Beautiful machine! Just curious about the choice of CPU:

1) how does it differ from a "usual" P24D performance-wise?
2) any reason you decided not to go the DX4/5x86 route? Those chips seem to be more easily available than an Overdrive, while giving better performance.

Absolutely loving the powder-coating of the case - makes it look really pleasing to the eye internally. You've really crammed in as much as you can, and this makes a sweet gaming setup, especially with the sound card selection. I'm curious to know the performance difference using compact flash with / without a caching controller.

Thank you for good reception 😀

As to the CPU choice - I have lots of loose CPU's, including IBM 5x86C (which is not supported by the motherboard), i486DX4, etc. - but I decided to go with DX2-66 because I perceive it as a pinnacle of i486 generation. Not in terms of power (as we all know, I could get more even out of a DX4), but in terms of something I would define as market position.

Proof me wrong, but DX2-66, unlike DX4-100, was once state-of-the-art CPU for home/office market. Whereas DX4-100 was competing against Pentiums, being a budget choice. So was Cyrix or AMD with their DX4/5x86 CPUs.

I thought I would put my IBM 5x86c CPU to some PCI-based build. But now I have no heart for this - I am much more interested in building some state-of-the-art 386 now 😀.

I will check how the CF card behaves with cache enabled and disabled and let you all know.

tikoellner wrote:

As to the CPU choice - I have lots of loose CPU's, including IBM 5x86C (which is not supported by the motherboard), i486DX4, etc. - but I decided to go with DX2-66 because I perceive it as a pinnacle of i486 generation. Not in terms of power (as we all know, I could get more even out of a DX4), but in terms of something I would define as market position.

Proof me wrong, but DX2-66, unlike DX4-100, was once state-of-the-art CPU for home/office market. Whereas DX4-100 was competing against Pentiums, being a budget choice. So was Cyrix or AMD with their DX4/5x86 CPUs.

I agree with that.
The 486DX2-66 with VLB was a popular platform for a while. Great for games and demos. The 'classic' configuration for games like DOOM, and demos like Second Reality and Crystal Dream 2.
While the 486 was already on the market for a while, the early models were still very expensive, so people still bought 386SX/DX systems. When the DX2-66 came around, the 486 was also becoming an affordable mainstream option. Not to mention that people who did own a DX25 or DX33 could now upgrade to a DX2-50 or DX2-66.
The DX2-66 was the right CPU at the right moment in the upgrade cycle of many people.
I personally went from a 386SX-16 to a 486DX2-66, which was the only 486 I ever used as my primary machine.

Indeed the first DX4s didn't arrive on the market until the Pentium was already out (and faster), making them the budget choice. Sort of like the Celeron of their generation.
I upgraded from my 486DX2-66 to a Pentium 133, skipping all the DX4's and the like.

I suppose the 486DX2-66 also marked the end of the DOS era for me, so it was the pinnacle of DOS as well for me.

Yes. As a DOS kind of man I can't stand any Windows key on any of my keyboard. Neither I can stand "designed for Windows 95" on late AMD 486 CPUs.

When I started this hobby, I did not care much for being period correct. But now I really require my builds to be authentic. CF cards being some exception, I know.

tikoellner wrote:

Neither I can stand "designed for Windows 95" on late AMD 486 CPUs.

They should have been sued for false advertising there.
AMD's 486s were nothing more than reverse-engineered Intel chips (and initially even pirated microcode, like their 386DX, but they changed that).
Explain to me how a CPU released in 1989 (so designed before that), and not even by yourself, can be 'designed for Windows 95', which wasn't even on the Microsoft roadmap back in 1989?

It was developed with Windows 95 in mind - released in nov.1995. It had several enhancement and top speed - it handled Win95 with ease.

kixs wrote:

It was developed with Windows 95 in mind - released in nov.1995. It had several enhancement and top speed - it handled Win95 with ease.

Correlation does not imply causation.
Sure, it handled Win95 with ease, but that's more because Win95 was designed to run on 32-bit x86 CPUs (mainly the Intel 486, which AMD had cloned), not the other way around.
AMD didn't even design the CPU period. Let alone that they designed it for Win95. False advertising.

tikoellner wrote:

As to the CPU choice - I have lots of loose CPU's, including IBM 5x86C (which is not supported by the motherboard), i486DX4, etc. - but I decided to go with DX2-66 because I perceive it as a pinnacle of i486 generation. Not in terms of power (as we all know, I could get more even out of a DX4), but in terms of something I would define as market position.

Honestly, I was simply surprised that a 486DX2@66 Overdrive exists at all. I mean, what is the purpose? Are there any Socket 1-3 motherboards that can't take a regular DX2?

jheronimus wrote:

Honestly, I was simply surprised that a 486DX2@66 Overdrive exists at all. I mean, what is the purpose? Are there any Socket 1-3 motherboards that can't take a regular DX2?

The CPU might work, but the problem is with the cooling.
A 486DX-33 will not usually have a heatsink, let alone a fan.
A DX2-66 would require a heatsink, and some amount of airflow.
The OverDrive models have a small heatsink glued on, and may actually be cherry-picked for less heat generation than a 'normal' DX2-66, which an OEM would install with a larger heatsink and possibly a fan.
So I guess the idea behind the OverDrive products was to offer a reliable drop-in solution that could be guaranteed to work in any 486DX-33 system, and could be installed by regular users, without having to bother with third-party heatsinks, thermal paste or whatever.
Think of it as retail vs OEM.

That baby AT case really is sweet. Where the hell did you find it? I can never find them. I would love to find one in either gray or black.

Guess there weren't any black cases of this kind. I found mine locally. Actually I found two sets and combined the best pieces of them

tikoellner wrote:

Guess there weren't any black cases of this kind. I found mine locally. Actually I found two sets and combined the best pieces of them

Always local. I've been hunting out cases like this for a long time. In the US they are few and far between on ebay and shipping costs more than the case 😵

Absolutely beautiful rig. Would love to have one like that again 😊

Great sound setup too!

Browser froze up and double posted on me, sorry

Congratulations dude! 😀
Beautiful/powerfull rig, I really like non-black heatsinks, purple looks so cool. 😊
Incredible sound setup too. 😉

Baby AT are really lovely 😊

Thanks man! Next I will replace Promise controller with Tekram Dc-680c that I just found and add some really hdd for complete retro experience. And it's done.

Unless you have any idea to hype how it a little more 😉

Chassis looks mint!

Thanks!

It looks mint as it was completely disassembled and powder coated (RAL-9001). Then I just replaced the rivets and here it is.

Today I finally swapped the LCS-6941 controller with TEKRAM DC-680C that arrived in the mail.

First I was skeptical if that would make any difference to the performance of my 486. I was wrong! The speed increase is VERY perceptible.

I also went through speedsys tests with both controllers. You woun't believe but this are the results (both controllers operating with the same memory, cache enabled, shadowing, etc.):

TEKRAM:
Random access time: 0.77ms
Buffered read speed: 18216 KB/s
Linear verify speed: 310066 KB/s
Linear read speed: 2091 KB/s

LCS:
Random access time: 1.07 ms
Buffered read speed: 15073 KB/s
Linear verify speed: 74872 KB/s
Linear read speed: 1011 KB/s

It seems that in some departments (linear verify speed) TEKRAM works more than THREE times faster! It really beats the shit out of Promise thing... The irony is that I payed three times more for Promise than I did for TEKRAM. Or am I commiting some methodological mistake?

TEKRAM also has a very advanced menu with lots of options. Promise in this respect seems extremely limited.