486 motherboards, especially vlb, are not cheap. You can get a good deal if you keep your eyes pealed, but don't expect to pay less than $200 for a motherboard, RAM, cpu, graphics card and HD controller/ IO board. Maybe up to $300 (or more) if you can't get any deals. VLB graphics cards in particular are really bad price-wise unless you go with something like a Trident or Oak with 512k memory.

If all your retro gaming needs are served by the P-233 system and you don't have any particular attachment to the 486 era (I had one in college, so that's why I built one) then just leave well enough alone and stick with the P-233.

As others have pointed out, you can quickly end up with a lot of systems and having spent a lot of money. It is very easy to get caught up in that "got to have them all" mindset. In order to play games from 1980 to 1999 on physical hardware, you could easily end up with 8 or more systems. If you're pulling them all out of the trash and only spending the odd $10 here and there to get a part, that isn't too horrible but if you're buying everything off E-bay, god help you.

Just do it dude! Playing old games is fun but messing around with old hardware is often more rewarding I think. Spend a couple of months finding the right bits, realise half of them aren't compatible with the other half, buy more bits, and finally beat a stable 486 into shape through blood, sweat and tears. It's time well spent, and if you end up just putting it in the cupboard or selling it, I think you still come out ahead.

VLB cards appear regularly on eBay, and it won't take long before you find reasonably priced ones.

Also, you MUST get yourself a C64 😈

Stop encouraging him, I still have to finish my box 🤣

I think you already late now. Finding something is really hard( you mentioned it your self) 486 boards are going for higher prices now, and finding good price VLB stuff isnt very easy as well
If you really have patience (and money) you can do it. But if you dont want to spend to much, then better forget it.. Then you could better look for an socket 5 or first period socket 7 stuff and put a pentium 75 processor in the board to get almost the same speed out of it.

Maybe its a better idea to look for an PCI board instead.

snorg wrote:

486 motherboards, especially vlb, are not cheap. You can get a good deal if you keep your eyes pealed, but don't expect to pay less than $200 for a motherboard, RAM, cpu, graphics card and HD controller/ IO board. Maybe up to $300 (or more) if you can't get any deals. VLB graphics cards in particular are really bad price-wise unless you go with something like a Trident or Oak with 512k memory.

This isn't true. I just spent 3 mins searching ebay and found:

http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/486-586-Motherboar … de8790cf&_uhb=1
http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Vintage-video-Card … 88a55c80&_uhb=1
http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/VINTAGE-UMC-QD6500 … 12692908&_uhb=1

Carefully searching over the course of a month would turn up much better deals.

Thanks for the replies, seriously. One my my reasons was t rebuild my first "real" computer, a 486 DX4-100. I found a board on ebay that looks suspiciously like it, but I cannot be sure.

Oh, bugger. Figures you post a VLB/PCI combo board after I've already bought my boards. I got them for about the same (maybe even a bit less, would have to check my records) but it would be nice to have a single board instead of two. Note to self: start checking www.ebay.au more often.

Am I or am I not wrong about this? Sooner or later everyone who goes back and re-builds that "first PC" finds out it was not what they thought. Sort of like the old saying, you can never move back home again.

Oh you're definitely correct. Descent or Doom on a 486dx2-66 looked absolutely amazing, or Diablo on a dx4-100. Problem is we have been so spoiled by so many years of retina-searing graphics that it is hard to go back to chunky pixels and 320x400 mode x or 640x400 (if lucky).

I imagine I'll have a fun weekend getting it all together and throw a few old games on but it just isn't quite the same.
On a different note, what is with the douche posting $500 vlb cards? Really??

Like I wrote before, I am also tempted to go 486 sometimes. A while ago I decided I would first check how slow one can set an ATX socket 7 board. It turned out that the Cyrix 6x86L runs happily at a mere 60MHz, that makes it near a 486DX-4/100 PCI. Without all the hassle. Lets say that is good enough for me, for now. 🙄
'Baby AT' looks so primitive..

My "excuse" was that I stumbled on a clean and fully running 486 on eBay for $30 + 23 shipping [AST oem]. So, after years of forswearing 486's I jumped right in. I actually really like it and finally have a permanent home for my cpu-limited games, or the ones that seem happiest with a very primitive 1-2mb VGA setup.. No more fussing with temporary under-clocking or devising fussy solutions for these. Also, I got to learn about motherboard cache, TAGs, etc., It's definitely been worth it.

If you can manage to score a sweet deal like that, then it is no big deal to snatch it up. I don't seem to find those kind of deals, though.

I inherited a beast of a VLB machine not too long ago from a friend who's father had died and she had me come clear out his equipment. It's got onboard IDE/SCSI, 256k cache, etc. The thing was fully loaded, but the case was a monstrosity of an AT tower that I had to get rid of. So, now I have this beastly 486 board (ZEOS Gosling I think. I still haven't quite pinned it down) that I can't use because I don't have a case/psu for, but I really want to setup...just because I already have it and all the parts it needs.

Funny, I've been thinking of exiting the old hardware game for awhile now and it's been coming to a head. I just can't bring myself to do it.

You can usually buy 486 OEMs for < $100 including shipping. 😀

Even a cacheless PC*HI*S M9*9 can scratch that 486 building itch 😀

PeterLI wrote:

You can usually buy 486 OEMs for < $100 including shipping. 😀

Yes. An OEM system is usually a good way to get into early PC's without spending too much money. They will come with all the parts you need for basic functionality, but not a lot of bells and whistles. As soon as you start building custom systems from scratch is where the time and expense start to add up. If you just want a system to experience what it was like in the old days and aren't planning to do a lot of experimentation, then an OEM box is the way to go. The last thing you want to do is spend $1000 and a year of your life gathering ultra rare, high end parts for the ultimate vintage PC then finding out you really don't like it as much as you thought you would and then not being able to recoup your funds because the market has gone soft in the meantime.

Well I bought my Tandy OEM, no way in hell was I going to try piecing that together.
Most of the pre-built 486 boxes I've seen have been $200-$300. I've seen plenty of sub $100 Pentiums, though.
Maybe I just haven't been looking long enough. Or I'm lookingin the wrong spots.

When you search for OEM search on brand name and model #. That usually works very well. Most sellers do not know what a 286 / 386 / 486 is. They just list the box.

That's how I stumbled on mine - it was just listed as a Vintage Computer working condition etc. I was searching for old cases at the time but the pic looked like a 486 era rig. Luck.