Ozzuneoj wrote on Yesterday, 19:04:

I cannot believe I finally found one of these. I purchased a bunch of processors as-is, untested. I was 98% sure that one of them was a Pentium III 1.1Ghz SL5QW , which is the fastest 100Mhz FSB Coppermine CPU you can get.

Congrats! It's Copperyours now. I'm on the other end looking out for the fastest Katmai atm. On eBay US I can see someone has more than 10 SL3JM up for sale for $20 each, but over here not a single one has been listed for over a month now.

double post

giantenemycat wrote on Yesterday, 12:04:

So I've only gone and bought another mystery box with no specs listed. I really wasn't going to, but then the seller immediately sent out an offer for 5% off. I countered with 20%...and they accepted.

Last time people here seemed to enjoy guessing what hardware will be inside. Bets on this one?

It has USB ports! That's means min Win95 OSR2, but more likely Win98 SE. It also obviously means PCI slots, but more likely 3.3v PCI slots.

3.3v PCI + Win98SE = Pentium of some kind.

AT form factor: Technically could be a Celeron, but very unlikely with the Turbo and VGA card in a PCI slot. Technically, could be Pentium Pro or MMX but unlikely with a Turbo button.

Passthrough on the PSU, serial mouse! Definitely pre-Celeron, maybe pre-MMX, and likely pre-multimedia.

Looks like it had ISA cards that were then removed, probably token-ring. It may have had a few different NICs in its time, and maybe no sound card at all.

Is that a SCSI card? If it is, I'd lean away from MMX. Could be a maxed out Pentium 100/120/133.

8x CDROM is ~1996 but its colour is lighter than the surrounding case suggesting that is not the original. I'm going to say pre-1996.

In summary: Turbo button, 3.3v PCI, AT form factor, ~1995. What the hell is that? Something is a mismatch and I'm going to guess that USB card is 5v PCI.

Final guess: i430FX, Pentium 120, ATI Mach64, 64Mb EDO. Upgrades may have included SCSI, faster IDE CDROM, USB mouse, extra RAM.

Ozzuneoj wrote on Yesterday, 19:04:

Yes!!! […]
Show full quote

Yes!!!

I cannot believe I finally found one of these. I purchased a bunch of processors as-is, untested. I was 98% sure that one of them was a Pentium III 1.1Ghz SL5QW , which is the fastest 100Mhz FSB Coppermine CPU you can get.

They arrived today and not only was it in fact an SL5QW, it was intact! Amazingly, the pins didn't even need straightened and it dropped right into the socket.

I have put it into a slotket in my W6BXA 440BX test system and the BIOS startup message reports it as ;01Mhz, but it seems to be working perfectly!

The attachment 20260323_144929.jpg is no longer available

Given the rarity and value of this chip it seems a bit sketchy to use it for this purpose, but I have really wanted one of these for my Windows 98SE test system to allow GPUs to stretch their legs a bit more in testing. Prior to this, the fastest 100Mhz FSB PIII I have found to use in this system was an 850Mhz, so this should offer a pretty sizeable performance increase. I also have a Powerleap Tualatin adapter which I haven't tested yet, but I like the idea of keeping this setup as simple as possible to eliminate variables when testing.

Also, I'm happy to report that it seems like the SL5QW runs cool enough to be happy with the small cooler I am using with the fan connected to 5v for silent operation. I was concerned that the higher wattage would require more cooling, but it seems okay for now.

EDIT: Oh, and part of why I am so happy to have found one of these intact is that I saw at least one, possibly two or three or more of them in a huge scrap lot recently. The lot was combined with tons of ram ($), old 486\Pentium processors ($$) and misc bits of gold plated stuff ($$$) which would put it way way out of my price range for what might end up being all broken CPUs. Just out of principle I messaged the seller and told him there were some desirable processors that people would use in the lot and that his buyer should consider looking through them or just relisting the Pentium III chips before processing them as scrap. I got no reply, so I assume that they all met a sad fate unless the buyer was some collector with deeper pockets.

I am happy to have been able to save one this time at least. 😀

I'm happy for you! Congrats 😀

MattRocks wrote on Today, 00:26:

AT form factor: Technically could be a Celeron, but unlikely with the VGA card in a PCI slot. Technically, could be Pentium Pro or MMX but unlikely with a Turbo button.

Is that a SCSI card? If it is, I'd lean away from MMX. Could be a maxed out Pentium 100/120/133.

I thought I had it narrowed down to a small subset of PCChips boards with SiS or VIA chipsets by searching for 1 serial port, but I was being a dingus. The two ports below the PSU are both serial, the left one is just 25-pin.

Or at least I think it is by deeply analysing those 5 pixels? This makes more sense than there being two parallel ports, or a random SCSI port hanging out the back. You can see that same arrangement of breakouts on this Socket 7 board, including the parallel/PS/2 combo.

giantenemycat wrote on Yesterday, 12:04:

Bets on this one?

~386 era computer got upgraded on the cheap with low end abomination like pcchips M5xx/M7xx. I expect something stupid inside, maybe even Cyrix or Covington Celeron

Ozzuneoj wrote on Yesterday, 19:04:

one of them was a Pentium III 1.1Ghz SL5QW , which is the fastest 100Mhz FSB Coppermine CPU you can get.

Nice. I got this Coppermine clock beat back in 2002 (but obviously not speed) when I somehow learned Celeron 766s could be overclocked to 1150MHz just like good old 300A with only fsb and slight vcore bumps. It was end of Intel 180 nm era when they optimized fabs to cranking 1.10 Celerons so well everything on the wafer was able to reach that clock. Same speed and price as bottom of the barrel Duron 1100, but Celeron + slotket adapter forcing 100MHz fsb and 1.9V was a drop in for existing 2-3 year old 440bx systems, great cheap ass upgrade option.
What a time to be alive, lowest end <$100 brand new part faster than 2 year old top of the line $1000 flagship. Same deal with GPUs at the time.

giantenemycat wrote on Today, 02:18:

I thought I had it narrowed down to a small subset of PCChips boards with SiS or VIA chipsets by searching for 1 serial port, bu […]
Show full quote

MattRocks wrote on Today, 00:26:

AT form factor: Technically could be a Celeron, but unlikely with the VGA card in a PCI slot. Technically, could be Pentium Pro or MMX but unlikely with a Turbo button.

Is that a SCSI card? If it is, I'd lean away from MMX. Could be a maxed out Pentium 100/120/133.

I thought I had it narrowed down to a small subset of PCChips boards with SiS or VIA chipsets by searching for 1 serial port, but I was being a dingus. The two ports below the PSU are both serial, the left one is just 25-pin.

The attachment ENHANCE.jpg is no longer available

Or at least I think it is by deeply analysing those 5 pixels? This makes more sense than there being two parallel ports, or a random SCSI port hanging out the back. You can see that same arrangement of breakouts on this Socket 7 board, including the parallel/PS/2 combo.

The attachment pi.jpg is no longer available

I meant the backplate with the round socket - it doesn't look PS/2. I have a theory that that port is the big clue. If it's a motherboard backplate like you suggested, maybe it's a non-standard mouse port above a parallel port - and when the original mouse broke the new mouse needed a new port hence the USB expansion card?

Or, maybe I'm seeing PS/2 holes filled with brown gunk that I thought were copper pins? 😁

I'd guess it's a bus mouse connector. Hard to tell from the photo though.

that looks to me a standard ps2 mouseport bracket with lpt, there are even 4 cables coming from it

My Asrock 939A790GMH came in today.
Posts and gets to boot error.
I'll test it tonight but knowing it does actually work is great indeed.

keropi wrote on Today, 13:32:

that looks to me a standard ps2 mouseport bracket with lpt, there are even 4 cables coming from it

The picture of the loose brackets was just an example, not the computer everyone is guessing about. We haven't seen the insides of it yet. 😀

But yes, this is very unlikely to be anything other than a PS/2 mouse port + parallel port bracket that connects to headers on the (Socket 5 or 7) motherboard.

Nothing else makes any sense in the context of the rest of the system. If it is a bus mouse port it would have to be on a card, since I don't believe there are any motherboards with headers for attaching a bus mouse port. Since there is a USB card installed below it, it would have to be a PCI card. That would make it a combination Parallel (or 1980s-era SCSI) + Bus mouse PCI card. This also does not exist.

I picked up this Socket 7 Pentium 1 last night from a guy near me for $30 bucks. These are the pictures from the listing.

When I picked it up he had the case off so I could look inside . I told him I dont want to see whats inside until i get home. From the pics above I knew it was a pentium and the sound card drew my attention because of the memory slots.

Here is what was inside.

Its a great pickup for the price. I will do this up with some voodoo and i need to add a HDD

What kind of memory goes into the sound card?

Law212 wrote on Today, 17:35:

I picked up this Socket 7 Pentium 1 last night from a guy near me for $30 bucks. These are the pictures from the listing. https […]
Show full quote

I picked up this Socket 7 Pentium 1 last night from a guy near me for $30 bucks. These are the pictures from the listing.

When I picked it up he had the case off so I could look inside . I told him I dont want to see whats inside until i get home. From the pics above I knew it was a pentium and the sound card drew my attention because of the memory slots.

Here is what was inside.

Its a great pickup for the price. I will do this up with some voodoo and i need to add a HDD

What kind of memory goes into the sound card?

Nice system! The SB32 takes standard 30-pin SIMMs

Ozzuneoj wrote on Today, 17:10:

But yes, this is very unlikely to be anything other than a PS/2 mouse port + parallel port bracket that connects to headers on the (Socket 5 or 7) motherboard.

Nothing else makes any sense in the context of the rest of the system. If it is a bus mouse port it would have to be on a card, since I don't believe there are any motherboards with headers for attaching a bus mouse port. Since there is a USB card installed below it, it would have to be a PCI card. That would make it a combination Parallel (or 1980s-era SCSI) + Bus mouse PCI card. This also does not exist.

I was starting to doubt PS/2 because I've never seen one with a port that sticks out like that, but apparently they do exist. This is from a FIC VA-503+ and it's definitely PS/2. Case closed.

It should be here by Friday anyway, and then all the mysteries will be revealed.

TechieDude wrote on Today, 18:13:

Nice system! The SB32 takes standard 30-pin SIMMs

Ok thanks for the reply. Ill see if I have some lying around.

giantenemycat wrote on Today, 18:16:

The attachment w.jpg is no longer available

It should be here by Friday anyway, and then all the mysteries will be revealed.

🤣 I love the picture. Thank you for that.

I am looking forward to seeing who has been terrorizing the local townsfolk as "The Creature from the Beige Lagoon".