AsRock and Biostar has some very tiny uATX boards with exactly one PCI-e 16x and PCI-e 1x slot. Some examples are the:

• AsRock H61M-VG3
• Biostar H61MHV2
• Biostar H61MLV3

These still have XP drivers and support Sandy and Ivy Bridge CPUs. The expansion slots allow one graphics card and one sound card, for example a Sound Blaster X-fi Titanium SB0880. Also, the board is only 19×17 cm and fits cases made for ITX boards if the case allows dual slot GPU. Some such cases are the:

• Raijintek Metis Plus
• Cooler Master Elite 130
• Bitfenix Prodigy

The Raijintek is the smallest, but the Cooler Master and the Bitfenix lets you have an optical drive. I like the Raijintek the most, because it has room for dual slot graphics cards with the above mentioned boards. With the other two you are restricted to single slot.

There are also some small cases that allow you to have it all. These are two of those:
Re: Bought these (retro) hardware today
Normal uATX motherboard, full height expansion cards and room for normal a sized 5.25" drive, comparable in size to the Raijintek, but these are older parts with poorer ventilation.

For graphics cards anything works that goes with a single slot bracket. The GTX650/Ti and GTX750/Ti are two good cards with plenty of performance for XP, they sometimes still have analog output if CRT and supports Nvidia Shadowplay for gameplay recording with a negligible performance hit.

You also have the option of going low-profile, but then you more or less have to give up on (native EAX) sound cards.

RandomStranger wrote on 2023-03-16, 11:00:

AsRock and Biostar has some very tiny uATX boards with exactly one PCI-e 16x and PCI-e 1x slot. Some examples are the: […]
Show full quote

AsRock and Biostar has some very tiny uATX boards with exactly one PCI-e 16x and PCI-e 1x slot. Some examples are the:

• AsRock H61M-VG3
• Biostar H61MHV2
• Biostar H61MLV3

These still have XP drivers and support Sandy and Ivy Bridge CPUs. The expansion slots allow one graphics card and one sound card, for example a Sound Blaster X-fi Titanium SB0880. Also, the board is only 19×17 cm and fits cases made for ITX boards if the case allows dual slot GPU. Some such cases are the:

• Raijintek Metis Plus
• Cooler Master Elite 130
• Bitfenix Prodigy

The Raijintek is the smallest, but the Cooler Master and the Bitfenix lets you have an optical drive. I like the Raijintek the most, because it has room for dual slot graphics cards with the above mentioned boards. With the other two you are restricted to single slot.

There are also some small cases that allow you to have it all. These are two of those:
Re: Bought these (retro) hardware today
Normal uATX motherboard, full height expansion cards and room for normal a sized 5.25" drive, comparable in size to the Raijintek, but these are older parts with poorer ventilation.

For graphics cards anything works that goes with a single slot bracket. The GTX650/Ti and GTX750/Ti are two good cards with plenty of performance for XP, they sometimes still have analog output if CRT and supports Nvidia Shadowplay for gameplay recording with a negligible performance hit.

You also have the option of going low-profile, but then you more or less have to give up on (native EAX) sound cards.

Thank you for your recommendation. I'm also considering the option with a Shuttle computer, some look pretty good, what do you think? Why the sound card will not work with low-profile graphics cards btw?

nuvyi wrote on 2023-03-16, 12:15:

Thank you for your recommendation. I'm also considering the option with a Shuttle computer, some look pretty good, what do you think?

Shuttle XPCs are decent and indeed very small. I also have an older one with an Athlon 64 3400+ and AGP, but they all have proprietary motherboards and PSUs. If they fail, it'll be difficult to find a replacement.

nuvyi wrote on 2023-03-16, 12:15:

Why the sound card will not work with low-profile graphics cards btw?

It's not the low-profile graphics card that's the issue. That's actually the easy part. There are plenty of fast (for the XP era) low-profile graphics cards. Where the problem is, that there are low-profile sound cards with first party EAX support. You can get something like the Audigy SE SB0570, but it's shit. You can also get an ASUS Xonar DX, but I don't know how good its implementation of EAX is. Maybe it's good, I can't find any detail right now other than that it supports EAX 2-5 and at least EAX 5 is software emulated. Nothing about quality or performance hit.

Isn't it possible to replace Shuttle XPC PSUs with flex ATX PSUs?
Also wouldn't really recommend XPCs for serious retro builds though.😅

RandomStranger wrote on 2023-03-16, 20:52:

Shuttle XPCs are decent and indeed very small. I also have an older one with an Athlon 64 3400+ and AGP, but they all have prop […]
Show full quote

nuvyi wrote on 2023-03-16, 12:15:

Thank you for your recommendation. I'm also considering the option with a Shuttle computer, some look pretty good, what do you think?

Shuttle XPCs are decent and indeed very small. I also have an older one with an Athlon 64 3400+ and AGP, but they all have proprietary motherboards and PSUs. If they fail, it'll be difficult to find a replacement.

nuvyi wrote on 2023-03-16, 12:15:

Why the sound card will not work with low-profile graphics cards btw?

It's not the low-profile graphics card that's the issue. That's actually the easy part. There are plenty of fast (for the XP era) low-profile graphics cards. Where the problem is, that there are low-profile sound cards with first party EAX support. You can get something like the Audigy SE SB0570, but it's shit. You can also get an ASUS Xonar DX, but I don't know how good its implementation of EAX is. Maybe it's good, I can't find any detail right now other than that it supports EAX 2-5 and at least EAX 5 is software emulated. Nothing about quality or performance hit.

Also noticed that some of the motherboards have integrated GeForce 4 MX graphics. I'm curious if MX igp supports retro games features like 8-bit textures and table fog?

biostar p4m90-m4. i have a socket 478 model, but they come in lga775 varieties. micro-atx: you get 16x & 1x pcie, pci, onboard video/sound, ddr2, sata and 2 ide controllers.

Doornkaat wrote on 2023-03-16, 21:22:

Isn't it possible to replace Shuttle XPC PSUs with flex ATX PSUs?
Also wouldn't really recommend XPCs for serious retro builds though.😅

Yes, the Shuttles are Flex ATX. The PSUs (even Shuttle branded) are easily available.

As for “wouldn’t really recommend” for retro computing, surely that depends on the era and application. Nothing wrong with one for late 9x and XP, I wouldn’t want one for DOS gaming though due to lack of ISA or SB-LINK to get decent sound.

paradigital wrote on 2023-03-17, 07:26:

Doornkaat wrote on 2023-03-16, 21:22:

Isn't it possible to replace Shuttle XPC PSUs with flex ATX PSUs?
Also wouldn't really recommend XPCs for serious retro builds though.😅

Yes, the Shuttles are Flex ATX. The PSUs (even Shuttle branded) are easily available.

As for “wouldn’t really recommend” for retro computing, surely that depends on the era and application. Nothing wrong with one for late 9x and XP, I wouldn’t want one for DOS gaming though due to lack of ISA or SB-LINK to get decent sound.

Thanks for confirming the flex ATX PSU.😃👍
I have an S478 XPC that I used as a Win98 PC but I wasn't really satisfied with it.
Thermals was an issue with that system, especially for the GPUs I used in it. I had to mod the side of the case cover so a GeForce Ti 4600 and especially a 6800GT wouldn't suffocate. However that sabotaged the original air flow concept of the case so other parts (especially the VRM on the other side of the board) got warmer than intended. It's probably okish but it meant that at least the caps aged faster than necessary.
Adding to the thermal issue was the warm air from the GPU getting pulled through the CPU cooler which wasn't great for sound levels either. You're supposed to run the system on your desk but once you actually use it it gets rather noisy.
Having the case rely on negative air pressure didn't allow for effective dust filters either.
Another drawback was the single PCI slot. I like having both an Audigy2 ZS as well as an Aureal Vortex2 in a Win98 PC. Settled for Vortex2 only because the card's smaller footprint was better for airflow in the case.
Had Shuttle put the AGP slot horizontally underneath the mainboard giving it its own compartment, a second PCI slot would have been possible while reducing thermals and noise and only increasing the case height by maybe 3cm.
That's why I wouldn't recommend Shuttle XPCs as retro gaming systems even though they were really nice stylish productivity and web browsing machines back in the mid 2000s.