Timtheloon's RiscPC 600 build

[Timtheloon]

Hello Retro Users

I would like to share with you a project I have had hanging around for quit awhile now but always seemed to get put on the Shelf.

I never own one of these has a kid but I remember when one appeared in my school, for computing classes we had the Acorn Archimedes A3000. so this was an amazing bit of tech for me back then.

I always wanted to re-live my school computing club days and play a game which only seemed to of been release on the Acorn Archimedes machine and that was Stunt Racer 2000 not to get mixed up with Stunt Car Racer. and finally this weekend I was able to and it was amazing.

I've purchase most of the parts from here and eBay and now I am a proud owner of a 2 sliced Acorn Risc PC 600 with StrongArm CPU (cant remember the speed but I know it an overclocked one.)

Spec

StrongArm CPU (324mhz)
Risc OS 4 (Purchase Open Risc OS for it just waiting for it to arrive)
256mb ram
2mb video ram
128GB IDE HDD
Ethernet adapter (need some assistance on setting this up just so I can transfer files to it easier
Aleph One DX4 100 PC Card (sadly I think this is faulty it seem to crash a lot when the machine has been on a while) @trixster I believe you have one of these card so I may be picking your brains soon.
Two Midi Card which I still need to work out and decide which one is best to keep.
Floppy drive and CD-Rom
Original Keyboard
Original mouse (these are a pain and one bugbear that comes with these machines it needs a special mouse or a PS2 adapter the other is no onboard Joystick port.

I'm really excited to learn more about these machine and the software that can be used with them and the hardware upgrades I can do already seen there is a 586 PC card

Pictures in attachments.

Other projects of mine you maybe interested in:

A500+:

Timtheloon's A500+ with A570 CD-ROM and TF536 Build​

A600:

Timtheloon's A600HD PiStorm Build​

A2000:

Timtheloon's A2000 Triple Processor Project​

A1200:

Timtheloon's Checkmate A1500 Plus (A1200 Build)​

CD32:

Timtheloon's CD32 SX32 Pro Setup with Cosmos Kickstart Mod​

Timtheloon's CD32 TF360 Plus ProModule Build​

A4KD & A4KT

Timtheloon’s A4000cr Alice project​

Timtheloon's A4000T Project​

Acorn RiscPC:

Timtheloon's RiscPC 600 build​

RetroPC

Timtheloon's Retro High-End AGP (HD3850) PC (Dual Boot WinXP & Win7)​

 

[trixster]

Superb! These really are amazing machines. I recall when they first got introduced into high school (before the first pentium pcs) and it felt like the future had arrived, especially with the pc card.

I have a single slice RiscPC 700 with 233Mhz StrongArm and 5x86 100Mhz PC Card, so I’d be happy to help you set that up if you need

 

[Timtheloon]

Yeah I seen you mention about the PC Card on Stardot this is how I knew you had one.

It is a big learning curve and how much I've forgot

 

[Timtheloon]

@trixster have you done any network file transferring with it yet?

 

[trixster]

Yes, networking is working fine using the etherlan600 NIC, both in RiscOS and Windows 95.

 

[a.mi.goun]

Nice machine Never had one, but I played Acorn version of Dune II on emulator.

 

[Timtheloon]

Yes, networking is working fine using the etherlan600 NIC, both in RiscOS and Windows 95.

OK I'll Need your help on this at some point

 

[Timtheloon]

Found the Clock speed of my StrongArm its overclocked to 324mhz

found the original for sale thread on here, bought from @keropi

 

[Timtheloon]

Looks like the Lark Midi card is more than just a midi

Lark Manual

 

[Amiga Forever]

In my Old school, there was BBC Mirco computer, Amiga 500(only one!) and Acorn Archimedes.

I had go on Acorn Archimedes as I was really curious of it and thought that if they were gaming machine and they would beat Amiga but it wasnt so.

They are release in 1987 and can do 256 colours on screen which mean graphics wise that they were step ahead of Amiga 500!

 

[Tuxbar81]

It's a really beautiful computer Tim !
Unfortunately, unless I am mistaken, never sold outside of UK.
I've always dreamed of having one.

 

[Timtheloon]

It's a really beautiful computer Tim !
Unfortunately, unless I am mistaken, never sold outside of UK.
I've always dreamed of having one.

Thanks @Tuxbar81

 

[StrongARM]

Hi Tim,

did you buy the machine already with the two slices or did you add the second one later??

 

[StrongARM]

Unfortunately, unless I am mistaken, never sold outside of UK.

Who told you so??
Many were sold in Germany too.

 

[Timtheloon]

Hi Tim,

did you buy the machine already with the two slices or did you add the second one later??

I bought the 2 slice case awhile ago on eBay I believe, I've been slowly building up to a fully working machine

 

[StrongARM]

Thanks.

I still think the RiscPc has a revolutionary simple case design.

 

[Timtheloon]

Thanks.

I still think the RiscPc has a revolutionary simple case design.

Yeah just wish it was stronger, some of the plastic case has gone brittle in its old age

 

[StrongARM]

True, have seen NOS replacers and new "re-printed" ones... maybe on ebEh IIRC.

 

[Timtheloon]

Been having a good play on the RiscPC today.

Got it to mount floppy disc and ISO images, it can now see my network drives and browse the web which makes it so much easier to transfer stuff to it.

Just can't find my RiscOS select 4.39 cd, found the !boot folder online but would really like to install it correctly

Only big issue is my PCcard does seem to have an issue and crashes every time it loads when the machines warmed up.

 

[StrongARM]

The"DX4 100" is overclocked, IIRC.
That and a not 100% working fan can make the difference.