First post, by Hellistor
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Hello people!
For the last few weeks I've been trying to get a PC together that is in the same rough performance bracket as my Dual 1GHz Pentium III machine.
I originally tried to work with two VIA Apollo chipset based boards, but I couldn't get the AGP performance I needed.
Sifting though local ads I found someone selling an Abit BX6 Rev 2.0 Motherboard with CPU and RAM.
I picked it up yesterday and went straight to builing. I threw it in a spare case and added some parts I had laying around.
I mostly built it so I can play some games with my cousin who's visiting me this Weekend. 😀
Here it is:
It features:
Motherboard: ABIT BX6 REV 2.0, Intel 440BX Chipset
CPU: Intel Pentium III 700MHz, SL45Y, with MSI MS-6905 Master Slotket
RAM: One 128MB stick and one 64MB stick of PC100 SDRAM, Not final configuration.
Graphics: PowerVR Kyro II 64MB
Soundcard: Soundblaster Live! CT4670
Networking: 3Com 10/100 PCI NIC
USB: NEC USB 2.0 Card
HDD: Maxtor 80GB IDE HDD
Disc Drive: LG CD-RW Drive
Floppy Drive: 3,5' 1.44MB Floppy Drive
Peripherals:
Monitor: Phillips 107E
Keyboard: IBM Model M, German Layout, 1993
Mouse: Logitech G5
Mousepad: Steelseries QCK
Speakers: NEC WO-SPKR2B
The case is a spare I had lying around. I don't know the manufacturer but with these old cases that's not rare.
It has a sliding door with notches at each of the drive bays. The steel inside is a bit sharp but I managed to avoid any unintentional bloodletting.
The inside of the case is quite spacious with enough room for all my hardware. The 3,5' drive cage is removable.
This is the first Slotket I ever used. It came with the motherboard. I can't say much other that I works well.
The previous owner added a thermal probe. The motherboard has a header for it. I of course cleaned the cooler and replaced the thermal paste.
While the motherboard only says AB BX6, I'm pretty sure it is the REV 2.0 version.
All information I could find point to the <2.0 versions to have three ISA slots. Since this one has only two I concluded it's the Rev 2.0.
Also note the Kyro II.
I try to put at least a network card, USB 2.0 Card and DirectSound compatible soundcard in my late 90s PCs. The USB card is nearly a necessity since any file transfer other than drivers takes ages.
For sound I used a Sound Blaster Live! for it's DOS emulation and EAX features. The network card is a 3com 10/100 PCI NIC.
Since I had most of the hardware lying around I already had most of the drivers I needed. Getting this system to run was suprisingly hassle free.
Maybe I'm too used to troubleshooting the VIA based boards. It only took me about 3 hours to get this system from parts pile to fully functional.
Even though It doesn't have the Glide eye candy the Kyro II works very nicely in NFS III Hot Pursuit. It's one of my favourite racing games.
Unreal and Unreal Tournament are working well too. At highest graphic settings at 800x600 32 bit they run at over 50fps. 1024x768 is only marginally worse.
Half Life is very smooth even at 1280x960. Gotta have that game on any PC capable of running it.
While it's not particularly demanding, Diablo II is one of my standard games to install on any freshly built Windows 98 machine.
If you want to see the pictures in higher resolution, click here.
So that's it, I hope you guys like it!