What is your oldest PC component/peripheral that you still use today

[SPDIF]

Used in my older rig, the Soundblaster Audigy 4 PRO from 2004.

 

[Ruru]

Used in my older rig, the Soundblaster Audigy 4 PRO from 2004.

View attachment 331698

Wasn't Audigy4 practically an Audigy2 rebrand? I loved Audigy2 ZS back in the day.

 

[SPDIF]

The Audigy 4 PRO used the same DSP as the Audigy 2-ZS, but with superior Cirrus Logic DAC's offering higher digital-to-analog audio conversion quality. They put sticker on the chip to mask this DSP with the same number. And also Gold plated connector's.

I hope i never have to recap this thing...

 

[Onasi]

Used in my older rig, the Soundblaster Audigy 4 PRO from 2004.

Is this thing still supported on relatively modern OS through, like, custom drivers? Or you just use it for retro stuff with XP?

 

[SPDIF]

Is this thing still supported on relatively modern OS through, like, custom drivers? Or you just use it for retro stuff with XP?

There are drivers available for Windows 10, and also modded drivers you can download for better compatibility. But i use this card in Windows 7 rig.

 

[Audioave10]

I have many old items still in use....like me!

 

[SPDIF]

This video-card also still used, works with Windows 10 and 11. The ATI Radeon X1950XTX from 2006. With heat-pipe cooling, weights a ton really. Cooling element is in full copper!

 

[ir_cow]

Xbox 360 controller. It just feels great in the hand. A little bit of stick drift, but it's alright.

 

[SPDIF]

And this Sound Blaster X-FI Platinum Fatal1ty, works excellent in Win 10 or 11.

 

[chrcoluk]

Probably my Xonar D2X sound card.

Oh yeah also still using my first wired Xbox 360 controller as my PC controller. (thanks ir_cow for reminding).

 

[SPDIF]

Will post a pic from the inside of that X-Fi card, i know many want to see it. Let me take that screw driver...

This is the guts of that X-Fi Platinum sound card.

 

[wNotyarD]

Will post a pic from the inside of that X-Fi card, i know many want to see it. Let me take that screw driver...

This is the guts of that X-Fi Platinum sound card.

View attachment 331776

You forgot the NSFW tag

 

[Princess Garnet]

Oldell Oldtrasharp 2407WFP and 2405FPW here. Both have Samsung S-PVA panels, and CCFL is holding up quite well. The 2407 has brightness at 0%, and at that setting it has more black crush than I would like. The 2405 is at 30% and is fine for some photo work. I'm not very demanding, I just want a nice uniform grey scale with no colour hues anywhere, which the 2405 can do.

A great era of displays from Dell. I wonder if that bodes well for mine then as far as further aging goes. Of course it's all luck as anything can go at any time, especially as they get older, and I would like to replace this sooner rather than later, as good as it's been for me through the years. Right now is awful timing financially though so it would have to wait a bit.

A few weeks ago, I turned my PC and monitor on and walked away for a moment and when I returned, found my display powered off and it wouldn't respond to the power button. I thought it had finally started showing signs of being gone (and maybe it was/is), but I unplugged both cables and when I reconnected the power cable, a picture immediately showed. It hasn't acted up since then.

I think I might be eyeing the U2724D later this year, but I need to do more research to see if that's what I want. I haven't settled on it yet. That one would be 1440p instead of 1600p that the outgoing 2022 (?) model had, but nothing else offers that other than the 30" model, and it's 60 Hz. The 2024 model goes to 16:9 but it does bring the refresh up to 120 Hz and keep with the same IPS type (not sure what "IPS Black" they're calling it now is, but I presume it's based on the S-IPS type I'm using now as opposed to the "e-IPS" offspring that came later?). It probably won't feel much bigger than my current 24" 16:10 since the extra estate on a 27" 16:9 is just going to make it wider, so I'm not sure how I feel about the scale of everything getting a lot (?) smaller. That makes it sound like maybe 30" wouldn't be too big for me after all, but my old HDTV was 32" 16:9 and was definitely bigger than I'd want in a PC display (though it had huge bezels compared to today's stuff so maybe that's throwing my imagination off).

 

[freeagent]

I finally re-wired my TY-143, love this fan.. I got it in 2016 I think..

 

[Ruru]

Xbox 360 controller. It just feels great in the hand. A little bit of stick drift, but it's alright.

Great gamepad but the d-pad sucks balls.

Is this thing still supported on relatively modern OS through, like, custom drivers? Or you just use it for retro stuff with XP?

I used modified drivers with Audigy2 ZS and worked flawlessly with Win10 when I used that with a Z68 2600K rig few years ago. Sadly the card seems to dead and I need to get an another one.

 

[Macro Device]

It probably won't feel much bigger than my current 24" 16:10 since the extra estate on a 27" 16:9 is just going to make it wider, so I'm not sure how I feel about the scale of everything getting a lot (?) smaller.

I made the exact same transition in late 2020, but I went 1920x1200 to 1920x1080 because my old monitor was toast. The 27" one felt considerably bigger but I wouldn't call it "much bigger."

Don't know how it works outside gaming but in gaming, 16:9 is superior to 16:10, unless we are talking some rare/ancient titles. Also better for YT and movies.

I currently own a 4K display of the same 27" diagonal. The only thing it lacks is being a 21:9 monitor. I mean, same pixel size but 5120x2160 and 34" diagonal. That would've been perfect for me. YMMV.

P.S. 32" ain't too much if your desk allows for 120+ cm (47") eye-to-display distance. Size of things is the subject to tuning, you can change the scaling in both Windows and Linux. Some software become abominations because devs didn't consider non-100% OS UI scaling but that's not as bad as it was 8 years ago. Highly recommend considering 4K if you go 32". Especially if you don't mind having relatively low FPS in games.

 

[Ruru]

Highly recommend considering 4K if you go 32". Especially if you don't mind having relatively low FPS in games.

Exactly. I have a 32" 4K60 monitor and I use my 24" 1080p144 just as a "normal" secondary monitor. I play mostly slow-paced games anyway where stable 60fps is more than enough.

 

[Readlight]

DVD

 

[Drash]

I used modified drivers with Audigy2 ZS and worked flawlessly with Win10 when I used that with a Z68 2600K rig few years ago. Sadly the card seems to dead and I need to get an another one.

Still using my 2ZS with DanielK drivers - better than mobo onboard, and with my T7900 7.1 speakers, beats headphones! No PCi mobos anymore, so with go external USB next time - if I ever upgrade!

 

[SPDIF]

Daily i have questions about why you would buy an Sound-card, if every mobo has on built in. Simple said an onboard sound-card uses your CPU to calculate everything.

A separate sound-card has its own DSP or Microprocessor and handles everything itself without burdening your CPU.

So on-board audio is a software based sound-card, and an external one is a hardware sound-card. On some computers that just can give you some more FPS in games.
Also the quality of the sound is much better and you have tons of options available on it. You can switch on screen with a mouse click between speakers or headphone, some has two outputs.

On the card i posted above you even see it has it's own memory on-board, a built in audio on your mobo uses memory instead from your PC.

 

[Panther_Seraphin]

Daily i have questions about why you would buy an Sound-card, if every mobo has on built in. Simple said an onboard sound-card uses your CPU to calculate everything.

A separate sound-card has its own DSP or Microprocessor and handles everything itself without burdening your CPU.

So on-board audio is a software based sound-card, and an external one is a hardware sound-card. On some computers that just can give you some more FPS in games.
Also the quality of the sound is much better and you have tons of options available on it. You can switch on screen with a mouse click between speakers or headphone, some has two outputs.

On the card i posted above you even see it has it's own memory on-board, a built in audio on your mobo uses memory instead from your PC.

All that used to be the case till windows Vista when they deprecated Direct Sound for some arbitrary reason.

Yes there is SOME hardware offloading in Windows 8 and above but its no where near what it was with Directsound (RIP EAX and what it could do to immersion)

 

[Drash]

Daily i have questions about why you would buy an Sound-card, if every mobo has on built in. Simple said an onboard sound-card uses your CPU to calculate everything.

A separate sound-card has its own DSP or Microprocessor and handles everything itself without burdening your CPU.

So on-board audio is a software based sound-card, and an external one is a hardware sound-card. On some computers that just can give you some more FPS in games.
Also the quality of the sound is much better and you have tons of options available on it. You can switch on screen with a mouse click between speakers or headphone, some has two outputs.

On the card i posted above you even see it has it's own memory on-board, a built in audio on your mobo uses memory instead from your PC.

Mainly electrical isolation. Onboard sound picks up all sorts of noise - on my mobo I can hear in the speakers/headphones when I move the mouse - higer polling rate = more noise. This is on a mobo that advertises a clean and isolated sound stage. Soundcard removes that. Can happen with HDD access too. SNR may be better or worse but no screeching/scratching when you move the mouse is a plus! External USB has more isolation, but timing can be an issue if you care about ASIO and DAW type stuff apparently. I game, play music and watch YT - power user

 

[Onasi]

@SPDIF
To be fair, in terms of pure sound quality nothing can really beat an external solution. The simple reason is that even the best sound card is still INSIDE your PC. This is, frankly, terrible from the standpoint of putting EMI sensitive audio process right next to the source of EMI. This is the same reason why on-board audio isn’t great. Realtec Codecs are, actually, nowadays pretty damn decent in terms of measurements.
CPU load argument is… technically true, but completely irrelevant with modern CPUs. Even back with a 2600K i ran a test with a CS:GO bot match and measured frametimes with an on-board, SoundBlaster Z and an external DAC/AMP. No difference that wasn’t run-to-run variance.

 

[Dr. Dro]

@SPDIF
To be fair, in terms of pure sound quality nothing can really beat an external solution. The simple reason is that even the best sound card is still INSIDE your PC. This is, frankly, terrible from the standpoint of putting EMI sensitive audio process right next to the source of EMI. This is the same reason why on-board audio isn’t great. Realtec Codecs are, actually, nowadays pretty damn decent in terms of measurements.
CPU load argument is… technically true, but completely irrelevant with modern CPUs. Even back with a 2600K i ran a test with a CS:GO bot match and measured frametimes with an on-board, SoundBlaster Z and an external DAC/AMP. No difference that wasn’t run-to-run variance.

Modern audio cards have great isolation. The real issue is that you're comparing a Realtek codec (which isn't even the biggest issue) on a motherboard that has maybe one low-end opamp and 4 small capacitors to... well, look at what I use to drive my headphones:

(Pic from Anandtech)

I use an open bench nowadays but, it wasn't always the case - and having the "Faraday cage" argument eliminated, I can tell you from experience that audio card sounds the same and has no noise whatsoever both out in the open and inside a case. To source the audio, you need to connect an external DAC to the computer anyway, so it's not even like the whole "grounding" argument truly works IMO.

Also, come to think of it... this is the part in "active use" that is currently the oldest in my PC. It'll be very very hard to ever justify or manage to get an upgrade... shame EVGA went under, I can't expect driver updates for this in the future should I ever need them.

 

[SPDIF]

Anyway the show must go on... Can someone here sport the difference?