VOGONS


Alton M571

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First post, by Stojke

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Is this board any good?
Ive been reading its specification here: http://m571.com/m571/
And ive noticed it has Internal VGA, but doesnt mention what kind of VGA it is, also that it has sound chip, PS/2, USB, and other.
Bus speeds of up to 83MHz and Multiplier of 5.5x , as well as over clocking PCI bus and such.

Has any one used this board before and how does it perform?

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Reply 1 of 19, by Malik

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Looks like a nice board with good layout. But the name "PC Chips" does not bode well... but I don't have experience in using this particular board.

5476332566_7480a12517_t.jpgSB Dos Drivers

Reply 2 of 19, by ratfink

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redhill.net.au loved it iirc

Reply 3 of 19, by Stojke

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Well, it says it was only marketed as PC Chips.
I am interested about the internal VGA. I also saw that the sound chip can be completely disabled, so thats good.

[edit]

Found out all there is 😀

Amoretro.de says this board was pretty popular and has great performance for price (at the time) and version 7.0A is extremely stable (i have 7.0).
This board supports 256MB of SDRAM [133MHz, Single Density, CAS 2.5] , 83MHz BUS (overclocks the Chipset, can also influence PCI clock), onboard CMI 8330 sound:

Sound Blaster 16 /PRO compatible with stereo voice up to 48Khz
sampling rates.
? Digital audio SPDIF (Sony/Philips Digital Interface)
Input/Output.
? HRTF 3D Positional Audio supports Microsoft Direct Sound 3D
DirectX 5.0. (HRTF library licensed from CRL UK).
? Software Wavetable MIDI synthesizer. (DLS 3Q/98).
? Built-in 3D surround sound.
? 16-bits Microsoft Windows Sound System hardware compatible.
? Interface for Ad-Lib, Sound Blaster OPL2/OPL3/OPL4.
? ISA Bus Plug and Play
? Full Duplex 16-bits CODEC.
? Sound Blaster 16/PRO Mixer and Windows Sound System Mixer
compatible.
? MIDI port - compatible with MPU-401 UART mode and Sound
Blaster MIDI mode.
? Dual channel GAME port. (Support Microsoft Game-Pad up to 8
ports)

Onboard VGA with up to 4MB of shared SD memory, USB and PS/2. ALso UMD33 mode for ATA Drives up to 32GB with out custom BIOS (128GB with).

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Reply 4 of 19, by Skyscraper

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The chipset is SiS 5598 (Renamed by PC Chips to TX Pro II)
I do not have experience with this motherboard but most PC Chips socket 7 boards are known to be hassle free but perhaps not top performers.
PC Chips slot 1 boards on the other hand...

New PC: i9 12900K @5GHz all cores @1.2v. MSI PRO Z690-A. 32GB DDR4 3600 CL14. 3070Ti.
Old PC: Dual Xeon X5690@4.6GHz, EVGA SR-2, 48GB DDR3R@2000MHz, Intel X25-M. GTX 980ti.
Older PC: K6-3+ 400@600MHz, PC-Chips M577, 256MB SDRAM, AWE64, Voodoo Banshee.

Reply 5 of 19, by Stojke

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Is the SiS 5598 Integratred VGA any good in MS-DOS?
Should i use Virge GX 2MB with Diamond Monster 3D or On Board video?

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Reply 6 of 19, by Skyscraper

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Stojke wrote:

Is the SiS 5598 Integratred VGA any good in MS-DOS?
Should i use Virge GX 2MB with Diamond Monster 3D or On Board video?

I would imagine it sucks but you could always try it out.
The Virge is a perfect DOS video card.

New PC: i9 12900K @5GHz all cores @1.2v. MSI PRO Z690-A. 32GB DDR4 3600 CL14. 3070Ti.
Old PC: Dual Xeon X5690@4.6GHz, EVGA SR-2, 48GB DDR3R@2000MHz, Intel X25-M. GTX 980ti.
Older PC: K6-3+ 400@600MHz, PC-Chips M577, 256MB SDRAM, AWE64, Voodoo Banshee.

Reply 7 of 19, by Stojke

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Good idea, i should benchmark it 😁
Cool, good to know about Virge. Its the CompaQ model.

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Reply 8 of 19, by idspispopd

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The main problem about the integrated VGA is mentioned on the site you linked to:
http://m571.com/m571/m571upgrade.htm
"My own tests show that memory performance suffers approximately 30% by using the onboard video function as opposed to using any PCI video card."
This is quite obvious since memory bandwidth is not too great on Socket 7 to begin with. The compatibility itself is probably OK judging from the SiS entries on Gona's page.

A Virge + a Voodoo1 sounds like a good match. Depending on the CPU something faster would also make sense.

Reply 9 of 19, by Tetrium

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idspispopd wrote:
The main problem about the integrated VGA is mentioned on the site you linked to: http://m571.com/m571/m571upgrade.htm "My own t […]
Show full quote

The main problem about the integrated VGA is mentioned on the site you linked to:
http://m571.com/m571/m571upgrade.htm
"My own tests show that memory performance suffers approximately 30% by using the onboard video function as opposed to using any PCI video card."
This is quite obvious since memory bandwidth is not too great on Socket 7 to begin with. The compatibility itself is probably OK judging from the SiS entries on Gona's page.

A Virge + a Voodoo1 sounds like a good match. Depending on the CPU something faster would also make sense.

Any idea how much memory this chipset can cache?

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Reply 10 of 19, by idspispopd

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Tetrium wrote:

Any idea how much memory this chipset can cache?

128MB according to my usual source.

Reply 11 of 19, by Stojke

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I see. OK, i guess Virge and voodoo will have to do 😀
I am currently using Cyrix 233MHz, but i will be switching to AMD K6-2.

What does it mean to cache 128MB?

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Reply 12 of 19, by Tetrium

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Stojke wrote:

I see. OK, i guess Virge and voodoo will have to do 😀
I am currently using Cyrix 233MHz, but i will be switching to AMD K6-2.

What does it mean to cache 128MB?

I'm not that technical, but it goes something like this:
Before Slot 1 and Slot A conquered the world, the motherboard would determine how much memory the board would accept (just like it is these days I guess) but also how much of that memory would be cached (uncached memory makes your system a lot slower).
So take the Intel 430TX chipset. I "think" it could in theory accept 256MB or maybe even 512MB, but anything over 64MB would not be cached, making your system a lot slower. Hence the maximum amount of memory that fits on your motherboard is kinda redundant, it's the amount the motherboard can cache that is relevant.

This is one (or maybe the best) reason to go with a K6-III for Socket 7 as it is the only CPU which removes the limit imposed by the motherboard.

Again, I'm not really that technical so I don't exactly know why it is going on, I just look at the numbers which is basically all I need to know 😜

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Interesting Vogons threads (links to Vogonswiki)
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Reply 13 of 19, by turtlesedge

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I have had problems with the onboard VGA not working with this board, it stopped working for me after turning the computer off while inside the BIOS.

I would recommend using a PCI card. The onboard VGA can be disabled with JP3.

Reply 14 of 19, by calvin

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My Compaq has a SiS5598 on board. It's... acceptable. You probably want to upgrade though.

2xP2 450, 512 MB SDR, GeForce DDR, Asus P2B-D, Windows 2000
P3 866, 512 MB RDRAM, Radeon X1650, Dell Dimension XPS B866, Windows 7
M2 @ 250 MHz, 64 MB SDE, SiS5598, Compaq Presario 2286, Windows 98

Reply 15 of 19, by Arctic

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I have this board in one of my systems! 😀

It can cache 128MB. I haven't compared the speed to my VX system though.
The onboard VGA doesnt work anymore. I have the same problem as turtlesedge! 😢
I hope this data helps you:

Intel Pentium MMX 200 MHz
128MB EDO RAM (4x32MB)
Titan TTC-003 exhaust fan
PC Chips M571 - SiS 5598 (TX Pro II) Motherboard (AT / ATX) Complete Fan Support Page
SiS 5598 Onboard
Matrox Mystique 220 4MB + Rainbow Runner module
Voodoo 2 12MB PCI (3dfx 2.0)
Sound Pro HT1869V+ ISA (onboard) (C-Media CMI 8330)
VIA VT6105 L (Rhine III) 10/100 PCI
AVM Fritzcard ISA
HDD1: 20GB Quantum Fireball IDE
HDD2: 2GB IDE
CD-Drive
Iomega Zip 100 IDE
AT PSU
Windows 98SE
Case: Targa Series II

Benchmark results:

3DMark 99 (Diamond Monster 3D II (Voodoo 2 PCI 12MB) (800x600)

IDT Winchip C6 240MHz
729 3DMarks
745 CPU Marks

Intel Pentium MMX 200MHz
1146 3DMarks
1395 CPU Marks

Reply 16 of 19, by PeterLI

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My first Pentium, a 90, had onboard SiS VGA: very slow, shared video RAM with system RAM.

Reply 17 of 19, by Mut

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I hate pcchips, but this one is a great board, stable and flexible, used whith a K6-2 500 as my main rig years ago.

My board died (bad caps), like the majority of pcchips boards.

Reply 18 of 19, by NJRoadfan

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I have this board's Super Socket 7 cousin, the M590. The on-board peripherals have excellent driver support, which surprised me (how boards from that era have full Win 3.1x and OS/2 support?). The on-board video (SiS 6236) claims to have VBE 3.0 support as well.

Reply 19 of 19, by perhenden

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The on-board video of M571 worked on my board. It is, as mentioned, slow in games.
The Windows 9x-drivers are decent. The bios makes you configure the refresh rate of the screen.
I added it to Vogonsdrivers, at
http://www.vogonsdrivers.com/getfile.php?fileid=1875