First post, by Tetrium
- Rank
- l33t++
Well, my turn to post some pics of my retro hardware!
I build this 486 about 4 years ago, it was my 2nd build ever! (1st was a celeron 400 that's kept running until recently).
It was also my 1st computer to use Windows 95.
- AP43 Socket 3 with 256kb cache
- 4x16MB FPM
- DX4-100 (AMD? Intel?) with custom heatsink attached with a metal clip.
- Rendition 2100 4MB (bad choice from hindsight, didn't know better at the time)
- 1GB harddrive.
- A soundblaster soundcard. Can't remember the model though but it's an ISA one.
- 24X standard CDROM and a standard 1.44M floppydrive
Even though I now realize that this computer is very poorly configured (for instance I only later found out that the Rendition is a good card for any Pentium 1, it's really not a good choice for DOS games) I'm still very pleased with how it turned out in the end 😀
I did a LOT of work to clean it all up as best I could, it looks almost brand new! Even the fan in the back of the power supply looks like it's fresh from the factory!
Also I think not all of the main memory is cached but I don't know for sure. I could still set it to write through instead of write back.
Also this computer isn't really stable.
I really did a lot of research to get the most optimal harddrive in there. In the end I read the Redhill guide and put my fastest 1gig harddrive in there. Windows 95 boots up really fast!
Afterwards I did some attempts to make the whole system a bit more silent with the custom CPU cooler and by adding cardboard on both sides of the case. It actually does a good job at dampening the sound and it's dirt cheap too 😁 !
Apart from it's buggyness it's really fast in windows but not great in games. Doom1 was laggy!
I'll have to admit that I haven't used it after I moved last year, was too busy with my other 'retro' rigs hehe
I have quite a few working systems but this is the oldest one I have currently
I'm not planing on tweaking it much, I'd rather just build another one!
The case. Not realy inspiring but I wanted one where I could fit a fan in the front. The heatsink gets pretty warm after a while, might be why it crashes sometimes?
U-cap removed, showing my 1337 hightech silencing systems for cheapscates
Overview pic of the inside
Showing the custom metal clip with largish passive heatsink
...and then my flashcard in my camera was full!
Anyway, hope you enjoy 😀