Help identifying Gateway 2000 Socket 7 motherboard \ VOGONS

Help identifying Gateway 2000 Socket 7 motherboard

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First post, by m1k3e

Posted on 2021-07-17, 21:58

m1k3e Offline

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Hi everyone!

Just wanted to ask a quick question. I picked up a Gateway 2000 P5-133 MHz system on eBay a few months ago, and I just got around to working on the system (had to switch it to a new case, since the original case got destroyed in shipping 🙁). I need some help identifying this motherboard (see attached image). I *think* it's a "Mailman" motherboard from what I read, but I'm not completely sure. It does indeed run the DQ0T BIOS, which makes me thing that is what this system is (or is this a "Hitman" motherboard?). I swapped in a Pentium MMX 166 MHz processor, and everything seems to be working okay, but I just wanted to verify that this motherboard is indeed compatible with MMX CPUs and that I'm not overvolting the processor. I had a similar computer as a kid (Gateway 2000 P5-166 MMX) with almost the exact same motherboard except that it also had two USB ports (Mailman II?). That computer, like this one, had an onboard ATI Rage II + Vibra16 as well.

Any documentation or information about this motherboard would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance!

Mike

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Reply 1 of 7, by BitWrangler

Posted on 2021-07-17, 22:25

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Well if we assume it's getting 3.3 from ATX power then that regulator should just be for core voltage, but you wanna confirm the settings I guess.

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Reply 2 of 7, by Repo Man11

Posted on 2021-07-17, 22:50

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Some inspiration for you: Gateway roadside rust bucket.

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Reply 3 of 7, by Doornkaat

Posted on 2021-07-18, 08:15

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As far as I can tell there are no jumpers for voltage settings on this board. I would assume it is single voltage and always runs the CPU at 3.3V.

Reply 4 of 7, by m1k3e

Posted on 2021-07-18, 16:11

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Repo Man11 wrote on 2021-07-17, 22:50:

Some inspiration for you: Gateway roadside rust bucket.

This is really cool! Thanks for sharing!

BitWrangler wrote on 2021-07-17, 22:25:

Well if we assume it's getting 3.3 from ATX power then that regulator should just be for core voltage, but you wanna confirm the settings I guess.

I think it actually might be a single voltage board. I might have to take out the multimeter and confirm that the VIO + Vcore are both 3.3V, but I’m not sure what the best way of doing that would be exactly.

Doornkaat wrote on 2021-07-18, 08:15:

As far as I can tell there are no jumpers for voltage settings on this board. I would assume it is single voltage and always runs the CPU at 3.3V.

I think you’re right. I shared this picture to a Vintage Computer group on Facebook, and an eagle-eyed member spotted that there’s no regulator attached to U5L1. I compared this to a photo of the P5-166 MMX board that I had as a kid and, while it’s the same motherboard, there was indeed a regulator there. I’m sure this board could be modified, but I wouldn’t even begin to know what to do. I’m not sure if it’s simple as just putting a regulator there, or needing to make some other modification. As of right now the system seems to be running well at what I assume is 3.3V, so I might just add some extra cooling and see if it remains stable.

Reply 5 of 7, by Socket3

Posted on 2021-07-19, 00:36

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Well, if the CPU socket reads "socket 5" then 90% of the time it's single voltage and not compatible with MMX cpus.

Reply 6 of 7, by Horun

Posted on 2021-07-19, 01:24

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Doornkaat wrote on 2021-07-18, 08:15:

As far as I can tell there are no jumpers for voltage settings on this board. I would assume it is single voltage and always runs the CPU at 3.3V.

Agree ! even with what appears to be two Mosfets attached to same heatsink there are no jumpers to set voltages. To bad being a VX chipset it should support MMX but w/o dual volts it cannot.....
Looks like an Intel OEM board.

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Reply 7 of 7, by m1k3e

Posted on 2021-07-19, 02:19

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Horun wrote on 2021-07-19, 01:24:

Doornkaat wrote on 2021-07-18, 08:15:

As far as I can tell there are no jumpers for voltage settings on this board. I would assume it is single voltage and always runs the CPU at 3.3V.

Agree ! even with what appears to be two Mosfets attached to same heatsink there are no jumpers to set voltages. To bad being a VX chipset it should support MMX but w/o dual volts it cannot.....
Looks like an Intel OEM board.

Yep, I think it's a TE430VX board from Intel. I did some digging around, it looks like there was an OEM option for split voltage support. I'm assuming that my current motherboard (P5-133) doesn't have split voltage support, but I'm wondering how difficult it would be to modify the board. I know that the photo of my P5-166 MMX board from 1997 also had no voltage selection headers (J6M1), like on the photo of my current P5-133 board. I found a nice high resolution shot of a TE430VX motherboard on the wiki (https://www.vogonswiki.com/images/9/9f/Intel_TE430VX.jpg) and it seems to have a 11173 voltage regulator on U5L1 and a capacitor on C5K4, neither of which are on my board. Also doesn't have a header on J6M1 for voltage selection. I'm wondering if split rail support is as simple as soldering on these two components, or if a more involved modification is in order.

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