Here some pictures, while the front is in mint conditions I spotted something on the back but I cannot tell if those signs on electrical traces are normal or not.
Is there someone with the same board that can confirm?

Here the back

I removed the Enermax and installed a very old, scary Ipertek. It has one bulging cap I think (top left).
And it works… This thing always work from decades…
Now who knows whether the Enermax is faulty, or if it’s correctly tripping its protection because the motherboard is drawing current in an abnormal way…

Do you have a PSU tester?

RetroPCCupboard wrote on 2026-01-03, 11:16:

Do you have a PSU tester?

I am afraid not.

I opened the Enermax and spotted at least two bad caps (the taller ones).
Makes sense to recap all?

Remember that one of the changes in rev 5.2 is the ability to power the AGP Slot directly from the PSU without going trough the VRMs. Useful for powerful GPUs, it’s JP11 or 13 if I remember correctly.

Minutemanqvs wrote on 2026-01-03, 22:06:

Remember that one of the changes in rev 5.2 is the ability to power the AGP Slot directly from the PSU without going trough the VRMs. Useful for powerful GPUs, it’s JP11 or 13 if I remember correctly.

Jp11 is for vcc3, cpu
Jp13 is for vcc (3.3v or 3.58v)

I do not see how both could have anything to do with agp.

Update.

Probably the motherboard as well needs attention.
I am not able to install any OS on it, XP installation hangs at copying file “Kernell DLL debugger” everytime.
Here calls for a memory issue but I am using multiple sticks:
https://www.tek-tips.com/threads/xp-setup-sto … ebugger.750908/

Win98SE won’t even start to install.
Updated the bios to latest one from Soggi, same.

I disabled external cache and installation is starting.

I do not see any damage around the cache chip.

Any suggestion?

I would try Memtest.

Repo Man11 wrote on 2026-01-04, 16:47:

I would try Memtest.

For cache?

Mamba wrote on 2026-01-04, 17:03:

Repo Man11 wrote on 2026-01-04, 16:47:

I would try Memtest.

For cache?

It should show a cache error as well; I would begin by testing it with the cache enabled, and move on from there. But, as a friend used to say "Advice is free, and worth twice the price."

Repo Man11 wrote on 2026-01-04, 17:52:

Mamba wrote on 2026-01-04, 17:03:

Repo Man11 wrote on 2026-01-04, 16:47:

I would try Memtest.

For cache?

It should show a cache error as well; I would begin by testing it with the cache enabled, and move on from there. But, as a friend used to say "Advice is free, and worth twice the price."

Thank you so much.

Alright,
It seems that the cache error was due to an incorrect parameter in bios.
Tag ram was on 10 but apparently should have been 8.
Now it is ok.
Still I need a reliable PSU to be sure I can rule out any instability on AGP.