lemonlime wrote on 2020-08-27, 21:33:

Hi All,

Bought this somewhat unique board on eBay on a whim, but having trouble identifying it and finding a manual. Any ideas?

It's socket 4 with Opti Premium 82C596/82C597 chipset. (including 82c822 VLB/PCI bridge)

Hello.
Does this motherboard work without any cache chips? I recently found one, still to be tested, but it doesn't have any cache chips, not even the two isolated ones outside the two rows of sockets, which seems to be the bare minimum.
this is mine: https://theretroweb.com/motherboard/image/boa … dc727653978.jpg
I have UM61256 chips (the big ones) but not that P4C187 (the small one, which i think work as a tagcache).

kinetix wrote on 2025-05-02, 22:48:

Hello. Does this motherboard work without any cache chips? I recently found one, still to be tested, but it doesn't have any cac […]
Show full quote

Hello.
Does this motherboard work without any cache chips? I recently found one, still to be tested, but it doesn't have any cache chips, not even the two isolated ones outside the two rows of sockets, which seems to be the bare minimum.
this is mine: https://theretroweb.com/motherboard/image/boa … dc727653978.jpg
I have UM61256 chips (the big ones) but not that P4C187 (the small one, which i think work as a tagcache).

Hi kinetix,

I know my reply is quite late. Did you have a chance to test it out? I don't have this board any more to be able to test, unfortunately. In my experience, most 486 or Pentium based systems should function without cache chips installed. It may be necessary to set jumpers accordingly on some of them. Also, I wouldn't think the TAG chips would be needed if there was no L2 in the system.

lemonlime wrote on 2025-06-04, 01:03:

kinetix wrote on 2025-05-02, 22:48:

Hello. Does this motherboard work without any cache chips? I recently found one, still to be tested, but it doesn't have any cac […]
Show full quote

Hello.
Does this motherboard work without any cache chips? I recently found one, still to be tested, but it doesn't have any cache chips, not even the two isolated ones outside the two rows of sockets, which seems to be the bare minimum.
this is mine: https://theretroweb.com/motherboard/image/boa … dc727653978.jpg
I have UM61256 chips (the big ones) but not that P4C187 (the small one, which i think work as a tagcache).

Hi kinetix,

I know my reply is quite late. Did you have a chance to test it out? I don't have this board any more to be able to test, unfortunately. In my experience, most 486 or Pentium based systems should function without cache chips installed. It may be necessary to set jumpers accordingly on some of them. Also, I wouldn't think the TAG chips would be needed if there was no L2 in the system.

Greetings. Thanks for the answer. No, I haven't tried it yet. I've been restoring a 386 that was damaged by the battery (someone had also worked on it before, and they put the main crystal in backwards, and the bus crystal was missing), in addition to my daily work and other projects I'm working on simultaneously. I'll do it as soon as I can; it's in the work queue.
The manual have no config for no cache. hope it works and then in the BIOS can be disabled, to avoid problems.
PS: a follower of yours on YT, thanks for your videos

kinetix wrote on 2025-06-04, 02:33:

The manual have no config for no cache. hope it works and then in the BIOS can be disabled, to avoid problems.

The BIOS does not enable the cache until the later steps of the POST process, so up to that point it should work without any chips installed. Of course, make sure to set the cache to "Disabled" in the setup utility so it doesn't try to actually enable it before booting. That's why there's usually no need for a "No cache" jumper setting on these boards.