VivienM wrote on 2024-08-28, 23:23:

So... I've been looking on eBay for "pentiums" for a while, hoping to find something interesting (probably a full system) that will make a decent retro DOS machine.

And I've noticed one odd trend - there seem to be lots of big OEM systems (Dell, Gateway, etc) with Katmai 450/500/550 PIIIs, and some Deschutes PIIs, but very, very few Coppermine systems, or at least slot 1 Coppermines (there are more socket 370 Coppermines like Dell Dimension 4100s, but those generally don't have ISA slots).

Any thoughts on why that might be? My recollection was that Katmai was quite short-lived, so it seems odd that way, way more Katmai systems have survived to this day? Or... I suppose it's possible that the coppermines are getting snatched up so quickly that I don't see them?

That is an interesting observation. Now that I think about it, a lot of times when I see a Slot 1 Pentium III it is a Katmai around 450-550Mhz, just like you said. I do see faster models mixed in here and there, but recently the majority that I've found or seen for sale are under 600Mhz.

I'm not sure of the reason for this either, though I guess it's likely that the faster models are getting picked over, much like 3dfx cards and other more sought after parts from that time period. Also, the scrappers have hit socket CPUs very hard, so I'm sure we've lost a massive chunk of the Socket 370 Coppermine CPU pool in recent years.

Ozzuneoj wrote on 2024-08-28, 23:54:

VivienM wrote on 2024-08-28, 23:23:

So... I've been looking on eBay for "pentiums" for a while, hoping to find something interesting (probably a full system) that will make a decent retro DOS machine.

And I've noticed one odd trend - there seem to be lots of big OEM systems (Dell, Gateway, etc) with Katmai 450/500/550 PIIIs, and some Deschutes PIIs, but very, very few Coppermine systems, or at least slot 1 Coppermines (there are more socket 370 Coppermines like Dell Dimension 4100s, but those generally don't have ISA slots).

Any thoughts on why that might be? My recollection was that Katmai was quite short-lived, so it seems odd that way, way more Katmai systems have survived to this day? Or... I suppose it's possible that the coppermines are getting snatched up so quickly that I don't see them?

That is an interesting observation. Now that I think about it, a lot of times when I see a Slot 1 Pentium III it is a Katmai around 450-550Mhz, just like you said. I do see faster models mixed in here and there, but recently the majority that I've found or seen for sale are under 600Mhz.

I'm not sure of the reason for this either, though I guess it's likely that the faster models are getting picked over, much like 3dfx cards and other more sought after parts from that time period. Also, the scrappers have hit socket CPUs very hard, so I'm sure we've lost a massive chunk of the Socket 370 Coppermine CPU pool in recent years.

Or maybe it was that a higher percentage of coppermine systems were hit with the capacitor plague and the entire systems were discarded?

douglar wrote on 2024-08-29, 00:37:

Or maybe it was that a higher percentage of coppermine systems were hit with the capacitor plague and the entire systems were discarded?

I thought the capacitor plague was more... 2003-5ish... a lot of socket 462 AMD boards, a lot of HotBurst Dell boards, etc.

Also, if you look at, say, Dell, the Katmai Txxx models and the Coppermine Txxxrs are basically the same motherboard. Maybe a slight revision for voltages, etc. I would presume the capacitors are of consistent quality across all revisions of that board. Yet eBay is overflowing with Katmai Txxx and while I did see a T700r today, I don't think I've seen any other higher speed of coppermines.

My college had several labs full of Antique OEM AMD Slot A with very sparse P3 representation all below 550 and zero celeron. The segments of the college with Intel were mostly P4 and faster p3 was seemingly skipped.

From what I remember there was a brief period of time where Intel was putting out more slower CPUs and AMD had availability of all the faster clocks and OEMs were moving a lot of AMD silicon compared to normal

In this more competitive environment Is when the p4 launched as p3 was sort of stagnant for a period of time

Abit started early, every Abit board from 1998 onward died after ~3-5 years from capacitors.

>or at least slot 1 Coppermines

those are very rare, both Intel and clients were heavily favoring s370 versions due to cost

rasz_pl wrote on 2024-08-29, 02:08:

>or at least slot 1 Coppermines

those are very rare, both Intel and clients were heavily favoring s370 versions due to cost

The 1GHz 100FSB one, sure, but... the 700-850MHz slot 1s? Dell certainly sold a lot of XPS T700r-T850rs, I'm sure plenty of others did too...

That being said, so... I just went on eBay, and it seems that 850MHz slot 1s are listed for way more than I might have expected.

Which means... you may have actually led me to the answer to my question: if 850MHz slot 1s are US$200+, maybe experienced retro sellers will strip any system containing one and sell it for parts, whereas 500MHz Katmais are <$20 + shipping, so you're much better selling the Katmai as a whole system.

Might be wrong, but I somewhat doubt that in the 'full system' market, an 850MHz is worth US$200+ more than a 500MHz Katmai.

douglar wrote on 2024-08-29, 00:37:

Ozzuneoj wrote on 2024-08-28, 23:54:

VivienM wrote on 2024-08-28, 23:23:

So... I've been looking on eBay for "pentiums" for a while, hoping to find something interesting (probably a full system) that will make a decent retro DOS machine.

And I've noticed one odd trend - there seem to be lots of big OEM systems (Dell, Gateway, etc) with Katmai 450/500/550 PIIIs, and some Deschutes PIIs, but very, very few Coppermine systems, or at least slot 1 Coppermines (there are more socket 370 Coppermines like Dell Dimension 4100s, but those generally don't have ISA slots).

Any thoughts on why that might be? My recollection was that Katmai was quite short-lived, so it seems odd that way, way more Katmai systems have survived to this day? Or... I suppose it's possible that the coppermines are getting snatched up so quickly that I don't see them?

That is an interesting observation. Now that I think about it, a lot of times when I see a Slot 1 Pentium III it is a Katmai around 450-550Mhz, just like you said. I do see faster models mixed in here and there, but recently the majority that I've found or seen for sale are under 600Mhz.

I'm not sure of the reason for this either, though I guess it's likely that the faster models are getting picked over, much like 3dfx cards and other more sought after parts from that time period. Also, the scrappers have hit socket CPUs very hard, so I'm sure we've lost a massive chunk of the Socket 370 Coppermine CPU pool in recent years.

Or maybe it was that a higher percentage of coppermine systems were hit with the capacitor plague and the entire systems were discarded?

This!
Even I'm guilty of eventually binning my bp6.
At the time I thought it died because I dropped it, but on reflection, being in the cupboard for years with that era caps probably did more than the small squish on the front bottom corner.

No proof but may have been better timed for peoples update cycle?

Reading peoples history quite a few had a DX2/66 and didn't upgrade till P2 early P3.
And by the time Coppermine was selling in any real numbers industry had moved over to S370.

VivienM wrote on 2024-08-28, 23:23:

And I've noticed one odd trend - there seem to be lots of big OEM systems (Dell, Gateway, etc) with Katmai 450/500/550 PIIIs, and some Deschutes PIIs, but very, very few Coppermine systems, or at least slot 1 Coppermines (there are more socket 370 Coppermines like Dell Dimension 4100s, but those generally don't have ISA slots).

I think we tend to to oversight how highend was a Pentium 3 in late 90's.
OEM systems were mainly targeted at business users and generally a celeron or an entry-level Pentium 2/3 would be largely sufficient.

According to Wikipedia, in 99 anything above a 600MHz P3 would cost 500 to 800USD that would make something between 950 and 1500 USD in 2024 with inflation correction. Same price level as later "Extreme edition" CPUs.

There was also a CPU shortage in 99. Most dates mentioned in Wikipedia are "paper launch" dates. Sure Anandtech could test the CPU day one, but you could not find them in OEM or retail before long. (Or at a very inflated price)

And a bit later, when the prices went down there was Athlon and Duron on the market

My brother's first own system was a business machine he bought back from our mother's work. It was a Pentium 3 500 and it was in 2002. That means that this 1999 500 MHz CPU was replaced by the company when Athlon 2400+/2600+ and P4 2.8 Northwood were arriving.

acl wrote on 2024-08-29, 07:30:

There was also a CPU shortage in 99. Most dates mentioned in Wikipedia are "paper launch" dates. Sure Anandtech could test the CPU day one, but you could not find them in OEM or retail before long. (Or at a very inflated price)

And a bit later, when the prices went down there was Athlon and Duron on the market

This. Apparently first six months of Coppermine there was a real shortage, checkout here: https://www.redhill.net.au/c/c-f.php and looks like the s370 versions with 133mhz fsb came out and maybe surpassed the slot 1s? Certainly no shortage of s370 CPUs out there.

Also, back then, for people like me, on a budget, a CeleMine and a Slotket was widely used ... I ran a 600@900 for some time, until I went to a NorthWood ..

If I take myself as a sample point, I initially upgraded from a Pentium1 120 MHz to a Pentium II 450 MHz.

As many Slot1 boards would not be upgradeable with Coppermines, they simply did not offer an easy x2 upgrade option. The next CPU I upgraded to was an Athlon XP. Coppermine simply was no option.

@VivienM
OEM Coppermine based systems usually had Intel Desktop Board variation on i815 chipset, which were reliable boards with quality capacitors (usually Nichicon).
Do you mean slot-1 Coppermines or Coppermines in general?

VivienM wrote on 2024-08-29, 00:43:

I thought the capacitor plague was more... 2003-5ish... a lot of socket 462 AMD boards, a lot of HotBurst Dell boards, etc.

It started around 2000 with boards from 1999 onwards. My first encounter with it was with a then 6-month old MSI MS-6309 board in mid 2000, and I've had to recap piles of Slot 1, So370 and even some late So7 boards. It was definitely still a thing in 2003, in fact it's still a thing in 2024. I had to recall a bunch of power supplies earlier this year for some devices we ship due to failure within a few month. Postmortem showed depressingly familiar sight&smell.

Also, if you look at, say, Dell, the Katmai Txxx models and the Coppermine Txxxrs are basically the same motherboard. Maybe a slight revision for voltages, etc. I would presume the capacitors are of consistent quality across all revisions of that board. Yet eBay is overflowing with Katmai Txxx and while I did see a T700r today, I don't think I've seen any other higher speed of coppermines.

I'd say the reason for more Katmai than Coppermine Slot 1 is quite simple - Coppermine was released around the time that Slot 1 was being migrated to So370. So370 FC-PGA was always its target platform and the vast majority of Coppermine CPUs were released for that platform. Slot 1 Coppermines were primarily released so OEMs didn't need to certify a new motherboard when they upgraded the CPUs. They were also sold retail, but given you could just as easily - and generally cheaper - grab an So370 version and a slocket, the upgrade community preferred that flexible path to a new CPU on a legacy platforn, particularly as if you chose a slocket with voltage jumpers you could run CuMine on old board that couldn't deliver below 1.8V.

It's telling that most of the faster Coppermine Slot 1 CPUs you see have an OEM cooling solution, not the Intel retail HSF.

stef80 wrote on 2024-08-29, 09:24:

@VivienM
OEM Coppermine based systems usually had Intel Desktop Board variation on i815 chipset, which were reliable boards with quality capacitors (usually Nichicon).
Do you mean slot-1 Coppermines or Coppermines in general?

i815 launched in the summer of 2000, and yes, large OEMs sold tons of i815/socket 370 Intel desktop board-based systems in the second half of 2000 and into 2001.

Prior to the launch of the i815, the same folks (Dell, Gateway, etc) were selling slot 1/440BX 100FSB Intel desktop board-based systems. Some variant of the ... SE440BX I think it was called? Originally designed for Katmais then switched to Coppermines when those came out in late 1999.

acl wrote on 2024-08-29, 07:30:

I think we tend to to oversight how highend was a Pentium 3 in late 90's. OEM systems were mainly targeted at business users and […]
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VivienM wrote on 2024-08-28, 23:23:

And I've noticed one odd trend - there seem to be lots of big OEM systems (Dell, Gateway, etc) with Katmai 450/500/550 PIIIs, and some Deschutes PIIs, but very, very few Coppermine systems, or at least slot 1 Coppermines (there are more socket 370 Coppermines like Dell Dimension 4100s, but those generally don't have ISA slots).

I think we tend to to oversight how highend was a Pentium 3 in late 90's.
OEM systems were mainly targeted at business users and generally a celeron or an entry-level Pentium 2/3 would be largely sufficient.

According to Wikipedia, in 99 anything above a 600MHz P3 would cost 500 to 800USD that would make something between 950 and 1500 USD in 2024 with inflation correction. Same price level as later "Extreme edition" CPUs.

There was also a CPU shortage in 99. Most dates mentioned in Wikipedia are "paper launch" dates. Sure Anandtech could test the CPU day one, but you could not find them in OEM or retail before long. (Or at a very inflated price)

And a bit later, when the prices went down there was Athlon and Duron on the market

My brother's first own system was a business machine he bought back from our mother's work. It was a Pentium 3 500 and it was in 2002. That means that this 1999 500 MHz CPU was replaced by the company when Athlon 2400+/2600+ and P4 2.8 Northwood were arriving.

I'm not sure I would agree. Sure, lots of these P3s had really high launch prices, but a faster variant would come out a few months later and the rest of the lineup.

I had a Dell T700r in the summer of 2000. I often describe it as my first "decent" x86 box, after two elcheapo pieces of junk. And IIRC, it cost CAD$2300 + tax + $160 shipping (yes, Dell charged for shipping back then) for a PIII 700, TNT2 M64, SB Live, 128 megs of RAM, 20 gig HD, CD-ROM drive, modem, 3Com NIC, and a nice Dell Trinitron 19" monitor. That felt like a bargain to me... maybe because only a few years earlier, CAD$2000 would get you a hopelessly cheapened 486 with a super-crappy matching-brand bundled 14" CRT that needed a RAM upgrade to run the current version of MS Office. (I suppose in summer 2000, the hopelessly cheapened K6 or Celeron with a super-crappy 15" CRT was... CA$1200 or so, I don't remember.)

Now, when I ordered that system, the 1GHz slot 1/100FSB coppermine was... theoretically out... but I think largely unavailable, and Dell offered up to 850MHz. My recollection is that I picked the 700 because that was the best value within my budget. I don't know what Intel's price for a 700MHz slot 1 100FSB chip was at that time, but it certainly cannot have been anywhere near its launch US$7xx-8xx. I do vaguely recall that the 850MHz was a lot more money than the 700...

The other observation I will make is that I didn't realize until fairly recently how many 1GHz socket 370 coppermines seemingly landed in large OEM i810 systems. Such a waste. I'm guessing these systems were made after the launch of the P4 and Intel had socket 370 Coppermines to clear?

I have few slot-1 Coppermine EB cpus, I think 600MHz. Not sure why Intel decided to make them, since BX440 does not have "clean" divider for AGP bus on 133MHZ FSB. Were they helping VIA/SIS ?

stef80 wrote on 2024-08-29, 16:06:

I have few slot-1 Coppermine EB cpus, I think 600MHz. Not sure why Intel decided to make them, since BX440 does not have "clean" divider for AGP bus on 133MHZ FSB. Were they helping VIA/SIS ?

I think Dell sold some early XPS B series (RDRAM i820) with slot 1 motherboards. (This is the board in question - https://theretroweb.com/motherboards/s/intel-vc820-vancouver - was totally shocked when I saw it on retroweb, I had always assumed the XPS B was socket 370) And there was also supposed to be the i820 + whatwasthenameofthattranslationchipthatwasrecalled, and maybe some of those were slot 1 too?

When did socket 370 P3s launch? I feel like there was a weird period before the i815 launch in summer 2000 when high end PIIIs were expected to be slot 1 still... then i815 + 133FSB socket 370 P3s were the end of slot 1.

VivienM wrote on 2024-08-29, 16:16:

And there was also supposed to be the i820 + whatwasthenameofthattranslationchipthatwasrecalled, and maybe some of those were slot 1 too?

To answer my own question, most of the i820 + MTH boards listed on retroweb seem to be slot 1. So before that exploded in Intel's face, that's probably where many of those processors were headed...