First post, by 386SX
Hi,
I am trying to push my 386 to its limits but it seems that I already arrived at the its end. I found an expensive Cirrus CL-GD5429 1MB 60ns DRAM ISA to switch from the previous ATI MTX1024A on 28800-5 1MB 70 and 80ns ISA. Probably I had to high expectations on this change or maybe it was the great ATi card (incredibly well built pcb and great layout design) that was already fast enough for the whole system but this switch make me wonder this last opinion.
The only game that seem smoother (I need to bench it) is Doom where you can now appreciate the gameplay in lowres with the step before the "full screen" but If we consider a 1990/91 vga versus a 1995/96 one, well.
I can't go lower than 0-WS (write) and 2-WS (read) and I bet it's more stable when 1-WS and 2-WS; is there any way to go lower than that without crashing at boot?
Actually my system is:
Soyo ETEQ ET82C491 (0-ws write 2-ws read), Am386DX-40, no fpu, 256Kbyte L2 15ns, 16Mb 4x4 60ns, CL-5429 1MB 60ns ISA, ESS1688F, KNE2000 nic isa.
My results are this;
Speedsys: CPU 9,29 Memory speed index, 46,34 Video 2770 KB/s, L1 31,10MB/s Mem 21,72MB/s
SysCheck CPU 66,9 Mhz Video speed 5222 Char/s
HWInfo Cpu 12,036 Dhrystones, 32bit integer 25
PCPBench vga 3,7
3DBench 1.0 15,1
Landmark cpu 62,25 Mhz Video 3449 Chr/ms
I suspect the wait states problem is my issue but I don't know how to go lower than that. Maybe the fast memory is the problem? I paid a lot to buy them but I don't know if was worth it.
Thank
