A7VBX-X mobo with 6 pci slots ...no ISA ...1xAGPX8

That's an A7V8X-X mobo. KT400, iirc. Slightly misleading chipset name, as it couldn't do "400MHz" (i.e. 200MHz DDR) FSB, only "333MHz", but for mid-period AthlonXP CPUs it was a fine platform.

Model number NA-52000-TO16 ...passive cooling
Cant see under the heatsink so no idea what the chip is..

First hit on Google (and no surprise given the model number):

128MB Gainward GeForce FX5200 AGP VGA

Pretty much the least impressive GPU a system like this would have had, but it does the job of getting a picture onto the screen.

Sadly no hard drive ..so cant power it up ..

Eh? Boot the beast from a LiveCD or LiveUSB. At least that should show you the hardware works.

Cheers for the info ...
Not bad for a freebie ..and another worth a second chance at life..
rgds
VS

dionb wrote:

That's an A7V8X-X mobo. KT400, iirc. Slightly misleading chipset name, as it couldn't do "400MHz" (i.e. 200MHz DDR) FSB, only "3 […]
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A7VBX-X mobo with 6 pci slots ...no ISA ...1xAGPX8

That's an A7V8X-X mobo. KT400, iirc. Slightly misleading chipset name, as it couldn't do "400MHz" (i.e. 200MHz DDR) FSB, only "333MHz", but for mid-period AthlonXP CPUs it was a fine platform.

Model number NA-52000-TO16 ...passive cooling
Cant see under the heatsink so no idea what the chip is..

First hit on Google (and no surprise given the model number):

128MB Gainward GeForce FX5200 AGP VGA

Pretty much the least impressive GPU a system like this would have had, but it does the job of getting a picture onto the screen.

Sadly no hard drive ..so cant power it up ..

Eh? Boot the beast from a LiveCD or LiveUSB. At least that should show you the hardware works.

400mhz (200mhz DDR) was the max supported memory clock.

So ..it was going to happen I guess..
Mystery Meat ..has become a Project..
I have cleaned up the case as best I could ..though there are a couple of scuffs and rust spots.
Not sure yet if I will replace the DVD rom and 24X cd writer with a single drive..
but replaced the CMOS battery and a couple of caps ..
It now boots to the Award bios.
I have replaced the 1.44mb floppy with a combined Floppy drive and CF reader ..simply because I had one going spare.
I can now boot to a windoze start up floppy..
Next it required some planning as to what to populate the PCI slots with ..
There is no onboard graphics ..but there is on board sound.
..chances are this will be pants..
I have dug out a Gainward x8 AGP 256mb dual DVI card FX5800 ..to replace that poxy generic card..
It appears to work ..but needs a fan replacement..
I have a choice of 2 mpg accelerator cards
These are sooo similar it is untrue ..but here are differences..
One is made my Creative and uses a CT7235-VBQ ...and the other is Sigma designs REALmagic EM8300.
At this point I'm asking ..is one better than the other ??
..and which will be easier to find drivers for ?
Both appear to require external VGA passthrough ..which might be a problem since the Gainward has dual DVI and no VGA ?

Next ..the sound ..
I have an Xwave 4000 ...but dont know much about it ..
Anyone care to comment ?
and lastly ..as with most of my builds ..I throw in a scsi adapter ..
Yes I do still like scsi ..and have various external devices that use it..
🤣

For the OS ..
I would like to split partition a 200gb hitachi IDE ..and dual boot XP and Win98se ..
Though I believe Win98se doesnt like drives above 128gb ...
or is this just the max first partition size ?
Eventually Id like USP 3 on win98se ..so as to max the memory.
Having said all that ..I haven't even checked the bios can 'see' the Hitachi HD ..
Here are a couple of photos ..so far..
rgds
VS

Vipersan wrote:

Next ..the sound ..
I have an Xwave 4000 ...but dont know much about it ..
Anyone care to comment ?

Based on the Avance Logic ALS4000 chip. Cheap and noisy. Emulates Sound Blaster 16 under DOS with your motherboard and got good FM synth. One of the best PCI cards in regards of game compatibility under DOS. For Windows usage I wouldn't expect much, perhaps the integrated sound is better?

Kamerat wrote:

Vipersan wrote:

Next ..the sound ..
I have an Xwave 4000 ...but dont know much about it ..
Anyone care to comment ?

Based on the Avance Logic ALS4000 chip. Cheap and noisy. Emulates Sound Blaster 16 under DOS with your motherboard and got good FM synth. One of the best PCI cards in regards of game compatibility under DOS. For Windows usage I wouldn't expect much, perhaps the integrated sound is better?

Thanks for the info ..
You may well be right re the Xwave ..
I am having trouble getting it to install anyway ...
What is missing if I dont use a sound card is a game port ..
There IS a header on the mobo ..so it does support a gameport ..but this would be plugged to the header and the actual port slot mounted.
..and sadly I dont have one ..
grrr ..and I doubt I'll ever find one.
Oh well..

So ..everything is now installed ...everything that is except the Realmagic pci card ..
Sadly I dont have an install CD for this ..so not a clue as to how to go about it ..
Advice welcomed ..
My OS is win 98se ..if that helps ?
..and I will most likely have to fabricate a patch lead ..or hard wire it internally..
rgds
VS

For anyone interested in the sigma designs 'real magic' or creative equivilant PCI cards
There is a guy on youtube who has tracked down some drivers for XP and one for Win98se
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5IZbfBgV4mw
He has made these drivers available for posterity ..since neither Sigma nor Creative no longer host these drivers and basically are no longer available ..anywhere.
I shall be testing them soon..and they are interchangeable between the Creative CT7230 ..and the realmagic EM8300
These drivers are RARE ..so maybe Vogons should host them too ?
rgds
VS

Be nice surprise for your brother next time he drops round and see's his old PC up and running!

chinny22 wrote:

Be nice surprise for your brother next time he drops round and see's his old PC up and running!

TBH I dont think he will even remember it ..
The case has had a re-spray and laquer (rust)
and certainly there is more in it than when he had it..
Including a CD/PD drive ..
A better Graphics card ..
Soundblaster Live ..
A combo Floppy and card reader ...
A pull out caddy for the dual OS ...win98se and XPpro
A real magic mpeg card...
..and a scsi card.
+1gb ram ..with USP3 installed for win98se
The HD is a 200gb drive divided equally for the dual boot operating systems.
I guess I'm more or less done ..
just one blanked 3.5" slot left for a white Gotek ..
currently on order from China
rgds
VS
..at least now I can get back to my main WIN98se gaming build with an older mobo AMD cpu ...128gb HD ...Soundblaster Live ...and Voodoo 3

So ..I have what I can only describe as a BIOS Mystery ...then again in could be Win98se related..

Having almost completed the build which is looking very powerful insofar as it has all the hardware I planned for it.
I have a curiosity I cannot explain ?
Perhaps one of you guys can ?
As said ..this is a dual boot system ..
Win98se and XPpro
Today I added a Gotek floppy emulator
alongside the conventional mechanical floppy drive.
In the Bios I can enable 2 floppy drives A & B ..
Sadly I cannot set which will boot ..it is always default A:
which is the mechanical ..
Currently B: is the Gotek ..though physically I could swap these.
So ..the bios will NOT allow a boot from drive B: drive though theoretically B: could still be 'seen' by the OS ..
well so you'd think..
Well boot into XP ..and both drives are visible there is A & B in the list..
both drives can display their contents as both are set to 3.5" 1.44mb floppy in the bios..
power down and re-boot into win98se
Only the A: drive is listed ..B: is simply not there ..
rescan for new hardware ...
..still no B: drive ..
Restart in DOS ..and the B: drive (Gotek) is visible as is the A: drive.
WTF is going on ?????
Ok I accept I can only have one floppy bootable ..and it's always the drive after the cable twist..ie..the A: drive ..but why cant 98se see the B drive ..?
DOS can ...XPpro can ?
what is going on ..?
suggestions anyone ?

So ..if anyone ever has a similar issue ...this worked for me ..
Scanning for new hardware following the addition of a second floppy ...
Total waste of time..
Win98se aint smart enough to pick it up ..
However ..
going into Control panel ..and removing the FDD controller completely ..then rebooting so win98 is forced to find it again ..
Well ..it does ..AND the added floppy drive is also found..
Nice 😉

Oh ..and forgot to mention ..
The supplemental hard drive which contained many games in ISO format was mounted in a pull out IDE caddy ..
but I had a spare bay ..and an identical caddy which had been damaged when a hard drive died in it about 2 years back..
traces melted ..and burned off in places..
So I figured I might as well repair the traces and mount the dual boot OS in it..
That is now done ..and so ..I now have the option to find more drives around 100 > 200gb ..and build more OS's and make it a multi OS system.
Plans for more period correct operating systems for Mystery Meat are in process ..
Win 2000 and Me for certain ..and maybe a smaller drive with Win95 ...and even a 2gb drive with Win3.1
We shall see..
😀

Progressing very nicely 'Mystery Meat'.
Still waiting fo a replacement fan to fit the FX5600 ...
I have 3 on order from China.
(slow boat) 🤣
However ..in the meantime I have been building dual OS's for pull out IDE caddies.
So far I can dual boot either XPpro or Win98se
and by swapping out the HD tray ...dual boot Win2000 or WinMe.
Win95 is being a PITA ..most likely because the ram is excessive ...or the CPU is non compatible ..or too fast.
Not given up yet though.
I have now installed an extra USB pci card ..which accepts a thumb drive or a Logitech 310 usb game controller ..
analog and digital top hats ..and buttons
The real reason for fitting the startech USB card ..is that it has an extra USB pin header internally ..
The mobo only has one ..and I needed a second header for the front port card reader integrated with the Mechanical floppy drive.
Thus I now have a card reader and CF reader at the front of mystery meat.
The PD drive has an IDE interface ..and sadly I never found a driver which allows it to be recognised fully and mounted under 98 or Me..
However the CD drive IS seen.
Under XP or 2K ..both CD and PD are mounted ..thus useable.
Pics of the finished build will follow later.
rgds
VS

So ..the Win95-OS2 is sort of nearing completion ..but there are some issues I have yet to resolve ..
mainly relating to USB ..as expected ..
but one major issue I wasn't
during the isntall...and with a PS2 mouse connected ..
The process started just fine ...but part way through after the first re-boot ..
No mouse ..??
curiously ..If I crash out of the installation and boot using safe mode ..
the mouse works again ..
but reboot in full mode ..
no mouse again.?
So far I have managed to complete installation using a combination of keyboard ..and by connecting a serial mouse..
So windows hasn't crashed ..but has disabled or removed the PS2 mouse ?
This issue is proving to be a major obstacle...and something I have never seen before with other hardware..
I guess Win95 does not like the mobo ...or the cpu ..or somesuch.
All other drivers with the exception of USB have gone in no problem .
Soundblaster Live ...SCSI card...Gainward FX5600...even the Realmagic card ..
Obviously this mobo was really designed later and is more compliant with 98se..
I have applied the 'fast..CPU' patch ..in order to get this to work without the dreaded 'protection error' ..
This cannot be relevant as the PS2 mouse stops working in the early stages of building the operating system ...pre protection error patch.
????
rgds
VS

Finally got a stable Win95C OS for mystery meat ..
I even persuaded my old copy of Veritas Backup Exec to run on it ..
Very useful during the experiment and build stage..as I can backup the whole system as I go to DAT tape using the external DDS drive via scsi.
This software works best on win98 ..and can be a pita on win95
It turned out I can remove the serial mouse and connect my optical PS2 when all other hardware and devices have been installed ??
The crashes and lockouts are evident during the build phase..
resource conflicts I guess.
I can now read/write the contents of a usb thumb drive ...but absolutely no way use a USB game controller..
I guess too new even for 95C ...so no HIDs for me
The fast cpu patch makes it at least possible to run 95 on a mobo which really was designed for 98 ..and XP (just)

So that's 5 pull out working OS ..

Win95C
Win98se
WinMe
Win2000
WinXPpro

win2k and Me are dual boot on a 120gb HD
XP and 98se dual boot also on 120gb HD
Win95 on a 40gb HD

Hardware used is
pci SCSI - with external DDS tape drive
CD RW /DVD
CD/PD
Floppy drive with card readers..(card readers dont work in 95C- usb connected)
Gotek Floppy EMU
Gainward FX5600 Graphics card
RealMagic graphics pass through Card
Soundblaster Live
Startech 5 port USB 2.0 pci (4 ports and internal pin header)

Specs atm :-
A7VBX-X mobo with 6 pci slots ...no ISA ...1xAGPX8
768 mb ram
AMD ATHLON XP2000+ 1.67ghz

Not bad I guess for a 'Loft Find' a few weeks back.
😁

..still waiting for a new fan to replace the noisy unreliable gainward GPU fan ..
still ..all but done .
rgds
VS

...Hold the bus...
Postie just delivered the graphics card fans I ordered ...
bonus..
I ordered and paid for 3 ...
£2 delivered ..
there are 5 in the package..
which is a nice surprise..
🤣