Threw an m3d into my 98se box for some Mech2 action.

Busy taking pics.
Lots and lots of pics 😁

I just finished benchmarking various video cards with my P4P800dlx and a 3.2c P4 at 3.6ghz mostly. Unfortunately it's not stable at that speed and it seemed that the
more powerful video card I used the worse that got, so dropped back to 3.5ghz and was perfectly stable at that speed, also runs at default voltage at 3.5ghz.
I had forgotten that these Asus boards overvolt the cpu by 0.1v at idle, then under load that goes back down (vdroop) to the default voltage. I had modded it years
ago and forgotten that it no longer drops under load, and if anything the voltage increases which isn't good as P4C cpu's are notorious for dropping dead at around
1.7v.

Video cards used are 128MB 6800LE, 256MB 6800GT, 256MB 7800GS, HD3850.
What I have proved is that ATI didn't care too much for optimising their driver for opengl and some older DX8 based software, as the 7800GS gets higher FPS
in some benchmarks.

I will be doing a full write-up of all this later, but still have Pentium M to play with in this motherboard.

I finished off by playing some Crysis at 1024 and medium settings on the HD3850 and P4 at 3.5ghz, it's quite playable but FPS does drop too much during fighting.

gdjacobs wrote:

Threw an m3d into my 98se box for some Mech2 action.

Classic!

Imperious, can you publish your results?

Especially interested in the 6800GT vs 7800GS.

I would like to do it properly and write up a proper thread for it, that will take some time of course.
Let me know anything in particular You are after and I'll shoot it through in a PM to You. I took screenshots
of most benchmarks with cpu speed and gpu speed listed.

I got some inspiration from Your AMD vs INTEL videos, so used many of the same benchmark tools,
not all though.

I used Far Cry (maximum detail 640, 1024, 1600), Crysis GPU benchmark at 1024 Medium settings, X2 the Threat (1024 and 1600), 3dmarks 2001, 2003, 2006,
Doom3 (1024 ultra), Codecreatures Pro (standard benchmark), Aquamark 3.

My 6800gt I used 400/1000 (default 350/1000), and the 7800GS 496/1553 (default 375/1400)

With the HD3850 Doom3, Codecreatures, Far Cry, and all but the nature test in 3dmark2001 were slower. 3dmark2003 and 2006 were significantly higher though.
It's either AMD's drivers or the 3850 just needs a more powerful cpu to push it. The Pentium M will prove or disprove that later.

A quick way is to just create charts in PowerPoint. Or you can use the cloud versions of PowerPoint or Google docs.

I found that faster ATI cards are stronger in Far Cry, F.E.A.R., but weaker in OpenGL games. Even the X850 XT PE loses against the 6800 GT in Doom 3 for example.

Got the Opteron 170 and AMD heatsink I needed to replace the Opteron 148 which was having heat issues with the cheap cooler it was using.

using the new cooler, the opteron 170 runs at 40ish degrees, or a bit more when under load, compared to 60+ with the old cooler.
was also interested to see how a single core opteron at 2.2Ghz would do against a dual core at 2Ghz (dual core has twice the cache) , in single core applications in particular , and the difference is rather minimal (benchmarks are within the margain of error), stuff like Quake 4 obviously do benefit , somewhat.

I do something retro oriented almost everyday but it's always just bits nothing major so nothing really to talk about here 😀

Found some interesting wooden filing/sorting boxes that I thought would be perfect for organizing my ISA cards.

you need a supply of antistatic bags

Rhuwyn wrote:

gdjacobs wrote:

Threw an m3d into my 98se box for some Mech2 action.

Classic!

Sort of. The 1200Mhz T-Bird in this particular machine is from a slightly different era. It's a bit of a Frankenstein.

keenerb wrote:

http://i.imgur.com/fveYOY4l.jpg […]
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Found some interesting wooden filing/sorting boxes that I thought would be perfect for organizing my ISA cards.

You need to put every card in it's own antistatic bag.

brostenen wrote:

keenerb wrote:

http://i.imgur.com/fveYOY4l.jpg […]
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Found some interesting wooden filing/sorting boxes that I thought would be perfect for organizing my ISA cards.

You need to put every card in it's own antistatic bag.

I have all of my cards in wood blocks for a number of years now... just sitting in there with no anti-static bags, and with zero issues and everything still works. As long as they're handled correctly it doesn't matter.

Bought the D&D Classics bundle at GOG. Even though there were only a few in the bundle I wanted, it was cheaper to buy the bundle then to just buy the ones I wanted. If I ever hope to complete this many RPGs in my lifetime, I'm going to have to start gaming like Vyothric.

Been searching ebay for the past few days for good deals on rare items. Didn't find anything special but while cross-referencing on Vogons and other sites I see other, more clever people snagging some rare items within the same time frame including a genuine Adlib!

Oh well. I still managed to come out with a RAP-10 and some PS/2 powered laptop speakers. 😜

Copied a few essential files to my Tecra 500 using a null-modem cable, drivers and PCMCIA/Cardbus enablers mainly, and ran 3DMark2001 on my VT Book, and the results are quite low!

Kahenraz wrote:

Been searching ebay for the past few days for good deals on rare items. Didn't find anything special but while cross-referencing on Vogons and other sites I see other, more clever people snagging some rare items within the same time frame including a genuine Adlib!

Oh well. I still managed to come out with a RAP-10 and some PS/2 powered laptop speakers. 😜

Just keep searching and you will get lucky, the good stuff comes and goes in waves oddly. Got lucky on some nice graphics cards this week 😀

nforce4max wrote:

Kahenraz wrote:

Been searching ebay for the past few days for good deals on rare items. Didn't find anything special but while cross-referencing on Vogons and other sites I see other, more clever people snagging some rare items within the same time frame including a genuine Adlib!

Oh well. I still managed to come out with a RAP-10 and some PS/2 powered laptop speakers. 😜

Just keep searching and you will get lucky, the good stuff comes and goes in waves oddly. Got lucky on some nice graphics cards this week 😀

There was an auction I missed out on purpose, a Hercules Dynamite VLB 2MB card was in the mix, just not in the description. 486 motherboard, controller card, 5.25 drive, etc but the hidden jewel was that Hercules VLB card.

However, i'm packing up all of my belongings and moving them while I build a new house....very little vintage-stuff for at least 6 months and didn't need to add to my collection.

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