bios to 1.00.07byor, and bought a 00mhz mmx upgrade cpu, but must need a new bios? cause no matter how i set the jumpers it won't show over 133 mhz... do i need a new bios chip or is this something that can be done with a flash bios download? anyone have any suggestions please lemme know? thanks!

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I have been buisy upgrading again, I think you can stick me with a fork I'm done. My system as of today has an Intel Pentium 200MHz MMX Overdrive Processor, 96 MBs EDO RAM, Quantum3D Raven Video Card / 16 MB SGRAM, Two 3dfx V2 1000 3d Accelerator / 12 MB DO RAM each in SLI mode, Sound Blaster AWE64 Value sound card, Hi-Val 40x CD-ROM, Samsung 8x4x32 CD-R/RW, 3Com U.S. Robotics 56k Fax Modem, Seagate 1.7GB Main HD & Seagate 10.0GB Slave HD, Altec Lancing ACS45.1 Multimedia Speaker System, Windows95B O/S.

11/02/00 06:46:53

Name: Andy	My URL: Visit Me	My Email: Email Me
Motherboard #: PB680	Model Name: Executive1019	When Purchaced: 1997
Original RAM: 16	Original CPU Speed: 150	Original Video memory: 1mb

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While I'm saving up for a 800mhz+ extreme system I thought I'd upgrade my ancient Pentium. Your site gave me the info and confidence to do it - thanks. And, yes, there are still some of us messing with the old systems. BIOS upgrades, a second HD that jumps the 2GB/8GB barrier (to 20Gb), 16Mb to 48Mb and now from 150mhz to 233MMX Pentium. It makes a wicked difference and thats without any 2d/3d graphics card. Maybe a Voodoo3-3000..hmmm! Just in the process of getting the CPU fan to work.

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I have my problems? How do I tell the BIO's I have a CD drive on the force-54cd ? I have tried and tried. Please email me at jehall@frontiernet.net if you could help. Jim

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We bought this old computer in 1993 and i have kept it alive so far in GREAT condition (for a 486). The following is what i have upgraded: Added: 1) 40X CD-ROM DRIVE 2) 400MB Harddrive 3) 66mhz Processor, and overclocked it to 88mhz 4) Sound Card 5) 56k modem 6) 1 32mb Ram chip 7) Windows 95 8) Network card 9) 2 more 12volt fans.. otherwise it would over heat AND IT WORKS GREAT!!! 88mhz... if you know this system, then you understand that the motherboard was only designed for a MAX of 40mhz. ,but i overclocked it!! Comments/Questions : email me @ simprobe@yahoo.com

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Have successfully installed Spectra 233 MKz upgrade but have had no success with Creative Labs Riva TNT 16 MB PCI card - problems with disabling Cirrus Logic onboard card. Anyone with any experience or advice please contact!

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I have made a number of significant upgrades to old faithful. I plan to keep it for a couple more years. My original hard drive is 1.2GB and I added a slave with 2.0GB. Obviously by today's standards my system is weak on space. I am thinking about upgra ing my hard drive. I am now running win 98 and have made other mods that should allow me to use a larger master or slave hard drive. I would rather replace my slave and leave the master drive alone for obviously reasons. I don't feel like reloading all he software on that drive again. My current slave drive mostly has games or junk software that I don't care to load again. In fact, I now have software that I can't load because of limited space. Question does anyone know the largest drive my system will accept. I was told about 8GB. And is my thinking wrong to want to add a larger slave and leave old master alone. Can anyone help me with this hard drive replacement decision???

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I just recently upgraded my CPU with a Spectra 333 from Evergreen. I originally had problems with the system recognizing some of my devices after the BIOS upgrade and the installation of the new Spectra Processor. However, since I wanted to upgrade my OS o Win 98 I took the chance and upgraded from Win 95 to Win 98. I hoped that this OS upgrade would correct my device problems that I was having. I am happy to report that I had success. After my OS upgrade most things are normal again. There is one fatal xception that has me totally baffled. For some strange reason my color and resolution display are locked on 16 bit and 640X480 and nothing I do will change this situation. All I know is that before my upgrade I had no problems changing my settings on the ly, using the Quick Resolution from Power Toys, or my restarting my computer. But now nothing I do will cause the setting to change. Obviously I need help. If anyone out there has a suggestion on how I can correct this problem I would really appreciate he ring from you. Otherwise, I am a happy camper, but sometimes colorless since my upgrades.

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Ray, I do not have a problem with my Packard Bell computer...it is the software I am concerned about. I have a Toshiba Laptop and it works perfectly. Here is my problem..... Now, take in consideration that I am comparing my Toshiba with the Packard Bell. TOSHIBA: I click on start...then click on settings...then click on control panel...then double click on mouse...at the top of the mouse properties box I see Buttons, Pointers, Motion, Orientation, and Devices. I click on motion and I get a box that has P inter speed and acceleration, Pointer Trails, Snap to, and AccuScoll boxes. I go to snap to and click a check mark in this box to make a snap condition exist for my pointer. Packard Bell... This does not exist under the same conditions i named in Toshiba.... Can you tell me where to go in the Packard Bell to get this "snap to" for my pointer enabled? Thanking you in advance. Vaughn Peltier P>S> I can't get anyone to respond on this....H E L P!

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I'm hoping to try to upgrade this beast and am looking for advice. The hard drive should be easy enough, as well as adding in more memory, but I need help on the processor and video. I've seen advertisments for the Zerus Mach-Z processor upgrade. Can handle Socket 5/7 and runs off an AMD K6-2 400MHz with 3D Now! Any thoughts on if this would work? It lists 120 as one of the speeds it upgrades from and obviously would be a massive i provement. The second problem is video. I'd like to have about 8megs of video memory to run various games. Is this even a dream? Are there any cards that high that have worked with this computer in the past or should I just give up now? If anyone would be willin to mail me with advice, I would appreciate any help.

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Printer (Okidata OL600e) does not perform up to par. Can't get 600dpi print. Problem seems to be PC, because printer worked fine with Synera Model PB. Upgrades to 48mb ram, win98. System came with "CyberWarner". Anyone have any ideas on installation f drivers or switches?

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I would like to add memory but do not know how much I should go up to or where to start. Computer is running very slow. Can anyone help? Any help would be greatly appraciated. Thanks.

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Anyone know where I can get a new BIOS for this old machine have done some upgrades over the years and now need a new BIOS. Old BIOS always gives problems when upgrading but have managed to work around them. Currently have Phoenix BIOS Ver. 4.03 dated 12/6/94. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Ray this site is great. Thanks

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I installed windows 2000 and need to add memory. Added 128MB of 168 Pin SDRAM, 66MHZ, and it didn't like that. So sent it back and got two 64MB, and now it won't boot. Anyone know anything about memory with this motherboard?

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hi, i just set the jumpers from 166 to 200 mhz. and added 16 megs of edo ram, 48 megs tottal. and added a case cooling fan to the front of the case and vacumed out 8 years worth of dust and dirt out of it. so far the machine is running great, no crashes no problems. thanks ray !!!

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Easy overcklocked and stable at 200Mhz by changing the jumpers on mb, I don't beleive I didn't do it the moment I bought it. RAM is 48, hard disk is is a western 20GB, video is generic 8MB accelerator, has a SONY 10/4/32 writer, burning a full cd in just ver 7min!, also added a 10Mbit ethernet for DSL, and finally all the plastic covers from case are removed. I could not be happier with my PBell!!!!!!! (fantastic for 2nd computer)

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Easy overcklocked and stable at 200Mhz by changing the jumpers on mb, I don't beleive I didn't do it the moment I bought it. RAM is 48, hard disk is is a western 20GB, video is generic 8MB accelerator, has a SONY 10/4/32 writer, burning a full cd in just ver 7min!, also added a 10Mbit ethernet for DSL, and finally all the plastic covers from case are removed. I could not be happier with my PBell!!!!!!! (fantastic for 2nd computer)

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My upgrades aren't all that much,i haven't upgraded the amount of ram or my video or sound yet,but i have changed my CD-rom drive to a 40X Hi-Val(I'd suggest a defferent one cause the drive isn't easy to use when reinstalling the OS withthe stock restore iskette) added a syquest sparq 1 gig removeable drive(internal ide)it works well(i've partially filled 9 disks,i use it as to organize my files and for back-ups)it istalled easily enough,My old hard drive died and i got a replacement from maxtor(i had som time left on the hard drive warranty)that was a bit larger than my old one,and my favorite so far, I got DSL service and installed an internal DSL modem(it made me have to remove my ISA SCSI card for my scanner but i plan on getting a USB to SCSI adapter from adaptec or a PCI SCSI card). My main problem with the motherboard is the limited system resources(IRQ's for add in cards).

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Could anyone help me with what type of motherboard I have......thanks Jaime

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The biggest speed performance increase I've made is upgrading to a 7,200 RPM hard drive. More so of an improvement than when I upgraded the RAM to 82Meg. I installed a Western Digital 20.5GB hard drive that's barely audible ... virtually no clacking noi e! Defragmenting time is speeded up many times from the original 3GB Maxtor drive. The read/write speed of the new 7,200 RPM hard drive is 33% greater than the older 5,400 RPM drives, and makes a whopping difference. Also installed a Voodoo3 2000 video card that improved the video performance considerably, and provides excellent resolution performance for my 19" monitor. Also successfully added an Iomega 650MHz CD read/write drive. Operating a board layout CAD program on my old PB now equals my Pentiu II 450MHZ Micron system's performance at work. Computer speed isn't everything. The hard drive read/write performance definitely is a bottleneck as I have witnessed. Bill :)

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The biggest speed performance increase I've made is upgrading to a 7,200 RPM hard drive. More so of an improvement than when I upgraded the RAM to 82Meg. I installed a Western Digital 20.5GB hard drive that's barely audible ... virtually no clacking noi e! Defragmenting time is speeded up many times from the original 3GB Maxtor drive. The read/write speed of the new 7,200 RPM hard drive is 33% greater than the older 5,400 RPM drives, and makes a whopping difference. Also installed a Voodoo3 2000 video card that improved the video performance considerably, and provides excellent resolution performance for my 19" monitor. Also successfully added an Iomega 650MHz CD read/write drive. Operating a board layout CAD program on my old PB now equals my Pentiu II 450MHZ Micron system's performance at work. Computer speed isn't everything. The hard drive read/write performance definitely is a bottleneck as I have witnessed. Bill :)

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I have read a lot of mail about pb,s,some good some bad.I have had good luck.I think all manufactures use what ever they can at the momment when they are building machines. My first improvement was to buy a pb3020 17 inch moniter,then i added 32mbs for a total of 64mbs then i added a new printer,then scanner and was happy for a while. Then i added 64mbs for a total of 96mbs. Then i added spectra 400,changed out bios,voodoo 3 3000,zoom 56k v90 modem,sound blaster live,11gig hd as master and 4.3 as slave. changed out 24x cd for new 52x.next investment will be for a plextor 12x10x32 burner.As for now i,m quiet happy with my machine. (ps thanks for a great site Ray)

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I need help!!!!!!!!! Can some one help me i need to over ride my onboard grahpic card (sis) and replace it with a voodoo banshee 16mb. Any help with other upgrades would be nice. Thanks for a great site!!!!

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I have succesfully upgraded to a Pentium 233mmx. It requires a special adapter (Concept Manufacturing's CM-VA55C) to allow for the mmx voltage. This seems to work with no problems. I have also added an aditional 8g hard drive (which just lies in the case), a CD burner, maxed the video and system RAM (2mb and 64mb) with relativly few problems. This system comes with a USB port--which is disabled by default--whith which I have had nothing but problems. I think the USB the first version ever created and therefore has a lot of bugs (i.e. the system won't boot with anything plugged in at power-on . Has anyone tried to upgrade to a AMD K6-III with the PowerLeap adapter?

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I am looking for a way to get my ancient 486 to recognize a WD-2700(750meg) drive. The bios says only 512? I have been looking hard for a overlay program to do so. Is there one out there?

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I actually need some HELP... I have added 32M to my PC for a total of 40M. I also installed a Maxtor 11.4G HD. I am running Win95 Ver 1 and now I am trying to install Windows 98 on my PC but it doesn't like 98. I think that I may need to upgrade my Bios I have Pheonix Ver. 4.04. I would appreciate any feedback on this.. Thanks

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Sticker: Descr. LG 408CD Srv Cd. 07508 842279104 67858 S/N: N257047763+ P/N 890452 My Einglish is so bad but. I need only the last Bios for my computer tankyou

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Sticker: Descr. LG 408CD Srv Cd. 07508 842279104 67858 S/N: N257047763+ P/N 890452

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MY MOTHERBOARD WOULD NOT READ MY HARD DRIVE,NOR DOES IT SEES MY HARD DRIVE, BOOTS OK BUT WOULD GIVE AN ERROR MESSAGE "NO HARD DRIVE IN THE SYSTEM" DOES ANYBODY KNOWS WHAT IS GOING ON, PLEASE ADVICE. I DO HONESTLY NEED HELP..... THANKS IN ADVANCE EMMANUEL

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I AM HAVING DIFFICULTY WITH MY PB 685 PT MOTHERBOARD. I CAN NOT GET IT TO READ MY HARD DRIVE, THE CMOS WOULD NOT AUTO DETECT MY HARD DRIVE EITHER. THE MESSAGE I GET AFTER BOOT-UP IS "THERE IS NO HARD DRIVE IN THIS SYSTEM" IS THERE ANY BODY WHO KNOWS WHAT IS GOING ON WITH MY COMPUTER. WHAT DO YOU SUGGEST PLEASE, I NEED HELP........... PLEASE E-MAIL ME, IT IS URGENT... THANKS EMMANUEL

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Upgraded ram added 2nd Harddrive and want to upgrade CPu have no documentation, have 200mhz cpu need to find if jumper setting need to be changed.

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Upgraded ram added 2nd Harddrive and want to upgrade CPu have no documentation, have 200mhz cpu need to find if jumper setting need to be changed.

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Recently the old quad speed CD-rom that came with this machine died on me. Went to the local Future Shop and bought at 48x that was sale. The instalation was straight forward, just take out the tray, disconnect the wires, and unscrew the screw in the bottom of the tray. Slip in the new CD insert and t ghten the screws and slip the tray back in place. The only slight hitch was that the wire between the CD-Rom and the sound card had the wrong kind of end for the connection point on the sound card. Solution: used the old one and it worked.

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I kinda like my trusty R515. Added another 32megs of Sdram, added an ATI 8mb video card, added a linksys NIC, added a Spectra 400mhz CPU upgrade (installed without a hitch) - CD drive failed after 11 months - (luckily was still under warrenty - PB replace for free) - my other PC is a homebuilt 600mhz Athlon - but still I enjoy my PB!

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Also, upgraded memory to max of 88Mb.

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Sometimes not knowing it's impossible Can be wonderful. My oldest child bought our P.B. for $20.00 from friend .Then friend said it was a piece of crap. We opened it up and it was all upgradible. after afew calls ,a computer friend(who can tweak anyth ng) Clearance catalogs and alittle scrounging in other people's cast off parts as they went to newer systems or upgraded. started with overdrive from Evergreen Tech. Our 486 is now the equivent of a 133 Pentium found a 2mg graphics equilizer card (P.B is all ISA) Has Creative Sound Card. Faxmodem Big find a 52x CD Rom PLayer damaged cosmeticly but works perfectly $20. 64megs EDO Simms May do more (one ever believes the ram count). 6Gig Harddrive.with EZ BIOS though it can take a much bigger one .C rrently we are running Windows 95 Plus. Total cash outlay was less then $200. And alittle hard work we have a Great little Packard Bell.

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I'm aware I'm one of the few people who have had a great experience with my PB601. It's never let me down. Here are my upgrades: 1)Added 32 MB RAM for a total of 64. Noticeable speed increase. 2)Added 6 GB hard drive, then a 15 GB unit. Had to use Maxblast's EZ bios for drive over 8.4 GB. No problems, more storage than I'll ever need. 3)ATI All-in-Wonder Pro TV/Graphics card. 8 MB PCI, plug & play, awesome. 4)Upgraded BIOS from PB FTP site, 810mb.exe. 5)Upgraded modem driver from X2 to V.90, v90upgr.exe. Fast 52K connects speeds to Netzero, Altavista, and Freeatlast. 6)Acer 6206 CD ReWriter with Adaptec software, 2X write speed, works awesome. 7)Prime Peripherals 8X DVD-ROM. No decoder card yet. Plays movies but drops some frames. Reads all formats, CD-R,CD-RW, faster and more reliably than stock Lite-On 24X CD-ROM. 8)Win98 first edition with service pack 1. 9)Peripherals:Lexmark 3200 printer, Sony StorStation/Ditto 2GB Tape Drive and Artec AS6E Scanner. All on parallel port. My only complaint is that despite trying different parallel port BIOS settings, I can't use the scanner and printer together or the pri ter goes off-line. I must scan, save, close the scanner software then use the printer. A small concession. 10)Intel USB Camera. I use with Webcamnow with very good results. 11)Kensington scroll mouse. Perfect. 12)Proview 17" monitor. Very clear display. I have reset the computer a few times due to a buildup of junk software residue, and Win 98 always detects the new hardware very reliably. It automatically installs the proper software for the StorStation, monitor and scroll mouse. The system has been incredibly reliable, helping me resist the temptation to upgrade to a newer machine. I won't bother upgrading the processor, it's great for home use. Nice graphics in games like Combat Flight Simulator. Jumpy but very clear DVD movie p cture using software decoder only. I'll get another year of good use out of this one, and I expect it'll be a good backup machine for much longer than that.

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I am trying to install a small slave drive for my hard drive, however, when I set up the jumpers and turn the power on, it will not boot. If I take it back to 1 drive it will boot no problems, any ideas why ? Pleas e-mail with any ideas :) Thankyou

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Ray, nice piece comparing the K6-2 & K6-III. I've installed a VA-503+ motherboard with K6-2 300 and am about to upgrade the cpu again. Any idea whether the K6-2 550 clock speed trumps the L2 cache of the slower K6-III 450? The VA-503 has 1MB of onboard c che so the L2 256 would be level 3. Is there any place to find this comparison? Thanks. -r

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Hi.... I found a 233 mmx proccessor for 15 bucks at a yard sale. Came home removed the jumper f2-d and slapped the cpu in. It booted right up showing 233 mmx. it works great and no extra cooling needed. Also added ram for a total of 64 megs. easy a 1,2,3 jim

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My current system as of today has an Intel Pentium 200MHz MMX Overdrive Processor, 96 MBs EDO RAM, Diamond Stealth II Video Card / 4 MB SDRAM, 3dfx V2 1000 3d Accelerator / 12 MB EDO RAM, Ensonic Audio PCI, Hi-Val 40x CD-ROM, Samsung 8x4x32 CD-R/RW, 3Com .S. Robotics 56k Fax Modem, Seagate 1.7GB Main HD & Seagate 10.0GB Slave HD, Altec Lancing ACS45.1 Multimedia Speaker System, Windows95B O/S.

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I have to say they might be eazy to upgrade but....Im buying a new computer for the simple reason is that you can not even change the cd rom drive with out a blue print. How things are mounted in this piece of S#@t I will never know. In my old 486 Gateway I never had a prob.A few nuts and bolts ..it was in. This thing I cant even remove the darn thing everything is rived!!!! God forgive you want to use anything that uses a pci card you got one to fill....Dont leave much room for upgradeing. Oh well good luck with your pb 600 you will need it. JW

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I Linked a PB Platinum 1550 & PB Multimedia L190 The Ram is now 80MB in P-1 128MB in P-2 I added a 6gig WD hard drive to P-1 to total 8GB I installed a 20gig Maxtor Diamond Max in P-2 P-1 has a cd burner, and scanner set up also... hi, mom's at it again! After two days of naked computers... both cases off, screws and 'stuff' all over, I'm networked!!! I picked up a Linksys Etherfast 'Switched 10/100 Network in a Box' grabbed my trusty screwdriver(THANKS CHUCK, FOR THE MORAL SUPPORT!!!) and started in. First I plugged the pci 'nic' cards into the putes. Pain-1 gave me a hard time there, nearly had to use a sledge hammer to get it to seat all the way in the socket, and windows wouldn't recognize it till it was all the way in. Pain-2 just said all right! Let's do it! Next I hooked the cables up to the hub and plugged it in... so far so good. Then came the fun part. After Win found the card on P-2 it did the usual loading of drivers etc. good, good... reboot, 'what do you mean missing files!!!' I then talked to Lynksys support... very pleasant, but not the right answers. After going to a favorite driver site I found the error msg I was getting had been very popular among a lot of the board visitors. I found the files I needed, and a little help on how to deal with getting them in and accepted. I replaced the missing files in P-2 and he said 'yummy'. Before programming P-1, I assumed I would have the same problem so I replaced the files in win\sys before even trying to set up the card. This made the job much more pleasant... no nasty-grams! The two Pains are talking to each other fine so far, I have played mp3's from one to the other (found win media player worked better than real player, no break ups) and accessed other files between too. That is after I figured out how to set them up as 'shared' files. NEXT... Anyone know anything about setting up LanBridge?? It is a program that is supposed to let you take both putes online at the same time. got it in p-2 but so far am having trouble getting it to work to go online... WHAT!!! I should expect to have no trouble!!! I LOVE Murphy... he's always with me!

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Can you install a network interface card on an old Packard Bell PB 450 machine without too much of a hastle ?

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Packard Bell did fine by me. This desktop model has served as my daughter's university machine all the way through her undergrad. and now starting her Master's. It took a licking and kept on ticking. I've upgraded memory to 48 Mb and added a new IBM 10 gi drive as Master, keeping the old 1.0 gig as Slave. The machine now runs Windows 98. I also added an ISA Ethernet card as part of an ADSL installation, and recently installed a Spectra 233 processor upgrade which nearly doubled the performance. I'm hoping to get another year out of this PB workhorse.

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Help! I'm running windows 95 just fine but netscape 4.75 is slooooow. Where can I find more ram? I also need a manual for this unit. Please help!

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i upgraded to 64 megs of RAM, then installed L2 cache ( celp socket ). up the video to 2 megs. Change modem to 56 PCI, install better sound card PCI, then came across Ray's website and change processor to Evergreen Spectra 400 with MR BIOS upgrade include . Next project will be the video card. So far so good. Very happy and satisfied. You learn as you go. Thanks Ray and to other PB users.

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Been reading everyone's complaints about their Packard Bells. True, it sucks that there's little or no support in the US...but web pages like this one make it a bit more bearable...way to go Ray! I upgraded the bios 2 years ago, no problems. I went from 3 mb ram to 64 mb, upgraded with a 32 mb chip I brought from Computer City (I really miss that place...sniff sniff boo hoo) after trying to use a 64 mb chip that would only read as a 16 mb. There are sites selling the correct 64 mb upgrade chip for the 810 motherboard, but for $229, it's not worth it. Just upgraded to Windows 2000, had to delete all of the software the computer came with, since it was mostly for Windows 95, but all of the drivers for the motherboard & sound still work. Maybe one day I'll up rade the processor, but for now it's a reliable workstation in my network.

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Just got my AMD K6-II 400 mhz cpu in the mail. I must say this upgrade was very easy with the power leap adapter. The speed increase was very noticable. I can now play games that wouldn't run on the pentium 100. I have also upgrade to 80 megs of ram and a 16 gig Maxtor hard drive running EZ Bois software. So far, my system is performing great. Hope to upgrade video soon.

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I have been looking for good site that helps me to feel confident to upgrade my BIOS, I have not done so yet. I already have 640.exe BIOS update dowloaded from PB site several months ago. But unable to extact old BIOS before updating new one. PBtech didn t have time to give me info through Chatroom and never sent E-mail. So I was afraid to update it cuz I don't wanna to cover my eyes and click "Update now" while my wife hoover the frying pan over my head!. LOL Glad to find Ray's PB site that helped me t feel better doing it so. I have upgraded my PB alot, It still have a screaming little 166mhz CPU but added 32mb EDO ram (Kingston EDO 16mb PAIR) (got it free through Compusa 50 dollars rebates:-)) to become 48mb and replaced the old 8x NEC cdrom with ne Digital Research 50x cdrom drive (my little son shoved the cdrom rack hard and it popped gears out of it's place)Added 51/2 floppy drive (is there any use of it huh?). Also Added many new cards on ports such as daul slotted USB card, Viking Component 56 modem, 2nd Parallel port (I only have one ISA and one PCI port left!! yike!). I also upgraded Win 98 (original version with downloaded Service pack 1 update :-P ). I also updated alot of drivers in my old PB and it ran great. I also added old parallel ype Quickcam VC on PB's parallel port set to ECP mode and it ran just like any camcorder. Originally, It ran just as fast as 300mzh CPU but I installed and downloaded too many softwares and caused the performance to drop dramacally to moderate-slow speed yike!. Guess I'll have to add 2nd hard drive and unload all software to newer drive to improve the performance. I have not check the Winstone software to check the performance of my cpu. If anyone have problem with Sound cards or other hardware except h rd drive. Go to Control Panel-->System-->Hardware manager. then look for the yellow caution sign and click on it and update the driver. Use either select from the list or "all drivers" to find compatible one. If you have floppy or CDrom with drivers c me with it. Use it! click "Have disk" and then click "browse" and choose A: or D: whatever you're using it and then find the driver what it is looking for. If you go the matching file like in the rectangular window in Browse window, that's the one you cou d use it. this may help resolve many hardware problems. Reminder to AOL users who updated AOL 5.0 have problem with modem driver cuz AOL 5.0 kicks out modem driver on COM 2 port except any other COM port after rebooting. Either try to change modem COM r if you have a controllerless modem, try using old modem if it has jumper or set it to COM 2 and it'll force the new modem to find other COM port then set up AOL 5.0 and it'll kick out COM 2 and go for newer modem with different COM port!!. This will ma e your life breathe easier!! thanks!

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I can't seem to find a place in BIOS or a jumper on the Motherboard to Disable onbaord VIDEO. Does anyone have an answer? I am trying to a new video card to this Packard Bell because the one built-in to the motherboard is flaky. When I put in the new video card the system just beeps a couple of times on bootup and does nothing. When I take out the new video it boots up fine. But with crappy video. Any help would be aprecciated.

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I am trying to locate drive "rails" for a Packard Bell Tower, Mdl Pl 2240. I am mounting a CD/RW. These rails are hard brown plastic (phenolic?) and screw into the sides of the CD case, then the assembly slides and locks into the tower rack. Can you help e locate them? Thanks.

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Hello Friends: Make a long story short I have replaced everything, but my motherboard! Max on ram, 200mhz booster cpu,Diamond Stealth card, and everything there after. I now have a 27.5 gig hard drive which my Bios only see 8.8 gig. I have Phoenix 4.04 Bios now. I need a number for a motherboard that will fit into my tower. I have the ultra card for the hard drive using ez Bios to make thing's work. I would like to find a newer board out of 98 or 99 model that may help me see my hard drive. Don't know what number mother to order that will fit? Help someone! Anyone! I have been upgrading ever since I got it!

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I was happy in my last letter waiting on my new 64mb memory chips from Outpost.com to upgrade my system. The last three weeks have been very frustrating trying to get anything to work. First Peripheral chip for my pc using their configuator wouldn't work. Had to send back to peripheral for replacement. in mean time ordered another. It wouldn't work only recognize 15mb. Got second chip same thing . Tried 3 chips in all none would work. Alcoria support not very good. System credentials say FM530 mother board someone else says bios number is 430 mother board. Alcoria says only memory purchased from them will work. Had outpost send an edo memory but sent back without trying as had over $500.00 charged to credit card with no new memory. Went to web forums, sent lot of emails and never did get a straight answer on what motherboard and what memory will work. Then Alcoria says it's a 810 motherboard, so now totally confused-nothing works-no answers. If edo memory, it is $197 for only 64mbx2, so 128 would be price o new computer. Just two years old and I'm stuck. If anyone can help straighten this out please help. Was still getting fatal exceptions from Road Runner cable setup, haven't figured that out either. DG

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I started to upgrade my Legend 2440, then I realized it would be like adding chrome to a '85 Reliant. My 12 y/o daughter now uses it to draw pictures. What a piece of CRAP!

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I started to upgrade, then I realized it would be like adding chrome to a 85 Reliant. My 12 y/o daughter now uses it to draw pictures. What a piece of CRAP!

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I got this computer for free around march. I've made alot of upgrades(75mhz cpu to 400mhz,1mb on-board video to 16mb with a vodoo 3 2000, 18mb of ram to 80mb, and a 56k v90 modem). Everything works great but I want to do one more upgrade. I want to instal a usb port but I don't have any available slots left(It's a 3x3 case).Packard Bell says I can't upgrade to a 4x4 case cause my motherboard probably won't fit. Any help would be appreciated.

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I have added/replaced an internal modem, increased RAM to 28mb, added a touch screen, a tape backup, external Syquest SparQ 1 gig drive, replaced the Hard drive with a 2gig, installed WIN95, and a NIC card for connection to a WIN2000 server LAN. This PC as served me very well over the years, and has been most reliable. However, I find it very difficult to compare it to any of the model numbers listed anywhere; ie: PM6419. I have two other Packard Bell PCs in various states of repair, a PM5000CDTW, and Legend 204CD; neither of which can I locate any information on (these were basically junked PCs that I picked up for nothing and have gotten to work by adding spare parts; however, I cannot find any specs on them). I have the original documentation on he Pack-Mate, and would be glad to answer any questions about specs that I could. Likewise, I would very much appreciate any specs on the other 2 PCs I mentioned, such as RAM configuration & specs, mother board diagrams/specs, etc.

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I made to fatal mistake of upgrading my internet browser from 2.0 to 5.0. which has greatly slowed my computer down. The service provider does not know how I can uninstall it without dire consequencies. I have succesfully upgraded ram memory twice alrea y from 4 to 12 & 12 to 28. The first time I added an 8 to the 1st bank to get 12. The second time I added two 8 by stacking them in the 2nd bank with a ram stacker from Global Supplies (part now obsolete) to get 28. I want to add 32 more rams. I know I will have to sacrifice the 8 in the 1st bank to do this and lose 8 megs. But, Will this work? Where can I get one 32 meg simm, 72 pin, 8 x 36 parity upgrade for less than $100.00 (see tigerdirect.com and crucial.com). So far I've only used PNY Industrie upgrades because they work in my computer. If I can push the memory up to 52 Rams I will stop there and consider buying another computer. Technical support is no help at all for all old computers. They all want $$$$$$

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Can anyone tell me where to find the win95 driver for this model? What is the make/modle of the video driver for this system? TIA!!!! BTW, PackardBell support stinks. Couldn't get their web site working at all!

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I've lost my driver for my moniter and now have horrible color. If anyone out there has one could you please email it to me. Thanks

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I've lost my driver for my moniter and now have horrible color. If anyone out there has one could you please email it to me. Thanks

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Added Mr Bios upgrade, PowerLeap adapter w/AMD K6-III 400, 128 total edo, VooDoo3 2000 pci, Compaq 17" monitor, HP scanner, Xerox Docuprint C11 printer, additional hd, 2 case fans and fan for video card. Had problems with MR BIOS assigning IRQ for USB co troller, but after much experimentation with Bios settings, removal and reinstallation of several devices et al, everything works. The only thing left to mess with is adding L2 cache. Anyone who could help out, email me. Thanks for the site Ray. I've used it often and have been referred to YOUR site as being "PackardBell's". Although technically incorrect, it's definitely flattering for you, no doubt. You are the PackardBell King. Congrats on your newest addition!

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i have just put a new sound card in this thing but my microphone is on all the time and it does not work on any program---it shows the rockwell fax/modem still there but i dont know how to disable it so i can get the new one to work--my new one is a audio xcel sound card---my sound works just fine but the microphone does not--i also have a full duplex card put it is reading half duplex---will someone give me a hand--thanks bill please email real soon (thanks)

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Trying to upgrade from 24MB to 64MB. When I install 2 32MB DIMMs, only 16MB total shows up. What am I doing wrong? Help!

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Here goes....Started with overclocking cpu to 133mhz..wintune results showed no improvement.?why...after more research i found that voltage setting are needed but thats another day..added 10 gig hard drive ...but win95 wouldnt see it ..so thanks to rays s te ...an update to win98se and a bios update to 1.00.07cpor whitch was a breeze..ok windows picked the hard drive up at 7.9 gig...strange ..but recently found that has all to do with commands in the bios dos lines and cant do anything about it unless a th rd party bios comes into play....added 4mb sis video card works ok for the price at the swap meet..added compro 32-8-4 cd r rw. also after the bios update the overclocking didnt work.computer rebooted at original speed no matter what setting i tried...put 64 mb ram and a pentium 166mmx and wintune tells me its ok so the motherboard seems ok ...its not to bad for an old machine still serving me well.....cheers and thanks to this site for all the info....just added cable modem and a ethernet card as well its like its a new computer

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Greetings, I just swapped the appropriate jumpers on the motherboard and sped the processor from 75Mhz to 100Mhz. Thats been a year ago and no problems yet! Added 48 Meg of RAM,(major improvement). Found 1 Meg of video RAM on a scrap board that happened to work in my PB600. Ditched the 144AMSP sound card/modem. Used a newer 56K modem and a seperate sound card. All went well untill I tried to add a miro video capture card. Now I get hardware conflicts. I also added a 500 Meg hard drive configured as a slave. Now after compressing the heck outa i , I have a nice little 2 Gig secondary drive. I had nothing but trouble with this machine as purchased. I finally tried loading a different copy of Win 95 (not the packard bell one)and this machine hasn't given a bit of trouble since!

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Installed Evergreen Spectra 333 with no problem. Previously installed Creative Labs 56k modem & Soundblaster card. All problems were of my own making. Also added slot fan & glad I did my original case fan "blew" a bearing.

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Installed Evergreen Spectra 333 with no problem. Previously installed Creative Labs 56k modem & Soundblaster card. All problems were of my own making. Also added slot fan & glad I did my original case fan "blew" a bearing.

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When i recently tried to restore a friends pb, i swear i thought id go crazy!!!! Those have to be the only computers in the world that is a pain to restore to factory condition, when the master cd and the disks dont want to do the restore as they are inte ded to do,,, any suggestions on what else to try? Thanks

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Just a note to say that this was not as hard as most 'experts' thought. This thing now has 72meg RAM,3D Banshee w/16meg, 4.3gig HD,Evergreen 333mhz cpu, Yamaha8x8x24 CD-RW. And many other stuff connected at the same time. Who says you cant upgrade a PB Don

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I really need the help of someone who knows the Packard Bell. I was upgrading a PB486 "Legend 12CD" for a friend. Had everything working, new 1Gig HDD, Windows95b Plus. Started to work on the installation of a new modem and wanted to disable Com1. When I looked at the BIOS setup (F2) the system hung up and I had to do a cold boot. Now nothing comes up. When I boot, only the CD light comes on momentarily, nothing on the A drive. Nothing on the monitor (screen is blank). I'm really in a fix. When I had the system working, the lady stopped by and I showed her how it was working. Now there is nothing working. I have built several PC but have never worked on a PB. Did the BIOS "go south" when I had to cold boot. But before I start looking for a new chip, I was hoping for some help from a PB expert. Any help getting this PC up and running again would be greatly appreciated. I'm desperate, and would be willing to pay someone out of my own pocket if we could just get this thing up and running again. Sincerely, Ray Dean, Odessa, FL. rfdean@att.net

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Seems like a good computer for the price I paid (nothing). It's now running with 24MB RAM, 100MHz pentium processor, a gig of hard drive space, and a quad speed cdrom drive. I was gonna replace the daughter board with one that has onboard sound, but I can't get the thing out. Any suggestions outside of a large hammer?

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The first attempt at an upgrade was to increase the RAM to 32 MB (only 24 MB actually showed up). I replaced the 14.4 modem/sound card with a 56K ISA and an Aureal Vortex A3D PCI sound card. The most significant improvement, however, was to wipe the 1GB DD and perform a clean install of Win95b. I used Seagate's DiskManager to "zero-fill" (erase), partition, and format the drive and then re-installed all the hardware and only the software I wanted. NO MORE NAVIGATOR!!!:) I went from 24MB of free space t 500MB! Not too shabby!

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just got a call from brother in law wants to sell me a p.b. 814 cd computer aprox. 3 0r 4 years old wants $250.00 for it only about 20 hours on it no use for it kids wont use it should i buy it and do upgrades? never had a packerd bell before. any input w uld be greatly appreciated

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In March 1998 I threw out the Aztech Labs Washington Galaxy Sound Card with the attached 14.4 modem and bought a US Robotics 33.6 modem and a Creative Labs AWE64Value. In August 1998 I upgraded the hard drive to a Maxtor 6.2Gb increased the RAM memory to 32Mb and replaced the 75 Mhz CPU with a 120 Mhz. In December,1999 I purchased a second sound card, the AWE 64 Gold.(I run two sound cards. In May, 2000 I replaced the 120Mhz CPU with a Pentium Overdrive with MMX tech rated now at 180Mhz. In July 2000 I replaced the 32 Mb RAM memory with 64Mb (total 90.112MB) It is definitely do-able.

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Yo tengo un Packard Bell 1412SL y una Voodoo3. Esta targeta es muy bakan como para pónerla con este monitor , este monitor es muy rasca ! Cuando le cambio la resolucion, queda la cagada ! solo lo debo tener en 640*480 !!!

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Let me tell you. I have always dreaded having to have to work on any Packard Bell system. Well, I guess every bits and bytes guru must obtain the initiation rites of the computer world and all it's knowledge by having to actually see, handle, and attempt o fix one of these computer lemons of the century! All I wanted to do was upgrade a hard drive. So, I do like any logical person who has a some what kind of knowledge about computers, and go to the internet. Where do I go you ask? "Well, let's try the P ckard Bell's Web Site!" And so I do this. Do you think the story would end successfully there? Well, it just got worse. For over a week I have bombed the site, pounded at the wee hours of the morning, and if, and whenever I finally got to get thru, none f the icons or url's worked. Joy! So, needless to say, this system sucks. All because I was trying to upgrade the BIOS, to enable it to recognize a 7.5 GB Hard Drive........... So, until I get a BIOS, can anyone out there give me a clue! Where can I go, a d how can I get one!!!! Thank you much!!!! Love, Peace, and Hair Grease!!!!!

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First, in 99 the whole thing wouldn't start. I wasn't about to pay the service people $200 bucks to scratch their butts trying to figure out the problem. So I did the ultimate upgrade, I bought a new computer and not a Packard Hell. I discovered that the x CD had gone out, bought a 32x from Best Buy, thing ran like a charm. Upgraded the memory to 48 megs (PNY chipsets), added a 56K instead of the modem/soundcard (dumb design PB, no wonder they went out of business), put in an Evergreen 200 Pro w/ MMX. And now I'm thinking about taking a sledge hammer to it. The IDE controllers aren't working and I can't get any updated drivers for them (PB's support site, the new one even, is never responding, this is going on several weeks now that the Alorica site isn't oading)

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I really need help with this whole Ram thing with these friggin' things, honestly there are at least 4 other submitions with the same problem with the Ram only reading 1/4 of the supposed RAM. I would like to know if anyone actually got an upgrade to work Any information is greatly appreciated. E-mail me @ Smdvidgame@mailcity.com

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Just like Patrick Sullivan, this was my first computer purchase and i did not have much knowledge of computers then. Boy what a big mistake, no wonder the salesman wanted me to buy it. He just wanted to get it out of the store as soon as possible. Anyway upgraded to 64mb and it runs much faster especially while downloading from the web. i am very grateful for this site as the PackBell support site is always down. iam now considering the AMD K6 III upgrade, i like the comparison numbers i saw, and now tha i have put in the new memory i believe i can delve a little further into the upgrading of the system. it is good to know that i am not the only PB770 owner out there.

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I learned from your website that my motherboard is a PB550. My last upgrade included 72-MB RAM, PNY-233 CPU, 20-GB HD, USR Win-Fax-Voice modem 56kbps, Vodoo 3x 16MB PCI video card, ATA/66 PCI controller, Acer 50x CD ROM. I still have the original AMI bios Everything functions. (I'm having problems with my old Colorado tape back up windows SW: won't recognize the tape in the drive , stays on 'busy': the dos SW funtions. It worked until I upgraded my Windows 98 second edition from the MS website.) Questions: the Intel Neptune chip set has a PCI 2.0 version. The USR required standard 2.1. I don't believe it functions at 56k. I've run a 'NetMonitor' SW test and it reports 26k. I run the same test on my daughters new Dell and it runs at 36k. Also, I b ught the expensive modem so I wouldn't have problems with the installation (extra SW). It gave me a very hard time. The SW that came with it won't recognize the modem. Other SW off the net recognizes the modem but doesn't pass the dial tone test. It funct ons however--via JUNO. I'm not sure what's going on here. How do I know it's working properly, at the max speed and compression ????? Also, Norton's reports that the CPU is running at 196-MHz. The SW that came with the PNY-233 reports 210-MHz. How do I know what the actual speed is ??????? Related, I didn't see any jumpers on the mother board for overclocking the bus and/or the CPU. A different article on this site states that the bus clock can be set to 50 or 60-MHz. This user used some type of adapter and an Intel 233 and reported 210-MHz. The user also stated about the CPU overriding the CPU clocking rate of the motherboard. The P Y instructions state a max gain of 3 times the bus speed. Either I have 3x66 (which according to the other user) isn't possible with this mother board; or, I have 3.5 x 60 = 210 (which isn't possible per PNY) ???? I was told a RW CDROM wouldn't function properly with a clock speed under about 233MHz. I see other user's have installed them with success. Do they have succes recording MP3's ???? The video card does stay enable on the mobo. However, it is disabled in the hardware configuration do to conflicts. I recently was able to remove it and the computer didn't recognize it on boot up. This is new. I've put other video cards, and even with th s one originally: If I removed the mobo video in the HW configuration (system info, control panel), on boot up the Plug-n-Play would reinstall it. Is there a newer BIOS that will allow the spin down of the HDD for power saving mode and/or allow boot up from the CDROM or a ZIP drive? I found this site when looking for Info on the CetaurHauls WinChip (PNY CPU). I don't know what version yet, C2? , C6? Thank you for any information. It would be greatly appreciated. Please email me if there are any questions I can answer. Thank you, Bill Bagley bill.bagley@us.abb.com

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running windows 95/IE 5. replace cdrom that wouldn't open with 40x Acer. Signed up for Road Runner cable access free install beta test site. Constant fatal exceptions 2-5 times a day. RR advice was reinstall rr program. went to the web read about Dr Watso .exe to track fatal exc. Found that cable modem uses networking properties and we were missing a file vxdifsmgr[01] then ifshlp.sys. Went to microsoft after looking at many pages found a fix to update replace these files. When running IE/AOL instant mess nger/outlook express then maybe print computer would crash,just since rr was installed. Also we ran a y2k microsoft update/commercial version to repair a file conflict. So far haven't crashed maybe fixed. Just ordered 64 mb memory chip from Outpost.com fo 120.00 free shipping. anxious to try chip. Yes,We could buy a new computer,but moving all programs and data too much work! I have visited this site before and Alorica did email me back about Roadrunner problem, but I think is fixed. If you like 1964 Chev olet nova's check out my site. DG

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back in 3/98 I upgraded to a 233mhz cpu using the PowerLeap PL-PRO/MMX 233. No problems, just plug in and power on. I also increased RAM to 32meg using fast page Simms. Just last month I purchased PowerLeap's Amd K6-III(with 3-D Now!)-400, I'm running with Pheonix 4.04 Bios. so once again it was plug and power on with no problems. I've also upgraded to 48meg of RAM using a mixture of FastPage and EDO with no apparent pr blems.

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My first computer was a Packard Bell legend. Can't remember what model. I installed a new 26bp modem on it. It had 14bp. The old modem was permanently attached so it was left on and I just added the new one. In order for your computer to recognize it you must go into the setup and disable the old modem. Then it worked like a charm. Now I own a multimedia 705 packard. I just upgraded from 2.1 gigabytes to 15. I purchases a maxtor drive that had had a wonderful program that assists you. The main problem was that I could add the new drive on and keep the old one. You have to have these special adaptors to fit the drive into your extra bays. So I took out the old drive and replaced it with with the new. Then I used the software that came with the drive and it formatted and paritioned the drive. Don't choose Fat32 because your restore disk won't work. I know nothing about upgrading computers, but have managed to learn this much on my own with no help. I don't know all the technical terms. If you are upgrading your harddrive choose a maxtor with the software that helps you install.

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As you can tell I do not have much experience with hardware. I hate my PB & find it difficult to upgrade anything. At this point I am afraid. I upgraded my mouse & the whole system crashed & had to reboot everything. I really wanted to upgrade to try & ge this thing to run faster. I have 2/3 of my hard drive empty. I use Word, Excell & MGI Photo Suite Only. Of late I feel like I am running the 1st computer. It take forever to open a program & now take me up to 15 minutes to edit 1 photo. None of Packard B ll links work. I did manage to send an email to support but I have not yet heard back. This was on 7/1 today is 7/4 (Happy 4th. I just got a new message on my system to the effect of Your stacks are full & will crash. You have only 5. You can increase you stacks. MINSP's in system.ini Does anyone know what that means & how I can fix this. My computer is even slower now. Is there help for me? Can I make the computer last another 2 years with upgrades & if so how much. I would like to increase the ram. I a so have a network card installed. Its a Kingston. I do not know if I have a video card install & if I should install one. Anyone who can help shed some light on this computer, working, upgrades & config. would be greatly appreciated. thanks in advance.

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I noticed that there are no 1810 Models I have played hell trying to upgrade this system. Although I have tweeked cache to the fullest capacity. Defrag daily and have memory managers running. I find the only problem I have is locating memmory modules for his system. Help otherwise I will just keep on tweeking away works for me.

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This one isn't ready for the trash yet. Added evergreens 486 upgrade processor. BIOS reads at 100mhz but I clocked it at 133mhz. I now have 40mb of Ram, 33.6 modem,and assound gold sound card. Made the 524mb HDD my slave and added a 1.2 gig HDD for the ma ter. Running windows 98 se with no problems. This is my first computer and upgrade attempt. I am very pleased. Ther were a few hitches along the way but I worked my way thru them. I wish I had known about this site during all this. I got this system in 12 99. I don't believe I am going to anything else to it because someone just gave me a PB600 they thought was fried. I have it running windows 98 now and getting ready to start the upgrade process on it.

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This is too funny. Upgrading PB's. I first needed more than the 8mb of ram origionally given, I upgraded to 16, and she worked like a champ. I thought i would never use up the 1.2GB hardrive...welpers last yr, just to get on the internet I would have t dump. I upgraded my CDrom from the screaming X2 to the X12 when the 12's first came out, mistake on my part for giving my dad the old one. PB didn't want to recognize the new one all the time, so it's a big pain. And when I tried upgrading the 14.4 to a 28.8, forget it, the puter didn't like that either. When the 56's came out, no luck either. It did, however, let me upgrade the RAM to a whopping 64 + the origional 8 = 72mb. Now my kids use it, and I learned my lesson and bought a puter that can be asily upgraded... an AMD.

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My machine has had the following upgrades and modifications: 1) Original 2Gig Harddrive replaced with Western Digital 5.1Gig HD 1998 2) RAM added bringing up RAM to 72Mb 1998 3) 1Mb of Video RAM added in 1998 4) Windows 95 deleted 1998 5) Linux OS added 1998 6) Onboard video overridden with 3DLabs Permedia 2v video card 1999 7) Modem/Soundcard combo deleted 1999 8) Creative Ensoniq Audio PCI soundcard added 1999 9) 256k COAST module added 1999 10) RealTek 8139 NIC added 1999 11) COM21 Cable Modem added 1999 12) Colorado Jumbo 350 tape drive added 1999

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First i upgraged the ram to 32megs edos,then i overclocked to 200MMX cpu and no problems so far just got to make sure you get the jumpers set right,next came a Samsung 32x cdrom but i've i'd noends off problemsn with it.Then i upgraded the video card to 4 eg 3dfx Matroxs twin card again with no problems and then i haded a second hard drive(2.5GD) then last off all a 56k isa internal modem which is crap so the next is a external 56k modem.So far i have spent approx around £300 including the price off the sy tem and i would recomend Packard Bell to anyone I know my next PC will be.BYE

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in the name of all those who have suffered trying to uprade the RAM of the 810 does anyone know where and what kind of RAM can be purchased that will be read correctly by the 810. Packard bell's website no longer is of any use. any info would be greatly aprreciated. Reading the history of this message group it seems many of you have suffered similiar problems. thanks

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Let me just start by saying I was a novice to the world of PC hardware. The first thing I did was to remove the PB Navigator program and some of the shareware software that came with the computer, which were taking up way too much space. For the first 6+ onths, I had been having problems where my PB would lock up to the point of having to hit the reset button to restart the machine. This would happen mainly if I was moving objects around in MS Powerpoint, but had also occurred once when I was playing Mine weeper (weird...but funny if you think about it). I had heard of PB's really bad reputation for tech support, so I consulted with a few co-workers, who know a thing or two about PC's. My first move was to add RAM, 64MB of EDO to be specific. My system was considerably faster but the problems persisted. I then reinstalled Win95, but to no avail. What finally cured the problem was upgrading the video card from the paltry 1MB that is built in, to an ATI Expert98 8MB video card. About a year ago, I added in a ujitsu 6.4GB HD and while I was at it, installed Win98 overtop of the original Win95 OS. I have since purchased a newer computer to use as my primary PC, but am keeping the PB as my secondary. I am seriously thinking about installing a different OS, Linux If anyone has tried installing Linux on a similar PB or if anyone has any advice on installing Linux on a PB, let me know. Any help I can get would be useful.

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I recently began to upgrad my computer, I started with the RAM to 40 MB, new modem this all worked fine and then I attempted to upgrade the CPU with the Evergreen Spectre 400. Here is where I had my problems, the upgrade seem to go smooth everything happ ned in the upgrade exactly like the instructons described. However, when all was said and done my system is running way slower than before the upgrade. I double checked the jumpers, reinstalled the BIOS update from Mr. BIOS and went through the installat on a second time and the same results. I was thinking that it may be related to the Video. I currently have not upgraded the video yet. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

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bought it new in 94, i upgraded to 8MB total ram and a Us robotics 28.8 modem as soon as i got it. then i put win95 on it. Its now 2000, and i need a linux box so i slayed the spiders that claimed the packerd in the basement and dusted it off today. su prisingly it still booted. i need more ram though. Anyone know what kind of ram this beast takes? i dont remember, its been too long, please help.

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AcceleraPCI 533/256 upgrade. 5-2000 The Evergreen Technologies Pre-Qual software determined that the AcceleraPCI was compatible with my system. I received the board and memory about three days after I ordered from their web site. The card was placed in my second open slot (out of three; I have a Cisco 605 ADSL modem installed in the first slot) and restarted the computer. Windows 98r2 freezes during the start up. Apparently, the AcceleraPCI does not play well when installed alongside the Cisco modem (may have had something to do with the Cisco card being bus mastering as well?? That's my guess). I putzed with the card for three weeks. New flash BIOS versions fr m tech support; tweaking my bus settings, BIOS settings (the Cisco does use the same IRQ as my system's 'IRQ holder for PCI steering', but tech support said that shouldn't be a problem). If I removed the Cisco via the Device Manager, I could get the Accelera up. When it worked, it worked like the dickens! 533 Mhz, 256 MB SODIMM SDRAM. But without my DSL modem, it just wasn't worth the $855 I shelled out for it. So, back it went.

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Gee I wish I had seen this site before I gave my ol pb to my mother in law I need to replace the old modem and was wondering if any one had suggestions, can I still use the soundcard or should I replace both.. thanks for any help!!

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I have had very little problems with my packardbell. Upgraded memory to 48mb, replaced 28.8 modem with 56k. v90, added 10gig hd, added zip drive, extra parellel port. Need to upgrade cpu and replace power supply. Anyone know a good place to find a power supply for this model?

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WHY???????????????????????????

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The only thing I've changed is that I've upgraded the RAM to 12 M. I'm interested in further upgrades. So, if anyone wanted to give me hints, that would be just dandy.

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Wanted to upgrade from 40mb and the 32mb and 64mb dimm modules from PNY and kbyte only show up as one fourth ( 1/4 ) of the mb that should be present ( i.e. 64 shows up on boot as 16mb and 32mb shows up on boot as 8mb) . Kbyte web page mentions "a problem" with the number of chips used on a dimm and this very symptom. This model730 motherboard 810 seems to have a number of similar comments , but I don't see any fix ( i.e. change bios to level so and so or some jumper ) . Presently I am running with one orig PB dimm that was and still shows aok as 32mb plus have the 64mb plugged in to at least get the 16mb off it for a total of 48 mb .... but would like to really get the total 64 off that PNY dimm to add to the 32mb PB dim for 96mb total ... but the award bios ( 1.005 I believe ) doesn't see but one fourth of any dimm I put in from kbyte and pny so far ( but reads the PB supplied dimms aok ) . ANY fix would be appreciated ( hopefully not something like send your computer to pb or only they have the memory that will work ( by coincidence...?)

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this system has been very slow and thay don't have money to upgrade so I opened my big mouth and here I am! By the way what happened to packard bell? Can't even get into there support site at all! I intended o upgrading the hard drive to a quantum 3.2 ig and am not having much luck there but in the process the bios will no longer find the two speed cd. The bios version is 4.3 and is a pheonix bios. I ordred some memory which is 2 72 pin simms @ 60ns. How can I get the cd back? What kind of settings should I have in the bios for this drive (cd)? will the bios support larger drives like the one I mentioned earlier? Any help with this little project will be much appreciated. Kevin

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My uncles bought me a barebones system for college, Windows 3.1 installed. I upgraded the RAM to 40, got Win 95, a 14.4 modem and upgraded to a 6.4 gig hardrive. Never could get my CD Drive to detect in protected(Win95 mode) Then I got 40 speed CDROM dri e, Evergreen 200 MMX CPU, a 4MB video card, 56k winmodem, and upgraded to Win 98. My CD problems are over, but I still get video garbage when I restart. (Conflict with Cirrus logic card?) Anyway, does anyone know where to get an upgraded Phoenix Bios for his? Thanks

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Finally, I got the ZoomCam_ISA videocam installed and working ... at least half-way. This product is a "card"_based videocam, and needs a free ISA_slot, IRQ and DMA channel. Just the thing if you don't have a PCI-graphics card, and can't use USB ... my B OS (1.00.09DNOR) doesn't enable USB. Now ... why it's working I can't exactly tell you - software setup is quite a jumble. Picture quality is poor on the Vid-email output, and I don't have CUseeme or the like running yet. A REAL version of CUseeme is NOT included, and the PaintShopPro "video editor" must be the LITE version - no CMYK decomposition, cropping requires multi-ste messing around etcetcetc. If you have NO OTHER ALTERNATIVE for a system videocam, then ZoomCam is a try ...

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I got it for free as a starter pc. In 2 months time with a little research I jumped my bus speed from 50 to 66, My cpu speed from 75mhz to 400mhz with a evergreen spectra 400 processor, My memory from 18mb to 72mb, And my 1mb video card with a 16mb vodoo 2000. It never freezes or overheats. All for about $375.00 dollars. Don't give up it can be done

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Just finished main upgrades: Upgraded CPU to Intel overdrive 120 MHz : found a newly boxed one, never opened through eBay, the auction site: trivial to install. Haven't tried changing bus speed to 66Mhz yet ! Upgraded video memory to 2MB - Packard Bell still have supplies !! Upgraded RAM to 40MB using 2 x 16 MB fast page DRAM SIMMS - still have 2 slots free. Removed Aztech sound card: replaced with Creative Labs AWE64 ISA Value Sound card. Used PCI slot for 3COM US Robotics V.90 56K Voice Modem Card. Changed CD-ROM drive for 48X CD-ROM drive Changed 512 MB Seagate disk drive to Western Digital 6.4GB disk drive...EZ-BIOS overlay enables all of the hard disk to be accessed ! Simple to install.. Used clean disk to install Win98 SE with a single 6.4GB FAT32 partition -- works like a dream. Downloaded all critical Win98 patches from windows update site...amazingly, even Microsoft can get some things right eventually i.e it worked.... Lots of new software installed now I've got enough disk space. The system has proved very reliable since 1995 with no disk crashes or other hardware problems... we'll have to see what happens now... Win98 SE reboots so many times during install.... it becomes very tedious. N.B. remove any expansion cards before you upgrade or install Win98..after OS install, refit hardware cards and let win98 discover new hardware. It doesn't seem to correctly identify new hardware during an upgrade from Win95 to Win98...a real pain messing around with device drivers and getting them to work...don't try it !

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My fourth upgrade attempt, after upgrading the CPU, memory, modem & soundcard. So now I tried installing a digital vidcam and this try a miserable failure. I used a card_based ISA_vidcam from ZoomTek ... I run Win95Bx200x32x2 BIOS 1.00.09DNOR with USR56pc and SB16isa. I tried installing the ZoomTek ZoomCam_isa Vidcam. No way can I get the thing to install and show pics. Software installation appears bizarre and seems to be missing required files on the CD. The company has been NO help at all. Win95 sez the camera is in talled, but the ZT software can't find it. I have available IRQs, but free DMA channels ??? I'm missing this concept and/or how to deal with it. Anyone try this camera installation and succeed??

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Can somebody email me on how to disable onboard video, S3 virge. I'm installing a new I/O Magic video card and when I do so, it gives me one beep followed by two during post, then black screens. No input to my monitor. Somebody help.

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I have upgraded my CPU from the OEM 133 to an Evergreen MXPro 200. I have not noticed any real change in speed. I had a coworker install a USR 56K modem and, but it was installed on com 5. Again, no change in speed. I still get 28.8 performance and it reports the port setting, not the modem speed. The SB AWE 32 works great though. Sounds a darn sight better through the SB speakers I bought to repladce the PB speakers that came with the system. :-) I've installed an Orchid Righteous I video card and ttached a CTX 17" monitor. If I use the 1024x768 mode, all I can muster is 265 colors. I'd LOVE to get CLOSE to 200 with the CPU. Close to 50K with the modem and better 265 colors. Can anyone out there offer me some advice? Besides buying a new comp ter, which I can't afford right now. Thanks, Dave in VA

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I am glad to see that some of you are happy with Packard Bell. I wish I could say the same. I have had nothing but trouble with my computer. And right now I can't even get the help I need from their premier support. I have surfed their web site for the la t couple of days and there is nothing there. they don't even have drivers, software nothing to download. I need a driver that I can only get from them and I can't even get response from them. I will mention what driver I am looking for and maybe someone o t there could tell me where to go and get it. I need a driver called MSCD001. Can someone help me and restore my faith in Packard Bell again.

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Does anyone know if the PB680 motherboards are compatiable with Ultra ATA/66. I have installed the Western Hard Drive (15 gig), 7200 RPM. It is compatiable with Ultra ATA/66, BUT it said to make sure that your motherboard can support this. E-mail if an body has done this.

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year 2000, it's y2k compatable alright, but it sucks

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I am interested in upgrading to a 7200 rpm, 10 gig Western hard drive. Has anyone upgraded a pb680 to above the 8 gig orginal limit? Also, the following are the upgrades I have made for the last 3 years: Spectra 400 processor(with Mr. Bios), Awe 64 sou d card, Sportser 90v modem, 6.4 gig Wester hard drive, 128 meg ram, 16 meg Riva TNT video card, PCI USB adapter card (running new microsoft explorer mouse, and HP 932C printer off USB. The Spectra really cooks.

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I added: 56k/v.90 modem 1.44 Floppy Drive 40x CDROM 32 MB PCI 2D/3D Graphics accelerator Sound Blaster PCI512 sound card 128 MB of Fast Page RAM surround sound speakers 10.2 Gig Western Digital Hard Drive 2 USB ports I am now working on adding either a new Mother Board and CPU, or getting a 200 MHz CPU and adding it to the existing MB.

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My bios is American Megatrends 1.00.07.CP0R. I was told that this bios is not compatible with AMD K6. I was wandering if I upgraded the bios with Mr. Bios would this action eliminate the incompatibility issue? I'd like to install an upgrade chip with 400m z. Also, are bios upgrades expensive? Also, I'm looking for some cheap upgrade items ie; hard drive, pci usb card, upgrade chip, and video card. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance. Thanks Ray this page is great!!!

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If anyone can help. I am attempting to upgrade my computer to Windows 95 or Windows 98, but it constantly fails no matter if I try for a clean install with a boot disk or as an upgrade over the top of Windows 3.1. I've tried to disable any BIOS settings that may interfere with the installation to no avail. Now nothing will install because the HD is FAT32 and the recovery disk does not recognize the HD, so I'm basically stuck. any ideas are appreciated. EMAIL me. Thanks

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Upgraded memory to 96MB. Removed PB 33.6/Soundcard board, replaced with 56K WinModem and Creative 64AWE soundcard. Added 16MB STB Velocity video card. (Disabling on board video was a pain!) Put in a network card to hook up to the kids PC, nice for print ng and gaming. Finally, picked up Evergreen Spectra 400 (which now includes the bios from Mr. Bios!!) and am happily chugging along at 400mhz.

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WELL.ITS ALWAYS NICE TO SEE HOW FAR YOU CAN GO WITH A LITTLE TIME AND EXPERTISE.I REPLACED THE DX/2 CHIP WITH A 133 AMD CHIP.I USED A CTM16L.EXE BIOS TESTER TO MOTHERBOARD AND STARTED MOVING JUMPERS IN DIFFERENT SETTINGS TO FIND THE MAX SPEED BEFORE OVERC OCKING OCURRED.IT NEVER DID OVER CLOCK AND I WOUND UP WITH 149.17 MHZ.TESTED AND RUN INTO THE GROUND TO ASSURE STABILITY.I WORK ON MANY COMPUTERS EVERY DAY,AND IM REALLY HAPPY TO SAY THAT THIS IS ONE FAST ON LINE GET WHERE YOU WANA GO COMPUTER.WITH COMPUT RS NOW IN THE 1GIG RANGE,I WAS ALMOST EMBARRSED TO EVEN TALK ABOUT THIS.BUT,WHEN YOU GOT A SMOOTH AND FAST SYSTEM,IT DONT MATTER WHAT(THEY)SAY.THE RESULTS SPEEK FOR THEMSELF.

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The upgrades that I did the past year are as follow: I first had to install a new CD-Rom Drive (the old one went bad), an easy task. Then I upgraded the RAM from 24 to 64 Megs, with this upgrade there was a few glitches but in the end it work just fine. A the same time I installed a new 56K modem, here too was a few bugs but luckily I sorted them out with not to many problems. I left the old modem in to use it for faxing etc. About two months ago I installed a AMD K6-2 400Mhz CPU with the Powerleap PL/Pro MX Plus Adapter. The upgrade went well including the flash of the BIOS. This did not much to the speed because my HD was still slow! In the last weeks a installed a new parallel port for my scanner, which gave endless errors when it was hooked-up with the printer on the same port. Now it works perfect. The second to last upgrade was the installation of a Sound Blaster SB 16 sound card. Finally I was able to rip out the Modem/Sound Card Combo. The most difficult part of this upgrade was figuring out that I had to disable the onboard sound chip in the BIOS to keep it from trying to reinstalling all the time. The last was to add a new Maxtor 13.6 Gig HD (7,200 rpm), the installation went flawless and suddenly the speed of the AMD K6-2 400 Mhz was unleashed! N w I am enjoying my PB!

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I have performed a series of upgrades which seem to have created glitches. I added a 32MB DIMM PC100 Ram chip to the existing and cannot get the full 64MB recognized. I see on this Mssg. board it is a common problem. I also upgraded the CPU to a 333mHz using the Evergreen package and the installation went without a hitch except now I get a "video adapter" error, and I cannot get resolution above 16 color (everything graphic looks like a negative) even after I change it and restart. The Windows "logo in the clouds" at the start up and shut down is obviously using a higher resolution, but when Windows starts the hourglass icon changes from the smaller, higher resolution size, to the larger size and the graphics/colors become 16 color (at least that is wha I assume). The folks at CompUSA are NO HELP, in fact they laugh at anyone that would even consider owning a Packard Bell. Strange that they don't offer that point of view when they sell them, but that is another story for another forum.

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Can you tell me where i get obtain an update bios for my system, my actual BIOS version is 1.005.CPOR. I do not even found this version on the packard Bell Website. Thank you. Fezal

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Great Site Ray! Upgraded to 48 Meg FastPage ram. No problem. Installed Ethernet card, cable modem (Cable rules!). No problem. WD 8.4G hd. No problem. 4 partitions. Upgraded to PNY 233 QuikChip. Benches at 232. No problem. Still have old Phoenix BIOS - reports 133. No big deal. A problem I'm having now is this: Playing mpgs when I had my 100 chip predictably skipped a lot of frames, usually playing ~11 fps i/o 30 fps Now with my 233 chip, the mpg still only plays ~11 fps (?), but the audio is really bad- garbled. Mp3s play fine though. I figure it must be still having only 1 meg video memory, since I believe both the mpg video and sound go through the video card. I p cked up a Hercules Stingray 128/3D video card (6 Meg EDO) on E-Bay for $30, so when I get that, hopefully my mpgs will work better. I'll let you know. Also, anyone have any info about overclocking this PNY 233? Little card that came with chip said no jumper changes were necessary clear up to a 266. Any ideas anyone? Greedy, aren't I?

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I've ordered the Spectra 333 from Evergreen. I'll post results/questions soon.

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Folks: BIOS_1.00.09 & Win95_4.00.95B My third upgrade report: This time success and failure. First, I easily upgraded vidram to 2_megs with a small but noticeable effect on sys-speed. Then - and now - I crashed and burned trying to install a digital USB_VidCam ( Etronics_EZcam ). I discovered my USB_ports were disabled in the BIOS, and I cannot get that "advanced" setp screen to change any settings. Further confusion ... at the alt.*.packard-bell newsgroup the consensus is not to try getting ANY USB_function working under ANY vers on of Win95 !!! There are total-system-disaster events recounted just in that USB_enable attempt! But explicit counter-examples exist even with the USB_Vidcams, so I am willing to take a shot - but I'd sure like input from anyone who might have tried/be t ying the same Vidcam installation ... I think the mb_version, BIOS_version and Win95_version are all crucial , as well as perhaps the KEYBOARD !?!

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OK folks, second round of the ungrade saga. I had previously upgraded sys_mem (16-32) and replaced the combo modem_card with a US Robotics_PCI_56K and SBlaster_16. Many thanks to Ray and all on Ray's PB_site, and especially to those who emailed with comments and suggestions. I run Win95B_4.00.1111 with AMT_BIOS 1.00.09DNOR and NO BIOS upgrade was required. Yesterday I replaced the OEM-CPU with an Evergreen_Mxpro_200 "kit" (CPU+fan). Looks like the installation came off with no major problems. Interger CPU_ratings are up by 30% and graphics by about 110% ! Probably the toughest parts of the installation were getting off the heatsink_clip on the 133_CPU ( push hard on the top at 'flick' the end with a screwdriver) and changing the J1F2D_jumpers (use a "photograph" or stiff sheet of paper as a guide ) I had to gently use a "puller" on the 133_CPU to remove it from the ZIF_slot, but then the Evergreen "kit" just dropped right in. One funny thing ... after I finished the installation, my WWW_access programs - OPERA, NETSCAPE and WS_FTP all hung after the reboot. A second reboot solved the problem, but I have no idea what happened initially. VidMem upgrade is next ( two 256x16 chips on the way ) then ... VidCam installation ( $50 at CompUsa ) and then ... I'd love to go up to a 2.1 gig master HD, but that's really in the future.

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This box has gone through about every kinda upgrade you can imagine, CPU(OC and replacement) RAM, HD, I/O cards, but the one story that seems the most intresting or risky is when i upgraded the video memory. I couldn't find the upgrade memory anywhere a a reasonable price so i forgot about it for a while, untill i was working on an old IBM 386 which had the connectors busted off the back so it was basically useless. I noticed that the video memory on the motherbard was the same size as the socket on the packard bell. I proceeded to use a large screwdriver to bust the soldered-on video memory off the 386 mobo. I had too look around the room for the chip because they flew off. I then straightened out the pins and put them into the expansion sockets on the packard bell mobo. I booted it up and it worked fine. The only problem is that i have to run 1024x768 in interlaced mode to use 24 bit color.

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I am trying to add an OEM U.S. Robotics PCI modem and having problems. It is not recoginized after running the software. Do I need to uninstall the original modem/soundcard? I have uninstalled the original driver, tried different Com ports. I do get one o those yellow exclamation marks in Device Manager under Port. Any help would be appreciated.

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I inherited this computer from my father. It originally had very little to get excited about, but after I got the machine, it needed upgrading. It simply could not handle Win 98 and Internet applications well enough to be effective. I have upgraded to 0MB RAM, added a Diamond SupraExpress modem, a Diamond Sonic Impact S90 sound card, and the latest thing from Evergreen Technologies, the Spectra 400. It is like a dream come true. Well, almost. Everything performs very well, and was relatively inexpen ive vs. the price of a new computer. I got all this for about $400, whereas my father spent about 5 times as much on a new computer. This was THE way to go for me, since as a college student, money is tight. Additional RAM and the new processor have dr matically increased the usability of my computer.

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I am attempting to replace my 840 MB Western Digital hard drive with a 8.4 GB hard drive. The auto setup seems to find the correct drive, but the hard drive is totally inaccessible. The DataLifeGaurd setup program that Western Digital suppies does not appear to access anything on the hard drive. I'm pretty sure all my cabling is correct. I am running PhoenixBIOS 4.04 and AGOURA 1.20.

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Any info on low cost upgrades,ie cpu, motherboard, hard disk. Thanks, Dave

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I have a Packard bell 4610 .I would like to know what I can do to upgrade my system to make it faster on the web.?Ive changed the modem to 56k and added 8more meg of ram taking me to 32meg now. Am I running too much in the background and How will I know if I am?..confused mabey but not really that stupid!! please email with your suggestions....Thanks

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Upgrades include: to 72 mb ram, 166mmx proc. Best Data 56k pci modem win 98 1 mb video ram. Further upgrades include: McAfee office 2000 (includes speed and performance benchmark software), 233mmxtreme from Zerus, and cordless mouse. System now runs at 99.4 mhz. Still would like to find ways to speed up to full 233 without Powerleap. Zerus says that the processor has built in Clock Multiplier that overrides mobo swithces. Is this true? Also bought Microtek parallel scanner that powers from 12 volt "w ll wart". I hate wall warts. I installed 1/4" 2conductor audio jack into slot plate and wired it to pc's power supply 12 volt out. Now when I hit the switch on my cpu, everything roars to life at once. This soltion also avoids the message box at startup " an't find scanner device". The cost of all these items is teetering on the edge of a new computer cost, so I am trying to tweak internet speed without $$$. What was this I heard about running a line "directly to the phone box from my modem"?? Does this do any good to speed up? T anks to all for overclocking and other advice, it gave my Hillary new lease on life. One more thing.(not an ad.) Be sure to buy at Staples for all periph's and software. THE BEST prices and THE BEST service. I don't work there but I do Buy there first, and have had great experiences every time. Their customer service regarding rebates a d such is awesome. Thanks again, Edsie.

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Over the past year I have made many upgrades to my system.I installed the Powerleap Pl-ProMMX PLus adapter with the AMD K62-400 CPU,I increased the Ram to 72MB.I removed the original sound card fax modem combo and installed a SB Live Value card and a 56K odem.I replaced the 1.2Gig with a Maxtor 20Gig HD.I also installed a D-link PCI USB Upgrade card. All these upgrades went together without any problems.I went to use my printer the other day and it would'nt work. I tried using a different printer and new ables, I also tried using a parallel to USB printer adapter. It seems like the parallel port on the motherboard is'nt working.

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I just bought this Packard bell in July of last yr It was running fine when I Bought it,It had w98 on it.But,I was having problems with not enough space on my hard drive seagate 1.6g.So I bought a WD 4.3g and reistalled w95 no software for w98 I had no problems with that I'm running w95 right now. I was having a problem with the oem sound,but I bought a SB16 and that's Ok now. I'm in the process of installing an ATI Xpert 98 Video accelerator and the instructions said to diable the onboard graphics,that I'm not to sure about. Need help. also I'm in the process of upgrading my CPU to a 233mmx intel,I have the CPU I'm just waiting on the univeral voltage adapter from Concept manufacturing.My question here is,are there any jumpers that I'll have jump and my BIOS will it have to be upgraded,My BIOS is Megatrends 1.00.7.BYOR I just started messin with computers about the 6mo.ago so I'm still a rookie. Send me and Email If you can help,Thanks all. Bernie

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First, many thanks to Ray, and to various posters on this site. I would never have started a system upgrade without them. In the last week I have made three separate upgrades: 1) installed 2-8Meg Simms to bring my ram to 32_Megs. I'd say, this alone doubled my computer speed. I bent some clips, because of the tight fit, but finally got them seated. 2) ripped out the combo soundcard/33.6 modem and: a) installed a US Robotics 56K_data_fax_PCI modem (non-Win). b) installed a SoundBlaster_16_ISA sound card. Neither installation went according to the "book". In each case, Win_95B refused to auto-run the CD installation program, and even refused to recognize all the files on the 3.5 US_Robotics floppy. I did a lot of backtracking with nasty "corrupted install" error messages glaring at me from the monitor. But actually those messages were mostly BALONY ! To make a long story short, whatever you do during installation of either hardware product, when Win_95 asks for the location of a file, point it at the CURRENT installation disk, whether floppy or CD. Even if you have previously told Win_95 where to look !!! All you need is on those disks. Both devices now run perfect ( except the US Robotics install actually CHANGED some of my Netscape configuration files - I fixed that ) Next!!! A video-memupgrade to 2-Meg, perhaps a second HD ( my OEM 1.2 gig has MUCH not-replaceable stuff ) and maybe a shot at the 233_CPU_kit. I'll need to work up the guts for that, especially if I need to change my 1.00.09 BIOS. Thanks again, to all on Ray's site.

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My most recent upgrade has been to replace the fan. The original one was making quite a bit of noise so I decide to replace it. Radioshack sells a 77mm (3 inch)DC Brushless Fan, 12 volt DC input for about $30 (Canadian). The surprise was after I got ho e and found that the end of the wires were bear, there was no way to connect these wires to the pins on the motherboard. This meant a return trip to Radioshack. After explaining my situation the one of the employees pointed me to a piece an adapter cab e for connecting old 5 1/4" drive to 3 1/2" disk drive (76.2 mm (3") Disk Drive Power Adapter Cable, Part No. 278-765B). Once I returned home I needed to cut this cable in half strip the ends of the wires for one end (this is the end that fits on the pi s on the motherboard) and then attach these wires (with solder (optional) and electrical tape, match the colour of the wires from the cable to the fan). Once this is done the fans fitted into the computer housing and the wire connected to the pins on the motherboard.

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Does anybody know how to add memory to THIS THING? It shows only 8 for 32MB chips or 16 for 64. I already upgraded the BIOS from 1.23a to 1.25I. It did not help. Any ideas?

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So right of the bat, I'll admit that I'm a Tech Head. I use a Pentium II Xeon mega system - 450Mhz,Dual 50GIG HD's,500MEG Ram, ect,ect...... You maybe are asking yourself what I'm doing on this board, Well last year I started building Celeron 433 systems to give to disadvantaged kids and that just got too expansive(there are MANY disadvantaged kids out there)and I was going to stop; untill las week when somebody dumped a truck load of these Packard Bell systems on my door step, and what an adventure thats been!!!! These are great little machines, I love 'em. So here is the upgrade story: Each system was identical: PB450M+ motherboards, Intel 486/dx2 50Mhz processors, 500MB HD's, network and modem cards, 2X CD ROM's and conner tape backups. 1- Upgraded to 450M+ PnP 1.1a from release 1.17 2- Upgrades to Intel P&P BIOS extensions 1.1u 3- Upgeaded PhoenixBIOS 4.03 to PhonixBIOS 4.05 which solved most of the problems with IDE controlers 4- Upgraded to 64Megs RAM with only mininal Problems 5- Formated all the 500Meg HD's 6- Removed the tape drives and added 1GIG HD's 7- added legal copies of Win95 and a good libraryofpre k-second grade educational software and BOOM!! 15 excelent systems for the price on one Celeron 433, One week now and complete, ready to deliver. Three cheers to Packard Bell and all of you who keep this forum on the net, so guys like me can surf the net and find all the info we need to do asks such as this. I bid you graditute for the information you provide and wish you sucess in all you indevors. Zannath-paaneah

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CAN ANY ONE TELL ME IF I CAN UPGRADE TO A IBM 6x86L PR200+ cpu 150MHZ 2.8v core NOT SURE ON CPUV SETTINGS OR J5J1-J5J2 SETTINGS

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Hi, I am trying to add RAM to this machine for a friend...it was hard enough to get the cover off of the tower (haha), but now I see 4 slots that look like they could be for memory...although 1 has the usual slot where you add it sideways and then stand i up...the other 3 appear to lay flat...I've not worked with this before and they seem to be all over the motherboard...would anyone have a manual that they could scan the page on upgrading the memory on this tower? or know of a manual on the web? I've s arch PB website and here and nothing...She (friend) doesn't have the correct owners manual as her PC crashed and this was a replacement back then. TIA, Chris

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I found Rays' site to be very helpful when upgrading this computer. I really thought it just couldn't do anymore than it was already doing... I was wrong! I upgraded the CPU to a Pentium 200 MMX without needing any kind of special adaptors or anything, ust some minor jumper setting changes. Also, upgraded to 32MB of EDO RAM, replaced 10X CD-Rom with 24X one. Added a 10Mb/s NIC which replaced a 14.4Kbps Modem. I'm still not done adding and replacing things in it yet, but it's be a much better workstat on than it was before!

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Would first like to thank you for the information I have received fron this website. I was getting ready to go out and buy a whole new motherboard, but am now definately considering a PL. I have upgraded the PC to 48MB RAM, 10.2GB Western Digital UDMA HD had to install the EZBIOS that came with the drive), a Mitsumi CDRW (4X4X24) and a Voodoo2 16MB (pass-through). Works great now that I have my swap files setup on my old HD (2.1GB) with min 250MB and max 400MB size, but guess I still need a little speed t play some of the newer games. Hopefully will get the PL233MMX upgrade.

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hi. whenever i try to play directx games, the movie portions are blurry and in about 6 parts. it's so bad i'm lucky if i can find which cursor is the right one to click on the right exit button. i have a win4 modem which i assume is the problem, or my vid o card. anyone have this model PB and can suggest what i can do? i'm hoping a download of driver or something rather than opening up the computer :)

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First upgrade was more memory, added two 32 MB EDO SIMMS for a total of 80 MB-easy, no problems. Installed Maxtor 8.4 GB hard drive as slave to original Seagate, no problems. Upgraded video memory to 2 MB, a little tough to push chips into sockets. Rem ved Sound 3 sound card/modem and installed 56k Sound 4 sound card/modem from PB with v.90 upgrade, no problems, very easy. Flashed BIOS to version 1.00.12DNOR, no problems. Upgraded CPU to P233MMX on Concept Mfg. adapter, very easy. Disabled on board S3 ideo and installed ATi Xpert 98 8MB PCI video card-disable was easy thanks to Rays Site and info from the posts on it. Had a little trouble getting video drivers installed, but was sucessful-you *can* upgrade the video on this board. This is our first c mputer, I knew nothing about them 3 years ago. I have been reasonably happy with this system and have learned alot, largely thanks to this site. Too bad my particular 680 board does not have L2 cache. I *would* like to know how all you 680 owners are us ng all your expansion slots. This 680 is in the 4X4 desktop case and the riser card has 2ISA slots, 1 PCI slot, and 1 PCI/ISA "shared" slot. I can't install long cards in the 3 lowest slots (closest to the motherboard) because they will hit the CPU heat ink/fan! The Concept CPU package is very low profile, much shorter than a Power Leap?

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I have a problem. Some one put a password in my administrative password slot and set it to limited use. My floppy wont work because my son killed it. Will replacing my floppy and restoring windows 95 work or do I upgrade? This is probably better any way with the 800 mhz computers and 40g drives out there now. Help!!! I also purchased windows 98 and a superdisk drive. Windows 98 gave me fits so i unloaded it and I cant load the superdisk with out my floppy and password locked.

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First upgrade: Added memory: Bought a 32 Mb upgrade EDO RAM kit from CompUSA. Per the PB site, this type of memory had to be loaded in pairs; this kit consisted of 2 cards each with 16Mb on them. On opening the case, I found that all 4 slots were loaded, ach with an 8 Mb card. Therefore I had to remove 16Mb of my memory to add the 64, yielding a net 48Mb. PC recognized the 48Mb just fine. Second upgrade (Aug 99): Bought W98, SE, and upgraded over W95. Having heard tales of woe regarding not having secority codes or some such for fresh installation, I did the "overlay" method. This proved to be a very painful process. The installation st lled many times before, sometimes rebooting spontaneously, sometimes halting. After some tweaking (I have 15 pages of notes from this joyous experience), W98 installed and the PC ran. Then ensued a lenghty period in which I atempted to get various device to function (CD; sound; printer). I tried lots of things to fix the various problems, device failures, etc. In the process, I upgraded the BIOS to version the 12 for this motherboard (that version had not worked for me under W95). In the end, what worke was going to the Device Manager, finding a device that was not working (even when W98 may have said it was working), "installing new driver", then forcing it it use the old driver file I used under W95. I would have had no clue which these were except t at, in my paranoia, I had printed out the system configuration before starting any of this (the "print" button on the device manager panel). When the installation was done, all devices seemed to be working, but there were a few device warnings. Third upgrade: Bought a 64Mb EDO RAM memory kit (2 32Mb cards) and a 13.6Gb Maxtor "Diamond Max Plus" hard drive. The memory addition required removing 2 8Mb memory cards, and left me with 96Mb. No problems with this installation. The hard disk was an ther matter. Physical installation was relatively easy — the cables fit, thankfully, to install it as a slave on the same IDE cable as the 2.5Gb original hard disk. The Maxtor software came with a program called EZ-BIOS which, it would later turn out, wo ld have allowed recognition of all 13 Gb, but knowing nothing about it, I was reluctant to install a 3rd part BIOS, so used FDISK, which could recognize only 8Gb of the disk. (Later, after finding more about EZ-BIOS (it supplements but doesn't replace the normal BIOS), I redid the formatting using it and got all 13Gb on the disk). On rebooting after using FDISK, W98 "found new hardware", then proceeded to scramble many devices (sound, CD, etc.) as before. Had to change some of the drivers back again. I lso ran into a lot of "MS-DOS Compatibility Mode" errors related to PCI Bus Mastering and involving the disappearance of the all hard disk and CD device drivers. These problems were resolved using info gleaned from Ray's PB, Intel's, and Microsoft's site . I tried enough different things that it's hard to say exactly what worked and what was a dead end. With experience, though, this generated only 4 pages of notes on these tribulation. Everything works, now, though. When W95 or W98 is working, make and keep a copy of your system device configuration. You never know when Windows will discover "new devices" (real or imaginary) and improve your system into non-functionality.

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I added 16MB of edo ram, a powerleap 233, SB16 and an ati xpert98 over a period of about a year after I had the machine about 2 years. I used this for about six months and noticed an improvement in performance but decided to build my own system as follows. Soyo 6ba+IV atx MB,Iwill slotket, SB512, ATI Rage Fury, IBM 14MB Ultra DMA66 HD, 256MB PC100 CAS2 memory, 56X CD ROM ULTRA33, Celeron 366@577 and a full tower/w 300W power supply. I built this machine for $900. It would have cost me $600 to upgrade the packard bell all the way. I wish I would have never pent a cent upgrading th PB and used my funds toward the new machine. The celeron /w heatsink cost less than the powerleap 233. All I can say is don't waste your cash upgrading a PB. If you can upgrade a PB, you can build your own machine.

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When I put in 2 new DIMM's the system only saw 25% of what I had installed. Any ideas?

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I have tried to increase the ram but with no luck. I took it to a locale shop and they put in a 64mb sdram chipset but it only recognized 16mb of the 64mb. Since the website is closed for tech support and their store is closed, I can't get any info from t em at all. Any help at all would be a great help.

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Well thank's to Ray and his site. I have recently upgraded my Legend 1540 S with a 8.4GB hard drive, 32MB EDO Ram, Mitsumi CD-ROM, Sound Blast Live Value, not to mention the best two upgrades. The first was a 56K modem from Archtek (smartlink the best thought was the Power Leap K-6 III 400Mhz The difference is amazing. Thank's RAY. Great name by the way. Even though the adapter needed a Mr. Bios to work in the 680MB. No problems installing and total time with CPU and Bios about a half an hour. Thank's for all the help RAY and other Pack Bell o ners for there stories and opinions. Without them it would have taken me a week and a half. Thank's and Hope I can help some of you someday. :)~

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I need help with the following if anybody have any suggestions. I installed a new CD-Rom Drive, Memorex 40X, but now my restore disk do not want to recognize the Rom drive. How do I correct this problem? Without this I will be stuck the next time I need t format the hard drive. Thank you.

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I see no mention of the Zerus MachZ-400 upgrade module, so I'll put in my two cents worth. The Zerus module runs great! I have upgraded the BIOS to Agora Rel 1.20, set the jumpers on the mainboard to 133MHz (maximum,) and installed a new, VooDoo3 2000 video card. Lastly, I added an Ultra/66 IO card, to take advantage of the faster hard-drive I ut in last year (BIG improvement.) Performance tests indicate extremely favorable marks, compared to other, big-name 400 MHz machines. I highly recommend the Zerus module. For the price (~120,) it was well worth it. Problems encountered: I had an older version of MSCDEX running from my autoexec.bat file. Get rid of it. Windows doesn't need it. It is now painfully obvious that the CD-Rom player is too slow. I'll probably get a faster one. Having added memory (8Megs onboard + 32Megs) years ago, I may boost that now to at least 64Megs.

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This is my first computer after having the famous Commodore 64K! I used my Packard Bell for all my years in College doing Web pages, Database, all the good stuff... My first upgrade was Win95a in 1996, then I ugraded it to 72MB of Ram to be able to do som Visual Basic designs. In 1997, I added a 33.6K modem for faster Internet connection. Then my major update was in late December 1999, I bought a new CD-Rom 48x with cache memory (makes it faster), I replaced my 1.2GB Conner with a Western Digital 4GB (wit EZ Bios), I made a Win 98 SE fresh install, I have also upgraded my video memory to 2MB, my Ram memory to 128MB, I have added a 100MB internal Zip Drive, I have replaced my Intel Pentium 75mhz with a 133mhz, and finally removed the combo sound+modem card for a ESS1868 sound card! My next upgrade could be either a 56K modem or a network adapter card for my own network or for a cable modem connection. My next major upgrade will be either a complete new system or a new motherboard ( I do not believe in overd ive, once a mother board is too old it will always be a bottleneck). Anyway my Packard Bell will stay with me as a workstation on my network for games. Well I am kind of attached to it! Thank to Ray's Packard Bell Web Site, it was a great help!

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We've had a lot of "little" problems with out system. So I get really leary of messing with anything. First off, anyone have any ideas how to get this darn thing to take a Internet explorer upgrade? PB supplied it with their version of Microsoft Internet Explorer 2.0 (4.40.516) . I can't get it to take the new program and am having a really hard time getting around the net on this one. The only upgrade we've made so far was to add to the RAM giving us 32 MB. I've also added another printer port. My kids like to play comuter games so I am open to any suggestions from all you experts, on how to upgrade my system.

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my first upgrade was to ad 8 megs of ram, later to add more for a total of 72 megs. next was the modem; upgraded to a us robotics 33.6 then to a 56k. i then had to replace the soundcard, seeing as the packard bell soundcard is not soundblaster compatible and wouldnt work with any newer games, so i added a soundblaster 16 card. i then replaced the original 4x cd rom drive with a 32x and added an external iomega zip. my most recent upgrades: i added a voodoo3 2000 video card, and the greatest improvement of all was to get rid of the packard bell motherboard and replace it with an epox mvp3g5 with 2meg cache and an amd k6-2 533 processor. my only complaint now is that the maxtor 1.2 gig hard drive from the packard bell is too slow and it slows the whole system down, so my next upgrade will be a western digital udma/66 7200 rpm hard drive, and lastly a new monitor. i will then be rid of every packard bell component. of course my packard bell will still come in handy. maybe i can use it as a nice door stop. to any others out there looking to upgrade your packard bell... the the best upgrade you can make is the motherboard. you can get a new one for around $100 and a new processor for less than $100. if you need any more advice or opinio

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Upgraded my ram from 16mb to 48mb and added a Voodoo3 2000PCI video card. also i'm going to upgrade my BIOS to MrBios and my Processor to a Powerleap AMDK6-3 400mhz.

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I just got rid of my quad 4 speed CDROM and upgraded to a 56X magic spin. It has 8,400/sec Max 80ms average seek time @1/3 stroke. There web site is: http://www.iomagic.com/ All I had to do was install the diskette to install the driver and the CDROM worked! You have to delete the lines from your config.sys that call your system device mine was cr_atapi.sys its not needed its an internal ATAPI. The other thing I did was upgrade to 80MB RAM. I will take it to 128MB soon. Also onboard video RAM is on the way. I contacted MR BIOS to learn about updating my BIOS so I can go with a larger h rd drive. I also tweaked my menu speeds using tweakUI (power toys from Microsoft). I added some bat files to delete my cache and *.tmp files at boot up. I also deleted unneeded help files and zipped ones I did not need. I have a 133mhz upgrade CPU coming but since I read this site I may go even higher maybe to 446mhz if I can get it to ork. Faster internet time allows for more programing time!

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when I bought my computer it was CRAP!! the CD-ROM was shot, the floppy drive was shot,most of the programs were shot,first thing I added was ram 80 megs, 2.1gig hard drive a and 1 gig hard drive,44X CD-ROM a new floopy drive, a 56k modem,8 megabite 3D graphics card a AWE 64 sound blaster,and a 233mhz 3d now prosser,now it runs AWSOME!!!! if you need any help with your packard bell PB2951..E-mail me

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So far I have upgraded the Hard drive to a Western Digital 8.4 Gig, the RAM to 64 Meg, the Video card to a VooDoo3 2000 and the CPU to an AMD K6-400 with PowerLeap and I had to upgrade the BIOS. Everything has gone fairly well. I had a little problem wi h the BIOS upgrade. I had to upgrade the BIOS before the new AMD 400 would work. But once the adjustments were made with Unicore tech support help it really flys. Everything and all software seem to work. I haven't had any problems. It really makes a ifference with my machine. All together I've probably spent around $400. on upgrades.

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Added a Diamond Viper V550 as well as a Voodoo2 SLI. Also bought an Iomega 100MB Zip Drive,upgraded to 96MB RAM and added an Evergreen Spectra333.Oh yeah, did I mention that I had also installed Win 98?

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I'm upgrading a friend's PB600. First off, I don't know what the deal was with adding a new hard drive but the thing would not boot to save my life. When it finally did boot, I would get a hardware error. Anyway, I'm past that. I put the computer back together and now I'm getting a keyboard locked error message along with a "Unlock key switch" message. I haven't changed any jumper settings so I don't know why this is happening. Any ideas? Thanks

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This is not an upgrade story, but a desparate cry for help. A friend had problems with a PB Legend 11CD - he had all the original disks. Se we decided to format the hard drive, and start from scratch. Now, I find the Restore Diskette has some vital files (not sure which ones) which appear to be corrupted. The diskette is labeled "Multi-Media CD10 Restore Diskette PBMMMCD10 V. 1.0". Does anyone have this diskette, if so, could you zip the files on it, and send it to me at tech@ccrc.on.ca? Thanks a million! John <><

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I really like this site. Ok! I have been messing with my computer and there are a few things added. So here they are a logitech webcam(40.00), acer scanner(79.99), and an acer cd burner(160.00). All successful, but I have been thinking of upgrading my pu(highest for intel 233mhz mmx) as well so if anyone knows more then email me. I know that an AMD k6-2 400 processor is compatible, but what other materials do I need and please include detail explanations. Thanks!

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Well Over the Years I pulled out the 16x Cd Put in a 32x took out the Aztec sound card and modem put in a XG 64 bit 3D/wave sound card made by Yamaha a cheap 56x modem that connects at 50.666bps added a maxtor 8.4 kept the 2.1 was a slave add 80mbs of ram added a CDRW 4x4x24 drive Christmas of 99 well Then I killed it when i tryed to Upgrade the cpu with a Evergreen spectra 400 ,installed it a d it was over driving the monitor so it was 8 oclock on a Friday night figured I'd go back to the Intel 200 well it didnt restore my Bios And I couldnt find anyone to fix or would even work on it took it to 2 shops 1 charge me 31 dollars to say they could t fix it and the 2nd one was 21 dollars they couldnt find the Bios for it so I had it Stripped out on Friday 2-18 2000 Had My drives, modem, sound card put In a New Case with a AMD 450K6-2 3D now, with 64mbs sdram New MotherBoard, Video Card all for 300 b cks I think it was the Best way to go Instead of trying to Fix My Packmate 7590 it was a good computer I could have Waited a little longer to Strip it out But I feel like im ready for the Next 3 yrs Now and I can always go to a 533mhz or wait till 600 an 700 comedown in price and change motherboard and cpu again But By then I'll already have enough parts to Put One together Myself Good luck to all you packard bell owners ..I'll pop in from time to time after 3 1/2 yrs I do Know alot about Packard Bell

02/21/00 22:33:33

Name: stan	My URL: Visit Me
My Email: Email Me	When Purchaced: oktober 98
Original RAM: 32	Original CPU Speed: 233

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i've got a pb and want to upgrade to w98 how do i do that????

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I would love to know more about the source and process for upgrading the motherboard and clock speed of my good'ol 300CD -- now relegated to file server status. I have just found this site today and am intrigued by some of the stories I have read and wou d like to know more.

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I have the corner computer box. It came loaded with all the goodies of its time...PBTV4 card, FM radio card, 14.4AM modem fax S/R/V card, 4X CD ROM, Fast Media remote control and a 1083.8 MB Seagate hard drive. I found out the motherboard number is 181230 I have updated the CPU to 180 MHZ Zerus MMXtreme, the RAM to 64 meg, and the CD ROM to a Memorex CD-242E.

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My wife bought me this super machine, with FM radio card, PBTV card, and a combo 14.4 modem/3D sound card just so I would stay away from the computer shows. Well, I still went to the shows! I installed a 180 mhz add on chip, and additional 1 meg video ram & 32 meg ram. I later updated the ram to an additional 32 meg ram for a total of 64 meg ram. I operate my machine as a dual boot OS from Windows 95A to Windows NT server 4.0, works very well. This is still my baby even though I have three other fire breat ing dragons. Since this computer, I have taken courses in computer repair and MCSE. My next project is to upgrade the motherboard.

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I DID IT!! With lots of help from this site I dove in and upgraded my 5 year old jalopy. First came 72 more megs of RAM. Just drop in and go. Next came the Maxtor 13.5 gig hard drive. Kept old Hard Drive as slave. Next came windows 98, a 56K PCI winm dem, and finally a Powerleap K-6/3 400MHz processor. Had a little trouble with the Powerleap beacause I had the RAM crossed up in the wrong banks but got it going now. This machine is super fast now! The whole upgrade costs about $500. A load less the a new system and when I do go better, this will be fine to pass along to my children for school work. Thanks for the great site Ray!

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I have been trying to upgrade my memory and each time I have a problem with the upgrade. For some reason it is only reading a 32mb chip as 8mb. I am using the chips that are called for. Any suggestions?? Any and all help appreciated. Thanks, Warren

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I have updated this computer by adding extra ram (80mb now) and a 9.6gb hardrive (my original supposedly died shortly after. I have upgraded my BIOS to 1.00.12 and would now like to put in the fastest processor possible. Can anyone tell me which one tha is? I assumed it would be a Intel Pentium 200 mmx overdrive, but it seems as though others with the same original configuration have added faster ones. Can someone please advise?

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Clocked up to 100 mHz, still was too slow. Next added to total 40MB RAM, installed 233 mHz PNY Quick Chip, 4MB video card, added a slave hdd and windows 98, runs fast and sweet with NO problems.

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HELP!! Have a 680 MB so far have added memory, no prob...added 6.4 hd...no prob...added zip drive...no prob. added cdr writer...no prob (just had to get Y connector for all the power)BUT am trying to get this 56K V modem blaster installed and it had been BIG prob...I even went and got a Sound blaster Live sound card and installed it..didnt have a prob with that either. Can someone please help me with this? I did a reformat without the original sound/modem card...took out all cards to start fresh then add d the new sound blaster live and now trying to add modem. HELP =) thanx

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This computer is my girlfriends and I was so horrified by its 8 minute boot time that I had to step in and perform all the voodoo I knew.

1. I added a second hard drive so I could uncompress the first drive. The hard disk was actually the slowest system component and having it compressed made it worse.

2. I deleted all the Packard Hell real-mode drivers from the startup files that were leftover from the computers' Win3.1 days. I then applied I every Win95 tweak I knew.

3. I added 96MB of RAM which brought the system total to 104MB. Retweaked Win95 to exploit the new memory.

4. I reconfigured the BIOS to be more flexible for a Plug and Play OS. I also changed some settings to speed up the boot.

5. I installed a SB Vibra 16 PNP card and a Zoom PNP modem. Threw the combo card away and tried to forget its existence.

6. Added an Ati Rage Pro Turbo 8MB PCI card to get some decent graphics. Then convinced my grilfriend to buy a 17inch monitor.

7. Hard disk access still was crippling the system so I added a 2940U scsi card and a 4.5 gig Seagate Barracuda drive and a 24x cdrom. Installed Win98se cleanly to the drive. Configured it for optimum performance.

Note: At this point boot time had gone from 8 minutes to 1 minute on the dot.

8. Picked up a 120/133 overdrive on ebay. Installed it without a hassle. System now boots in 45 secs. Running at 120mhz.

Additional Notes: 66hz works fine with the orininal chip but not he overdrive. Perhaps I need to up the voltage too?
The PCI IDE controller will not function. Win98 says the BIOS will not assign it an IRQ. Not sure what I need to change in the bios to fix it. ISA IDE controller still works fine.
This computer works fine for MsOffice, Internet browsing, and everything else she uses it for.

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My experience with the PL-K6-III AMD 400Mhz upgrade. When I left off I thought the windows 95a timing patch from the Friendtech web site http://www.friendtech.com/FTKHome.htm didn't work. But it turns out that the Mr. Bios bios had defaulted my RAM to 5 ns. At a suggestion from Nate Dahl at powerleap I changed it to 60ns to match my RAM and it took right off. So after upgrading my bios to Mr. Bios., solving a drive recognition problem with help from Mr. Bios tech support, and using the PL-K6-III AMD 40 Mhz upgrade kit, I am now at 400Mhz on a PB 570, 430 FX chip set, formerly Hillary bios (BYOR) mother board. And I'm still using windows 95a. Sincerely, Brian Bitney bitney@gte.net

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This is my girlfriends system. I couldn't believe how fubar this system was. I applied a series of software/hardware upgrades and tweaks. Original Config: 1. Typical 520r with default cdrom, HD, video, processor. 2. Running Win95 original which was upgraded from Win 3.1 3. Hard disk was compressed. What I did: 1. Added a second (540 MB) hard disk and then uncompressed the first disk. Compressing a disk is the stupidest thing you can do. System then booted faster. 2. Deleted all entries in config.sys and autoexec.bat. System was loading the old real-mode drivers from its older dos/win3.1 config. System booted even faster and had more free mem. 3. Took out that hideous combo card and put in a true sound blaster PNP card along with a PNP rockwell based modem. This experience required me to go into the BIOS and reconfigure it for a more PNP config. 4. Put in an 8MB Ati Rage Pro Turbo PCI card. 5. Added a 17in .26DP Mag Monitor from Walmart ($239). Her family can't beleive the difference. 6. Got sick of hard disk access slowing the system down. Put in an Apaptec 2940U based card and added a 7200 RPM 4.5 gig barracuda drive and a NEC 40x max CD ROM. I installed Win98se to this drive cleanly and then applied all of my accumulated Win98 tweak . System now boots in 1 minute on the dot. Down from 8 minutes originally. 8. Got a pentium 133 overdrive off ebay cheap. Added it. Tried setting the bus speed to 66 but memory wouldn't count right. So, right now it runs at 120 and the system boots in exactly 45 seconds. Lingering Issues: 1. The 66 bus speed thing has me irked because it worked fine with the original processor. 2. The PCI IDE controller does not work right and Win98 tells me the problem is that the bios will not assign it an IRQ. Beats me. The SCSI card makes this a non-issue but I would still like to fix it. Future Plans: 1. I want to add a better 2d/3d card to the system. Something that will at least let the system play a few 3d games in 640x480. I have to figure out whether the V3, TNT2 M64, Savage, or Rage Fury takes the largest burden off the cpu. 2. Replace the 2x16 with 2x32 to max out the memory. Windows never has enough :). 3. Get a better scsi cable and run the hard drive in ULTRA mode. That's right, I'm running it in plain SCSI-2 right now and achieving a 45 second boot on a mercury based system with a high PCI latency. 4. CPU upgrades are a dead end because PowerLeap has discontinued their line for these. I wanted to try getting a CPU-less unit and then putting my Evergreen 400 upgrade into it, a combo CPU hack, hehe.

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First, I added two 32MB EDO SIMMS, bringing RAM to a total of 96 MB. Reaching inside the case was tricky since the memory slots were very close to the riser card. Next, I added a Voodoo3 2000 PCI video accelerator (16 MB video memory. I followed the in tructions from 3dfx and it worked great right away. I have also added the EZCam USB video camera from Ezonics. It works fine, too. My next projects will be to add a second hard drive, a Zip drive, and maybe upgrade the processor to a faster Socket7 device. My BIOS is still at the original 1.00.11.DN0R. Can anyone tell me what was changed in version 12? Thanks for a great reference site, Ray!

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Between 10/99 and 2/00; upgraded CPU to 233MHZ (overclocked bus to 66MHZ) using 233 Intel chip and MMX adapter; added 2x16MB EDO ram sticks (up to 72MB)Note: 4 slots (8motherboard+ 4 slots x 16MB); 2.1 GB Seagate HD (reformatted; installed Windows 98);52X CD-rom; HP8100i CD-rw;Creative Labs AWE64 Value sound card; Diamond Viper S330 PCI video card;Canon BJC4000 color printer. First CPU upgrade would not boot up. Replacement would boot up after a few minutes by pushing the reset button a few times. Instal ed Rain CPU cooling software. Biggest mistake was not installing Windows 98 first after HD install. Windows 98 much more compatible with hardware upgrades. Only problem now is that I think I have both (i.e. 2) PCI slots full with 56K SupraMax modem and ideo card; not sure how to add new Evergreen PCI motherboard card. Any suggestions?

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I changed the modem card with a US Robotics 56k sportser modem and a Sound Blaster Awe 32 sound board, added a Maxtor 27 gig hard drive and slaved the 6.5 gig hard drive, Voodoo3 2000 PCI video adapter, Powerleap AMD K6-III 400 adapter, Mr. BIOS upgrade, nd 96 meg off 66ns EDO RAM. Two extra fans. I first installed the EDO RAM. After that was in in place, I copied the settings from my old BIOS and installed Mr. BIOS and reset all of the settings. The new BIOS read the full capacity of the 27 gig hard drive. I did this because I use Windows NT 4. and it will not write into the boot partition if there is a 3rd party application (EZ-Bios) running. Only Win 95/98 enable this feature. I added the Powerleap adapter and it worked beautifully. After this was in place I installed the video card. I dr lled some holes in my case, used the old CPU fan on one side of the case and bought a new fan for the front side of the case to improve air circulation and keep the cpu and video card cool. It runs incredibly well. All of this I did for under $500 and it runs with more features then a new comercial PC. I did a stripe partition in NT to improve disk access and will be including duel boot capabilities for linux,Win 98, and NT Server.

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i want to upgrade MB (PL-LPX) (Power Leap) Non Chang case?

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I stumbled accross a deal on 2 complete PB systems at a thrift store where they had just been donated - $150 for the Legend 406CD and a Legend 204CD (486DX2/66MHz), both with PB 1412SL monitors w/speakers. I first replaced the 830MB HD with a 13GB Maxtor ($160). I partitioned the HD for FAT32 and installed Windows 98 (2nd ed) ($190). Then I replaced the 4X CDROM drive with a Digital Research 10X DVD/40X CDROM drive for $150. Then I replaced the CPU with a Evergreen Spectra 333 ($200). Then I added 1MB of video RAM ($14). So, $714 in upgrades has bought me a hummer of a system - I love it! It is ironic that when this system was originally shipped in March of 1995, I looked down upon PB as the "K-Mart special" of PCs. I did overpay a bit, and it was m own fault: 1. I screwed up the installed Windows 3.1 software when I was trying to fix video settings problems (the 800x600 problem) that cropped up when I loaded Windows 98 upgrade ($90), so I had to install the $190 version of Windows 98, as I did no have the original PB restore CD. Only later did I find out how to fix the problem with the 95util.exe download (postings on www.dejavu.com). 2. I bought the Spectra 333 from CompUSA because that was the fastest upgrade chip they stocked - I thought th t that was the fastest available. Wrong! A few days later I found the Evergreen web site (www.evertech.com) and saw that for the same $200 I could have ordered the Spectra 400. This has been an expensive learning experience for me (I will always scour he web first before I do any more upgrades!), but I still like the final result, especially because I will re-use the replaced compponents on other PC systems. The one thing left to do is to add a PCI 3D accelerator card, but I'll wait on that for awhile Unfortunately, that will entail replacing the original sound card, because I had to move the oversize sound card to the only PCI slot, at the top of the riser card, to clear the superstructure of the Spectra chip.

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I stumbled accross a deal on 2 complete PB systems at a thrift store where they had just been donated - $150 for the Legend 406CD and a Legend 204CD (486DX2/66MHz), both with PB 1412SL monitors w/speakers. I first replaced the 830MB HD with a 13GB Maxtor ($160). I partitioned the HD for FAT32 and installed Windows 98 (2nd ed) ($190). Then I replaced the CPU with a Evergreen Spectra 333 ($200). Then I added 1MB of video RAM ($14). So, $564 in upgrades has bought me a hummer of a system - I love it! It is ironic that when this system was originally shipped in March of 1995, I looked down upon PB as the "K-Mart special" of PCs. I did overpay a bit, and it was my own fault: 1. I screwed up the installed Windows 3.1 software when I was trying to fix vid o settings problems (the 800x600 problem) that cropped up when I loaded Windows 98 upgrade ($90), so I had to install the $190 version of Windows 98, as I did not have the original PB restore CD. Only later did I find out how to fix the problem with the 5util.exe download (postings on www.dejavu.com). 2. I bought the Spectra 333 from CompUSA because that was the fastest upgrade chip they stocked - I thought that that was the fastest available. Wrong! A few days later I found the Evergreen web site (w w.evertech.com) and saw that for the same $200 I could have ordered the Spectra 400. This has been an expensive learning experience for me (I will always scour the web first before I do any more upgrades!), but I still like the final result.

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My current system as of today has an Intel Pentium 200MHz MMX Overdrive Processor, 96 MBs EDO RAM, Diamond Stealth II S220 Video Card / 4 MB SDRAM, 3dfx 1000 Voodoo II 3D Accelerator Card / 12 MB's EDO RAM, Creative Ensonic AudioPCI Sound Card, US Robotic V.90 Modem, HiVal 40X max CDROM, Segate 1.7 GB Primary HD / Segate 1.2 GB Slave HD, Altec Lancing ACS45.1 Multimedia Speaker System, Visioneer PaperPort 6100 Flatbed Scanner, Windows95B OS.

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Was given this machine a few months back because the secondary ide was broke. I didn't care because I had a bunch of spare parts to install. First installed 2 Sticks of 32meg RAM for a total of 72meg. Had a APAC PCI video card with an S3/Virge DX chip & 4 eg RAM. No problem with the built in video system. Got rid of the 2400 modem and installed a Zoom Fax/Data model 2919. I had to go with this type of modem because I run Win95 and Linux on it. Installed a 8.4gig Hard Drive. Had to use EZBios to use the who e drive. Didn't mess with the BIOS. It already had the latest upgrade. Added another parallel port. Added a Sound Blaster Card. All the slots are used up. Installed an Acer CDRW 4x4x32 CD Recorder. It is slaved off the Hard drive so I didn't have to bothe with the broken secondary ide. I run a parallel Zip Drive on the first port and the printer on the second. And now for the grand finally. Installed a PowerLeap PL-ProMMX Plus! Adapter and got an Intel 233 MMX CPU and it really speeded up. On board clock speed can be set at 50 or 60 mhz so I went with 60 and set the Adapter to 3.5x speed for a CPU speed of 210mhz. If I try 4x speed the CPU d dn't like that and clocked at only 120mhz. All my upgrades went smoothly and painlessly with small investment in PowerLeap Adapter and CPU. I like to Thank Ray for this excellent site. It really helped me with info on this Packard as I didn't get any manuals.

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I bought my PB used to use at school (university) for my research. When I bought it came with Windows 95 but no software to run the soundcard. My initial upgrade was RAM doubling the 24 to 48. More recently I replaced the orginal 75 MHZ chip with the ev rgreen 200 MHZ. This took several hours mainly to run around town to get the little plastic jumpers. Next I upgraded the modem to V90, that was fairly easy. The last major hardware upgrade was the replacment of the 850 MB hard drive with a 13 GB hard d ive. This was about a 2 hour job. Even though I have only 3 bays in the computer I was able to keep the orginal hard drive as a slave by attaching it to the bottom of the case with velcro strips sort of between the power supply and the CD player. My fin l upgrade was installing Windows 98. The only problem I have had with this computer is with the 3.5 floppy I get the dreaded windows BLUE SCREEN sometimes writing or reading from saying DATA MAY BE LOSS or CANNOT READ DRIVE. I've tried replacing the flo py but this did not seem to do any good. I'm still working on that problem.

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Can anyone help?! My PC now has 48Mb ram, 10Gig HDD, Creative labs SB16 sound card and creative TNT 3D card, WIN98. All worked ok until I fitted successfully an Evergreen Spectra 400Mhz MMX (3D?) processor. The boot up is only successfull if I connect mon tor to motherboard. If connected to 3D card, the boot up gets 'stuck' on the BIOS setup screen, even though the PC continues to boot correctly. A colleague thinks that I need to disable the motherboard video somehow. Anyone out there with some ideas at al ?? Regards, Phil

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Upgrades accomplished to date: 1) now have 72MB of Ram, 2) Diamond Stealth S220 video card w/4MB video ram , 3) Mr Bios Update, 4) 20.4 GB Western Digital HD (plus the original 1.2 Gb and a 130 MB "trash" drive), 5) IOMagic 40X CD ROM, 6) Windows 98 SE (s ill having some shutdown and sound gremlins), and most recently, 7) Ethernet card to support Cable modem. I still have the original 17" PB monitor and the 16-bit SRS 3D sound system. Next upgrades planned are: 1) PowerLeap w/AMD CPU (haven't decided how far to go yet), 2) new sound card (any suggestions?) and 3) a good game card to run my NASCAR steering wheel and pedals. Even after all that the lure of new, modern machine is slowly creepin in...

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I had heard about the "quirkiness" (read "bad press") of Packard Bell computers, but heck, my wife and I were broke, but we had already had a Radio Shack card in good stead. But now comes the surprise. The PB911 is a dream. Standard Intel ZX chipset (a Celeron chipset that is PIII compatible), Ensoniq sound card chipset...excellent. Our system came with an SiS video card and a Lucent LT winmodem. All my upgrades so far have been software. I'd guesstimate a 50% performance increase just from dumping the PB drivers for chipset spec. I downloaded the latest chipset drivers for the 440ZX from Intel. I downloaded the latest winmodem drivers from Lucent for the LT winmodem, and I downloaded the latest soundchip drivers from Creative. As for upgradeability, I poked around and found that the PB911 is the most upgradeable PC that Packard Bell has made. If you want to pick up another PB before the marque fades into the woodwork, look for a system with the 911 motherboard. (7950's and 797 's)

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Is thier anyway to update the motherboard so that a soundblaster live sound card will work with this machine? Sound blaster tech support said my mother board had to be upgraded or the bios, to 2.1 or something like this, is it possible to use a sound blas er live sound card or did I just waste all this money on nothing? it uses a pci slot, and I am having major problems please if anyone has a idea let me know Im running windows 98 second edition

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Is thier anyway to update the motherboard so that a soundblaster live sound card will work with this machine? Sound blaster tech support said my mother board had to be upgraded or the bios, to 2.1 or something like this, is it possible to use a sound blas er live sound card or did I just waste all this money on nothing? it uses a pci slot, and I am having major problems please if anyone has a idea let me know Im running windows 98 second edition

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When my sister first asked me to install some games on her Pack Mate 4100CD for her kids I told her she'd be better off to just buy a new computer. I, like many who have worked with computers over the last ten years, believed that PB's couldn't be upgrade . After giving it some thought, I surfed the web and came across Rays PB site. Good thing. The '95 vintage PB 4100 is now cooking along nicely with 72 megs ram, a Powerleap PL-ProMMX AMD K6-2 400, ATI Xpert at Play 98 8mb video, Aopen FM56-ITU/2 56k mod m, Soundblaster 16 ISA, an additional WD 3.2 hardrive (now the master, left the Barracuda 1.0 as slave) and then topped it all off with a Logitech Wingman Digital 3D joystick. It all works just fine.

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Well it's been a big task but now it's completed. first I added 32 mb of RAM about two years back along with a new 24x cd-rom to replace my original 4x. then this summer I installed an evegreen 233mmx with 3d (that was far easier than expected) along with another hard drive 2.1 GIG (slaved to the original, and a Voodoo 3 video card. This chritmas Santa brought me a Sound Blaster Live X-Gamer audio card and a Rico CDR/RW (both installed with no glitches. So I basically have a brand new system. Only other thing would be a new BIOS, but the original one is working fine so far so... The only problem i'm encountering is a SNAFU on com port 4 (video) from wich I'll take Ray's advice and just disable the cirrus card (it keeps on detecting it even thought it's removed) and a com port conflict (no number just :"com port"). So along with my ASDL connection I am now a downloading/ playing fool and quite happy with my PB. P.S. Ray, If you have some more advice about the above mentioned conflict pls let me know... thnaks J-F Pelletier, Halifax N.S. Canada

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I have upgraded this PB 590 as follows replaced the CPU with a QuickChip 233MHZ/3D Now. Was very easy only needed to change a few drip switches. The BIOS reports on boot up 133 MHZ but verified running 233 MhZ. Changed the hard drive as the original faile after 3 years. Replaced with a Quantum 2.5 Gig only because at the time was running WIN95 and was limited to FAT 16. Now running WIN98 with no trouble. Increased the RAM from 8 meg to 64 meg. Also running slave from an older PB that I had chucked when th motherboard blew out from 1995. The slave is a Maxtor 812 meg from the old PB600 I had. Still working after all these years. Bought more video RAM increased to 2 meg. Replaced the combo sound card/modem to a 3d 16bit Drsound Card and a Zoom 33.6-56K mode . Dont bother trying to disable the combo sound/card. Just get rid of it. Have no PB software anywhere on the computer. Have tried to install a Magic I/O 3d video card on this computer but keep getting windows protection errors on shutdown under the old w n95 system that the tech dept could not solve. Am thinking of upgrading the BYOR BIOS but have seen no need other than the cosmetic problem of the incorrect CPU speed on boot up. I had two PB computers the PB600 and the PB590. Agoura was always trouble su but Hillary was more stable and to this day is running well.

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My syatem has the SND3 Sound card with a built in 33.6K modem. I want to upgrade to a 56K modem but since com2 is already in use I need to disable the modem on the sound card which is using com1. Can anyone tell me if I can disable the 33.6K modem and co tinue to use the sound card? If so how is this done? Thanks

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I need help making my computer software Y2K compliant. I have used the PB site to fix the BIOS and it tests "OK". Now I need to fix the factory installed software - Windows 3.11, MS Works, MS Money, etc. I can't find where to do that on the PB site. I am a novice. Can you point me to a site for the needed fixes?

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I have successfully overclocked my INTEL 100mhz to 120mhz. I tried 133mhz but the poor thing just kept trying to reboot. So 120mhz is working right now, but if anyone knows how to get 133mhz clocking to work please let me know, it would be great until I c n afford powerleap. Thanx all and thanx Ray.

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Added 32 Meg Ram, CD Burner, 8 Gig HD, and just put in an E$vergreen Spectra with 333 Mhz AMDK6-2 chip. CPU works great. System has AMBIOS 1.00.12 BBOR BIOS. The install program that came with the Spectra updated my BIOS and worked fine.

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I am trying to help a friend give a boost to his Packard Bell PC by initially increasing the RAM from 16MB to 128MB. According to the manual I can upgrade to a maximum of 128MB. The board has two memory banks with two slots in each. I have therefore remov d the 16MB and replaced it with four 32MB Simms. However, the PC will only recognise 64MB instead of 128MB. I have removed two of the SIMMS and it then recognises only 32MB instead of 64MB. The bios knows that the RAM exists in the slots and I have tried ombining the SIMMS in different banks/slots etc but still same. The machine is currently running WIN95. Can anyone help please ?

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My PB has gone through a number of upgrades. First was the CPU. I started with the Intel 125 overdrive, then went to the Intel 166 MMX overdrive and finally to the Evergreen Tech Spectra AMD K2/333 overdrive. 32 mb of EDO ram were added to the 8mb for a t tal of 40 mb, along with STB 128 Lightspeed 2.25mb 2d card and a Diamond Monster 3d card. I changed the soundcard/modem (14.4k) to a Shark Multimedia soundcard/modem (56k winmodem), replace the 2x cd-rom with an Asus 40x cd-rom and replaced the Conner 850 b hd with a Western Digital 2.5 gb hd. I added a Visioneer sheetfed serial port scanner, with no problem. When I tried to add a Mustek 1200III EP flatbed parallel port color scanner, it would not scan properly. I found that this motherboard claimed to hav an EPP printer port, but didn't. After putting in a Siig EPP I/O card, the scanner started working fine. I think the next upgrades to the system is to max out the RAM to 128mb and to add an NIC card so I can network it with the P2 400 system I built 1 1 2 years ago. My PB has been a great system, both to operate and to upgrade. I think I'll keep it a while. :-)

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I just got done installing a Voodoo3 2000 PCI graphics accelerator - thanks to being encouraged by your site and reader comments. The installation went SUPER easy, and the hardware works works SUPER FINE! I have also added a PNY 233 mhz processor, 80 me of ram, a 4.7 gig Maxtor disk, and a CD-RW. The machine now runs like a field mouse on coffee! Thanks again for your site.

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The main reason I am writing here is because I have just upgraded my CPU with the PowerLeap PL-K6-III/400 complete upgrade kit. My board does have the capability to run a 66MHz bus which allowed my system to run at 400MHz. The installation was very easy and went without any problems. I have been running the chip for one week now and have seen no side affects. I did install a Western Digital 13GB Ultra ATA 66MHz 7200RPM Hard Drive. I have added 72MB of RAM to give me a total of 80MB. My current video is now 2MB after adding one chip to the board. I ran the Wintune98 program and it stated I was running at 398MHz.If you would like to see the results I have saved them on my Hard Drive and will email them to you if your interested.

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The L 197 was the first computer I have ever owned, I think it is a great first computer, but the problem is, "I can't upgrade it too much". I have upgraded it to 32 megs of ram, and it works much better. If you want a computer for word proccessing or sur fing the web, the L 197 is a good computer. When I bought the machine, I did not know much about computing, but using the L 197, I gained more knowledge about computers. Now that I am interested in computers, I want to upgrade to something more high-end. he L 197 is a good computer start out with, I am considering another Packard Bell.

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The L197 was the first computer i have ever owned, I think it is a great first computer, but the problem is, "I can't upgrade it too much". I have upgraded it to 32 megs of ram, and it works much better. IF you want a computer for word proccessing or surf ing the web, the L 197 is a good computer. When I bought the machine, I did not know much about computing, but using the L 197, I gained more knowledge about computers. Now that I am interested in computers, I want to upgrade to something more high-end. T e L 197 is a good computer start out with, I am considering another Packard Bell.

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I had a compaq prolinea 4/66 (486 66DX2) with a Western Digital Caviar (yep) 1.3 gig HD, 24 megs of ram, SB16 with onboard adaptec SCSI, askey 33.6 voice modem, and finally a sony 8X CD-ROM (not necessarily in that order). First I got a AMD DX4 100. That till wasn't fast enough to listen to mp3's at full quality but at least now I could listen to them in stereo (with a 486/66 you have to choose mono and half quality). This has absolutely nothing to do with packard bell YET (I know, I know) Finally one of y friends had an old packard bell pentium motherboard (originally a pentium 75 that he overclocked to 90; then I overclocked it to 100). From what I have seen of the diagrams on this site, the motherboard is a hillary series. I got some memory from my sch ol so now I have 40 megs total (im only 15 and have geeky friends that hang out in the computer lab) I'm probably going to buy a WinChip2 200MMX next so I can play some 3D games and add the 2 megs of video memory. Great motherboard but I really had to sc ew the side of the case to fit it in (to wide). It looks kind of funky if you get to close but I have it on the floor anyway.

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Started with a cheap $800 (new) computer and added upgrades over time. Thinking that it may be time to get new system, but this one still works too good. Added 32mb RAM for total of 48mb. I liked the boost so much, that I would try overclocking. Runs fine at 133mhz, and added 3 in fan in front of case, and paper duct to direct air directly over heat sink. Tried going to 166, but got errors, and auto dro ped to 90 mhz clock, so I stayed at 133. Next year added WD 6.4 gig HD, kept old 1.2 gig as slave for backups. Haven't used it much since I added 2x2x24 CD-RW, kept the old 8x Goldstar installed too. Added 3-Com network card, and cable modem in 99, an love it. Thinking about Spectra upgrade with K6-2/400 chip for X-mas. Another $200.......hmmmmm. Maybe it's finally time to break down and get another system.

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Upgraded ram to 40 meg, added 56k fax modem, soundblaster 32awe soundcard and 333mhz k6 2 processor with Mr Bios. Everything runs great except I can't install my printer. Just give me some time... I'll figure it out!

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Rescued from basement storage.After installing new hardrive just to make operational I realized how ineffective existing system was.Added memory to total 80MB, 3dfx voodoo 3000 video card,3 com 56k modem and the best value added Spectra 333 CPU upgrade.Un elievable performance increase until I upgraded the cdrom to a Creative Labs 48x, by the time tech support got through with me I no longer had sound capabilities.I purchased most components at Buy.com but be forwarned do your research fitst as the website offers little product info and no tech assistance. PackardBell website was actually helpfull; unfortunatly found this website after completion.

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okay, this system was given to me by a friend who upgrades systems for the public. He assumed that it was pretty much unsalvageable... I took out the modem and replaced it with a 56k USR, removed the sound card and installed an ESS1868, and added a 2.5 g g HD. It now has a mere 20 megs and is running 95. I am leaning towards installing an ISA powerleap board to further enhance the system. So far it works wonderfully, If a little eccentric at times.

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Originaly upgraded ram to 32mg of EDO. Then added an 8.4 gig Maxtor hard drive with no problems. Next added Sound Blaster 16mg Riva TNT Graphics Blaster card along with a 17" KDS monitor. Didn't think Photoshop and Illistrator could look so good and work o fast. Just added Linksys 10/100 Network in a Box to link my 2 pcs. The new Emachine has a problem with Lanbridge Internet sharing software otherwise all is fine. Thinking about powerleap cpu upgrade next.

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About a month ago I upgraded my parent's Model M415 with PB 810 motherboard from an Intel Pentium MMX 166 MHz processor to an AMD K6-2/333 MHz processor. I figured out that if you put all three CPU core voltage jumpers ON (you have to buy extra jumper pl gs from Radioshack if you don't have extra's since the PB 810 only comes with one.), the CPU core voltage is 2.4 Volts (I measured it.). This is fine for the AMD K6-2 processors - some are 2.4 V and some are 2.2 V but all will work at 2.4 V. To combat t e extra heat, I installed a fan in the lower front of the cabinet - there is a snap fit fan holder there already. This blows air directly across the CPU and the core voltage regulator transistor heat sink. Since the motherboard only has two clock multip ier jumpers (you need three to get the 5x multiplier for 333 MHz) I used some wire wrapping wire from Radioshack (a couple of $)to run a jumper wire from the center clock multiplier jumper pin of the clock multiplier jumper closest to the front of the cas to the cpu socket hole for the BF2 CPU Clock Multiplier input pin. I then jumpered the motherboard for a 3x multiplier per the motherboard manual which the CPU saw as a 5x jumper setting because of the added jumper wire. It has been running great ever since with Wintune98 numbers close to 98% of average for the 333. Total cost was about $20 for the stuff from Radioshack. I plan to replace the CPU with an AMD K6-3/400 MHz when the prices come down to the $45 - $50 range. I didn't upgrade the BIOS, di n't even install the PB upgrade. The BIOS doesn't detect the CPU's speed properly (says 66 MHz)and doesn't know it's name but it boots fine (these are just CPU ID errors and don't affect performance - AMD changed the CPU ID scheme for this version of AMD K6 after the BIOS was made.) To get optimum performance I installed Powerleap's free CPU Control Panel software to properly enable Write Allocation and disable the Memory hole at 15M-16M which really does speed things up. CPU speed as detected by Power eap CPU Control Panel, WCPUID, and Wintune98 all show 333 MHz. e-mail me if you would like more information.

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Installed Powerleap's K6III 400 last night. Thanks Ray and Ernest. Will double the RAM and possibly add a bigger/faster HD later. Added a Monster Fusion board with 16 meg. last year. Very happy with both products. Also added Win98, but that's not really a upgrade in my opinion Can't wait to see Windows 00... Hardest part about the Powerleap upgrade was getting the old CPU fan off. The K6III kit is already fully assembled, just line up the CPU pins, plug the power cable to your power supply and fire it up.

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Somewhere along the line, I upgraded my RAM to 24meg, when really helped the speed. I'm considering the purchase of the Kingston 486/133meg upgrade processor chip. However, when checking the "Kingston" website it indicated I would need to disable the "clo k speed doubler(?)" and make some jumper changes on the motherboard. Unfortunately, I've long ago lost the manual with necessary motherboard diagrams/jumper settings. So, does anybody out there with the same PC model, happen to know what motherboard # I h ve? It would be greatly appreciated. Thanks P.S. Neither Ray's page nor Packard Bell's website have a downloadable manual for my unit that I can find.

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#1 Installed a 5.4 gig Maxtor hard drive (dma66).This upgrade doubled my computer speed. #2 Running 96 megs of EDO fast page ram.The most noticeable performance increase was in the 32 meg range. #3 A 48x cd makes things real nice when running cd's. #4 Just installed a Winchip2 (233mhz).System running at 233mhz. The Winchip2 is not intended to be the fastest running chip available it is the most bang for your buck. $100.00 - 30.00 rebate good til Jan 2000. Cheers & happy computing.

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This site gave me a lot of help in upgrading this system. Now let me tell you what I ended up upgrading for those who think there's no way to upgrade this system. From the original 545 MB HD, I upgraded to a Quantum 13 GB HD for just a $112. I needed t supplement my BIOS with a third party rider to be able to use all the 13 GB of the HD. Upgrade my memory to 88 MB. Ditched the combo modem-soundcard and replaced it with pretty decent Creative Ensoniq Audio PCI and a Modem Blaster V.90, worked like a c arm. The MOdem Blaster V.90 was a second buy. I first tried Yamaha 64bit 56K V.90 but it was too noisy. Now the kicker...just installed the AMD K6-III/400 with PowerLeap adapter and I'm zingin'...works very good...happy computing!!!

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First thing I did, I added more Ram. I went from 32mb EDO to 96 Mb EDO. Secondly, I upgraded my video card from the crappy S3 to a Diammond Monster Fusion (Voodoo Banshee w/ 16mb of ram), upgraded to windows 98. That was my systems confguration up to two eeks ago when I decided my computer could use another upgrade. Upgraded video card from a Diamond Monster Fusion to a Voodoo3 2000 PCI with 16mb of SDRAM. Added a creative Labs Soundblaster Live Value! Removed old Aztech Sound/Modem card from ISA slot and replaced it with a new Creative ModemBlaster (not a winmodem) 56K Flex/V.90 ISA. Installed 40x Memmorex cdrom drive as well as a 4x2x24 Memorex Cd-Rw and today I have just received my new PowerLeap PL-Pro MMX with a K6-2 400 mhz. Can anyone tell me the ho much will I have to pay for a new set of Bios? Also, I plan on adding a 10Gb hardrive or maybe a 12 Gb hardrive while keeping the old one of course.

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Based on the recent upgrades I've reached a conclusion. My system runs faster and its a lot quieter. I first became aware of this after installing the new sound card, which consume less resources. this became more apparent after replacing the old ISA winmodem with a newer ISA hardware modem which also consumes less resources. I can't wait to replace my Pentium 200 with the newer Powerleap Pl Pro MMX K6-2 400 and see how much faster my system runs. I'll keep you posted.

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First thing I did, I added more Ram. I went from 32mb EDO to 96 Mb EDO. Secondly, I upgraded my video card from the crappy S3 to a Diammond Monster Fusion (Voodoo Banshee w/ 16mb of ram), upgraded to windows 98. That was my systems confguration up to two weeks ago when I decided my computer could use another upgrade. Upgraded video card from a Diamond Monster Fusion to a Voodoo3 2000 PCI with 16mb of SDRAM. Added a creative Labs Soundblaster Live Value! Removed old Aztech Sound/Modem card from ISA slot and replaced it with a new Creative ModemBlaster (not a winmodem) 56K Flex/V.90 ISA. Installed 40x Memmorex cdrom drive as well as a 4x2x24 Memorex Cd-Rw and today I have just received my new PowerLeap PL-Pro MMX with a K6-2 400 mhz. Can anyone tell me the how much will I have to pay for a new set of Bios? Also, I plan on adding a 10Gb hardrive or maybe a 12 Gb hardrive while keeping the old one of course.

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When I bought my PB in 1995,only was going to use w/p spreadsheets etc.My brother who works for a computer firm, upgraded the ram from 8 to 24mb,and removed the double speed cd-rom and installed a 8x Sony cdu-31 model.This year(99),got on-line.realised th speed of computer and space would not cope.Installed 133mhz Quickchip,Pace56 external Modem,and due to problems with a faulty Comport(modem)the motherboard was upgraded to a DX4.The original Hard drive of 528mb was now not big enough,so I got the local c mputer store to install a 8.4gb Western hd,it is split into 4 1.98 gb partitions.Also at the same time increased the ram from 24 to 36mb.My PB still goes like a dream,itis fast for my needs.I upgrade the O/S from 3.11 to windows 95 not long after I bought it,and I am still very pleased with it all.