6. CPU

PIII 1000/133 is several times cheaper than the FSB 100 variant, more common, and it’s easier to find a unit manufactured in the year 2000, because FSB100 version was announced later. 1000/100 is worth roughly ±5% about the same as an Athlon 1000 Orion.

For Intel CPUs, the production date is encoded in digits 2, 3, and 4 of the code: the second digit indicates the production year, while the third and fourth indicate the production week. My unit comes from week 32 of 2000, which points to July. That said, I’m still not completely satisfied.

There has been a lot of discussion on forum about “paper launch” of Intel’s gigahertz-class processors, which of course doesn’t mean they couldn’t be purchased anywhere. Just like me, a user @arncht was looking for proof that the Pentium III 1 GHz, specifically the Socket 370 version, was actually available for sale in 2000.

1ghz pentium iii fcpga release date

Thanks to his research, I found a mention of a slot-based CPU being available for purchase in July on the Akiba website. The problem is that the processor shown there is SL48S, while mine is SL4BS. At one point I thought SL48S referred to boxed versions of the processor, but according to Akiba they were also sold as oem CPUs, without cooling or retail packaging.

Based on observing listings on eBay, I’ve concluded that all of SL4BS that i`ve seen were units shipped in prebuilt systems and servers — IBM, Dell, etc. To be satisfied, i need to find confirmation that the SL4BS was also sold separately. Alternatively, I might score an SL48S marked “1000G” in the future (like the one shown in the Akiba news post I’m attaching), and then sell the processor I currently have. I've already seen one offer, but I didn't have enough cashat the time : )

This is difficult, but maybe someone here knows where I could look for information confirming that the SL4BS was available at retail. I’m also curious how common it was to run 133 MHz CPUs on the BX chipset. I would probably have to dig through old forum archives. One thing is certain — 133 MHz CPUs on BX boards were commonly used in benchmarks shown in hardware reviews.

Nice build.
Go with Intel

These Netgear network products were very inexpensive and popular back in 1990's marketed for home PC computers
NOT for Workstations or Servers and Netgear had problems
sometimes driver issues or hardware issues with full duplex.
I remember the driver use to make my computers crash.
we tried using these products with servers and they would not negotiate a link speed

Try Intel NIC, or HP

@Intel486dx33 True, i have "modern" netgear usb wifi adapter, and this is a disaster. Never got drivers for Win10 (Win10 came at the same time as this adapter). It keeps losing connection

There is no Intel/HP Blue adapters. When non netgear, there is only realtec ic`s available.

7. Cooler

I once experimented with a cooling setup like the one shown below. It was a modified heatsink from a Celeron. Dual fan is must-have : ). I wanted it to be low-profile, so the motherboard wouldn’t be obstructed and more of its color would remain visible : ). The only question was whether it could handle cooling a 1 GHz CPU. At least 933 MHz was fairly hot, but stable.

I changed my mind when I got the opportunity to import a NOS Alpha P3125 from Austria, very cheap. It does cover the motherboard, but what convinces me is the fact that it’s unquestionably the best cooling solution ever made for Slot Pentium CPUs. Overkill solution, this cooler is rather designed for 60W Athlons

The unit I got is the plain P3125 version, which means it was distributed without fans. The P3125M60 variant, on the other hand, came bundled with Sanyo San Ace fans. According to an AnandTech article, in order to reduce costs, the fanless version of the cooler was often paired with Y.S. Tech fans, making it cheaper than Sanyo combo.

My cooler came without fans, so to preserve authenticity, I wanted to source Y.S. Tech fans with the exact same model designation as the ones used in the AnandTech review. I ordered them from China as “new,” but they turned out to be fake one. The RPM ratings didn’t match, and the stickers were poorly printed. Then i asked a friend if he’d be willing to sell me some of the fans he had on his Alpha coolers. I knew he had quite a few, since he collects them. It turned out he had Sanyo fans.

I planned to make my own custom cable with a single 3-pin connector for both fans, so the fact that the wires had already been modified actually made me happy—it meant I didn’t feel bad about cutting them up.

I heated the stickers with a hair dryer and carefully peeled them off so they wouldn’t warp — they’ll be visible. According to Anand’s review, Alpha Novatech claims the cooler performs better when the fans are set to pull air away from the heatsink. That`s good for me — it looks better that way : )

Another issue was hiding the cable so it would be as invisible as possible. I thought I could squeeze it between the heatsink and the fan, but it ended up catching on the fan blades. I solved it by making a small notch in the cooler housing. I didn’t want to modify the Alpha, but it’s subtle enough and done cleanly enough that no one would probably even notice it’s been modified.

Finally, I soldered in a 3W resistor to reduce the fan speed. By mistake, I bought a 27-ohm resistor instead of a 56-ohm one. For now, I don’t feel like changing it — the hard drive is louder anyway.

I don’t care about the fan grills — they’ve looked exactly the same for the past 30 years anyway : ).

Proof

Anandtech review for P7125 and P7125M60 (athlon ones) with P3125 note (February 2000), and manual scan that was included with my cooler

That's quite a chunky cooler, I might try to track one down myself.

The build looks like it's coming along nicely. The effort you're putting in to ensure period correctness certainly is inspiring.

Rehehealy cool (no pun inteded) cooler there! But - since you did have the labels off the fans, I would've probably rotated them, so they had the same reading orientation when mounted on the cooler 😉