Why is that unusual ? AT super socket 7 are not more uncomon than ATX super socket 7 as far as I am aware.

But AT Socket 7 with AGP. This is the first one I ever see. Nice.

There are a few different SS7 boards with AGP:

Acorp 5ali61
ASUS P5A-B
Biostar M5ALC
Chaintech 5AGM2
DFI K6BV3+
DFI K6BV3+ /66
DFI P5BV3+
EPOX EP-MVP3C
EPOX EP-MVP3C2
FIC VA-503+
Gigabyte GA-5AA
Gigabyte GA-5SG100
Jetway J-542B
Jetway J-542C
Jetway J-598B
J Bond 500C-Pa
J Bond ALD 5
Lucky Star 5mvp3
Lucky Tech P5MVP3
Matsonic MS6260S
PC-Chips M577
PCPartner VIB838DS
PCPartner VIB878DS
PCPartner MVP3BS7-954
Shuttle HOT-591P
SOYO SY-5EHM
TYAN S1590S (yours)

Here is a weird one
PCPartner VIB806DS (Via VP3 chipset - Has AGP but manual says it only supports up to 75Mhz fsb)
EPOX EP-5BVP3A

After looking into it, there are a huge number of VP3 based boards - see here for a list:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_VP3

They were not that uncommon back in the day.

In the computer store I worked at, we sold a ton of FIC VA-503+ boards.

Anybody know of any I missed?

Even with AGP I didn't know they were uncommon x)

@Warlord: that's a pretty nice layout; not often you see a SS7 board with a FULL compliment of 4xPCI and 4xISA slots, which is the maximum the format supports. My P5A-B only has 3 PCI & 2 ISA which is really limiting. Although I imagine the PSU+IDE+FDD+AGP pile-up in the top left could be a big pain to work with.

@Cyclone3D: JBond (seriously) PCIALD5. I only remember that one because I found the driver disc in a stash of old CDs ages ago. I vaguely remember getting that board as an extra system back when socket 7 was getting dumped.

AT SS7 boards are not too common but I don't believe they're that rare either.
This particular one is a really nice find though! 😀 Congrats!
Really nice layout imho, CR2032, AT+ATX PSU campatibility, 1MB of cache on the MVP3 and you can actually utilise all eight card slots on AT cases.
The CPU and VRM are near the front where a fan mount might be so they can be conveniently cooled.
It also has headers for PS/2 and USB if you fancy those and even goes all the way down to 2.0V so you can safely run K6 Plus CPUs.
The latest BIOS supports 128GB drives and there's a K6 Plus patched BIOS on Jan Steunebrink's website.
This board is perfect for a Win98 AT build.
Even the CPU cooler is one of the good ones, guiding air all the way around it and not only to two sides so the VRMs get some air flow as well.

Those style of CPU coolers were all the rage back then... However, they don't cool the CPU very well due to the thick fin design.

They are fine for stock speeds and voltages, but if you are overclocking they really suck.

@Warlord - thanks! Added.

cyclone3d wrote:

Those style of CPU coolers were all the rage back then... However, they don't cool the CPU very well due to the thick fin design.

They are fine for stock speeds and voltages, but if you are overclocking they really suck.

Does it really matter on SS7 though? I have the same cooler and it never seems to run hot with a AMD-K6-III/400AHX so I always thought that as far as (S)S7 goes this was a good design.
Wouldn't thrust it with an Athlon though. 😁

thank you, ok guys, I'm not an expert on all motherboards ever released, It just seemed very unusual to me because of the features it had. I'm not exatly a socket 7 noob either since I have had a Soyo sy-5ema+ for 17 years. 🤣 Thanks for the input, I'm thinking of keeping this one and selling my other socket 7 now, even though the other one is questionably better.

Really Nice ! AT with AGP and 4 PCI and 4 ISA is a rare find. Looks like all the jumper settings are painted on the board too which is always a good thing. The FIC VA 503+ has AGP but only 3 PCI and 3 ISA (of which I own two, both running AMD processors similar to what you got.). Sounds like you got a very good deal ! Oh does the board boot up ? :p

cyclone3d wrote:

There are a few different SS7 boards with AGP: […]
Show full quote

There are a few different SS7 boards with AGP:

After looking into it, there are a huge number of VP3 based boards - see here for a list:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_VP3

They were not that uncommon back in the day.

In the computer store I worked at, we sold a ton of FIC VA-503+ boards.

Anybody know of any I missed?

whats curious about this board is that its not a VP3 chipset its a VT82C598MVP northbridge with a VT82C586B sothbridge. So its very unusual imo. It's also 1024 L2,

Anandtech article
https://www.anandtech.com/show/117

Warlord wrote:

whats curious about this board is that its not a VP3 chipset its a VT82C598MVP northbridge with a VT82C586B sothbridge. So its very unusual imo. It's also 1024 L2,

VT82C598MVP is exactly MVP3, and the 586B is its southbridge.

Even PCChips' HT82C598AT chipset is a rebadged MVP3 chipset.

PcBytes wrote:

.

MVP3 is a refresh of the VP3 and most of those AT style boards were VP3, not MVP3. They were just normal socket 7 not ss7 and couldn't take Plus versions of CPU.

Tyan 1590 - a very good motherboard

Warlord wrote:

PcBytes wrote:

.

MVP3 is a refresh of the VP3 and most of those AT style boards were VP3, not MVP3. They were just normal socket 7 not ss7 and couldn't take Plus versions of CPU.

"Super" Socket 7 is nothing more than a marketing term. All SS7 boards are 'normal socket 7'. Someone just decided to make a bit more money by calling 100MHz FSB support "Super".

In my experience MVP3 was much commoner than VP3 in AT as well as ATX; VP3 was a transitional product where Via wasn't quite able to get the desired 100MHz FSB, as soon as they could (re-spin of basically the same design) everything was MVP3, and stayed so for quite a while as it was the final (high-end) chipset for So7 by Via.

In any event K6Plus support was completely independent of chipset. Many MVP3 boards didn't support it and - with correct BIOS and voltage settings - many boards with older chipsets, even as far back as the i430HX, could support it.

I'm running the same motherboard in my WIP Super Socket 7 build using the modified BIOS for K6-III+ support. Only issue I've had is that once I loaded it with all my hardware DOS/98SE would hang at boot unless I disabled the L2 cache. When I was running it in minimalist mode this didn't occur. I think the benchmark score from TOPBENCH was only a few points. I'd like to see if there are any undocumented FSB settings. Throttle worked on my first try too, which was awesome. I can definitely say I'm happy so far.

I had one of these boards back in the day with a K6-3. A few years ago I hooked it up again and upgraded to a K6-3+. I definitely like the "plus" CPU a lot better. It's cooler, more stable, and clocks both faster and slower with more ease. A K6-2+ is very close to a 3+, and might be cheaper/easier to find (I haven't looked lately). To use those CPUs requires the modded BIOS that Doornkatt referred to.

I wrote a really long and boring post about this board here:
Tyan S1590 (baby-AT Super7) 3.3v AGP power limits

The 2nd post goes through some undocumented Vcore settings. However, it looks like yours is an older revision and maybe it won't go below 2.0V. If you have a multimeter, then you could safely experiment with the jumpers as described in that post (measure with no CPU installed).

The slot arrangement can be inconvenient because it prevents using an AGP card when the board is installed in an ATX case. But as long as you have an AT case with 8 slot openings, then it's no problem.
If you're using an AT power supply then be careful how much 3.3V current you pull. Some AGP cards could overload the onboard regulator and cause damage.
If you use an ATX power supply (and set your jumpers appropriately) then I don't believe this is a problem, but I haven't tried any really heavy cards on mine.
The onboard 3.3V regulator is the heatsinked 3-pin device at the corner of the DIMM slots, near the L2 cache. It gets pretty hot, I started pointing a fan at mine.

Your board has several Sanyo capacitors, which are good, but a couple of the caps near the CPU (the black and gold ones) look like cheapies. The vent pattern looks like Hermei or something. I had those on my board also. I'd consider replacing at least those if you're comfortable doing it.

When I used this board a few years ago, I had some glitchy problems with >32GB hard drive, even though the modded BIOS supposedly allows 128GB (or more?). I don't know if I was doing something wrong but I ended up needing to cap the drive to 32GB and move on with my life.

My board probably only will do 2.0v. The caps by the cpu are Canicon which some sites lists as a bad manufacture but the caps look solid, not bulging or leaking. They are 6.3v 1500uf 105c Given the age of the board these caps may not be bad ones. 🤣

Warlord wrote:

My board probably only will do 2.0v. The caps by the cpu are Canicon which some sites lists as a bad manufacture but the caps look solid, not bulging or leaking. They are 6.3v 1500uf 105c Given the age of the board these caps may not be bad ones. 🤣

I don't think Canicon has ever made good caps, but these might be a more conservative series than the ones that came a bit later on. Some of the worst caps were so defective that they'd start leaking just in storage, even if never used. These obviously haven't done that, and mine didn't either.
I'd count on them to be the first caps to fail, if they're not bad already (bulging only happens in severe cases). But I can understand leaving them if recapping isn't something you're comfortable with. Just keep an eye on them if you run the board over a long term.