Building a crappy system isn't challenging at all. About 95% of the parts used in the average person's PC are crap.

Anonymous Coward wrote:

Building a crappy system isn't challenging at all. About 95% of the parts used in the average person's PC are crap.

And the percentage was higher in the late 80's and 90's 😉

And when done, install Windows ME on it!

Its not only about crap - its about legendary crap! How about this:

1) get a GF 5800 Ultra (yes, the one with a really nice sound)
2) stick it into a VIA MVP3 motherboard which has a really crappy AGP support and do get a model with not more then 512kb cache.
3) get a quantum bigfoot 5" hdd with some isolated bb's, or if you are not that much of a sadist, get a really loud quantum fireball (i think it was called like that)
4) get a crappy K6/2 @ 266mhz and downclock it
5) get a thermaltake Vulcano 6 cu as a CPU cooler (yes, the one with 6500+ RPM)
6) get a pioneer CD drive from late 90's. It had problems reading CDs when it was brand new and it had a nice sound to it too.
7) grab a Opti Mad 16 pro sound card - you will have loads of fun to install drivers and hear any music at all
😎 A4 mouse is a must along with a nice crappy el cheapo keyboard.
9) grab one at least 10 year old CRT... for example Daewoo 511x or worse.

Now, if you combine all this... You might get a few FPS in 3dmark 2000 with loads of artifacts since GF is not rly compatible with MVP3; you will get no, or at best crappy sound with a lot of background noise (CPU fan + GF 5800); you will be rewarded by awesome radiance from a crappy CRT and loads of installation problems. Sounds like hours of fun :d

Ultimately a really bad system won't boot, and I can't stand working on those. So, ultimately, to make a bad system is to make it so it doesn't boot, but you dunno why.

TO MAKE THE ULTIMATE BAD SYSTEM IS TO MAKE ONE THAT DOESN'T BOOT. GO BUY A DEAD MOTHERBOARD NOW.

I have an idea!!!

Just buy a whole selection of "AS-IS" parts off ebay and put it all together. It is sure to be the most horrible computer building experience in your life. 😀

I was on there today wasting work hours and stumbled across a fabulous mobo with fire damage. It was literally smoked and scorched. Fleabay forever.

Svenne wrote:

And when done, install Windows ME on it!

You know everybody seemed to hate ME, I never had any problems installing or using it at all, but then again 2000 came out soon afterwards and I upgraded again 😁

Okay, how about Vista then?

Svenne wrote:

Okay, how about Vista then?

imho it's the same story there...some have problems som have no problems.

I think it's all down to drivers/hardware but imho Win ME was overall terrible

I've tinkered with ME for fun recently on two different systems and I got BSOD's on both systems on different occasions 😜

Use to have problems with Vista (BSOD's) until a new SATA driver and SP1 came out but what annoys me with Vista is all the disk activity that sucks juice out of your PC and the time it takes for updates to complete

I think you can do better than some of the "crap" on your list.

I strongly recommend:

-An off-brand 52X CD-ROM drive that sounds like a jet engine when it spins up. It should also the type that is capable of shattering the discs by spinning them too fast. It probably shouldn't do DMA or have the ability to do DAE either.

-The K6/2-266 is far from the crappiest socket7 CPU. You want something like a Winchip or a MediaGX. The MediaGX comes with the bonus of crappy integrated video.

-Be sure to use a really off brand HS/fan combo. You want to make sure you get one made in China so that the bearings wear out really fast.

-I think a Samsung drive might be preferable to a Bigfoot, because at least the Bigfoots could do DMA. But I guess if you're using an MVP3 it won't really matter either way.

WinChip is faster than a K5. 😀 The first K5s (5K86), the 75 / 90 MHz varieties, were actually somewhat broken and perform worse at the same clock rate than the later grades. Very slow.

MediaGX is based on the pathetic Cyrix 5x86 and is a total dog of course, but you can't drop those into a regular socket. One could buy a MediaGX mobo though!

Anonymous Coward wrote:

-An off-brand 52X CD-ROM drive that sounds like a jet engine when it spins up.

Pioneer by any chance? I have 2, from old NECs...

There's also the kind of CD drive that won't open the drive door until god-only-knows-how-long, massively frustrating. I mean - goddam cd drive, I want the disk NOW, why the hell do you think I pressed the button a hundred times!?! Mine's an LG I see.

Pity you can't get the now-you-see-it-now-you-don't DVD drive for a PC that we have attached to our TV. Whenever you turn it on, the first time you ask it to open it does so, then quickly shuts again before you can either get a disk out or put on in. Friggin comedy designers...

And finally, get a knackered slot-loader. I had one of these for a week and then it kept the CD. Ho ho ho, try getting that out without dismantling the drive.

Who has had a CDROM explode in a 52x drive? 😁 Oh the good 'ol days!

I still have a Sony 52X that is by default 48X or something until you hold the eject button for 5 seconds when a disc is in. Then it goes 52X. They do that to reduce crazy vibrations/explosions. We need structural integrity fields eh.

I could never figure out why anyone needed a CD-ROM drive faster than 8x in the first place. I guess for burning it's pretty good, but I don't think there are many games that would benefit from the extra speed...plus the sound and vibration is really annoying. The only fast drives I really liked were the plextor caddy loaders, because they handled the problems in question very well.

Why is everyone so down on Pioneer drives? I've been using them almost exclusively for years, and I still consider them to be one of the best drives on the market.

I suggest some Connor HD's , louder than the SCSI drives I had. Quantum Fireball's weren't anywhere near as loud, even the head moving was massively loud. CLICK CLACK CLICK CLACK. 😁 😁 😁

Kenwood TrueX drives all the way*
*if you can ignore their near-inability to read CDRs

Here are some tips :

1. Take a cup of coffee, filled to the brim, and drink from the cup (without the saucer) just above the opened cpu casing, while the system is running hot! (if it is able to run anyway.) And deliberately spill some on it. Either from your mouth or directly from the cup. The choice is yours. Come spill some!

- And don't forget to say "Ooops" afterwards.

2. Give your system to your 4 or 5 year-old cousin or nephew. (The one who messes up your whole home when he comes!) For best results, give to your relative who has 2 or more kids with equally energetic activities! Then take it from them forcefully and try booting it.

3. Ever heard of the washing machine company who advertise "You Can Wash ANYTHING In It? No? Well, it's worth a try anyway.

4. You can see the lightning. No, numerous lightnings with ear piercing thunders! Now will be the perfect time to turn on that computer. You'll agree with me that you've completed a "well done" job afterwards.

5. Water cool it. I mean it! Water Cool it!

Hey! What am I doing in this thread anyway?

Oops.. I forgot to mention ... stuff it with Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit. I don't care how. Just stuff it! 😁

And why am I STILL here?? 😕 🤣

🤣 at Kenwood TrueX CD-ROM drives, man those were utter garbage!!!!!!

You need to find a FAKE CACHE PC Chips 486 motherboard, then load in a 512kb Trident 8900, an ESS Audiodrive sound card, 8MB of RAM, and Windows 95 first edition...........on a Quantum Bigfoot or ancient Fujitsu hard drive as mentioned above. Now that would be a 'smokin system!!!!!! 😵

I joked about a PC Chips fake cache mobo on this Vogons thread here -

486 mobo with compact flash device and CD-ROM

This particular cache is not completely fake, as it isn't made of plastic! I think it's just normal RAM - no faster than SIMM RAM. If you enable the L2 "cache" in the mobo's BIOS settings, the BIOS POST screen reports that the "cache" is enabled, and vice versa. This particular mobo revision was spoilt by that fake cache. A pity, as it had some nice features to it.