Intel Xpress Resurrection: Reviving a Forgotten EISA Beast
9 hours ago
- #Intel-Xpress
- #retro-computing
- #EISA-bus
- The Intel Xpress line, produced from 1992 to 1995, was a modular, expandable system between a personal computer and a workstation, aimed at professional and networked business use.
- Its motherboard uses a dual chipset design: Intel's Xpress chipset handles the processor, memory, cache, and onboard I/O, while a separate EISA chipset manages the expansion bus.
- CPU boards for the Xpress supported a range of 486 and early Pentium processors, with notable examples including a 486SX/25 board, a Pentium 66 MHz board with a voltage converter, and a high-performance 486 DX 50 MHz board.
- The EISA bus offered 32-bit data paths and bus mastering while remaining compatible with ISA cards, though it was eventually replaced by PCI; featured EISA cards include a Compaq QVision 1024/E VGA card, a 3Com 3C597-TX Fast Ethernet card, and an Adaptec AHA-1742A SCSI host adapter.
- Restoration involved replacing the Dallas RTC/CMOS chip, adding ECC DIMMs, upgrading cooling and power supply, replacing the hard drive with a CompactFlash card, and installing period-appropriate software like MS-DOS 6.22 and Windows for Workgroups 3.11.