momaka wrote on 2025-03-01, 16:48:

Yeah, that's a standard and OK cooler for socket 370. But I'm not surprised it's not handling the 2500+, as that's a 60W TDP CPU […]
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Yeah, that's a standard and OK cooler for socket 370. But I'm not surprised it's not handling the 2500+, as that's a 60W TDP CPU (54W idle, 68W load) - almost twice as much as any P3.

All in all, socket 462 CPUs are pretty demanding, given their core is rather small considering the TDP.

If you're not afraid of cobbling something together DIY style (like many people did back in the day 😉 ), a thick copper heat spreader + thermal epoxy (to glue the head spreader onto the CPU) + any large Pentium 4 or full-size s775 heatsink will likely handle that CPU nicely. The tricky part is the mounting.

Heh, who would've thunk these would be in demand again and have such good resale value. 😁

Yeah, I just completely overlooked checking to see if I actually had a good cooler on hand. That was my bad. I was hoping this dinky thing could keep it cool enough to get it all setup, but nope.

I'm actually picking up one of these: https://www.cwc-group.com/mf035032.html for $23 shipped. I don't "need" copper, it's just a preference. I've used ones similar to this and they worked well. To think, all the coolers I tossed over the years... haha

I seriously considered seeing if I could adapt something more modern, but, I just don't have time to work out the mounting. Would be cool though. 😀

On a side note, I picked up a Athlon XP 3000+ for $15, shipped! With 30 day money back! Ran across it over on Amazon Marketplace. Most go for $35 or more over on eBay. It's the KV4E 2100MHz version, not the KV4D with the slightly faster 2167 MHz. clock, but for $15 I can't complain. It's better than the Sempron 2500+ I have now, and I get that 512K L2 vs 256K. Thankfully this MB supports 400MHz FSB since that's what the KV4E needs, the KV4D was 67MHz faster but uses a 333MHz FSB.

Either way, it's coming together. Slower than I wanted, but it is what it is.

I think I'm just going to use this case: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CHPRKW18?

I already own one, it houses my home "server". Nice cheap case and I can maybe dress it up with some case stickers/badges to show off it's retro contents. 😜

StriderTR wrote on 2025-03-01, 20:41:

I'm actually picking up one of these: https://www.cwc-group.com/mf035032.html for $23 shipped. I don't "need" copper, it's just a preference. I've used ones similar to this and they worked well.

Hey that's a pretty good cooler and decently priced too (for online stuff, anyways.)
I'm most impressed by the noise figure, though - the manufacturer claims *only* 28 dB, which is pretty impressive for a socket 462 cooler. Then again, the fan is stated to run at *only* 3600 RPM, so it makes sense.
Considering most coolers used 5k RPM fans and made around 40-50 dB of noise... man, how did we stand those noisy things back in the day?! 🤣

StriderTR wrote on 2025-03-01, 20:41:

To think, all the coolers I tossed over the years... haha

Not me! 😀
Could never bring myself to throw away anything that was still good or in working condition... and often times even when it wasn't. Coolers, even more, are made of valuable metals, so that's a big no-no on my list. About 10 years ago, I had a shop give me a large-ish box of various Xbox 360 heatsinks. I haven't used them all up yet, but probably a good 2/3 by now. And not just for computer stuff, but also used a few for other electronics-related projects. So heatsinks (and any scrap aluminum or copper) are always saved and stashed. 😀

StriderTR wrote on 2025-03-01, 20:41:

On a side note, I picked up a Athlon XP 3000+ for $15, shipped! With 30 day money back! Ran across it over on Amazon Marketplace. Most go for $35 or more over on eBay. I

Wow, even those have gone up in price. 🤣
I've turned down no less than 10 socket A systems at my local flea market in the last year, as the sellers for most of these wanted about $10 per entire PC, and I thought that was too much at the time. I do try to grab them at $5, though... if I can carry them. Interestingly enough, none of them came with high-end CPUs. But that's OK, because somehow I've ended up with a lot of higher-end CPUs and older socket A boards that are not compatible... so now I can finally swap parts over to give the high-end boards good CPUs and the older boards the older, low-end CPUs.

I wish I had saved more, but as they say, hindsight is 20/20. 😜

momaka wrote on 2025-03-01, 21:20:

Wow, even those have gone up in price. 🤣
I've turned down no less than 10 socket A systems at my local flea market in the last year, as the sellers for most of these wanted about $10 per entire PC, and I thought that was too much at the time. I do try to grab them at $5, though... if I can carry them. Interestingly enough, none of them came with high-end CPUs. But that's OK, because somehow I've ended up with a lot of higher-end CPUs and older socket A boards that are not compatible... so now I can finally swap parts over to give the high-end boards good CPUs and the older boards the older, low-end CPUs.

Sadly, the little town I live in has no shops, markets, or anything to find stuff like this. It's just not a thing where I live. During the summer, they have town-wide yard sales, and I hit those and all the neighboring towns, but have little luck.

Where I grew up is vastly different. Lots of shops and flea markets to this day, but that's 500 miles to the south of me now. So, I'm limited to luck and online these days. I have local ads out looking for stuff, but I don't get all that many responses. Just not a popular hobby around here. Heck, most people in my area don't even own a PC, and if they do, it's a Wal-Mart special.

Oh well, I manage to get what I need eventually, if not always exactly what I wanted. 😀

StriderTR wrote on 2025-03-02, 06:47:

Sadly, the little town I live in has no shops, markets, or anything to find stuff like this. It's just not a thing where I live. During the summer, they have town-wide yard sales, and I hit those and all the neighboring towns, but have little luck.

Yeah, I totally understand.
It's not that much more different here (on the other side of the pond) if you live in a small town and aren't close to any large cities. In fact, it's exactly like you said - most people don't even have a PC anymore. It's all "smart" "phones" now. Only the very few large (largest) cities have decent flea markets. Elsewhere, people rarely bother to even sell stuff online, let alone organize a sale.

Bit of a change, again...

My Athlon XP 3000+ KV4E model order was cancelled buy the seller. No reason, just cancelled and refunded. Probably realized they were underselling it for $15.

So, I said to heck with it and picked a KV4D model over on eBay for $36 shipped, also 30 day returns. The KV4D is the model I wanted anyway, an extra 67MHz isn't much, but since both models sell for about the same, why not get it. It will likely not arrive before my next day off, Thursday, but I still have the 2500+ here and can at least use that to setup the system. Hopefully.

This build just keeps running into silly little roadblocks....but I'll get it done eventually! 😜

On a side note, I'm 99% sure I won't have any issues running 1GB of RAM in this system with Win98SE. Am I correct in my assumption? I have 512MB and 256MB sticks, so not a big deal, but I have a single 1GB stick sitting here.

StriderTR wrote on 2025-03-04, 06:49:

On a side note, I'm 99% sure I won't have any issues running 1GB of RAM in this system with Win98SE. Am I correct in my assumption? I have 512MB and 256MB sticks, so not a big deal, but I have a single 1GB stick sitting here.

You likely will I'm afraid, Win9x doesn't like >512MB RAM. There's a fix for it though: https://archive.org/details/PATCHMEM

Since you have smaller sticks you can use one to install Windows, run the patch and then replace it with the 1GB stick. You can also install Windows with the 1GB stick if you want, just read the manual and follow the instructions.

Sombrero wrote on 2025-03-04, 07:52:

You likely will I'm afraid, Win9x doesn't like >512MB RAM. There's a fix for it though: https://archive.org/details/PATCHMEM

Since you have smaller sticks you can use one to install Windows, run the patch and then replace it with the 1GB stick. You can also install Windows with the 1GB stick if you want, just read the manual and follow the instructions.

Yeah, I already have that downloaded and ready. However, as I sit here digging into what I want to do on this system, I'm struggling to find a need to go beyond 512MB. We will see when I get it set up. I just thought it would be "cool" to drop a gig in it. I just could not recall where the issues started, I've read some people supposedly ran up to 1.5GB unpatched, but I've never went over 512MB and wasn't sure on the validity of what I read.

StriderTR wrote on 2025-03-04, 09:30:

Yeah, I already have that downloaded and ready. However, as I sit here digging into what I want to do on this system, I'm struggling to find a need to go beyond 512MB. We will see when I get it set up. I just thought it would be "cool" to drop a gig in it. I just could not recall where the issues started, I've read some people supposedly ran up to 1.5GB unpatched, but I've never went over 512MB and wasn't sure on the validity of what I read.

Even 128MB is plenty for Win9x unless you have some specific need for more. Only reason I have 2GB on my system is because I have it dual booting to WinXP.

It's entirely possible more than 512MB RAM works on some unpatched systems, there's always those weird outliers. Same with large hard drive partition sizes, for some they work fine while for some they soon start to crap themselves.

Sombrero wrote on 2025-03-04, 09:50:

StriderTR wrote on 2025-03-04, 09:30:

Yeah, I already have that downloaded and ready. However, as I sit here digging into what I want to do on this system, I'm struggling to find a need to go beyond 512MB. We will see when I get it set up. I just thought it would be "cool" to drop a gig in it. I just could not recall where the issues started, I've read some people supposedly ran up to 1.5GB unpatched, but I've never went over 512MB and wasn't sure on the validity of what I read.

Even 128MB is plenty for Win9x unless you have some specific need for more. Only reason I have 2GB on my system is because I have it dual booting to WinXP.

It's entirely possible more than 512MB RAM works on some unpatched systems, there's always those weird outliers. Same with large hard drive partition sizes, for some they work fine while for some they soon start to crap themselves.

I coudnt agree as more ram is always better. Back in a day you coudnt afford big ram numbers as it was no cheap , but now it's not big deal. Also I sat in windows Me till late 2002 early 2003 and I upgraded ram from 128 mb to 256 mb and then 384 mb to play medal of honor , Nolf 2 and other games. See no point to limit ram size to 128 unless you want to.

Well, my "new" heatsink arrived. Yeah, I think it's going to be much better suited to these processors. It's amazing what having the correct parts can do for you. 😜

The small guy will go into my bin and wait for something more suitable, should that day ever come.

Now, I'm just waiting on my 3000+ to arrive.

My Athlon XP 3000+ arrived today. Working like a champ so far.

Got Win98SE partially setup, video and sound drivers installed and working. Now I just need to figure out why the chipset drivers wont install, see if I can get USB 2.0 working (nusb36.exe installed still having issues), and see if the "Motherboard Resources" conflict...that doesn't show a conflict, is related to the chipset drivers not installing.

Also, does 98SE always identify as ME? I never remember seeing this.

Oh, and figure out why 3DMark99 wont install. 😜

StriderTR wrote on 2025-03-10, 19:06:

Also, does 98SE always identify as ME? I never remember seeing this.

It's because of NUSB 3.6.

Don't use that version, stick with 3.3 instead.

StriderTR wrote on 2025-03-10, 19:06:

My Athlon XP 3000+ arrived today. Working like a champ so far. […]
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My Athlon XP 3000+ arrived today. Working like a champ so far.

Got Win98SE partially setup, video and sound drivers installed and working. Now I just need to figure out why the chipset drivers wont install, see if I can get USB 2.0 working (nusb36.exe installed still having issues), and see if the "Motherboard Resources" conflict...that doesn't show a conflict, is related to the chipset drivers not installing.

Also, does 98SE always identify as ME? I never remember seeing this.

Oh, and figure out why 3DMark99 wont install. 😜

To get usb work as 2.0 might need to change values in bios. I had issue with usb 2.0 on asus i865g motherboard there was high speed and full speed option in bios . I chose full speed and it was 12 mbps or usb 1.1 .

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2025-03-10, 19:30:

It's because of NUSB 3.6.

Don't use that version, stick with 3.3 instead.

I ended up reinstalling W98 several times chasing down issues. Switched to 3.3. Thanks for that!

ciornyi wrote on 2025-03-10, 20:52:

To get usb work as 2.0 might need to change values in bios. I had issue with usb 2.0 on asus i865g motherboard there was high speed and full speed option in bios . I chose full speed and it was 12 mbps or usb 1.1 .

My BIOS only has USB Legacy Support, enable/disable/auto. Haven't tested that out to see if it makes a difference.

So, as mentioned above, did several re-installs. Kept running into stability issues. In the end, think it was the PSU I was using. 12V rail was at 11.2'ish, needs a recap, it's an old FSP supply I had on hand. Dug out a modern Corsair 450, that seemed to stop most of my stability issues. Had some of the same issues as this guy...

Motherboard Resources conflict in Device Manager (Windows 98 SE)

MB resources is still like that, but everything else is working. So, I don't think I'm going to worry about it.

Also, unofficial service packs, nope... kills the system every time. So, not going to use those. One of my re-installs was just to fix the issues it caused. Don't need it.

So far, running at 1024x768, the few games I've tested, work great. MechWarrior 3, Blood II, and Elite Force. Should have no issues running DX8 and under games very well, and that's what I want.

Still can't get 3DMark99 Max to load, illegal operation every time. No biggie, I just wanted to try it out on this old MX440.

It's slowly coming together. Been playing with it off and on all day. 😀

Just got around to testing FF7.... seems it's stuck on software rendering for some reason....

Pretty sure D3D Rendering should be working on this MX440. Using 45.23 drivers, perhaps not the correct one?

StriderTR wrote on 2025-03-11, 09:12:

Just got around to testing FF7.... seems it's stuck on software rendering for some reason....

Pretty sure D3D Rendering should be working on this MX440. Using 45.23 drivers, perhaps not the correct one?

You need to install the official patch 1.02.

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2025-03-11, 10:00:

StriderTR wrote on 2025-03-11, 09:12:

Just got around to testing FF7.... seems it's stuck on software rendering for some reason....

Pretty sure D3D Rendering should be working on this MX440. Using 45.23 drivers, perhaps not the correct one?

You need to install the official patch 1.02.

Well....I completely forgot about that.... I was working on that system until 4AM'ish and once I got to FF7, I felt like I was forgetting something. I haven't played FF7 outside of 7th Heaven for a very long time.

Thanks for pointing out my bad memory and why I shouldn't be working on anything at 4AM. 😜

While working on this system, I went down an "AI" rabbit hole and spent hours creating a couple dozen "retro wallpapers", most directly themed for Windows 98 with various patterns, colors, and graffiti style lettering. All of them are 1024x1024 and most are easily scaled to other "square" resolutions I use on my old systems. I will be using these, and more, on this build.

While I can't share all of them here obviously, here are a few examples anyone can use. I will upload all of them somewhere once I'm done making more to cover other themes and builds.

What do you think so far?

StriderTR wrote on 2025-03-14, 07:45:

What do you think so far?

If I have to be completely honest, these wallpapers scream "modern" despite trying to be about a retro/vintage system.
In particular, this art style is currently still really popular on modern art stuff (I used to browse DA a lot up until the last 2-3 years or so). It's also an art style that's used quite frequently for loading screens in Fortnite.
FWIW, there is too much "RGB"-ness in most of these, as well as too much going on (background is too busy) with too many details in everything. In contrast, old stuff was less busy, and everything was a lot more pixel-y. I suppose the AI stuff is trying, though, as it seems to be using bright color palettes, which would be somewhat inline with 80's and 90's art styles. But where it misses is the particular colors in those color pallets - 90's stuff was colorful, but sort of "murky / weird" colorful... whereas, again, the AI seems to be using pretty modern "RBG"-like color palettes.

However, I'm not trying to say these don't look good / aren't interesting, though. 😉