My Dad was actually the CTO at Number 9, and he designed a lot of this card, including the main chip. Anyway, not trying to flex just thought finding this video was really cool. To answer your question on the design choice of the IBM chip on the back. He said it was basically a cost cut to support VGA (as it was apparently annoying to work with), while keeping the high performance main chip. Then, with the Imagine 128 II they had enough development time to integrate VGA into the main chip. (Note: I'm a software guy myself, so sorry if my terminology is a bit off.)
Very cool to hear this perspective, thanks for sharing! That makes a lot of sense. I'm hoping to one day find the version of this card that doesn't use the CL VGA chip as well to compare.
Around 24 years ago, I started a job at a place that had a PowerMac 9500 with a Number Nine Imagine card in it. The machine would crash every day, and I suspected the card. I contacted Number Nine, and they sent me a new ROM for it that fixed the problem. That ROM looked exactly like the PLCC on the card in the video. Great customer service. Wish Number Nine was still with us today.
I had a Number Nine Ticket To Ride video card alongside a pair of Diamond Monster II cards in my first PC gaming rig. It was really fun. The Number Nine was very capable on its own, but not well supported by games. It had that same IBM DAC chip too.
Nice fix, so good when you spot something that can be easily fixed like that. In other hands it could well have ended up in the recycling bin! Number9 entered this market after making a lot of very high end video cards based around the TIGA standard.
Back in the day, my dream system consisted of one of these cards, a quantum 3d 100sb4400 (SLI voodoo 1), an AWE32 with a roland sc55 daughterboard, all on a p233 mmx. Never happened of course, as it would have been terribly expensive and no way could I afford it. Hell, I'd still like to have that setup for retro goodness.
Cool! If yours was longer than this one it may have been the original Imagine 128 card. That one is harder to find these days than the Series II cards 👍
this dual chip design reminded me of sb x-fi oem dell/alienware sb0770 that has dual chip design, work plug and play as basic AC97 audio card without drivers, and when you install the driver, it works as fully function sb x-fi
Ah, thought as much, that the IBM Chips on those cards are actualy "VRAM", which is DUal Ported. That means you can read and write to the chips at the same time. Was something that was a thing at the time with hgih end cards with seperate RAMDACs. Matrox (and #9 as well) used an extended version of that called "Window RAM" aka WRAM (on the legendary MGA Millenium for example).
I have what I believe is a 1st-gen Imagine 128. One of two Number Nine cards in my collection. It has a TI DAC and a Cirrus Logic 5422 chip instead of 5424. It's a big long card and the Imagine chip is a MONSTER QFP in this case - really cool looking. I've never used the card yet myself but it was pulled from a working recycled PC so I assume it's good to go. I'd love to see another video exploring what it can do!
Thanks for your comment! Yes that definitely sounds like the original Imagine 128. They are much longer than the second generation cards and quite a bit harder to find as well! I’m not sure how much difference there is between the two from a functionality perspective. I’m looking forward to trying it out 👍
Cool, looking forward to see it in action 😎 I also have a quite sizeable list of cards waiting for repair, some will be easy, others are probably beyond my current skills, will see how it goes 😅
Oh man! I watched your gpu June video earlier today, which I quite enjoyed. Keep up the good work. Then I noticed this video later and clicked on it, to then notice your logo, which was familiar. Thanks again for the 6x s370 cpu holder 3d files. 😃
Well, yay for easy fix :) replacing all that RAM would NOT have been fun... so it's good this was just a few broken joins. And that blue dac is really sexy...
I was looking at your video, then I just did a bit of resource what could I have that time to ran quake so smoothly? trust me, wasn't easy to remember. Diamond viper V330 which I have found in one of the abandoned pc on the street. It felt like i am the luckiest person at that moment. Damn, that was very long time ago.
It impresses me when old tech is made all with tantalun capacitors. I think it's a hint the manufacturer wanted to go one step further than the average high quality electrolytic capacitors.
I have an old Ati Rage something AGP card which I recently got which at first worked fine but after some time gave artifacts (even during post and under DOS). I looked under a microscope but couldn't find any bad soldering joints (at least visiually). I'll try the squeze test next! 😄
Thanks for your comment! The squeeze test is a great way to identify contact problems. It won't always work, but definitely worth a try. Even with a very high magnifaction level, I'm always surprised just how hard it can be to spot bad solder joints by sight. Gently pushing the pins side-to-side is the best way to be sure.
Thanks for your comment! Cool - your card is the newer revision of Imagine 128 II. They eventually ditched the Cirrus Logic chip and updated the BIOS so that the Imagine 128 II chip would handle all of the standard video modes as well as GUI acceleration in Windows. I recently got a copy of the BIOS that your card has. I am very curious to see if I can get my card to work like the later revision cards. Flashing it will be a challenge though because it appears to be a "one time use" BIOS chip
Interestingly enough, I remembered having a graphics card with an Imagine 128 chip on it, so I went and check and indeed it's an Imagine 128 series II card, but it has 8 memory chips on the top instead of 4, the blue IBM chip is placed higher, and there's no Cirrus Logic chip nor any components on the back of the card... could it be only 3D? I never tested but I might try it out if I get the chance, because now my curiosity is piqued.
Thanks for your comment! Sounds like your Imagine 128 II is the later revision if it doesn't have the Cirrus Logic chip on it. These seem to be harder to find these days. Number Nine ironed out all the quirks with 2D graphics modes by that point and didn't need the CL chip any more. Your card would be much faster for DOS gaming as a result :-)
I had always thought that all GPU's should have 2x GPU chips on the PCB, one normal GPU for playing the latest games, and the other for multimedia/desktop/web-browsing/legacy software that needs minimal hardware aceleration/etc. They could optimize the second chip for all those things and this would then free up SoC die area for more features and performance on the modern main cutting edge GPU, as they wouldn't have to worry about legacy features and multimedia codecs and so on, perhaps even FPGA on GPU's can one day be used effectivly in this way somehow, all legacy GPU and multimedia aceleration done by the FPGA and all modern gaming features handled by the main GPU, this would lead to better backwards compatabilty for older software and games, and much faster performance in GPU's as all DIE space is dedicated to cutting edge gaming API's and features, the FPGA could also change on the fly due to how FPGA works, so could be used as a legacy GPU one moment or as a dedicated multimedia acelrator the other, for top tier quality video playback upto 16K, you could also run multiple instances of high res & bit-rate video without any stuttering or issues, this could also be great for video capturing, and what about also audio aceleration, so many good uses for a decent FPGA on the GPU, some eDRAM or HBM2 ram might be cool too. I'd love to see good multi-positional HRTF sound make a comeback in PC games, imagine an FPGA on a GPU that could do amazing HRTTF audio (like EAX was) as well as FM synth or MIDI audio for legacy PC games, drool, a GPU that can do it all sounds amazing (literally), Steam Play or Steam OS with a GPU like that available would be next level, it would be able to perfectly play every PC game correctly from early DOS era to Windows 11 era, all in one OS, no emulation needed, and don't forget FPGA can do console systems without emulation too, that FPGA could be used to turn you PC into any console upto N64/PS1 or classic computer like the Amiga or X68000, sorry got a bit carried away there lol, still an awsome concept though, a proper backwards capable GPU/FPGA hybrid, having something like a MiSTer built into a gaming PC would just be an endgame setup, there is almsot nothing i could do nativly, software emulation would be almost redundent.
Agreed! Would be a very interesting concept, especially using FPGAs for something like that. Having used MiSTer for a while, I can really see amazing potential in FPGAs, that's for sure. Thanks for your comment!
@@vswitchzero I come up with some of my best ideas typing comments when I'm really stoned lol, seriously though, a GPU/FPGA hybrid card with a full version of MiSTer or full FPGA cores compatable with RetroArch in a normal Windows gaming rig would be sweet, I think there has already been some experimental FPGA RetroArch cores working on Windows 10 via a PCIe FPGA card.
Thank you for the feedback, I appreciate it. I'm always looking for ways to improve future videos. I tend to go into a lot of detail and need to do a better job of providing the right amount of information without getting too verbose. Hopefully I'll be able to improve on this in the future.
My Dad was actually the CTO at Number 9, and he designed a lot of this card, including the main chip. Anyway, not trying to flex just thought finding this video was really cool. To answer your question on the design choice of the IBM chip on the back. He said it was basically a cost cut to support VGA (as it was apparently annoying to work with), while keeping the high performance main chip. Then, with the Imagine 128 II they had enough development time to integrate VGA into the main chip. (Note: I'm a software guy myself, so sorry if my terminology is a bit off.)
Very cool to hear this perspective, thanks for sharing! That makes a lot of sense. I'm hoping to one day find the version of this card that doesn't use the CL VGA chip as well to compare.
Awesome reply thanks for sharing
Around 24 years ago, I started a job at a place that had a PowerMac 9500 with a Number Nine Imagine card in it. The machine would crash every day, and I suspected the card. I contacted Number Nine, and they sent me a new ROM for it that fixed the problem. That ROM looked exactly like the PLCC on the card in the video. Great customer service. Wish Number Nine was still with us today.
liars after liars
That card is a looker! The IBM chip really adds something to it. Neat repair. Cheers
I had a Number Nine Ticket To Ride video card alongside a pair of Diamond Monster II cards in my first PC gaming rig. It was really fun. The Number Nine was very capable on its own, but not well supported by games. It had that same IBM DAC chip too.
Nice fix, so good when you spot something that can be easily fixed like that. In other hands it could well have ended up in the recycling bin! Number9 entered this market after making a lot of very high end video cards based around the TIGA standard.
Back in the day, my dream system consisted of one of these cards, a quantum 3d 100sb4400 (SLI voodoo 1), an AWE32 with a roland sc55 daughterboard, all on a p233 mmx. Never happened of course, as it would have been terribly expensive and no way could I afford it. Hell, I'd still like to have that setup for retro goodness.
That sounds like it would have been an awesome system, that's for sure! Always loved the really unique Quantum 3D cards :)
I'll have two number 9s, a number 9 large, a number 6 with extra dip, a number 7, two number 45s, one with cheese, and a large soda.
Great video and well done on the repair job 👏🏻 It’s given me hope that I might be able to get my faulty GeForce 256 DDR working again!
Thanks, Jon! Best of luck with your GeForce 256. That card is definitely worth the effort to get going again 👍
I had one years ago! It was longer than this card though. Mine was able to expand the desktop on the same screen. Had a great time while I had it.
Cool! If yours was longer than this one it may have been the original Imagine 128 card. That one is harder to find these days than the Series II cards 👍
Great job - Just shows that not all problems has to do with defective components!
I don't see a lot of interest in this card but it's certainly more interesting than it would first appear. Glad it was an easy fix!
Nice Video, Nice Repair.
You have to show us now how this thing performs.
Looks very exotic.
this dual chip design reminded me of sb x-fi oem dell/alienware sb0770 that has dual chip design, work plug and play as basic AC97 audio card without drivers, and when you install the driver, it works as fully function sb x-fi
Ah, thought as much, that the IBM Chips on those cards are actualy "VRAM", which is DUal Ported.
That means you can read and write to the chips at the same time.
Was something that was a thing at the time with hgih end cards with seperate RAMDACs. Matrox (and #9 as well) used an extended version of that called "Window RAM" aka WRAM (on the legendary MGA Millenium for example).
I have what I believe is a 1st-gen Imagine 128. One of two Number Nine cards in my collection. It has a TI DAC and a Cirrus Logic 5422 chip instead of 5424. It's a big long card and the Imagine chip is a MONSTER QFP in this case - really cool looking. I've never used the card yet myself but it was pulled from a working recycled PC so I assume it's good to go. I'd love to see another video exploring what it can do!
Thanks for your comment! Yes that definitely sounds like the original Imagine 128. They are much longer than the second generation cards and quite a bit harder to find as well! I’m not sure how much difference there is between the two from a functionality perspective. I’m looking forward to trying it out 👍
Cool, looking forward to see it in action 😎
I also have a quite sizeable list of cards waiting for repair, some will be easy, others are probably beyond my current skills, will see how it goes 😅
8:00 Fine tip or rather hotair station ;) Cheapest "Zhaoxin 858D" cost ~50-70$
Oh man!
I watched your gpu June video earlier today, which I quite enjoyed. Keep up the good work.
Then I noticed this video later and clicked on it, to then notice your logo, which was familiar.
Thanks again for the 6x s370 cpu holder 3d files. 😃
Thanks so much! Glad you enjoyed the videos. One of these days I’ve got to get my 3D printer going again. It needs some attention 🙂
Reflow all the ram chips even tho it's "fixed " if those legs came off it eventually might affect the other legs
Nice save!
Interesting experience as usual. First time I hear about such chip, and def. looking forward to part2 if there's any.
Well, yay for easy fix :) replacing all that RAM would NOT have been fun... so it's good this was just a few broken joins.
And that blue dac is really sexy...
I was looking at your video, then I just did a bit of resource what could I have that time to ran quake so smoothly? trust me, wasn't easy to remember. Diamond viper V330 which I have found in one of the abandoned pc on the street. It felt like i am the luckiest person at that moment. Damn, that was very long time ago.
I'd get one of those just because those IBM chips
It impresses me when old tech is made all with tantalun capacitors. I think it's a hint the manufacturer wanted to go one step further than the average high quality electrolytic capacitors.
This was the flagship #9 card when it was released. Sold for something like $1800 USD. So yeah, premium components and a very nice PCB layout.
What a great channel with a unique angle (repairs). Subbed!
Thanks so much! 🙂
Good video, keep 'em coming
I have an old Ati Rage something AGP card which I recently got which at first worked fine but after some time gave artifacts (even during post and under DOS). I looked under a microscope but couldn't find any bad soldering joints (at least visiually). I'll try the squeze test next! 😄
Thanks for your comment! The squeeze test is a great way to identify contact problems. It won't always work, but definitely worth a try. Even with a very high magnifaction level, I'm always surprised just how hard it can be to spot bad solder joints by sight. Gently pushing the pins side-to-side is the best way to be sure.
the IMAGINE 128 logo on the chip kinda looks like a FINAL FANTASY logo
I subscribed because i like the tutorial so much
Thanks so much! Glad you enjoyed the video 👍
One Chip for use with DOS, the i128 Needs Win NT or XP to get it to run Right..
Thanks for the tip. I may give the card a shot in NT4 one of these days.
I have this same card but mine does not have the Cirrus Logic on the back...
Thanks for your comment! Cool - your card is the newer revision of Imagine 128 II. They eventually ditched the Cirrus Logic chip and updated the BIOS so that the Imagine 128 II chip would handle all of the standard video modes as well as GUI acceleration in Windows. I recently got a copy of the BIOS that your card has. I am very curious to see if I can get my card to work like the later revision cards. Flashing it will be a challenge though because it appears to be a "one time use" BIOS chip
@@vswitchzero Let me know if I can help. I can scan the card for you to see if there are any other changes..
Interestingly enough, I remembered having a graphics card with an Imagine 128 chip on it, so I went and check and indeed it's an Imagine 128 series II card, but it has 8 memory chips on the top instead of 4, the blue IBM chip is placed higher, and there's no Cirrus Logic chip nor any components on the back of the card... could it be only 3D? I never tested but I might try it out if I get the chance, because now my curiosity is piqued.
Thanks for your comment! Sounds like your Imagine 128 II is the later revision if it doesn't have the Cirrus Logic chip on it. These seem to be harder to find these days. Number Nine ironed out all the quirks with 2D graphics modes by that point and didn't need the CL chip any more. Your card would be much faster for DOS gaming as a result :-)
Great video nice job sir :)
great video, just wish our voodoo cards were that easy to fix.
Thanks Patrick! Haha so true. The 3dfx stuff seems to always be extra painful to fix!
I had always thought that all GPU's should have 2x GPU chips on the PCB, one normal GPU for playing the latest games, and the other for multimedia/desktop/web-browsing/legacy software that needs minimal hardware aceleration/etc. They could optimize the second chip for all those things and this would then free up SoC die area for more features and performance on the modern main cutting edge GPU, as they wouldn't have to worry about legacy features and multimedia codecs and so on, perhaps even FPGA on GPU's can one day be used effectivly in this way somehow, all legacy GPU and multimedia aceleration done by the FPGA and all modern gaming features handled by the main GPU, this would lead to better backwards compatabilty for older software and games, and much faster performance in GPU's as all DIE space is dedicated to cutting edge gaming API's and features, the FPGA could also change on the fly due to how FPGA works, so could be used as a legacy GPU one moment or as a dedicated multimedia acelrator the other, for top tier quality video playback upto 16K, you could also run multiple instances of high res & bit-rate video without any stuttering or issues, this could also be great for video capturing, and what about also audio aceleration, so many good uses for a decent FPGA on the GPU, some eDRAM or HBM2 ram might be cool too.
I'd love to see good multi-positional HRTF sound make a comeback in PC games, imagine an FPGA on a GPU that could do amazing HRTTF audio (like EAX was) as well as FM synth or MIDI audio for legacy PC games, drool, a GPU that can do it all sounds amazing (literally), Steam Play or Steam OS with a GPU like that available would be next level, it would be able to perfectly play every PC game correctly from early DOS era to Windows 11 era, all in one OS, no emulation needed, and don't forget FPGA can do console systems without emulation too, that FPGA could be used to turn you PC into any console upto N64/PS1 or classic computer like the Amiga or X68000, sorry got a bit carried away there lol, still an awsome concept though, a proper backwards capable GPU/FPGA hybrid, having something like a MiSTer built into a gaming PC would just be an endgame setup, there is almsot nothing i could do nativly, software emulation would be almost redundent.
Agreed! Would be a very interesting concept, especially using FPGAs for something like that. Having used MiSTer for a while, I can really see amazing potential in FPGAs, that's for sure. Thanks for your comment!
@@vswitchzero I come up with some of my best ideas typing comments when I'm really stoned lol, seriously though, a GPU/FPGA hybrid card with a full version of MiSTer or full FPGA cores compatable with RetroArch in a normal Windows gaming rig would be sweet, I think there has already been some experimental FPGA RetroArch cores working on Windows 10 via a PCIe FPGA card.
Should have just drag soldered every chip as many have bad solder joints
How can you dare to overclock that poor 300A ;-)
Haha irresistible 😁 .. it’ll actually do 600MHz with some extra voltage and 450MHz undervolted. Such a legendary CPU 🙂
preface too long
Thank you for the feedback, I appreciate it. I'm always looking for ways to improve future videos. I tend to go into a lot of detail and need to do a better job of providing the right amount of information without getting too verbose. Hopefully I'll be able to improve on this in the future.
@@vswitchzero arrange your video, most audience don't want see only your hand and graphics card and listen your preface at same time.
very nice video, thanks! . looking forward for the second part with some benchmarks