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RE: What expansion slot?

desktopstu — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 09:42:27 GMT

Ahhh the good ol desktop optiplex, ugliest compters ever made but great fun to work on.

If your motherboard has a short brown slot I may be able to help you with a wired LAN, ive got in my bit box an ultra rare optiplex lan card that is, to my knowledge, proprietry to opti's. Its not an AMR slot one but its sililar in size.

With regards to you going wireless, any PCi wireless lan card will do this. My old Opti used to conect to the net with a wireless card- so long as your operating system is reasonably new you wont have any probl;ems. I would not suggest trying this with windows 98, its just painful getting drivers sorted.

If your opti is the full sized one rather than the slimline pizza box type you may well find a pii only riser card, this has something like 4 or 5 PCi (white) slots and just one ISA (long black ones). i upgraded mine in this way and it worked fine. ISA are only any use for sound cards really.

You will find theres no AGP so your limited to the onboard graphics either Rage 2 or if its newer you may have TNT like mine or you can get a PCi graphics card. My Uglyplex has the following-

Intel 1400Mhz Tualatin cpu on dodgey looking adapter for socket 370
256mb RDRAM (the earlier ones were SDRAM)
20gb IDE HD
128mb FX5200 nVidia PCi graphics card
onboard LAN
ISA soundblaster AWE sound card
CDRW/DVD drive
Windows 2000

only it all stopped working a while ago and try as I might it just wont boot again :-( It started out originally as a socket 7 board that some long termers will remember me blowing up after trying to fit a K6-2 cpu in. Upgrade followed upgrade till i ended up with what I have now. a dead pute. But its been fun and educational, so go ahead and upgrade/tinker with it :-)

RE: What expansion slot?

Jason — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 16:10:47 GMT

Ah, I thought he only wanted an Internet connection. USB is fine for that, easily fast enough. I wasn't aware there was any other networking required. My mistake.

RE: What expansion slot?

RAMmer — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 15:13:40 GMT

Can't cable it! It is too far!

RAMmer

RE: What expansion slot?

ToRReVeZ — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 12:21:24 GMT

Try and cable it, you will regret wireless in the end. the only things wifi is useful for is phones and laptops, its far too slow to support any type of network.

RE: What expansion slot?

RAMmer — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 11:05:20 GMT

No it has USB ports just I thought using the card would make the internet a little bit faster.

I might need to get a USB hub though as it only has 2 USB ports. Using the Wireless USB thingy seems easier.

RAMmer

RE: What expansion slot?

Jason — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 08:38:54 GMT

I meant the original poster's PC, Dave, not your customer's. The PC I was talking about was my own use (still have it, as it happens) -- it runs Windows Me! Of course, the OP's PC might not have any USB ports...

RE: What expansion slot?

ricedg — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 00:25:20 GMT

Well I wan't going to let the customers PC on the net without at least SP2, and MS had the big blue star saying the same ;)

Installed SP1a (it had never been updated even that far, it was on dial up) and that took 2 hours (from a CD) even when I disabled McAffee.
Thought about SP2, then thought as they're going to be on the net properly they're going to have 100+ updates to deal with even if they aren't going to be offered SP3.

SP3 (from a CD) complained about virtual memory being low, so got it to up it automatically, then after 20 mins of "inspecting" I gave up and it took 15 mins to cancel :w00t:
Physical memory 256mb - virtual memory 512mb - slow old HDD - enevitable really.

I did have wireless networking via USB with SP1a (the £8.50 E-Buyer Plexus Wireless-G USB Adapter is rough round the edges software wise, but does the job well).
So yes, I do think you're missing something Jase, quite a lot of something.

There is no way that PC was going back to the customer with "it was working when I left it", which technically I could have done, but not in all concious.

RE: What expansion slot?

Jason — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 23:57:54 GMT

Maybe I'm overlooking something, but I've had wireless Wi-Fi working just fine on a PR300 Cyrix system (Socket 7) via USB...

RE: What expansion slot?

ricedg — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 23:39:30 GMT

[quote]Any chance of a free wireless networking card??[/quote]

I just tried adding a wireless network card to an Advent Celeon 1.1Ghz with 128mb of ram and XP.
Bumped the ram up to 256mb from the spares box (the maximum she'll go).
Conclusion?
Forget it...

RE: What expansion slot?

RAMmer — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 21:50:29 GMT

Had another look and yes it is a dial-up networking card but there is also room for a line-in a Mic and Speakers! The speaker one doesn't work though. I have another 2 3.5mm holes below that on the outside with a weird sign like > )) and (( < the speakers work in one but not in the other!!

Any chance of a free wireless networking card??;)

RAMmer

RE: What expansion slot?

RAMmer — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 21:42:28 GMT

Yes it is a Dell Optiplex GXa!!

I was looking for a wireless networking card!

RAMmer

RE: What expansion slot?

jools — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 21:29:06 GMT

I think that card in the bottom pci slot is a dial up modem...
The pci & ISA slots look to be on a dell style riser card (dell optiplex perhaps?) most optiplex's i've had the pleasure of working on have had onboard sound.

I doubt you will find any ISA cards about nowadays - i have a old soundcard & maybe a network card kicking around somewhere.

RE: What expansion slot?

shuggie — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 20:40:57 GMT

Hi, look for the date on the motherboard or the PCI card and you'll find it circa 1998.....:)

RE: What expansion slot?

RAMmer — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 20:37:09 GMT

:D:hehe::P! well it is an old computer! Thanks again!

RAMmer

RE: What expansion slot?

shuggie — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 20:35:54 GMT

ISA = Industry Standard Architecture.....old style slots......:)

RE: What expansion slot?

RAMmer — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 20:34:33 GMT

Thanks and what are the other slots I have never heard of them before??

RAMmer

RE: What expansion slot?

ricedg — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 20:33:18 GMT

Old style pci, not pci-e (they are the ones that are x1, x4 etc).

RE: What expansion slot?

shuggie — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 20:33:07 GMT

Only PCI-e slots have x4 and x16......:)

RE: What expansion slot?

RAMmer — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 20:28:58 GMT

just normal PCI ones not X4 or X16?

RAMmer

RE: What expansion slot?

shuggie — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 20:21:48 GMT

Would say 2 x PCI slots....white, and 2 x ISA slots.....black........:)

What expansion slot?

RAMmer — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 20:13:54 GMT

Can someone please tell me what expansion slots these are!! A sound card is attaches to the one at the bottom! (I THINK it is a sound card)