Nice machine! I also started with a 486, but back in 1991. SX 25MHz. 2MB RAM. No L2 cache. No CD-ROM. No sound card. It came with PC DOS 6.0. No Windows. 130MB Conner HDD.

Can't wait to see the rest of your collection! I've been thinking of doing something similar and showing off my collection.

This is my kind of advent calendar! You have a beautiful collection of machines

ildonaldo wrote on 2020-12-07, 09:59:

Favoured Games: Commander Keen 4-6, Alien Carnage (aka Halloween Harry), Riddle of Master Lu

that's interesting of you to add favoured games per machine, it'll be good to follow this

Intermezzo, TIP: About colouring Cases or drive bezels

Spraypaint is in most cases my choice, when retrobright failed or did produce "spotty" results.
In such cases, I use this two colours for painting old cases and drive bezels:
a) In most cases: RAL 9002 grey white, silk mat soes the trick - see #1 😉
b) ... or, if a bit more beige tint is required: RAL 1013 oyster white, silk mat

In my experiance, one of this two colours matches with most of the hardware I intend to use.

... next PC-specs of my collection will follow tomorrow 😀

... and here comes the #2 of my little PC collection 😀

#2: year 1997 build …
My rating: 4,0 from 5 stars
Description: in 1997 I had a very similar machine and it was my first one with a 3D card.
But the Hardware back than wasn’t very well balanced for the PowerVR PCX2 3D-card
and Windows 95 is a real pain.

Board: GA-586S Rev. 1.22C, Socket 7, SIS 5571, AT-Board
CPU: Intel Pentium 1 MMX, 200MHz
RAM: 128MB EDO (2x64MB), SAMSUNG KMM53216004AK-6U, 60ns
2D-card: Matrox Millenium II, 4MB WRAM, PCI (1997)
3D- card: Matrox m3D, 4MB, PowerVR PCX2, PCI (1997)
Sound: Creative Sound Blaster Vibra 16XV, CT4170, ISA (1997)
HDD: Quantum Fireball lct10, 10.2 GB, ATA-66, IDE
ODD: CD-ROM 8x, Sony CDU311, IDE (1996/1997)
FDD1: 2.88 MB, 3.5" floppy, Sony
FDD2: 1.2MB high-density, 5.25" floppy, Teac FD-55GR (NOS)
Case: NoName AT/ATX-Tower (1997)
PSU: FSP SPI-300G, 300W (NOS)
OS: Windows 95c
Games: Tomb Raider (1+2+UB), Quake II, Descent II, Wing Commander Prophecy , Incoming

nice builds. can't wait to see the rest!

... and today it's #3

#3: year 1998 build …
My rating: 3,0 from 5 stars
Description: Basically, this is a great PC, but I was never happy with the loss of image quality due to the loop-through solution of the voodoo add on cards.
Board: MSI MS6119 Ver. 1.1, Intel 440BX Chipset, AGP, PCI, ISA, USB (1998)
CPU: Pentium II, 450MHz
RAM: 128MB, Mo SDRAM PC100, Hyundai GMM26416233ENT
2D-card: Matrox G200A, 8MB, AGP (1998)
3D-card: SLI 2x Voodoo 2, Creative Labs CT6670, 2x12MB (1998)
Sound: Sound Blaster Live! Gold CT4620 & CT4660, PCI (1998)
HDD: 6,4gb IDE, IBM DTTA-350640 (1998)
ODD: DSR-520H DVD-ROM (5,2X/32X), DVS Korea Co. (Feb. 1999)
FDD: 1.44 MB 3.5", D359T7, Newtronics Mitsumi
Case: NoName ATX (ca. 199x),
Case fan: 1x 80mm Lüfter (Cooler Master A8025-21CB-3BN-P1)
PSU: be quiet! PURE POWER BQT L7-350W
OS: Windows 98SE (incl. Updates)
Games: Grim Fandango, Shogo, Mysteries of the Sith, Conflict: Freespace, Freespace 2, Amerzone, Indiana Jones and the Infernal Machine

... and still more to come 😉

... an here comes #4

#4: year 2000 build …
My rating: 4,0 from 5 stars
Description: As far as I can remember, the P4 & Rambus Ram was massively spotlighted by the media back in 2000 and the Kyro II was set to compete with the Voodoo 5.
((… but it was far too expensive for me, so I had to cling to my K6-III+/550 for a little bit longer))
Board: Asus P4T, Intel 850 Chipset, Sockel 423, ATX
CPU: Pentium 4, Willamette, 1.5 GHz, Cooler with 60mm fan
RAM: 1GB RDRAM (4x256MB), Samsung MR16R1628AF0-CK8 Rambus 256MB PC 800
2D/3D card: Hercules 3D Prophet 4500, 64MB, AGP
Sound: Creative Labs SB PCI 128 CT5803
HDD: IBM Deskstar 20.5GB, DTLA-305020, UDMA-100, 5400RPM
ODD: Hitachi GD7000 8X40X IDE DVD-ROM
FDD: 1.44 MB 3.5", Samsung SFD-321B
Case: NoName ATX
PSU: ATX 350W, Be quiet! Pure Power, BQT L7-350W
OS: Windows 98SE (inkl. Updates)
Games: ST Voyager “Elite Force”, Starlancer, American McGee's Alice, TR Chronicles, Outcast, The Longest Journey

Congratulations, interesting machines to take inspiration from for future builds
😀

I take this opportunity to ask you for information: I also have a Hercules 4500 card, what graphic rendering does it have in 2D? and what do you think about 3D? How does it behave with StarTrek Elite Force? I ask you why I have been thinking of using this card for a long time, but my total inexperience with exotic graphics cards has always held me back (consider that I grew up with Cirrus, Matrox, Ati and nVidia ... then I learned to use 3dfx and lately I experiment with S3). Thanks for the advice you want to give me

Hi igna78,
the 3D Prophet 4500 is a typical S3 card concerning 2D => very good VESA implementation, didn't notice any flaw at 2D.
3D is also good and with the latest drivers "ST Elite Force" should be fine for windows 9.x, but I havn't tried it much, so far.
From my personal history, I went with ATI or NVidia in the post Voodoo 5500 era (2001 and later).
But the voodoo 3 and the voodoo 5 are still my favourites for Windows 9.x builds ...

I'll try the 3D Prophet 4500 paired with a P4 or AthlonXP..an exotic build from the early 2000s. For audio I'll try something other than the inevitable SoundBlaster (that is, generaly, my first option), let's say a Diamond Monster II MX300. Thanks for the inspiration 😀

Note: I agree that 3dfx cards give Windows9x builds something extra 😀

igna78 wrote on 2020-12-15, 00:17:

Note: I agree that 3dfx cards give Windows9x builds something extra 😀

Hi igna78, in that case this one might interest you. It's on of my favoured builds 😀

And here comes #5 ...

#5: year 2000/2001 build …
My rating: 5 from 5 stars
Description: As much as is don’t favour the voodoo 1+2 add-on-cards, as much I love the Voodoo 5 5500.
Back in that time, I was very, very sad when I had to part from it because the new boards didn’t support AGP 2x any longer (… and the driver support had stopped after 3Dfx went bust).
Board: Medion 2000 Ver. 2 (MSI MS-6318 OEM), Apollo Pro 133A
CPU: Pentium III, 1000MHz, FSB 133, Coppermine/EB, cooler with silent NB-fan
RAM: 512 MB (2x 256MB), D-RAM, PC-133U non-ECC, Samsung, M366S3253ETS-C7A
2D/3D-card: 3Dfx Voodoo 5 5500, 64MB, AGP
Sound: Soundblaster Audio PCI 128, CT5880 (ES1371), onboard
HDD: Maxtor D740X-6L, 20GB IDE
ODD: Pioneer DVD-104SZ, CD/DVD Slot-In Drive, IDE
FDD: LS-120, Matsushita LKM-F934-1, IDE
Case: NoName microATX
PSU: ATX 350W, Be quiet! Pure Power, BQT L7-350W
OS: Windows 98SE (incl. Updates)
Games: Conflict: Freespace & Freespace 2 (both still great), Myst III, Aquanox, Syberia

... and here comes the #6 of my little PC collection 😀

#6: year 2003/2004 build …
My rating: 5 from 5 stars
Description: this the first PC of my collection that is mainly based on HW that I originally bought back then … and it is IMO a real beauty 😉
Board: MSI K7-N2 Delta2, with nVidia nForce2 Ultra 400
CPU: AMD AthlonXP 3200+, FSB 400 (with AC Copper Silent 3 cooler)
RAM: 2x 1GB, Aeneon DDR1, PC3200U, 400MHz, CL3, AED760UD00-500C98X
2D/3D-Grafik: ATI Radeon 9800 PRO, 256MB, AGP 8x
Sound: Creative Labs SB0220 Sound Blaster Live! 5.1, PCI
HDD: Samsung SP2014N, 200GB, IDE
ODD: Freecom DVD 16H8, IDE
FDD: 1.44 MB 3.5"
ZIP-Drive: IOMEGA ZIP 750, IDE
Case: Lian Li PC-60
Display: LIS 2 Indicator, VFD Display & fan controller
PSU: ATX 350W, Be quiet! Pure Power, BQT L7-350W
OS: Windows XP
Games: Beyond Good & Evil, XIII, TR: The Angel of Darkness, Freelancer, Runaway, Syberia II

#6 such power! impressive. 😀 strange to think its a spec from 17 years ago and would probably choke on an average youtube vid now!

gerry wrote on 2020-12-18, 11:46:

#6 such power! impressive. 😀 strange to think its a spec from 17 years ago and would probably choke on an average youtube vid now!

Moore's law stikes again ...

I love this system. I wanted that case back in the day but sadly as a kid in highschool funds were quite limited. This is such a fun thread.

chrismeyer6 wrote on 2020-12-18, 13:42:

I love this system. I wanted that case back in the day but sadly as a kid in highschool funds were quite limited. This is such a fun thread.

I know what you mean ...
This are all PCs that I would have liked to have by that time but couldn't afford.
Usually I had to suffice with something more low end, but sometimes I had been lucky to get my hand on some of the highlight hardware as the Matrox m3d, a (single) Voodoo 2, a ZIP drive etc.
All the more I enjoy it building such systems now, fiddling around with the old Software and playing some of my favoured old games.
... and relearned a lot about autoexec.bat and config.sys related to this 😉

Watch out, there is still more to come before Xmas 😀 😀

Nice looking forward to the rest. My computer at that time was a K6-3+ 256 Meg's of ram and a GeForce 2 mx400 64meg

Builds #5 and #6 are my favorite at the moment
The Voodoo5500 and the Radeon 9800 were the two cards I wish I had in those days, when instead I had to settle for something cheaper
Today, however, I can have fun building everything with the pieces that I have gradually collected and discussions like this are a source of ideas
Thanks for what you share
😀