Info on 386DX motherboard

[timmcross]

Hi there, I picked up a 386DX-20 from Positive Corporation. It has a number of jumpers inside yet no description of what they are for. Anyone seen this before or know where I can get more information on it?

It says MBA-00303, MB-303 REV E Motherboard Factory copyright 1990.

 

[ajacocks]

Apparently “Motherboard Factory” was the OEM name for Northgate:

https://ibm.retropc.se/manuals/Pc_En..._Companion.pdf

Can you post some pictures of the whole board? That might help to identify the board.

You might want to look here. There are a number of Northgate boards, including several 386sx boards.

- Alex

 

[timmcross]

Uh, holy cow. That was it. It is Northgate Slimline 320. Thank you so much! I figured if any site knew about it, it would be here.

Sadly, looks like it only supports 1MB SIMMs. Any idea of that is just a guideline or can it really not support larger ones? I was thinking of getting 4MB SIMMs for this board. Not sure what I would do with 32MB though...

Thanks again!
Tim

 

[T-R-A]

Lots of early 386 machines only supported 256K/1MB Simms (especially 386sx). You can try 4MB SIMMS, but don't be surprised if it can't see them.

 

[Timo W.]

It's a DX20. Nothing that would need more than 4 MB will run on it anyway. 4 MB in such a system is just fine. More is wasted, as you shouldn't expect it to run DOOM or Windows 95.