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From: magnus@THEP.LU.SE (Magnus Olsson)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware
Subject: Speeding up an XT
Message-ID: <9010150903.AA09539@thep.lu.se>
Date: 15 Oct 90 09:02:20 GMT
Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU
Lines: 31

I'm getting a bit tired of my trusty 4.77 MHz XT clone, mainly because it's
too slow. Now, the smart thing to do would of course be to buy a new
computer, but I don't have very much money to spend, so I'm thinking of
just upgrading the old machine with a new processor.

Replacing the motherboard with an AT board seems rather attractive, but
then I'd also have to get new RAM and new disk controllers which would add
to the cost. And what would I do with the old board?

I've heard about 80286 expanison boards that plug into an XT slot, for
example something called the "Tiny Turbo", which are comparatively cheap.
Of course, they won't turn my computer into an AT, but at least they'll
speed it up a bit, and I assume I'll still be able to use my old
peripherals. 

Does anybody out there have any experience with boards like this? Are they
worth the price? How much faster do they make the XT? Is it still possible
to switch back to the old 8088 processor (e.g. for copy-protected games
that rely on 8088 timing)? Do they cooperate well with other XT expansion
boards? 

I can't afford to pay more than about $300 (US prices, I'll be buying it
over there) at the moment, so I'm afraid an Inboard 386 is out of the
picture (pity!).


Magnus Olsson		     	| \e+ 	   /_	      
Dept. of Theoretical Physics 	|  \  Z	  / q	      
University of Lund, Sweden	|   >----<	      
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