VLB boards are pretty easy and cheap but they are not excatly easy to work with and worse the best VLB cards are pretty hard to find. I suggest that you hunt for a pci socket 3 board and have easier options when it comes to the graphics card.

nforce4max wrote:

VLB boards are pretty easy and cheap but they are not excatly easy to work with and worse the best VLB cards are pretty hard to find. I suggest that you hunt for a pci socket 3 board and have easier options when it comes to the graphics card.

I don't fear "hard" as I used to build those PC back them. the VLB was pretty much designed for the 486.

I'm sticking with a VLB mobo.

Synoptic wrote:

nforce4max wrote:

VLB boards are pretty easy and cheap but they are not excatly easy to work with and worse the best VLB cards are pretty hard to find. I suggest that you hunt for a pci socket 3 board and have easier options when it comes to the graphics card.

I don't fear "hard" as I used to build those PC back them. the VLB was pretty much designed for the 486.

I'm sticking with a VLB mobo.

You k now what, I'm retracting that affirmation.

I think indeed, going for a Full ISA/PCI motherboard would be best.

Which models are recommended ?

Synoptic wrote:

- I want a VLB motherboard.

Boards using the SiS471 chipset tend to be good performers. Try and look for a board with PS/2 mouse connector and coin battery. The Asus VL/I-486SV2GX4 - Rev 2.x is probably the best VLB only board you can get (it also has PS/2 mouse and coin battery). Performance wise it is as good or even better than the PCI ones. See some benchmark in this thread: Build 486's And They Will Come! Suggestions please!

Synoptic wrote:

- I do not know what to use for Video card nor for IO controller.

For video card you need a VLB based one for gaming. There are many options, but the S3 Vision and ET4000/W32p are the fastest (and most expensive to get). A Cirrius Logic card will do the trick as well if you're low on cash.

Synoptic wrote:

- I would like to put in the best SoundBlaster money could buy in the 4 years after that CPU came out that will not conflict with my GUS Max.

Best Soundblaster money can buy 4 years after? Probably the AWE64 Gold is the card for you. Last Soundblaster ISA card to be released.

Synoptic wrote:

- Mouse ?

Again, if you get a board with PS/2 connector you can use your modern USB optical/laser mouses with an adapter. That a huge benefit! Mouse technology has come a long way since the 90s.

Synoptic wrote:

- I will run Windows 3.11 for Workgroups with Dos 6.22 (otherwise suggested)

Run 95 on it!
95 has an excellent "restart in msdos mode" and has far better program support.
Its also not much slower and a DX100 would be wasted on a 3.11

- I do not know what to use for Video card nor for IO controller.

Most motherboards have built in I/O controllers
For video, I don't know much about VLB but there has been some discussion and it looks like the S3 Vision series is the way to go

- Mouse ?

You'll probably need to find a serial mouse (simplest solution)

You will also need to find an AT power supply

And what would be the PCI + ISA go-to motherboard if I'm not going VLB ?

Synoptic wrote:

And what would be the PCI + ISA go-to motherboard if I'm not going VLB ?

Well I am using a PCI 486 system right now.
The motherboard is an Acer AP43 with SiS 496+497 chipset

Specs:

CPU AMD AM486DX-120
RAM 64 MB 72 pin FPM RAM
Video S3 Virge 4MB (You have a LOT of options with a PCI system. Some newer cards may not work well in DOS though)
Sound Soundblaster Vibra16 with OPL3

Doom plays silky smooth. Tomb raider and quake run slow but are marginally playable

Note it does not have a PS/2 mouse port, most 486 boards actually do not
Even some early pentiums didn't

I installed a PCI USB card so I can use a USB mouse in Win 98 and 2000
but in DOS/95 I have to use a serial mouse

Synoptic wrote:

You k now what, I'm retracting that affirmation. […]
Show full quote

Synoptic wrote:

nforce4max wrote:

VLB boards are pretty easy and cheap but they are not excatly easy to work with and worse the best VLB cards are pretty hard to find. I suggest that you hunt for a pci socket 3 board and have easier options when it comes to the graphics card.

I don't fear "hard" as I used to build those PC back them. the VLB was pretty much designed for the 486.

I'm sticking with a VLB mobo.

You k now what, I'm retracting that affirmation.

I think indeed, going for a Full ISA/PCI motherboard would be best.

Which models are recommended ?

I grew up in the era when the 486 was king, and was maybe 19 or 20 when the 486-100 would have been hot stuff. And I built all my own PCs back then. Maybe I'm spoiled by modern PCs, but I'd have to say save yourself some heartache and get the PCI board. I can't think of any specific boards right now, if I do later I'll post to the thread or send you a PM.

And good VLB cards will be hard to find. You'll have a much easier time finding a nice PCI card. It might be mismatched/anachronistic in some way, but shouldn't be any issues getting it working. A period correct or high performance VLB card will be difficult or expensive to come by.

I'm watching a 486 M919 VIP v3.2. It has the fake cache on it, but the 256kb module is installed. Comes with CPU (don't need) and 32MB ram.

It has 2 PCI slots and 1 VLB. Would this be a good mobo ?

Synoptic wrote:

I'm watching a 486 M919 VIP v3.2. It has the fake cache on it, but the 256kb module is installed. Comes with CPU (don't need) and 32MB ram.

It has 2 PCI slots and 1 VLB. Would this be a good mobo ?

Fake cache is a sign of a cheap (read lower quality) motherboard

I hope it has atleast a few ISA slots too because 3 expansion slots is very few

Synoptic wrote:

I'm watching a 486 M919 VIP v3.2. It has the fake cache

...stop right there. It is bad.

http://www.redhill.net.au/b/b-bad.html

I didn't have the same model as you're looking at, but I had a PCChips board whose layout matched the one in that Red Hill article. Mine however had a socketed BIOS and socketed "cache". To this day I don't know if my cache was real or fake. I kept the chips but I've never had a way of testing them. Don't have the board anymore.
The manual doesn't even say PCChips on it. My understanding is that PCChips was literally just the manufacturer. They built the boards to a spec requested by shady 3rd party distributors who sold it under anonymity.
Based on my experience with that board, I wouldn't recommend any 486-era PCChips to anyone. They are useless.

I can't describe how frustrated I was trying to play games on that motherboard. Anything with intense memory bandwidth would crash it. I got to see the DOS/4GW crash screens a LOT.
Crashing was manageable on some, but not all 320x200 VGA games. I found it interesting that in Papyrus NASCAR Racing, it was 99.5% stable in the cockpit view, but if I switched to an external view it would crash within seconds. I guess the difference was the amount of screen space that was being animated, resulting in more intense data bus activity.

Almost no game was ever playable in SVGA modes. Windows was mostly stable at 640x480 256 color, but I couldn't go any higher.

As a matter of personal crusade, I do wish I had that board today, just to see if I could make it usable. I didn't know much about building PCs back then. I can say that the 33MHz bus with 66MHz CPU, and an ISA video card (didn't have a VLB card) was not stable at all. I'd be interested to see what happens at 25MHz bus and maybe some cap modding and a voltage boost, if possible.

Maybe the PCI model is better, but I would never give them that benefit of the doubt. Don't pay any real money for a 486 PCChips. I was very glad to be rid of ours when we upgraded later.

I would also recommend staying away from PC Chips, or anything with fake cache. I think they are still in business, but to this day I won't buy anything from them due to the reputation they earned back then.

VLB/PCI combo will probably not be as good as all one or the other. I would say just pick one and stick with it.

I have a M912 w/real cache that seems to be an OK board. Saying that I would never recommend a pcchips product. If you have 486 experience then tackling a pcchips 486 might prove to be fun trying to make it stable and eek every ounce of performance out of a turd.

shamino wrote:

To this day I don't know if my cache was real or fake. I kept the chips but I've never had a way of testing them.

Maybe just snap it in two? 😁

archsan wrote:

shamino wrote:

To this day I don't know if my cache was real or fake. I kept the chips but I've never had a way of testing them.

Maybe just snap it in two? 😁

Not a bad idea, actually... 😀

Umm the best way would be to remove the cache and see if it slows way down

Would that motherboard be something interesting ? http://motherboards.mbarron.net/models/486pci/ls486ef.htm

Doesn't look terrible. Only 2 RAM slots and 4 cache slots though