I got an old computer chassis that had a turbo button on it. The motherboard had been changed, so the button wasn't plugged in. So now I have this turbo button. It goes to this circuitboard that has an lcd number readout on it. That circuit board also has a molex connector for power, and a single wire that would hook up to the motherboard. When I plugged molex in, the lcd displayed a number (16, if anyone cares to know). I wondering how this thing works, and if it can be used for anything else besides turbo. I'm envisioning a fan speed readout or something, but i have no idea if it could work.
Normally it's just a couple of seven-segment LED displays, and when u press the turbo button, it toggles, and the number on the lcd is simply set by some jumper switches.
It steps up the speed of the computer, similiar to a one-push overclock. I think this was used when older programs had trouble or were not running right on higher clocked computers. The Apple II gs had a bios option for normal/fast speed of the processor, I think 0.75Mhz and 1Mhz selection, that addressed this issue before the turbo button was invented.
That is from the old days... when the "new", "fast" 66Mhz processors came, some programs didn't handle the speed. It could also be some stability problems when running at 66 Mhz... so the button often slowed it down to 33Mhz... edit: Xiachunyi is a bit faster i guess...
Back when processor speeds were just starting to take off with the 286 & 386, some programs (mainly games) ran too fast to play at 16MHz, so the mobo makers made it so you could slow the system down to the old 8086 speeds, about 8MHz. Rather than call it a "Slow" button, they called it "Turbo" which sounded better. edit: everybody beat me...
I can tell you what you can do with your MHz display. The circuit uses a different IC, I have to update that guide, but I'm already using it with the new circuit and with an old MHz display. If you want to do it, I can make the schem for you. http://www.gideontech.com/content/articles/209/1 The one at the guide was the first one I did. And here is the second one I did, but this time, with a MHz display. I have it always showing my CPU temp.
apple bashing time ! they added a bios option, so you couldn't do it on the fly when u needed it, ugly. Adding a switch is expensive yes, but well worth it, i have my retro box, it has 4 CPUs for it, a 33sx (no maths co-pro, can't do floating point stuff) a 33dx 66dx and a 75dx. Turbo off cuases strange stuff with the 66mhz and the 75, but thats cuas they be cirix's. more apple bashing. I didn't know u drank mini-expresso-mocha-americano's, have a goate and a scooter Smilodon? Also how long have u been using 12 differn't mosturisers. [SIZE=-1]These views are sterotypes based on anyone stupid enough to buy a computer because of how it looks[/SIZE]
that was ment for Xiachunyi, i copy + pasted wrong name but at least i'm not a mac user. also cpemma, my hair is scarly long at 1inch atm. and the pens, i find that offensive! i have one pen that has a pencil + biro + highlighter + stylus all in ONE! 6 seperate pens indeed.
I have no idea what you are talking about. The main reason I know how about Apple is because I need the background information for my senior project.
Thats a pretty cool guide, skylined, but it looks like you made the whole board from scratch. I'v got a premade board (yay). The only connector for it is a single wire, that I assume would go on the mobo somewhere. I have no idea how I could get that wire to interface with my comp. PS...I'll try to get a pic up.
The singal wire from the board, is most likely just the turbo button ouput (ie the state of the turbo button) and will in no way help you set what is on the LEDs. Are there a bunch of jumper pins?
As the Animus says, there's nothing complicated about the Turbo display, it's no more than 14 leds (in the two 7-segment displays) and 2 sets of jumper switches to turn on whichever you pick for each speed. No complex electronics, you can make them display anything, such as "HI" & "LO" As the pcb is useless for anything else & the displays are quite cheap, it's easier to start from scratch.
My 7 segment display was soldered to a PCB. I just cut the leads of the display going to the PCB so I just got the display. To make the new circuit I used a new proto PCB and as cpemma said, you can buy a new display and start from scratch if you don't wish to take the old display out of that PCB. Copy paste these addresses into your address bar, otherwise you won't be able to see them. http://pics.gideontech.com/users/Skylined/P3190005.JPG http://pics.gideontech.com/users/Skylined/P3190010.JPG It's really easy to do.
