Limpem wrote on 2021-11-20, 12:36:

Well I did some testing and can confirm I have your issue as well on this board. None of the 3x modi seem to work without a bios […]
Show full quote

Well I did some testing and can confirm I have your issue as well on this board.
None of the 3x modi seem to work without a bios error:
150 Mhz (50Mhz)
165 Mhz (55Mhz)
180 Mhz (60Mhz)
200 Mhz (66Mhz)
If you don't mind ignoring the error every boot, the processor will probably work fine at 200 Mhz just as the 233 Mhz works fine on other boards which also cause an error on boot.
You could test it by running cpu-z in Windows and see the reported speed.
I didn't want to do a fresh install to see for myself 😉

If you want to verify if you have the FRU12H2015, it was reported on a sticker above the 2 SIS chips on the mainbord.

Hi, thank you for your help.
You have the same board as I, and you got the same results.

I was able to use the settings for 166MHZ, so I guess I will keep this way, since I do not like having the error every time the machine boots.

I have updated the firmware to early version from dated from 99.

Limpem wrote on 2021-11-20, 12:39:

I also did an additional test with a 200 Mhz pentium Overdrive. The bios didn't give any error messages, but also didn't report […]
Show full quote

I also did an additional test with a 200 Mhz pentium Overdrive.
The bios didn't give any error messages, but also didn't report the clockspeed.
Instead it just said Pentium ODP.
So if you want a 200Mhz error free boot process (and also extra cpu power + MMX instructions) you might consider this cpu if you can find it cheap.

Interesting. I guess I'll try to find a cheap one in ebay 😀

Thank you.

So this is the current status of my build.

Decided to use an SDCard to IDE adapter with 8GB SD to be used as primary unit, and not to use the hard drive. It works great with Windows 98 SE.

Installed this NE2000 ISA network card, and replaced the MWave Audio/Modem with a Sound Blaster 16 card.

Also tried this USB2.0 PCI card with two ports, to use with a Zip100 USB drive, but windows 98 becomes very unstable and frequently freezes, so decided to remove it.

I will try later a different branded USB card that I should have in my spare retro junk.

I had a spare 5.25 floppy drive, so I throw it in the case.

I think it looks cool.

soupapes wrote on 2021-11-20, 14:02:

Limpem wrote on 2021-11-20, 12:39:

I also did an additional test with a 200 Mhz pentium Overdrive. The bios didn't give any error messages, but also didn't report […]
Show full quote

I also did an additional test with a 200 Mhz pentium Overdrive.
The bios didn't give any error messages, but also didn't report the clockspeed.
Instead it just said Pentium ODP.
So if you want a 200Mhz error free boot process (and also extra cpu power + MMX instructions) you might consider this cpu if you can find it cheap.

Interesting. I guess I'll try to find a cheap one in ebay 😀

Thank you.

Sweet, but don't overspend!
Overdrive pentiums are usually quite expensive when I see them on ebay.
If you do want to buy them, it might be cheaper to upgrade the motherboard and use a regular pentium mmx cpu.
The boards I can recommend:

1st pick is the 93H4690 (which is what I currently use).
Although it is meant for a totally different system (IBM PC 330) it works perfectly in the aptiva (I did have to unscrew one of the mounts for a serial port for installation).
The advantages over your current board:
-intel 430HX chipset (still 64MB limit though)
-S3 trio 64V+ onboard graphics, which have one of the best dos compatibility
-Works fine with the 233MMX (shows as 100Mhz in bios, but no boot errors)
-Normally functioning pci ports, the Aptiva boards have some limitations with certain pci devices (TNT2, savage4, voodoo 5500 and other cards don't properly work on aptiva including the second pick, but they work fine on this board)
-Option to upgrade the riser board to a 60H9503 which gives 5x PCI and 3x ISA
The disadvantages to the second pick:
-No SD-Ram support
-No overclocking
-233Mhz cpu reported incorrectly in bios, but fully functional
-I never tried any official Aptiva install media, but it probably won't work on this board
-(very specific for my case) the ps2 mouse from my kvm switch isn't recognised by this board

2nd pick is the 93H77122
The advantages over your current board:
-Intel 430VX chipset
-Is an Aptiva mainboard and uses the same chipset as the 2176 A2 board, therefore my Aptiva install media worked with this board installed
-Ati 3D Rage II+ onboard graphics
-Works with SD-Ram instead of EDO Ram and EDO DIMM which grants a minor speed improvement with my testing
-Fully supports 233MMX Pentiums with correct clockspeeds in BIOS
-Overclocking to 75Mhz Bus (couldn't get it stable with certain hardware unfortunately)

Both those boards will require a voltage regulator which isn't needed for your current board.
In the pictures I included are both the Pentium and Pentium MMX boards.
The one on the left is for the Pentium MMX cpu's and the one on the right is for regular Pentiums.
Make sure the one suitable for your specific cpu is included if you order a motherboard as an upgrade (or order one seperately).

PS, I love the larger floppy drive! Other hardware seems nice as well 😁

Limpem wrote on 2021-11-20, 15:33:

Sweet, but don't overspend! Overdrive pentiums are usually quite expensive when I see them on ebay. If you do want to buy them, […]
Show full quote

soupapes wrote on 2021-11-20, 14:02:

Limpem wrote on 2021-11-20, 12:39:

I also did an additional test with a 200 Mhz pentium Overdrive. The bios didn't give any error messages, but also didn't report […]
Show full quote

I also did an additional test with a 200 Mhz pentium Overdrive.
The bios didn't give any error messages, but also didn't report the clockspeed.
Instead it just said Pentium ODP.
So if you want a 200Mhz error free boot process (and also extra cpu power + MMX instructions) you might consider this cpu if you can find it cheap.

Interesting. I guess I'll try to find a cheap one in ebay 😀

Thank you.

Sweet, but don't overspend!
Overdrive pentiums are usually quite expensive when I see them on ebay.
If you do want to buy them, it might be cheaper to upgrade the motherboard and use a regular pentium mmx cpu.
The boards I can recommend:

1st pick is the 93H4690 (which is what I currently use).
Although it is meant for a totally different system (IBM PC 330) it works perfectly in the aptiva (I did have to unscrew one of the mounts for a serial port for installation).
The advantages over your current board:
-intel 430HX chipset (still 64MB limit though)
-S3 trio 64V+ onboard graphics, which have one of the best dos compatibility
-Works fine with the 233MMX (shows as 100Mhz in bios, but no boot errors)
-Normally functioning pci ports, the Aptiva boards have some limitations with certain pci devices (TNT2, savage4, voodoo 5500 and other cards don't properly work on aptiva including the second pick, but they work fine on this board)
-Option to upgrade the riser board to a 60H9503 which gives 5x PCI and 3x ISA
The disadvantages to the second pick:
-No SD-Ram support
-No overclocking
-233Mhz cpu reported incorrectly in bios, but fully functional
-I never tried any official Aptiva install media, but it probably won't work on this board
-(very specific for my case) the ps2 mouse from my kvm switch isn't recognised by this board

2nd pick is the 93H77122
The advantages over your current board:
-Intel 430VX chipset
-Is an Aptiva mainboard and uses the same chipset as the 2176 A2 board, therefore my Aptiva install media worked with this board installed
-Ati 3D Rage II+ onboard graphics
-Works with SD-Ram instead of EDO Ram and EDO DIMM which grants a minor speed improvement with my testing
-Fully supports 233MMX Pentiums with correct clockspeeds in BIOS
-Overclocking to 75Mhz Bus (couldn't get it stable with certain hardware unfortunately)

Both those boards will require a voltage regulator which isn't needed for your current board.
In the pictures I included are both the Pentium and Pentium MMX boards.
The one on the left is for the Pentium MMX cpu's and the one on the right is for regular Pentiums.
Make sure the one suitable for your specific cpu is included if you order a motherboard as an upgrade (or order one seperately).

PS, I love the larger floppy drive! Other hardware seems nice as well 😁

Nice collection of hardware you have 😀

Here in Europe it is very hard to find this kind of components for sale, and usually they are quite pricey. But if an A2 board shows up for sale at a decent price, I'll take it.

soupapes wrote on 2021-11-20, 13:37:

Is your Aptiva a 2176? Does it has USB port (modern version of the board)? Can you confirm what version of BIOS do you have? An […]
Show full quote

Intel486dx33 wrote on 2021-11-20, 13:25:

Those are my two favorite IBM computers. The PS/1 and This Aptiva. My Aptiva has a 200mhz Pentium CPU in it. And is running Win9 […]
Show full quote

soupapes wrote on 2021-11-16, 14:40:

So today I received a lovely Aptiva I bought from eBay. It was one of my dream machines when I was a young boy, after having as […]
Show full quote

So today I received a lovely Aptiva I bought from eBay.
It was one of my dream machines when I was a young boy, after having as my first computer an IBM PS/1 486 😀

It's a Pentium 120MHz with 48Mb ram and 1.2GB HD.

I am planning to do the following upgrades:
- 3DFX Voodoo 4mb PCI
- Intel P200MHz CPU
- additional Hard Drive
- Replace MWAVE sound card with a Sound Blaster
- Install windows 98 SE

The BIOS of my machine comes in spanish, but I haven't found a menu option to change de language. Anyone knows how to do it in this machine?

Also tried a 10Gb hard drive, but the BIOS only supports up to 8.4Gb. Is there a recent BIOS update capable of solving this?

Greetings from Portugal!

Those are my two favorite IBM computers. The PS/1 and This Aptiva.
My Aptiva has a 200mhz Pentium CPU in it.
And is running Win95 the Operating system that came with these old Aptiva’s.

The Pentium 120 is actually fast enough to play most DOS games and Win95 games.
32mb is actually all you need for DOS and Win95.
1.2gb hard-drive is also more than BIG enough.
Maybe add a second drive to store all your files.

Is your Aptiva a 2176? Does it has USB port (modern version of the board)?
Can you confirm what version of BIOS do you have?
Any chance you could send a picture of how the board jumpers are set next to the CPU (JP10 & JP11)?

See my posts:
IBM Aptiva c77 restore.

Received today this Primax speakers I found for sale online.

They should be period correct for this build.

24 years later, finally I have a 3dfx Voodoo card 😀

Now that's a sweet combination!
As for aptiva parts in Europe:
I'm from Europe myself, I got most parts from Italy, Poland and the UK (pre-brexit) through ebay.
They're not as common as in the US, but they do come around eventually and usually aren't very expensive. 😀

Oh, and when you switch to one of the Intel boards, you will also get at least one USB port (I think usb 1.0 or 1.1 though if you need 2.0)

Limpem wrote on 2021-11-25, 11:59:

Now that's a sweet combination! As for aptiva parts in Europe: I'm from Europe myself, I got most parts from Italy, Poland and t […]
Show full quote

Now that's a sweet combination!
As for aptiva parts in Europe:
I'm from Europe myself, I got most parts from Italy, Poland and the UK (pre-brexit) through ebay.
They're not as common as in the US, but they do come around eventually and usually aren't very expensive. 😀

Oh, and when you switch to one of the Intel boards, you will also get at least one USB port (I think usb 1.0 or 1.1 though if you need 2.0)

Actually, the Voodoo card came from Italy.
Before Brexit I bought a lot of stuff from UK, but now the packages are retained in customs and I have to pay 23% extra of import taxes.

I found a lot of good stuff in US at decent prices but the shipping costs to Portugal are insane.

So today I installed the voodoo card.

Windows 98 SE detected it and automatically install a driver. In the windows display properties I don't seen anything new to configure or define settings for the voodoo. Is that expected?

Do you recommend me to install any particular software or different driver for the voodoo?

soupapes wrote on 2021-11-27, 13:48:

So today I installed the voodoo card.

Windows 98 SE detected it and automatically install a driver. In the windows display properties I don't seen anything new to configure or define settings for the voodoo. Is that expected?

Do you recommend me to install any particular software or different driver for the voodoo?

Downloaded this driver from PhilsComputer Lab:
voodoo_graphics_driver_kit_version_3.01.00.zip

It seem's better than the default driver from Windows and now I have access to 3dfx tab in display properties.

New addition to pair with the voodoo: the Matrox Millenium 4mb.

I was trying to test the 5.25 floppy drive by reading and formatting a new 1.2mb HD disk.
The unit B is recognized in Windows 98 but whenever I try to access the disk I always get an error. The disk is not recognized despite the green light turns on in the floppy drive when trying to read a disk.

The drive is Mitsumi brand and I have found the following jumper diagram online, but I am not sure if I am using the correct settings. That last jumper was missing, so I set the blue one in HS.
Anyone can confirm if the current settings make sense?

Do you hear the motor when the green light is on? If yes, try the LD/HD output jumper on HD.... if not, try different motor select setting first.

BitWrangler wrote on 2021-12-21, 22:55:

Do you hear the motor when the green light is on? If yes, try the LD/HD output jumper on HD.... if not, try different motor select setting first.

The motor does spin. Tried different settings, but no luck. I suppose is defective.

Due to space limitations, I decided to go with an LCD instead of CRT, so I bought an EIZO FlexScan S1921 I found in ebay.

Also bought an external parallel zip 100 drive. Quite slow in comparison with the internal IDE model.

Bought this from eBay from US to keep it as a spare. It's the later board version.

Haven't tested it yet, but if it works I might use it to upgrade, to be able to use my P200 CPU and also benefit from the USB port.