It's possible upgrade Indy XL 8 bits to 24 bits?

kikems

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Jul 22, 2020
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Checking pictures of XL 8 bits and 24 bits graphics boards for Indy I appreciate that XL 8bits is the same board with less vRAM chips. Someone try to upgrade vram in XL 8 bits?
 
Depopulating parts is a nice easy way to create 2 products from 1.
The downside is that there could be other differences, that tell the system how to recognize the difference besides just more memory.
8-bit is a palette format and 24-bit is RGB Framebuffer, so there is probably at least 1 other difference. Could be as small as a resistor jumper or as large as a different version of an IC, just have to look really close.
 
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I think there were other support chips, but who knows. I think this has been covered before, so you might want to search around the net on old IRIX/SGI archives for the answer. You're not the first to think about it :)
XL24 cards are pretty cheap tho so you might just want to try and find one first.
 
I think there were other support chips, but who knows. I think this has been covered before, so you might want to search around the net on old IRIX/SGI archives for the answer. You're not the first to think about it :)
XL24 cards are pretty cheap tho so you might just want to try and find one first.

Not found any info about a possible upgrade.
 
Old newsgroups are awesome. You can search them on Google, cause google stores all bits in the universe, and mines it just like it mines your brain ;)

From: comp.sys.sgi.hardware
gdouglas@reputable.com's profile photo

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Nov 24, 1999, 1:00:00 AM

to
valayden wrote:
>
> Hi,
>
> Is it possible to upgrade a XL8 to XL24 ?
> (By soldering memory on board.....)

Yes and no. You will need to solder on a bunch of RAM chips,
and a couple of SGI memory ASICs in very fine pitch surface mount
packages, and a few hundred discrete resistors and capacitors,
some in 0603 package or smaller. The only place I know to get
the ASICS is from another XL-24 board.

> Where can I buy a cheap XL24 ?

Most of the SGI resellers have them, they should run under
$100. Check in comp.sys.sgi.marketplace
--
---------------------------
Greg Douglas
Reputable Systems
http://www.reputable.com
 
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