Look online, plenty of places that offer industrial computers still offer isa solutions. Too many companies still use them. They will cost a ton of money though but they are new made in China. Might get lucky at goodwill. They often have rare stuff. "Best Practices", Event viewer, host file, perfmon, antivirus, anti-spyware, Live CD's, backups, are in my top 10

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Flea markets Want ads Garage sales Computer recyclers in you area. Post here on C/N are read by millions as they can also be found doing a search on Google. So...if you can edit your post and just add in..I live in Country...State? County, Town I just bet you someone close to you has an old AT that they would be happy just to give you. Don't post name address or telephone #.

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There's salvage places like this: http://www.weirdstuff.com/cgi-bin/i... which sell old parts, but I don't know any place still selling a complete working computer like what you describe. I currently have a 386SX-40 motherboard which came out of a Lucent 'Partner' voice mail system. It is well made and in good condition. I was going to eventually just throw it away. Your welcome to it if you want to try put something together. I also have the parts to put together a machine like you described based on this motherboard. But, that effort would require some kind of compensation.

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Dear F.Schu - you have not advised where you are based, which would help. I am in Hammersmith, West London. The place to find such a machine, would be:- ebay/computing/vintage or the forums in:- http://www.old-computers.com Surely a 486sx or dx would also be good. You advisse it should include a 5.25" floppy drive - is this a must? As a matter of interest, please advise exactly what the full size card does, as I do not follow your explanation above. Good Luck - Keep us posted.

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phar_L... "If my answers frighten you then you should cease asking scary questions" - Jules Winnfield (Samuel L. Jackson) in Pulp Fiction

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I've got a mini 386 motherboard (and maybe a few others) here somewhere. I believe it's a 40 mhz. The cpu was onboard and not socketed so it shouldn't be in the way of anything. Do you have a case for it or would you need that too?

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What's this thing gonna do? Act like a plc to control some equipment? By full length card, do you mean something proprietary that fills the entire length of the case? Longer than a vl bus card? 1Mb of memory is a little touchy too. Old motherboards have either 640k or 1Mb soldered to the board and a motherboard with 30 pin memory slots would require 4 256kb chips...not sure if I still have a set. More common and much easier to locate would be 4 1Mb chips. Is the 5.25" floppy drive requirement for a 360kb or 1.25Mb capacity diskette? Some of us could likely help you if we had more information. Skip

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The 386 was the first 32-bit cpu. That, as well as its method of memory management, is found in 486s and pentiums. I seriously doubt you must have a 386 PC. I think you need at least a 386. Dos will run just fine on a P-I or 486. If the software you're using came out when the 386 was the most advanced processor then it's going to say that's what you need because there was nothing better at the time. It's going to be much easier to find or put together an old P-I than a 386. I hardly ever find 386's even at goodwill anymore. But as I said above, I have a few 386 motherboards. I started keeping 386 and 486 boards when I noticed they were selling for more on ebay than I could get for them as scrap.

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"I started keeping 386 and 486 boards when I noticed they were selling for more on ebay than I could get for them as scrap" Just out of curiousity, how much can you get as scrap? I usually wait until I've accumulated a fair amount of stuff, then take a ride to the local electronics recycler. He doesn't pay cash, but will offer other tested/working hardware (boards, CPUs, RAM, HDDs, etc) in trade. "If my answers frighten you then you should cease asking scary questions" - Jules Winnfield (Samuel L. Jackson) in Pulp Fiction

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I totally agree with Dave. Other advantages are onboard headers for drives, serial ports, printer, and occasional PS/2 mouse, audio or USB. Sure an easy way to free up 2 or 3 ISA slots for other cards. 72 pin or PC66 memory is much easier to find and cheaper. No add in card to run a 2X cd-rom. One of the in-laws brought me a 486SX25 with a fried vl bus. I didn't think I'd live long enough to find a replacement board and cards so it's now a P133/96Mb PC66 rig. Dos 6.22/Win3.11, NT4 Server and Win2K triple boot on 2 HDD/4 partitions. 2Mb video card now, 24X cd rom, 5.25 and 3.5 floppies, USB, network, modem, ESS audio and a replaceable battery! Total cost...not a dime. IE6 works swell on both the NTFS partitions with his cable internet service. Most important was being able to build and test it in just a month instead of stumbling over it until I died of old age. Only one of his DOS games needed the help of a slowdown program; all the other DOS programs work just like they would on a good 386. Skip

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I've been getting 50 cents a pound for motherboards and cards locally. I believe they then ship it to California. I'm sure they're worth more since that's been their price for about 10 years. But unless I find a major recycler elsewhere and crate it all up and ship it myself, 50 cents a pound is the best I can do.

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