Intel486dx33 wrote on 2026-08-30, 10:11:

I use to have An HP kayak XU workstation back around 1998 with
dual Pentium-2 @ 400mhz.

Could it be this mainboard instead?

Cool system anyway!

Irinikus wrote on 2026-08-30, 16:40:

If you run XP with the basic "Classic"appearance the it actually runs surprisingly well on this system. […]
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Intel486dx33 wrote on 2026-08-30, 10:11:

You might be pushing these CPU’s beyond reasonable performance levels.

If you run XP with the basic "Classic"appearance the it actually runs surprisingly well on this system.

I've run XP on it before, that's how I got its blender test result:

Windows 9X is out as this is a Dual Processor system!

NT4's out because it's as boring as hell and almost nothing worthwhile runs under it! (I have NT4 running on my DEC AlphaStation 255 300)

XP, as long as it's run in a basic mode, actually runs very well and gives you options that its predecessors didn't !

Intel486dx33 wrote on 2026-08-30, 10:11:

I use to have An HP kayak XU workstation back around 1998 with dual Pentium-2 @ 400mhz. 512mb ram Dual seagate cheetah scsi har […]
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I use to have An HP kayak XU workstation back around 1998 with
dual Pentium-2 @ 400mhz.
512mb ram
Dual seagate cheetah scsi hard drives
Matrox dual head g4o0 video card
Dual monitors
Running WinNT 4.0 and then Win2000

Never considered running WinXP.

Also I used an HP combo card ethernet/scsi
And An iWill ide controller or was it highpoint I don’t remember .

But I do remember running out of expansion slots and IRQ conflicts.

Was finally able to get it all straightened out.

This computer was extremely stable and reliable running windows NT 4.0 and even better on windows 2000
It was my daily driver for work and home computing.
It too use to boot up slow but once it got running it worked great.
Sleep , power saver, and hibernation worked great.
I still have this computer stored in my garage.
I had a 100 base-t home network with gigabit cable internet .
I would like take it out of my garage and update it with some of these modern
Cards and Adapters but I don’t have the room for it.

Nice setup! 😀

I always found XP to run better than 2000. (I have 2000 running on my SGI Visual Workstation 320)

It's a dual slot-1 Coppermine @ 1GHz

oooh SGI 😜

gmaverick2k wrote on 2026-08-30, 18:47:

oooh SGI 😜

What SGI's are you running? (Nice monitor! 😀 )

Xp runs fine for me on a dual ppro system @233MHz with 512MB RAM

It's really more memory demanding than processor speed. You just have to watch out if you intend to load all the updates, some of the POSReady2009 ones will crash a system without SSE(2)

maxtherabbit wrote on 2026-08-30, 19:14:

Xp runs fine for me on a dual ppro system @233MHz with 512MB RAM

It's really more memory demanding than processor speed. You just have to watch out if you intend to load all the updates, some of the POSReady2009 ones will crash a system without SSE(2)

Thanks for the heads up! 😀

Once I have this thing fully up and running I'll order in 1GB of RAM from MEMORY MASTERS!

Irinikus wrote on 2026-08-30, 19:02:

gmaverick2k wrote on 2026-08-30, 18:47:

oooh SGI 😜

What SGI's are you running? (Nice monitor! 😀 )

Never owned any sgi's but I got this sgi gdm-5011 which had green hue. Was able to calibrate it with winDAS. Also have a sub microsystems Sony Trinitron. Workstation CRT's are awesome

gmaverick2k wrote on 2026-08-30, 19:31:

Never owned any sgi's but I got this sgi gdm-5011 which had green hue. Was able to calibrate it with winDAS. Also have a sub microsystems Sony Trinitron. Workstation CRT's are awesome

Cool! Workstation CRT's are indeed awesome! 😀

This is a funny thread, I was looking up any mentions of the Dynamic Pictures Oxygen since I still have my old 402 and I'm thinking of getting AI to write better drivers for it, then I saw you brought up the MultiSpin 6x. I just bought the one in that picture off eBay a few weeks ago! It works great, love the design of it. I recommend it!

I remember I was at a computer show in Silicon Valley and at the SGI booth they were showing off
That SGI windows NT workstation.
I thought that was cool and I wanted one but
Passed once I saw the benchmarks scores.
I use to see these selling used on eBay but proprietary parts are
Expensive and the benchmark scores don’t
Justify the cost. So I passed on it.

But it’s a nice looking case.

Intel486dx33 wrote on 2026-08-31, 02:28:

I remember I was at a computer show in Silicon Valley and at the SGI booth they were showing off That SGI windows NT workstation […]
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I remember I was at a computer show in Silicon Valley and at the SGI booth they were showing off
That SGI windows NT workstation.
I thought that was cool and I wanted one but
Passed once I saw the benchmarks scores.
I use to see these selling used on eBay but proprietary parts are
Expensive and the benchmark scores don’t
Justify the cost. So I passed on it.

But it’s a nice looking case.

You should have maybe purchased one at that time, as they've become pretty valuable to collectors today. (Today they fetch a premium!)

The 320 and the 540, although they made use of x86 processors, were in fact true SGI machines.They featured the Cobalt graphics chip and a unified memory architecture similar to that of the O2, so in a way, the 320 was the "direct descendent" of the O2.

The unified memory architecture gave these machines a huge advantage over the PC's of the day when it came to their available texture memory and this helped when it came to the manipulation of large images.

This machine's strong point was the manipulation of large textures such as maps for planning on battlefields, due to their unified memory architecture. (THESE MACHINES WERE SUCCESSFULLY USED IN PLANNING CELLS DURING THE AFGAN WAR!)

PC's of the day could not match them in this field!

The 320 and the 540 were in-fact really cool machines and their failure rested mainly in the fact that SGI didn't deliver followup models as they had promised, and this lead to a further loss of confidence in SGI's strategy at the time.

nickpunt wrote on 2026-08-31, 01:15:

This is a funny thread, I was looking up any mentions of the Dynamic Pictures Oxygen since I still have my old 402 and I'm thinking of getting AI to write better drivers for it, then I saw you brought up the MultiSpin 6x. I just bought the one in that picture off eBay a few weeks ago! It works great, love the design of it. I recommend it!

It's funny how things work out! 😀

I initially purchased the Dynamic Pictures Oxygen 202 for my DEC AlphaStation 255 300, but now have the Intergraph PowerStorm 4D60T in that machine.

The MultiSpin 6x's a damn cool drive! (I'm definitely going to source one for this machine, together with the Pioneer DVR-S201 Professional SCSI DVD-R Authoring Drive)

My 68-pin SCSI cable has arrived from the US! The really nice 50-pin SCSI cable from Slovenia has also arrived in the country, but is yet to be made available for pickup.

I'm having to order parts for this thing in from all over the world!

Ha! I guess all computers these days go through this kind of sourcing hahah.

Looks like a fun build man!!