First post, by NiPPonD3nZ0
Hello fellow Vogonists
Today I bring you a Windows XP era machine, an Athlon XP based system, and I want to photobomb you all with the road to glory of this PC
First, the "why" I will do this machine:
When I started to work for real with computers, back in 2002, these Socket A systems were the systems I've assembled the most. They were great performers for the price, as we all know now, so they sold well. And god I've build a crapload of them.
The machine in question, it's been given to me, and it is a Targa system, and to my knowledge, all Targa PC's are AMD based, and this one is built around a ASUS A7N266-VM motherboard.
This motherboard is to me kind of an elusive one! As I've started to build and repairing PC's, motherboards based on this chipset (the original nForce) were already replaced by the nForce 2 and VIA KT400A/KT600 based boards on the Socket A platform, so I was never able to work with one, until this week.
This is it, in all its used patina 😀
Lets start by taking it all apart!
I've already started it so I know it boots (into BIOS at least) and I've already replaced the CMOS battery, so I didn't take any pictures of it working before I've taken it apart
I love the way this chassis opens up.
There she is!!!
I will never know why there were 2 floppy drives and 3 optical drives were in the PC, but the guy who gave the PC to me also had a couple of front bezel covers for this chassis, one 3.5" and one 5.25", so I don't have too much to cover up afterwards!
This sucker is quite yellowed. From the 3 optical drives shown in the next picture, I will maintain the middle one, a Toshiba DVD-ROM as it came with this PC originally (thanks Wayback Machine for the info 😀 )
Here is the motherboard, an ASUS A7N266-VM, Rev 1,03 and this means it supports Athlon XP's with the "Palomino" and "Thoroughbred A and B" cores, with a 266MHz FSB. If it were the next revision, 1,05, it could support the "Thorton" core.
So, the system looked OK, but when I was removing the heatsink so I could do the maintenance properly I came across this:
"What the fuck", right? It's what you get when idiots mess with PC's
The motherboard and a few fellow cards are ready to their bath. I didn't know that the VGA is defective at this point, and I still don't know if the Audigy 2 is good or not, but they needed cleaning, so there they went!
In the isopropyl alcool they went, 15 minutes on each side, for good measure.
Next, while the cards are washing, I went ahead and opened the "Enhanced" branded PSU... I didn't like it, too many blown caps, so I got a Halfmann "650Watt" cleaned up and ready to go, at least for now.
No blown caps, that's good
With that taken care, lets try this thing out!
Temporary cooler, just to check if it still boots, with the original CPU (Athlon XP 1600+)
Good, it still works, so lets try some of my better Athlon XP 266FSB CPU's
I have the following CPU's, besides the one that came with the PC:
They are (from top to bottom): XP 1800+ (Thoroughbred), XP 1900+ (Palomino), XP 2000+ (Thoroughbred) and a XP2200+ (Thoroughbred)
The 2200+ is dead, so on it went the 2000+ for now!
The NB heatsink already in place with Arctic MX-2 on (I use this thermal compound everywere)
It needs a BIOS update but it POST's, so lets make this PC whole again!
It's clean, yellow, but clean!
I will retrobright this front bezel, but if some fellow Vogonist have one in better shape or found one in better shape, I would be glad to buy it and replace it, because this one has the blue part glued on it and it's ugly... someone broke it and I dont like it this way, because the overall case is so good, this bezel is just a fugly stain!
I usually spend an unholy amount of zip ties on my computers... I Like the cables well managed and tight
Now, it needs a CPU cooler... I didn't want to use the one it came with, because I have a Cooler Master one at home witch I really wanted to use, but I had forgotten it (I've done all this work @ my workplace). But then I realised, I only have a Athlon XP 2000+, it is not a very warm CPU, so fuck it, I've cleaned it all!
I've taken apart the fan to do some cleaning and lube job... I've done it to the 140mm fan of the power supply as well, but forgot to take pictures
Some WD40 and grease were needed
Best cooling company slogan EVER 😀
And it's in! The power supply cables arent managed, because this power supply is not for this system. Will have to do it some other day because time is running out today
I've found an Sony DVD-RW that complements the Toshiba DVD-Rom nicely
I've started it, installed Windows XP Home Edition on it, but during setup i've found that the graphics card, a Creative Blaster GeForce FX5600XT I was intending to use is showing artifacts... Bad chip? I will reflow it (@ my job we have proper machines for that. It won't fix it permanently, but maybe I can take a few rounds of benchmarks and gaming before it dies again).
Will post some more pictures of it today, if I can find the time to do what I want to!
English isn't my native language, so forgive me if I made to many mistakes.
Best Regards from Lisbon, Portugal!
😀