8 bit joystcik card in a 486?

[budbd]

Ya know, I might already know this answer, but am unsure. I once put an 8 bit joystick card years ago into a 286. Now, I have a unused "new" in the box 8 bit double joystick port card that I wouldn't mind putting in a 486.
I don't wanna ruin the card. Someone had already had an 8 bit ps 2 mouse port card in the machine in one of the EISA ports already, but no mouse of course(had to research as to what it even was, an "in port" card).

Maybe I can put the joystick card into the 486 I have mentioned into one of the EISA ports, even though it aint long enough to fit into the secondary portion of that port?

Wanna use my old 486 primarily for vintage dos games and other vintage software, but have no joystick port or card at present.

[GaryRouth]

Am I right in guessing that the double-joystick card is a full sound card with two MIDI/joystick connectors? If so, that seems like it should work OK . . . but I'm not all that certain.

The 8bit ISA slots are the same length as the first half of the 16bit ISA slots . . . but I don' t remember if you can use the half-length card in a full length slot [my inclination is to think you can - seems like there were some half-length modems around back then]

. . . might want to check around a bit more since my memory isn't helping much on this one
. . . Gary

[budbd]

Just so happens I just completed an installation of that card into the 486.
I used an old program to test the joystick, and it seemed to work in the test.
Unfortunately, it caused my mouse to not work anymore, and the computer could in theory install a mouse driver from a windows 95 cd(ASKED FOR IT IN THE ADD/REMOVE PROGRAMS PROGRAM IN WINDOWS 95), of which I have no cd, nor a cd drive installed. I did remove the joystick port then the mouse would work in win 95, but I have reinstalled the joystick port.

Can't quite figure out what went wrong. I did figure out there is a conflict with the joystick card and any resident program to run the mouse, and I do want to mention that I had already removed an 8 bit "microsoft in-port" expansion card, that at one time must have had a large conncector type ps/2 mouse installed into it, though this computer came with a serial mouse installed.

Oh well, I am thinking about removing the dvd drive out of my 333 mhz system and maybe try to get a mouse driver off of my windows 98 cd rom, or try to buy a windows 95 cd rom.

I had actually thought about installing 2x64mb ram chips, non edo, parity or non parity and a used modem, and a used cd rom, but haha, I think I should just stop right here and not waste any more money on anything else. Ya know, I wasted a ton of money(about $100) playing around with my old 333 mhz Gateway a couple months ago just to prove I could upgrade the old machine as a back up, and now more dollars might be in danger with the 486.

I don't think I can even get online anymore, with a 486, even if I had 128 mb of ram.
I did notice that as of 2002, someone had used America Online to get on the internet. I am sure there must have been a modem installed at one time, just like there must have been a cd drive installed at one time as well. Both likely went into a newer machine.

[GaryRouth]

Since it's Win95, you should have a good chance to be able to use both the joystick & mouse at the same time. Try entering Safe Mode and removing all mice you see listed in Device Manager. Win95's builtin mouse driver should be fine for the average serial mouse, and Win95 should redetect and install it on reboot.

The 486 might be OK on the Internet with a slimmed-down browser, connected to the Internet through a network card by way of a router to a cable/dsl modem. None of the major ISP's latest version bloatware would probably run on a 486 -

Good luck with your projects
. . . Gary

[budbd]

Haha, wish I did have cable/dsl internet, but no cigar on that, not gonna get it just for the 486.
I feel it is quite easy to upgrade the memory to 128 mb, see those for sale alot of places, even auction too.

Yeah, it would be nice to use the older version of MSN, it is pre-loaded on the 486. A person could possibly, maybe, use the internet with the older msn, if they allow it.

REmember, this is only for fun, I don't really need a third net machine. Likley I will only upgrade with an old cd rom and some more memory, and maybe a windows 95 cd purchase(cheap, or no purchase). Might be able to get all that locally for under $20.

Haha, I still need to confirm that both memory slots are actually working, cause I am only showing 16 mb of ram, when there is 32 mb installed. One stick is slimmer than the other, so maybe someone tried to install a laptop memory stick and it didn't work due to incapatibility.

[budbd]

Oh, also, forgot to mention, that when I get to win 95 screen with nio mouse, I AM UNABLE TO USE THE KEYBOARD ARROW KEYS ON THE NUMBERPAD as I did before the computer recognized a mouse eventually.

So what happens is that it is nearly impossible to navigate the screen now.

[GaryRouth]

Pretty strange about the arrow keys on the keyboard not working. Most of the time a standard keyboard either works or doesn't work at all. You could try removing joystick, mouse, & keyboard from Device Manager, shutdown/power-off/unplug, physically remove the joystick card, powerup/boot into Safe Mode, make sure any joystick/sound/mouse/keyboard references are gone, reboot into Normal mode - see if you have full functions on the keyboard & mouse after they redetect. They should. They'll both need to be standard devices.

You could try another old sound card (almost all ISA sound cards included the MIDI/joystick port), or simply see if on the 2nd try of installing the joysticks you can find in the setup a way to customize the interrupts to prevent conflicts. If you leave it to Windows to do this, you'll be in the "Resources" tab in Device Manager for the joystick. But many old ISA devices had jumpers to set a preferred interrupt and even I/O range.

. . . or try finding a different driver for the sound/joystick.

It always takes longer with older, undocumented boxes.
. . . Gary

[budbd]

This card is just an 8 bit dual joystick port arrangement. I think I will remove it so I can get into windows 95 at least.

I am thinking about borrowing the cd drive from my 333 gateway for awhile to be able to do things.

In fact, when I had first turned this thing on yesterday with the card, I had plugged in all the leds into the spots I thought they were supposed to go into as well, and the whole thing was so messed up that the system had a file saved to 3 1/2 disk just in case I wanted to "undo" something.

Other than that, there is a whole long list of drivers and programs I have to "press any key to continue" before windows 98 comes up, was always like that.

Really, that windows 95 on it is really corrupted.

[GaryRouth]

Yeah, you pretty much need a diagram to get the case connectors just right - unless they were kind enough to mark the board near the pins.

I've been mentioning Safe Mode a lot = you can clean up quite a bit of things in there. Next time in there, look through each category [but might want to leave the "System" category alone] and remove things that you know just aren't there anymore. Then try a run of that RegClean 4.1, if you haven't tried that yet = it's fast, easy-to-use, has an UnDo file, and is free http://www.download.com/RegClean/3000-2094-881470.html?tag=lst-0-2

Also in Safe Mode, visit Add/Remove Programs in Control Panel, and remove anything that you don't want, or seems to have been incompletely uninstalled. Then run RegClean after that, too.

. . . are the Win95 .cab files in the C:\Windows\Options\Cabs directory? If so, after things are operating on a bit cleaner level, you can give an over-the-top a try . . .
. . . Gary

[budbd]

Yeah, the board is marked, but some of the abbreviations don't match up. EVen some fo the wires are marked.
I have been in that win 95 safe mode several times when I shut down the computer improperly.

I am just gonna have to remove the card if I wanna do anything right now.