Re: Extensive 486 Modification - Getting an IBM PC 350 Type 6581 motherboard into a Packard Bell Legend PB400 Case

Posted on 2019-12-18, 19:12

by

by athlon-power

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

3. That yellow plastic HDD adapter looks awful, use metal adapters as such: 20191218_135830.jpg Metal 3.5" to 5.25" adapter set? I may have messed up, because I got a full steel wrap-around frame that the HDD sits in the center of. :lol: Jokes aside, it looks massively better than it used to. I …

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Re: "Full Tower," AT PSU Help

Posted on 2019-12-17, 00:33

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by athlon-power

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

That actually might be a problem with the power switch. Those things are meant to switch live mains -- intentionally connecting the in and out of two legs of mains power. There is absolutely no reasonable explanation for you to have contacted live mains through the switch itself unless it's …

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"Full Tower," AT PSU Help

Posted on 2019-12-16, 22:33

by

by athlon-power

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

The PSU in the full tower Dell 486 I just got recently is dead, which normally wouldn't be a problem, but it's one of those huge ones that are huge for no reason- the board inside them is the same size as any other AT/ATX PSU. Oh well. I took it apart, cleaned it, got it back together, and the …

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Re: Dell Precision 486/33s

Posted on 2019-12-14, 01:27

by

by athlon-power

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I will get some pictures once everything is back together as best as I can get it back (several of the standoffs for the front panel to screw it into the case are broken, it was this way before I got it), though I am beginning to plan on doing other things with this case and seeing about using the …

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Dell Precision 486/33s

Posted on 2019-12-12, 23:58

by

by athlon-power

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I just managed to get ahold of my first full-tower, ~2ft monster computer. It's a Dell Precision 486/33s, some old workstation, I think, with a 486SX 33MHz and an unknown amount of RAM, unknown HDDs, some Crystal sound card from around '94, some weird parallel port isa thing, and a 4x CD + 5.25" FDD …

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Re: 1999 Build Refresh

Posted on 2019-12-12, 17:28

by

by athlon-power

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Sounds like an excuse to try out all 3 and try some benchmarks I think ;) From personal experience our C500 came with a TNT2 Pro or M64 can't remember which which I stole and swapped with the TNT in my P2 400 and remember noticing the difference. Then upgraded again to a GF2 MX and still noticed …

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Re: 1999 Build Refresh

Posted on 2019-12-12, 15:15

by

by athlon-power

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I feel your pain. I would say don't be afraid to compromise in the sort term though. No point not having half dozen unfinished machine and nothing to play on. As an example I've been waiting on specific RAM modules for a decent price for 4 years now. Self imposed limitation as I want all matching, …

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Re: 1999 Build Refresh

Posted on 2019-12-11, 00:00

by

by athlon-power

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Keeping in mind your other post asking if set point in time is worth it, and as your STILL trying to achieve that here I'm guessing no one convinced that pcb dates aren't important. SO as your after full on authenticity I'll let you decide which NIC to use. I think the TNT2 is good choice, if your …

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Re: Good specs for late 1998-early 1999 Pentium 200 MMX

Posted on 2019-12-09, 22:15

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by athlon-power

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Unfortunately, early ATi cards are bad option for AMD K6-2, because they don't support 3DNow! instruction set. You should look for any 3dfx, Nvdia TNT+ or S3 Savage 4. In that priority order. As I've mentioned before, 8mb Riva TNT would be quite authentic for a budget 1999 build. While a bit of a …

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Re: Good specs for late 1998-early 1999 Pentium 200 MMX

Posted on 2019-12-09, 20:55

by

by athlon-power

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I recently acquired an ATI Rage 128 VR 8MB and a K6-2 266MHz- maybe I could use those, and overclock the K6-2, or I could give it the 8MB ATI card and overclock the Pentium 200MMX? With that ATI card, I may start getting somewhere.

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1999 Build Refresh

Posted on 2019-12-09, 04:02

by

by athlon-power

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

This poor build idea has transcended entire motherboards, cases, and CPUs. It's about to do that again. No, this will not end. Long after I am dead, it will gain sentience, and realize that a part in it was not made on February 22nd, 1999, at 05:26:42 GMT, and will try to find ways to gain …

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Re: To end the AMD v. Intel debate.

Posted on 2019-12-05, 14:45

by

by athlon-power

in Milliways

in Milliways

Yeah, this is where I'm at a crossroads building a new rig. Can't decide between those two....flip a coin? I would say that you should get whatever performs best in the fields you want it to. If you use programs (or games) that are heavily multi-threaded, I would go for whatever has more cores/ …

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Re: To end the AMD v. Intel debate.

Posted on 2019-12-05, 14:23

by

by athlon-power

in Milliways

in Milliways

I stand corrected on the first part. On the second part, I was talking specifically about x86. IBM having multi-threading in the 1960's didn't change the fact that the x86 PC market didn't get that until the early 2000's, on a wide scale. Regarding the third part, AMD was at least part of the fleet …

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Re: To end the AMD v. Intel debate.

Posted on 2019-12-05, 14:02

by

by athlon-power

in Milliways

in Milliways

As far as I am concerned, Intel or AMD making the "chiplet," (in my opinion, it's a terrible design. just put it all on a card. you know, i wouldnt have to change the thermal paste every time i switched a cpu in and out of a motherboard. imagine buying a cpu and just having to remove the old one, …

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Re: To end the AMD v. Intel debate.

Posted on 2019-12-04, 00:38

by

by athlon-power

in Milliways

in Milliways

This all just reminded me of AMD v. Intel flamewars I found a while back while looking at random, ancient threads about Quake. They used to get nasty back then, and I imagine they still do, but finding people cursing each other out because Quake was optimized for the Pentium and not the K5 or …

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To end the AMD v. Intel debate.

Posted on 2019-12-03, 16:05

by

by athlon-power

in Milliways

in Milliways

There is only one good processor company, and that's Cyrix. I don't want to see any Intel or AMD plebeians try to correct this, there was always Cyrix, there was never anything but Cyrix, and there never will be anything but Cyrix. I have custom-designed a super computer that uses 30,000 225Mhz …

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Re: i740 AGP Driver Installs Fail Universally

Posted on 2019-12-02, 20:29

by

by athlon-power

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I have a couple of i740 that are missing a heatsink. I've had them for a long time and never used them. I remember them to be working fine, just tried them some time ago and they booted to the OS just fine. You can have one of them if you cover the shipping cost :) Thank you, though I'm pretty jack …

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Re: i740 AGP Driver Installs Fail Universally

Posted on 2019-11-28, 16:23

by

by athlon-power

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

The subject got me curious because I have an i740 lying around somewhere (but I never tried to run it I found this: ------------------- https://www.vogons.org/viewtopic.php?f=63&t=61012 Postby canthearu » 2018-7-03 @ 11:44 The Intel 740 is really the wrong card to use on a super socket 7 system. It …

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Re: On "time-accuracy," and whether it's worth it.

Posted on 2019-11-28, 05:22

by

by athlon-power

in Milliways

in Milliways

Can't remember all my various builds but I found these in my files. This will be sure to drive you crazy. I respect your commitment and knowledge, keep it up but don't let your body be found under a mountain of computer hardware unless that's the way you want to go. heh I really don't want to be …

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On "time-accuracy," and whether it's worth it.

Posted on 2019-11-28, 01:42

by

by athlon-power

in Milliways

in Milliways

I don't know if this belongs here, but I felt like it wouldn't really fit in general hardware because that's more "halp mi my thri ait six di ex thurti thri megihurtz d i e d" sort of stuff. At least, that's what I end up using it for :lol: However, for some odd reason when I started my obsession …

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