Slowly progressing towards my 5x86 build! I'm extremely excited because I have a lot of plans for this project: getting MS-DOS networking, trying Phil's MT32/MIDI cable trick working and so on.

So, some VLB goodness today!

In the centre is the CPU I've got previously — an AMD X5-133ADZ which is, I believe, the more "overclocker-friendly" version. I'm yet to know if it works, but worst case scenario I'll use a 486DX2@66 until I get another one.

Top is VLB Cirrus Logic GD-5428 with 1MB RAM. It's expandable to 2MB and I think I should have some chips on a bunch of PCI cards I have. Just have to check the timing.

Bottom is a VLB multi I/O — ASKA SST-2946. It comes with a small leaflet that says that I should install drivers for this card. I actually thought multi I/O cards didn't drivers, but I'll try to look for these.

The vendor claimed that both VLB cards are NOS (cost me 7,8 USD for video and 3 USD for multi I/O). They do look quite nice, though the video card has small spots of rust on the back side.

All in all, I'm missing one crucial part — the motherboard. They are not rare, but compared to Pentium hardware there sure are too many chipsets and flavors. Also need a cooler for the CPU — I don't think a Socket 7 cooler will fit there.

Cool... VLB cards are nice stuff. (Especially the 5428) I would really love to have one my self.
I have had a 5x86-133 running without any fan. It was only a passive heatsink, that used to cool a P-166.

brostenen wrote:

Cool... VLB cards are nice stuff. (Especially the 5428) I would really love to have one my self.
I have had a 5x86-133 running without any fan. It was only a passive heatsink, that used to cool a P-166.

I do have a 486 heatsink, but I might need to run 5x86 at 160 MHz, so I'm a bit cautious. Also I think I'm gonna use a somewhat small desktop case for this build, so the airflow might be a bit restricted:

WOW 😳 That is an awesomme case. Never seen a powerbutton placed in that location before.
(I really want a desktop case for my AT machines. So hard to find locally)

candle_86 wrote:

SaxxonPike wrote:

candle_86 wrote:

Each gets an IDE to Sata card with dual 80gb SATA hard drives

Very cool! Would bandwidth be a problem for the SATA drives in that case?

Dunno, but its 9x I can't go bigger than 80, because my next size in my collection is 500gb

So exactly how does this thing combine two sata hard drives in to one IDE interface? Does it have some sort of onboard RAID-0 setup? If so.. you won't be able to install Win9x on it. Win9x won't work with any sort of raid anything even basic raid-0. It just won't, there's no way around it.

kithylin wrote:

Win9x won't work with any sort of raid anything even basic raid-0. It just won't, there's no way around it.

Raid using SATA-HDD's right? I have had zero issues with both Raid-0 and Raid-1 on my Asus A7V266-E setup.
That is however PATA and not SATA drives. There is a seperate BIOS for raid. Making it hardware and not software Raid.
I am running Win98-SE on this box.

Spec's:

- Asus A7V266-E
- AthlonXP 2400
- 512mb PC133
- 2 x Seagate 40gb 7200rpm drives
- Compaq Voodoo3-3500
- Yamaha YMF-724

jheronimus wrote:

Slowly progressing towards my 5x86 build! I'm extremely excited because I have a lot of plans for this project: getting MS-DOS networking, trying Phil's MT32/MIDI cable trick working and so on.

Just out of curiosity, what is this MIDI cable trick? I have an MT32 and I'm always interested in these things. 😀

Ozzuneoj wrote:

jheronimus wrote:

Slowly progressing towards my 5x86 build! I'm extremely excited because I have a lot of plans for this project: getting MS-DOS networking, trying Phil's MT32/MIDI cable trick working and so on.

Just out of curiosity, what is this MIDI cable trick? I have an MT32 and I'm always interested in these things. 😀

It's a trick for those of use who don't have MT32. 😀 Basically it involves running Munt on a modern PC, connecting it to the Soundblaster through a Gameport to MIDI cable and MIDI to USB cable and then feeding the music back through an AUX cable into the SB's line in.

brostenen wrote:

Raid using SATA-HDD's right? I have had zero issues with both Raid-0 and Raid-1 on my Asus A7V266-E setup. That is however PATA […]
Show full quote

kithylin wrote:

Win9x won't work with any sort of raid anything even basic raid-0. It just won't, there's no way around it.

Raid using SATA-HDD's right? I have had zero issues with both Raid-0 and Raid-1 on my Asus A7V266-E setup.
That is however PATA and not SATA drives. There is a seperate BIOS for raid. Making it hardware and not software Raid.
I am running Win98-SE on this box.

Spec's:

- Asus A7V266-E
- AthlonXP 2400
- 512mb PC133
- 2 x Seagate 40gb 7200rpm drives
- Compaq Voodoo3-3500
- Yamaha YMF-724

I've tried every possible RAID setup under the sun and none of them work 100% natively-stable with vanilla Win98se. I've tried 3ware IDE raid cards with it's own bios, I've tried SATA raid cards from adaptec, I've tried SCSI raid cards from 3ware, LSI, adaptec. I've tried Promise PCI IDE raid and SATA raid cards, I've tried AMI / American Megatrends PERC SCSI cards.. I've tried promise, via and nvidia onboard raid cards on motherboards.. none of it works. Either the exported array / virtual drives don't even show up under ms-dos for partitioning. (booting off the win98se CD-ROM to prepare it for installing the OS) Or they do partition but fail to format. Or they do partition, do format, and setup hangs and locks up on copying files.. or the few that have made it through setup either hang and lock up, or crash or if it does make it to the OS it'll bluescreen and fail. Or are some that I've managed to get working all the way to desktop are so ungodly terribly slow that a single IDE drive is faster.. just all sorts of "Weirdness" that ain't good.

In general Win9x doesn't work with raid. It's not worth the headache when you can just stick in a fast 7200 rpm IDE drive and go. And can get those off ebay for like $10 or less in good shape.

Most Win98 builds are generally for stability and just working period more than speed. At least on the storage side. If you really want speed use a single sata ssd in a single sata-to-ide and just go with that. or a CF card in CF-to-IDE is overkill for win98.

kithylin wrote:

So exactly how does this thing combine two sata hard drives in to one IDE interface? Does it have some sort of onboard RAID-0 setup? If so.. you won't be able to install Win9x on it. Win9x won't work with any sort of raid anything even basic raid-0. It just won't, there's no way around it.

The adapter will configure one drive as primary IDE, the other as secondary, the same as if you have two IDE drives with the cable selecting them.

Really dig that case, jheronimus!

debs3759 wrote:

kithylin wrote:

So exactly how does this thing combine two sata hard drives in to one IDE interface? Does it have some sort of onboard RAID-0 setup? If so.. you won't be able to install Win9x on it. Win9x won't work with any sort of raid anything even basic raid-0. It just won't, there's no way around it.

The adapter will configure one drive as primary IDE, the other as secondary, the same as if you have two IDE drives with the cable selecting them.

That sounds lovely and awesome then. 😀 Time to look through ebay later tonight and try to find one for sale myself then.

kithylin wrote:

I've tried every possible RAID setup under the sun and none of them work 100% natively-stable with vanilla Win98se. I've tried 3ware IDE raid cards with it's own bios, I've tried SATA raid cards from adaptec, I've tried SCSI raid cards from 3ware, LSI, adaptec. I've tried Promise PCI IDE raid and SATA raid cards, I've tried AMI / American Megatrends PERC SCSI cards.. I've tried promise, via and nvidia onboard raid cards on motherboards.. none of it works. Either the exported array / virtual drives don't even show up under ms-dos for partitioning. (booting off the win98se CD-ROM to prepare it for installing the OS) Or they do partition but fail to format. Or they do partition, do format, and setup hangs and locks up on copying files.. or the few that have made it through setup either hang and lock up, or crash or if it does make it to the OS it'll bluescreen and fail. Or are some that I've managed to get working all the way to desktop are so ungodly terribly slow that a single IDE drive is faster.. just all sorts of "Weirdness" that ain't good.

In general Win9x doesn't work with raid. It's not worth the headache when you can just stick in a fast 7200 rpm IDE drive and go. And can get those off ebay for like $10 or less in good shape.

Most Win98 builds are generally for stability and just working period more than speed. At least on the storage side. If you really want speed use a single sata ssd in a single sata-to-ide and just go with that. or a CF card in CF-to-IDE is overkill for win98.

Shure there are raid setup's that do not work in Win98se, mine however is working flawless in vanilla Win98se.
As I wrote. Both Raid-0 and 1 are working. There are a seperate jumper for enabling the Raid BIOS and if I
connect drives to the non-raid controller, they will net be used when the jumper is in Raid position.
I know they are working, as both drives are writing or reading at the same time, when placing my ear to the drive.

Most early 00's motherboard that had raid build into the main BIOS, were boards that I had problems with.
My silicon image ata-100 Raid PCI card have its own problems. It can not run raid in both 98 and XP.
Some early to mid-00's motherboards have problems running raid too. I have only tried it in XP though.
That all said. The Asus A7V266-E has no problems with Raid in vanilla Win98se. (I have not tested it in XP)
Some boards need the driver or raid program to be installed too. As they are software Raid.
Just keep that in mind, as it is not allways enough just to set an Raid array in the BIOS.
You need the drivers and programs to be installed in Windows too. Raid is in other words a hit or miss.

brostenen wrote:

Shure there are raid setup's that do not work in Win98se, mine however is working flawless in vanilla Win98se. As I wrote. Both […]
Show full quote

Shure there are raid setup's that do not work in Win98se, mine however is working flawless in vanilla Win98se.
As I wrote. Both Raid-0 and 1 are working. There are a seperate jumper for enabling the Raid BIOS and if I
connect drives to the non-raid controller, they will net be used when the jumper is in Raid position.
I know they are working, as both drives are writing or reading at the same time, when placing my ear to the drive.

Most early 00's motherboard that had raid build into the main BIOS, were boards that I had problems with.
My silicon image ata-100 Raid PCI card have its own problems. It can not run raid in both 98 and XP.
Some early to mid-00's motherboards have problems running raid too. I have only tried it in XP though.
That all said. The Asus A7V266-E has no problems with Raid in vanilla Win98se. (I have not tested it in XP)
Some boards need the driver or raid program to be installed too. As they are software Raid.
Just keep that in mind, as it is not allways enough just to set an Raid array in the BIOS.
You need the drivers and programs to be installed in Windows too. Raid is in other words a hit or miss.

Yep.. and more miss than hit. And you've managed to find the -one- magical raid configuration that works with win98, congrats. In general I'll always continue to suggest -against- raid with win98 to everyone.. it's just way too much of a headache to even bother with it when there's cheaper and easier ways to do it.

There are nifty hardware solution. IcyDock for example make drive bay devices with built-in RAID. It's totally independent to the machine. A single SATA lead comes out the back, connect that to the motherboard. Does 500 MB per second SATA III, should keep Windows 98 happy 😀

kithylin wrote:

So exactly how does this thing combine two sata hard drives in to one IDE interface? Does it have some sort of onboard RAID-0 setup? If so.. you won't be able to install Win9x on it. Win9x won't work with any sort of raid anything even basic raid-0. It just won't, there's no way around it.

IDE Master/Slave? The ones with single SATA jacks have a jumper.

Just got this awesome computer for 10$! It's just a Pentium 90 socket 5 with 16mb of ram but I'm gonna strip it all out and replace it with a Socket 7 mobo and make it totally kickass. 😁

King_Corduroy wrote:

Just got this awesome computer for 10$! It's just a Pentium 90 socket 5 with 16mb of ram but I'm gonna strip it all out and replace it with a Socket 7 mobo and make it totally kickass. 😁

Nice machine! Personally I'd leave it intact. Strip it, clean it, see if parts can be upgraded. But it's gorgeous as it is IMO.

Oooh wow. I'm envious 😀

PhilsComputerLab wrote:

King_Corduroy wrote:

Just got this awesome computer for 10$! It's just a Pentium 90 socket 5 with 16mb of ram but I'm gonna strip it all out and replace it with a Socket 7 mobo and make it totally kickass. 😁

Nice machine! Personally I'd leave it intact. Strip it, clean it, see if parts can be upgraded. But it's gorgeous as it is IMO.

I agree. Keep that beige beauty as it is. It already kicks ass.