The specs are a bit weak. Personally, I wouldn't pay more than R120 (~$10 USD) for it based on those specs and your negative comments about that brand.

The dual hard drives are cute. You could use the 4gb as your boot drive and the 40gb as your storage. If the mainboard is a good one, it may still be worth buying. Definitely inspect the PSU. After all these years, it is probably in need of replacement. Consider the Antec Basiq BP350; they're good and cheap. Also, take a look at the top ODD in that system. Is the tray missing its cover?

Regardless of whether it's a S370 or Slot1 mainboard, you're going to want to bump it up to at least a 1ghz Coppermine and 256mb or more RAM. Add a Voodoo 3 and it can be a very nice retro gaming PC.

It is unlikely that it's a Baby AT system. Based on the 700mhz P3 CPU, this PC is probably from around the ~2001 time period. AT/Baby AT was long gone by then, at least here in the USA. Aside from you mentioning your Celeron 466 Baby AT system, I was unaware that AT/Baby AT systems existed for Slot1 or S370.

I really like that case! Even if the guts inside it are junked, the case alone might be worth $10 if it's still in good shape and can take a standard ATX mainboard and PSU. Still, beauty is in the eye of the beholder and I've been known to have some questionable taste.

The thing is that I've already got a 1.4GHz T-Bird system that I'm working on. So going above 1GHz isn't really the point. I actually want to build something nice for the 12Mb Skywell Voodoo 2 someone donated to me. I was thinking of getting a Slot A system so that I can have a complete AMD-collection, but they're very expensive overseas and they barely sold in South Africa due to people being scared about them overheating. The case isn't bad looking, if it's still in good condition I'll respray it and modernize it a bit (make it black or something). I had a look at Phil's Voodoo 2 scaling project results, and there doesn't seem to be a significant difference in performance between the 600MHz PIII and the 1GHz PIII on the games he tested, so I think the 700MHz will be fine. I've got quite a few 128Mb PC-100 sticks at home, so I'm sorted with the RAM.

Nobody sells the Antec Basic BP350 in South Africa, but I'm pretty sure something like the Corsair VS350 or VS450 will work just fine (might even get a CX430M).

Evert wrote:

The case isn't bad looking, if it's still in good condition I'll respray it and modernize it a bit (make it black or something).

Nooooooooo! It's beautiful in all its beige glory!

Evert wrote:

I had a look at Phil's Voodoo 2 scaling project results, and there doesn't seem to be a significant difference in performance between the 600MHz PIII and the 1GHz PIII on the games he tested, so I think the 700MHz will be fine.

Yah, it all depends on what you want to use it for. It should be just fine for a V2. What will you choose for primary graphics?

Evert wrote:

Nobody sells the Antec Basic BP350 in South Africa, but I'm pretty sure something like the Corsair VS350 or VS450 will work just fine (might even get a CX430M).

Be careful with those. I checked the specs. The VS350 only has 14A on the +5v rail and the VS450 only has 16A on it.

KT7AGuy wrote:

Nooooooooo! It's beautiful in all its beige glory!

Haha, I know this is not the most politically correct thing to say on Vogons, but I'm really not a fan of beige cases. I even spray painted both my beige cases to be different colours back in the day. I can't stand it.

KT7AGuy wrote:

Yah, it all depends on what you want to use it for. It should be just fine for a V2. What will you choose for primary graphics?

Well, at the moment I've got a 32Mb AGP4X Gigabyte Rage 128 Pro, a PCI Sapphire Radeon 7000VE and an AGP4X Connect3D Radeon 7000VE. It would probably be smarter to be something like an nVIDIA GeForce 4 MX440 or FX 5200 in there, since they're passively cooled and offer better backwards compatability. Something more period correct, like a GeForce 256 or Riva TNT2 Ultra would probably be better.

KT7AGuy wrote:

Be careful with those. I checked the specs. The VS350 only has 14A on the +5v rail and the VS450 only has 16A on it.

Yeah! Thanks for that, that probably won't be too smart a choice then. The CX430M should be fine though? I think it can provide 110W combined on the 3.3V and 5V lines. That Proline computer is probably running a 230W or 250W power supply anyhow.

Evert wrote:

Haha, I know this is not the most politically correct thing to say on Vogons, but I'm really not a fan of beige cases. I even spray painted both my beige cases to be different colours back in the day. I can't stand it.

Heck, I've committed the ultimate sin of using thermal epoxy to attach new coolers to my Voodoo 5 cards. Since I never intend to sell them and I plan to use them, I figured I need to keep them running cool to prolong their MTBFs. I hated the puny OEM coolers.

To be honest, I never really cared for beige cases either. When things started turning black I thought it was an improvement. I only like the beige cases nowadays because they are "period correct" and offer a sense of nostalgia.

I've got one case that has not aged well. The plastic front bezel has yellowed over the years, but the floppy drive, cdrom, and painted sides have not. It looks like it's got some sort of vitiligo-like jaundice. I saw the case of your hypothetical build here and thought it would make a fantastic replacement if I could find one like that.

Evert wrote:

Well, at the moment I've got a 32Mb AGP4X Gigabyte Rage 128 Pro, a PCI Sapphire Radeon 7000VE and an AGP4X Connect3D Radeon 7000VE. It would probably be smarter to be something like an nVIDIA GeForce 4 MX440 or FX 5200 in there, since they're passively cooled and offer better backwards compatability. Something more period correct, like a GeForce 256 or Riva TNT2 Ultra would probably be better.

How about Matrox G400 or G400 Max?

Evert wrote:

Yeah! Thanks for that, that probably won't be too smart a choice then. The CX430M should be fine though? I think it can provide 110W combined on the 3.3V and 5V lines. That Proline computer is probably running a 230W or 250W power supply anyhow.

The CX430M should be good. Thermaltake TR2 W0070 is also a good choice (especially for Athlon systems). Wait for a sale and get whichever one is cheapest.

KT7AGuy wrote:

Heck, I've committed the ultimate sin of using thermal epoxy to attach new coolers to my Voodoo 5 cards. Since I never intend to sell them and I plan to use them, I figured I need to keep them running cool to prolong their MTBFs. I hated the puny OEM coolers.

I'm going to cool my V5 by using thes eBay coolers:

KT7AGuy wrote:

I've got one case that has not aged well. The plastic front bezel has yellowed over the years, but the floppy drive, cdrom, and painted sides have not. It looks like it's got some sort of vitiligo-like jaundice. I saw the case of your hypothetical build here and thought it would make a fantastic replacement if I could find one like that.

Sounds like a sight for sore eyes. I'd love to see a photo of it.

KT7AGuy wrote:

How about Matrox G400 or G400 Max?

I'd love to have one, but I'd have to import them. Locals that still have them are very reluctant to sell.

KT7AGuy wrote:

The CX430M should be good. Thermaltake TR2 W0070 is also a good choice (especially for Athlon systems). Wait for a sale and get whichever one is cheapest.

I trust Corsair and I can get their products at very good prices, so I'll stick to the CX430M. 😀

With respect to cooling the CPU. If it's a Socket 370 PIII, can I cool it with an Athlon XP 2500+ stock cooler? In case anyone forgot, it looks like this:

I modified mine with a 60mm Noctua FAN and 4 brass bolts. If I were to run the fan at 5V will the cooler be sufficient to cool the Pentium 3? Assuming it fits, of course.

When it comes to the cooler: In theory yes however on most boards I have seen components on the motherboard hinders the use of larger coolers.

Well, let's hope that I can easily mend or replace the fan(s) if that is the case.

I'll snap some pics of my ugly case later and share them.

Your cooler should be just fine. At 5V, it should also be really quiet. If it's a S370 Coppermine, it should run pretty cool. For comparison, I run these weak orb-wannabe coolers on my S370 Celeron 600 and P3 1ghz CPUs:

They work fine.

That's brilliant! Thanks. If I could ask, do you think the coolers I plan on using on my Voodoo 5 will be adequate?

Edit: Here's a bit of nostalgia, my old Jetway 933BS/BN motherboard. I have very fond memories of it crashing and freezing because of my Sound Blaster Live! 5.1 Digital Entertainment. I eventually got it to run stable thanks to a BIOS update.

Evert wrote:

Sounds like a sight for sore eyes. I'd love to see a photo of it.

Here's my ugly case. To the left of it is my nice P200 MMX system that has not yet had a chance to become yellowed. I put them together so you can use it for comparison.

That case is so damn ugly and it has really poor airflow too. If it was running anything hotter than a Coppermine I would certainly replace it. However, it is functional in its current configuration.

Evert wrote:

That's brilliant! Thanks. If I could ask, do you think the coolers I plan on using on my Voodoo 5 will be adequate?

These ramsinks look good:

I used something similar, but made of aluminum. These copper ones look better than what I used.

As with all copper heatsinks, you need to have air flowing over them to be effective. If airflow is stagnant, use aluminum heatsinks instead.

This HSF looks promising:

You'll want to get the measurements for those mounting posts to make sure they'll fit on the V5.
(54.8mm across is what you want.)

This one doesn't look very promising:

Maybe it's just the way I'm looking at it, but the mounting posts don't seem like they'll match up correctly.
(For the same reason that my Evercool units didn't work, I don't think this one will either. You would probably need to attach it with thermal epoxy.)

We briefly chatted about this previously.

To this day, the only two I've seen that fit perfectly without any permanent modifications are the Vantec CCB-A1A and CCB-A1C. You can read about a couple of folks who used those here.

Even though I used thermal epoxy on my V5 cards, the coolers I used are much better and the fans on them are very easily replaced.

Note: The Evercool EC-VC-RE and EC-VC-RF specs indicate that they should fit the Voodoo 5, but the heatsinks themselves are too large to clear some of the stuff on the board if you try to use the mounting pins. You'll be able to mount one of them, but not the other. I can't remember which of the two GPUs on the V5 is OK for those coolers.

I had a look at the machine and it's really not worth the trouble. The motherboard has lots of busted capacitors and it is Baby AT. Not really the type of form factor I like working with or being involved with. My search continues.

Good choice! I my self like Baby AT but busted caps... not so much.

I can replace the capacitors, but the board is really low-quality and it looks like it was made by ECS. It also has some sort of SiS chipset. Proline really are not known for building quality machines. One thing I've learned is that waiting pays off. Eventually you will find the perfect part or exactly what you were looking for.

Okay, so a small update: a guy on a South African forum messaged me telling me that he has a Socket 370 motherboard and CPU I might be interested in. He has a Gigabyte GA-6IWFE and an Intel Celeron 1100A. The motherboard is mATX with 3 PCI slots and an Intel i810 chipset. He wants roughly $20 for it. Is it worth it or should I keep looking?

Some links:

• Motherboard Specifications from Gigabyte
• Intel Celeron 1100A Specifications

Image of the motherboard:

I used to have an OEM i815 mATX board from a Compaq Deskpro EX, which was a pretty solid board (it had an AGP port as well). I think you should look into those instead of i810 if you specifically want mATX.

That board looks a bit boring but if you do not need AGP then why not?

This i810 board probably performs like other i810 boards. If its worth the price is a tricky question. The Celeron 1100A is a rather nice CPU to use with BX/i815 chipset motherboards, I ran one at 11*133 for a while. You need a modded slotket (or a rare one with Tualatin support) to run it in a slot1 motherboard though.

The lack of AGP may or may not be a hindrance; there's plenty of neat enough PCI cards. One thing I'm noticing on that Gigabyte though, is the CPU socket looks relatively clear of obstructions, so you may have decent luck with larger heatsinks.