I got to thinking about the parts I have laying around for my time machine computer, when I get time to get it all together and finish it, and had this thought.

The most precious piece of the entire system is the motherboard. It has to be Socket/Super Socket 7 and it has to have BIOS support for the AMD K6-2+/K6-3+ CPU's and those boards are becoming rarer by the day. We can recap them and do a few small repairs but that is about it to keep these things running. The more power these things use, the shorter their lifespan. So... here is one idea I had to decrease the power draw on the AGP port and its associated capacitors/etc. Instead of using say a Riva TNT/TNT2, which has great DOS compatibility and speed, why not 'emulate' it with a more modern piece of hardware? I know... I said it may be my dumbest idea yet. Choose a performance criteria... say Riva 128ZX, or Riva TNT2 Ultra and look at its fill rate and memory bandwidth. Then take my trusty Quadro4 380 XGL and underclock the GPU and RAM to simulate those specs. More modern GPU built on a smaller fab size, lower voltages (assuming), and underclocked for even less power draw. Modify the clocks in the GPU's BIOS and reflash it, no utilities that wouldn't work in DOS and definitely add a custom VGA BIOS post message;)

For instance:

Riva TNT2
========
Core Clock: 125MHz
Memory Clock: 150-MHz SDR
MPixel/s: 250
MTexture/s: 250
Memory GB/s: 2.4

Quadro4 380 XGL
==============
Core Clock: 275MHz (has a 2x advantage due to double pipelines over TNT2)
Memory Clock: 513MHz DDR (has a 2x advantage due to DDR)
MPixel/s: 1100
MTexture/s: 1100
Memory GB/s: 8.2

Emulated TNT2
=============
Core Clock: 62.5MHz (has a 2x advantage due to double pipelines over TNT2)
Memory Clock: 150MHz DDR (has a 2x advantage due to DDR)
MPixel/s: 250
MTexture/s: 250
Memory GB/s: 2.4

I bet it will run almost dead cold and barely pull any power.

I might get a chance to try it this week and see if it runs correctly at such low clocks.

Really dumb idea?