Ahh sweet, much better now. Def a nice and capable looking box you have there. Good selection of choice parts for sure. 😀

shspvr wrote:

Here is my build... Samsung SyncMaster 920N Intel P3 600Mhz Going upgrade it 800Mhz Soyo SY-6BA+II 3, 128meg SDRAM 168pin DIMM P […]
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Here is my build...
Samsung SyncMaster 920N
Intel P3 600Mhz Going upgrade it 800Mhz
Soyo SY-6BA+II
3, 128meg SDRAM 168pin DIMM PC133
ATI Rage Pro AGP 16meg
Quantum3D Obsidian x24 SLI PCI
Creative Lab's SoundBlaster ISA AWE 64 Gold
Lite-ON LH-20A1P DVD Burn
Realtek RTL8139 NIC
Windows98SE
20GB Seagate
Still have a few more thing to do
Hardware DVD Decoder
Replace Slot 1 Brackets
SIMMConn and add 32MB

I like your system. I think it's very well balanced (except for the case, it's too new 😜 😜 😜. Joke, your case looks very good as well ;D).
Those obsidians, never even seen one in the flesh. Cheers for having one dude! 😁

I suppose your put the ATI in there for 2D only?
Looking at it's stats, I could've build it 🤣 (except I use ME all the time 😜).

Tetrium wrote:

I like your system. I think it's very well balanced (except for the case, it's too new :P :P :P. Joke, your case looks very good […]
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I like your system. I think it's very well balanced (except for the case, it's too new 😜 😜 😜. Joke, your case looks very good as well ;D).
Those obsidians, never even seen one in the flesh. Cheers for having one dude! 😁

I suppose your put the ATI in there for 2D only?
Looking at it's stats, I could've build it 🤣 (except I use ME all the time 😜).

The case I give it paint job which was 11 years old and back in them days you didn't have lot option in color
Yes the ATI for 2D

Worked on my sons legacy gaming pc yesterday evening and most of today. He was using a Celeron 2.4ghz and GF Mx4000 pci combo stuck in a Compaq case, but I decided to change all that after his harddrive died. The new case is actually a old one from 1999-2000 or so. It had a ton of scratches on the metal area which was originally white, so I sanded those spots down, did some painting and clear coating to prevent chipping and crap.

The plastic front was also scuffed and scratched badly, so sanded and buffed out all that garbage for the most part, so you cant see much unless you get right up on it and look. Installed a cd drive and a 60gb Maxtor harddrive. The motherboard/cpu combo is a Sis 741 Socket A and Sempron 2500+ combo. The soundcard is a SB Live, and currently the grafx card is a Radeon 7000.

I had to do a repair on the Radeon. Originally the one 1000uf 6 volt cap was bulging, so I replaced it. The only 1000uf caps I had around were in the 35 volt range, and were too big to fit in the normal position because of the gpu heatsink, etc. Solution was to simply swap sides and solder it in. Looks fugly, but works. Also applied fresh Arctic Silver on the gpu/heatsink, and installed a fan on the card too. The card is a temporary and wont be in the system for very long. I will pick up something in the GF 2 GTS to GF 3 or GF MX 440 range for the system here soon.

I cant stick in anything much more powerful due to heat build up. The case has only one intake fan spot, and only the psu fan is doing the exhaust. GF 2 to GF 3 will be fine anyway. Nothing newer then 2002 will be run in the thing anyway, and it will be connected to a tv via svideo or composite, depending on the grafx card, doing 640x480 type gaming. Anyway, here are a few pics, nothing special though as I'm tired and need to hit bed.

And time for me to add again! 😁

I haven't gotten around to continue taking pics of my retro rigs for a long while now, but after having finally recommissioned my offline database rig I took the liberty of taking some pics 😀

This computer originated over 4 1/2 years ago. My best system at the time was a loud P3-1000 system (it was Maxtor who made it loud 😜) with a GF2MX....something.
Instead of steadily building slightly faster rigs from spare parts (up from my then upgraded P2-350) I decided to build a new rig altogether.
It's main aims were:
*Be as cheap as possible while retaining good quality parts
*Use as many spare parts laying around to help lower costs
*Usability over upgradeability, meaning max performance without expectations of upgrading later.
*Fulfill the task of being a main rig (the center piece around all other rigs) till the time was right to get myself a REAL new rig! 😁

For over 3 years this rig has been nothing but delightful to me. It's only drawback were some random crashes while watching BF2142 battle recorder, which was compensated a 100 fold by it's improved usefulness over the 40GB Maxtor rig I had before (and still have laying around actually).

It's function as main rig was partially taken away when I build my new quadcore 1 1/2 years ago, it became my offline database at that time 😀

It only cost me slightly over €300 to build! 😁

Stats (back then):
MSI s939 motherboard (see pics)
Athlon 64 3200+ Venice (2.2Ghz 512KB Cache and very cool)
2x2GB DDR-400 (Just some cheap consumer-grade but matched stuff 🤣)
GF7600GS passive, made active with the help of an 8cm case fan
400GB Samsung Spinpoint (it was this drive that sparked my love for the Spinpoints, what a world of difference compared to that horrible Maxtor!)
Sony 1.44/2.88 black floppy drive!!! 😁
Spare Black DVD burner I shamelessly removed from said Barton 3200+ rig (which was replaced by a regular white burner which btw sucked 😜)
Brand new 12cm very quiet case fan (with blue LED)
Coolermaster 450W (ahem?) PSU, with blue LED
Windows XP SP2

So first time after I assembled the rig and switched it on, I was surprised at the light it emitted. Along with the very bright LED activity LED from the all-black Coolermaster Centurion 5 case, this new rig was very blue indeed 😁
Great for playing MP3 with all other lights turned off 😁

I'm telling you, I absolutely loved this rig!

This rig never went online, it was always supposed to remain offline (didn't have internet back then, that was for the Barton 3200+ my dear mother gave to me as back when she got herself a laptop 😁).
The 2.88 floppy drive was used with WinImage for creating floppies for all the different retro rigs and has served it's purpose very well. Especially considering it's BY FAR the oldest part in the rig, it's 20 YEARS old!!!

It used to be used a lot, till the 400GB harddrive finally was full. As at the same time I build the new quadcore, I kinda forgot about it till very recently.

I decided it was time to recommission her again, this time with an extra 1TB Spinpoint. I also gave her a de-dust and replaced the GF7600GS with a slower, but also cooler running, Radeon 9600 256MB. The 7600GS is to be used in one of the spare LAN rigs that I'm currently working on. As I played less and less games on that rig, I figured the 7600GS was just being ignored, so time to but that faithful card back to some good ol gaming use! 😁

Pics are coming...

Edit:

Same case as my quadcore, except it's all black 😁

Insides, look at how neat the cables are arranged! 😜

Close up of the board + the Radeon

I sled the floppydrive out a bit for the sticker with the model number.
A 64 bit computer with 16 bit technology 🤣

Hope you all enjoyed! 😁

I forgot to add, I originally bought it with a black DVD burner and later added the DVD drive, which I destroyed while it's drawer was open -_-
That's why it has a hole in the front, never was bothered to fix it 😜

ProfessorProfessorson wrote:

Worked on my sons legacy gaming pc yesterday evening and most of today. He was using a Celeron 2.4ghz and GF Mx4000 pci combo st […]
Show full quote

Worked on my sons legacy gaming pc yesterday evening and most of today. He was using a Celeron 2.4ghz and GF Mx4000 pci combo stuck in a Compaq case, but I decided to change all that after his harddrive died. The new case is actually a old one from 1999-2000 or so. It had a ton of scratches on the metal area which was originally white, so I sanded those spots down, did some painting and clear coating to prevent chipping and crap.

The plastic front was also scuffed and scratched badly, so sanded and buffed out all that garbage for the most part, so you cant see much unless you get right up on it and look. Installed a cd drive and a 60gb Maxtor harddrive. The motherboard/cpu combo is a Sis 741 Socket A and Sempron 2500+ combo. The soundcard is a SB Live, and currently the grafx card is a Radeon 7000.

I had to do a repair on the Radeon. Originally the one 1000uf 6 volt cap was bulging, so I replaced it. The only 1000uf caps I had around were in the 35 volt range, and were too big to fit in the normal position because of the gpu heatsink, etc. Solution was to simply swap sides and solder it in. Looks fugly, but works. Also applied fresh Arctic Silver on the gpu/heatsink, and installed a fan on the card too. The card is a temporary and wont be in the system for very long. I will pick up something in the GF 2 GTS to GF 3 or GF MX 440 range for the system here soon.

I cant stick in anything much more powerful due to heat build up. The case has only one intake fan spot, and only the psu fan is doing the exhaust. GF 2 to GF 3 will be fine anyway. Nothing newer then 2002 will be run in the thing anyway, and it will be connected to a tv via svideo or composite, depending on the grafx card, doing 640x480 type gaming. Anyway, here are a few pics, nothing special though as I'm tired and need to hit bed.

Lol, I like putting good OEM motherboards that come in crappy cases in good cases.

May I recommend you a Radeon 9600? They have very good performance while running very cool 😉
Even battlefield 2142 will run on one (run, not sprint though 😜)

I considered it actually, but really I'm wanting to stick a Geforce card in this one. A lot of the stuff he will be running, the 9600 will be overkill for it, and I kinda fancy the GF 2-3 tech a tad. Most of the games he will be running will be stuff like Serious Sam or Quake 3 or prior titles. I will prob browse ebay for a card later today or tomorrow and see what I can find, because right now the only Geforce cards I have sitting here unused are Mx4000 pci cards and a FX 5950.

Thats a nice Athlon 64 build btw. I was considering doing a Socket 754 build to have around here for running Bet On Soldier specifically, but in my room I just don't have the space

ProfessorProfessorson wrote:

I considered it actually, but really I'm wanting to stick a Geforce card in this one. A lot of the stuff he will be running, the 9600 will be overkill for it, and I kinda fancy the GF 2-3 tech a tad. Most of the games he will be running will be stuff like Serious Sam or Quake 3 or prior titles. I will prob browse ebay for a card later today or tomorrow and see what I can find, because right now the only Geforce cards I have sitting here unused are Mx4000 pci cards and a FX 5950.

Thats a nice Athlon 64 build btw. I was considering doing a Socket 754 build to have around here for running Bet On Soldier specifically, but in my room I just don't have the space

If a 9600 is overkill then the GF4MX4000 should be fine. The whole GF4MX line is highly compatible with just about anything +/- 5 years from it's 2002 introduction date.

Incidentally, I had an unlocked 9500 in a 2.4 ghz P4 system and it didn't seem like overkill to me. At the time there were actually a lot of current games that ran pretty poorly with high settings turned on.

Yeah but the MX 4000 PCI is too slow. I'm factoring in compatibility, me wanting it to be from a Nvidia GF 2-3 card line due to temps and power draw, and performance. He was using the MX prior, as I said above, and it did barely ok at best.
http://www.ultimatehardware.net/045.htm
Take that review and knock the performance down another 15 percent or so and thats what you can expect from the Pci version of the card. A Geforce 2 GTS would curb stomp the card easily. If I spot a cheap Ti 4200 that I like I may go for that too really. Kinda kicking myself because I had sold my Gainward Golden Sample Ti4200 just a couple months ago because I stopped using it for video capping.

Tetrium
I would say for that era go a ati9800 pro or xt!
(the more processing power the better, right?)
they are harder to find but are well worth the extra money and effort.
By the way nice system...64 bit goodness...

stano wrote:

Tetrium I would say for that era go a ati9800 pro or xt! (the more processing power the better, right?) they are harder to find […]
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Tetrium
I would say for that era go a ati9800 pro or xt!
(the more processing power the better, right?)
they are harder to find but are well worth the extra money and effort.
By the way nice system...64 bit goodness...

I know, but I probably won't be playing any games on it, strange as it sounds. It's modded specifically to hold a lot of data and the Radeon 9600 can play BF2142 in offline mode well enough, which is the most it might be doing. Though I have other rigs for that 😉

I was thinking of doing exactly that, but with the rig that has the FX5900 Ultra in it, except that I don't have the actual card. I do have a Radeon 9800XL laying around, came out of a Medion I think, but has only 128MB RAM. The other options I have are the GF7600GS (I think the best option atm) and a Radeon 9600XT with 256MB and one of those copper Zalman coolers (modded the card a few years ago).

I'm currently working on another rig though (not counting a client's computer which needs fixing, testing some second hand hardware that was broken but the seller claims it was my fault -_-, a Thunderbird 1400 which I unmounted yesterday and a Tualatin 1400S with a GF3 which is to receive Windows ME cloned from a VHD...if it works 😁), another Athlon 64 which is, like I call it, desktop ready, but still needs some extra apps like a PDF reader and a few others. I already installed around 10 other programs which I "always" install on new rigs 😉
Still need to "burn" that rig though, doing like at least half an hour of playtesting but I'm waiting for that till my RSI arm has recovered well enough. As my arm is much improved over the last week, I reckon playtesting won't have to wait for much longer 😉

In the meanwhile, I'll be building a few other rigs for various purposes.
After these are done, I still want to build a Voodoo 3 rig with a Nehemiah 1200 and Windows ME 🤣

stano wrote:

... Asus A7M-266D motherboard 512 mb pc2700 ram(need to get registered ram) amd athlon 1900+ (x 2) Geforce 3 video card 320 gb I […]
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...
Asus A7M-266D motherboard
512 mb pc2700 ram(need to get registered ram)
amd athlon 1900+ (x 2)
Geforce 3 video card
320 gb IDE blue series wd drive
Soundblaster Live!
Case Lian Li K62

I have a very similar setup. and i'm using 2GB of normal DDR400. This board accepts both types. There is no need to get ecc/registered DDR.

What PSU are you going to use?

interesting I thought the a7m-266d needed ecc ram above 512mb,but it seems I am wrong. Thanks for letting me know.

The PSU is a corsair GS600 abit overkill for the setup, but it has blue glowing fan....a like glowing stuff... 😁

here is a pic with psu visable.

stano wrote:

interesting I thought the a7m-266d needed ecc ram above 512mb,but it seems I am wrong. Thanks for letting me know.

The PSU is a corsair GS600 abit overkill for the setup, but it has blue glowing fan....a like glowing stuff... 😁

here is a pic with psu visable.

I've been holding my setup because of the PSU. Asus states it requires 180W combined in 3.3V /5V. Your PSU has 150W max... Is it stable?

sprcorreia wrote:

stano wrote:

interesting I thought the a7m-266d needed ecc ram above 512mb,but it seems I am wrong. Thanks for letting me know.

The PSU is a corsair GS600 abit overkill for the setup, but it has blue glowing fan....a like glowing stuff... 😁

here is a pic with psu visable.

I've been holding my setup because of the PSU. Asus states it requires 180W combined in 3.3V /5V. Your PSU has 150W max... Is it stable?

Look at amps not what it say becuases 99% of the time it way wrong any way.
The power supply made just for this board is Antec PP-412X or TP430 with +5V and 3.3V combined output well over 250+Watts.
Hear the things you need a bear min +3.3V@25A = 82.5 watts, +5V@25A = 125 watts which is rigth combined of 207.5 wattage
The best high amps is SuperMicro PWS-865-PQ or Athena Power Zippy HP2-6500P yes there server power supply.
All power supply should have OVP (Over Voltage Protection) Mod which usely around 20/25% more amp/watts then what listed in there spec how ever Antec dose list all of it.
I perf Corsair over all other.

shspvr wrote:

Look at amps not what it say becuases 99% of the time it way wrong any way. The power supply made just for this board is Antec P […]
Show full quote

sprcorreia wrote:

stano wrote:

interesting I thought the a7m-266d needed ecc ram above 512mb,but it seems I am wrong. Thanks for letting me know.

The PSU is a corsair GS600 abit overkill for the setup, but it has blue glowing fan....a like glowing stuff... 😁

here is a pic with psu visable.

I've been holding my setup because of the PSU. Asus states it requires 180W combined in 3.3V /5V. Your PSU has 150W max... Is it stable?

Look at amps not what it say becuases 99% of the time it way wrong any way.
The power supply made just for this board is Antec PP-412X or TP430 with +5V and 3.3V combined output well over 250+Watts.
Hear the things you need a bear min +3.3V@25A = 82.5 watts, +5V@25A = 125 watts which is rigth combined of 207.5 wattage
The best high amps is SuperMicro PWS-865-PQ or Athena Power Zippy HP2-6500P yes there server power supply.
All power supply should have OVP (Over Voltage Protection) Mod which usely around 20/25% more amp/watts then what listed in there spec how ever Antec dose list all of it.
I perf Corsair over all other.

The problem is that it's kind of hard or expensive to get a PSU within specs. Older PSUs had lots of power within 3.3V/5V, newers have power on +12V rails...

I can get a PSU with 200W (3.3V/5V), surpassing minimum required by ASUS, but it's expensive. The funny thing is that this board has ATX12V. The real question is how much power can it get from this connector...

sprcorreia wrote:

The problem is that it's kind of hard or expensive to get a PSU within specs. Older PSUs had lots of power within 3.3V/5V, newers have power on +12V rails...

I can get a PSU with 200W (3.3V/5V), surpassing minimum required by ASUS, but it's expensive. The funny thing is that this board has ATX12V. The real question is how much power can it get from this connector...

I've been having somewhat similar issues regarding what PSU's to match with which retrorig. What I finally learned is, there is no fullproof way to know from which rail the CPU receives it's power.
There is a "rule" for Socket A's: If the board has the P4 connector (which most Socket A's don't actually), then the CPU gets it's power from the 12v line. Otherwise it usually gets it from the 5v line.

Also some PSU manufacturers state they have 2 separate rails, when in fact they don't.
PSU's can be messy when it comes to finding out what exactly they are

+12V rails min is 15Amps or more is better
From what I recall both the Auxillary Power P6 Connector and 12V ATX Power J4 Connector must be hook up
All need just get this http://www.atxpowersupplies.com/6-pin-aux-con … tor-adapter.php
MSI K7D Master used a reg update power supply
That wrong 200/250w 3.3V/5V where in low 10/17amps but not with the 300 watts then yes would ture
Like my Lite-ON 300w power supply
+5V = 40a
+12V = 12a
+3.3V = 30a
This puppy heavy build like brick hehe

But any case you min of 400watt with min of amps
+5V = 25a
+12V = 15a if you go with High RPM SCSI drive you want bump this up 20a or more
+3.3V = 25a

sprcorreia wrote:

stano wrote:

interesting I thought the a7m-266d needed ecc ram above 512mb,but it seems I am wrong. Thanks for letting me know.

The PSU is a corsair GS600 abit overkill for the setup, but it has blue glowing fan....a like glowing stuff... 😁

here is a pic with psu visable.

I've been holding my setup because of the PSU. Asus states it requires 180W combined in 3.3V /5V. Your PSU has 150W max... Is it stable?

no weird crashing that I have noticed....

Tetrium wrote:

Also some PSU manufacturers state they have 2 separate rails, when in fact they don't.
PSU's can be messy when it comes to finding out what exactly they are

When in doubt, buy a 1000 watt. 😜