

Ever used a PC with a Turbo Button? - coolwanglu

Wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turbo_button
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lmm
My second machine was a 386 with a turbo button.

I think this would be better as a poll rather than a story, there's not a lot
to say.

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kbenson
The first computer I used was a 286 XT (or AT?), and it had a turbo. I
remember playing a few games on it where the turbo button came in handy.

One specifically that I remember was called freefall, and simulated diving
into a cavern. You had to move the ascii character representing yourself back
and forth to avoid the cavern walls as you fell. Simple, but fun.

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DanBC
Yes.

Elite was very hard to play on some machines if they didn't have a turbo
button. (To turn off turbo, and put the machine in a nice 12 MHz.)

Later machines kept the button, but either just hooked it up to a display or
even left it disconnected. Cases could fit different motherboards so it's
handy to have the button for the older motherboards.

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munimkazia
When I was very young, we had a computer which had this button. I always
wondered why pressing it would change HI to LO, as the name of the button
suggested otherwise. I never really used it as my few games worked fine
without it. I was too young to remember the name of the computer, and we got
rid of it long ago.

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beobab
I opened up my PC (486dx) and found that the Turbo button had been
disconnected, and (obviously) made absolutely no difference whether it was
pressed or not. I never really investigated further.

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snooze82
<http://instagram.com/p/HWBYYmNDYD/>

386DX 40 MHz

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tgflynn
They used to be very common. Probably around the 486/early Pentium days if
memory serves.

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t0
What was the since in ever turning it _off_?

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jgeorge
Some games didn't use a timing loop, they were written with timing that
corresponded directly to CPU speed. Thus a turbo mode would make the games
impossibly fast to play.

Sopwith and older versions of Scorched Earth come to mind as examples of this
phenomenon.

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zimpenfish
Yeah, and thanks for reminding me that I'm old.

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mcherm
Yes.

It didn't do anything.

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nkubarelov
Sure :--)

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zensavona
Yes.

