Topcat's Weird Pentium Pro Builds

[ChaosLegionnaire]

Re: Topcat's Weird Pentium Pro Builds

No matter what config I tried, I could not get it to run stable with the scsi RAID....so I just dumped it

i know this is over a year ago but u didnt mention in verbose exactly what u tried. so i wanna ask just for clarity's sake, by config, u meant u tried the scsi card in every available pci slot but it still wouldnt play nice with the irqs or some such right? despite all that pci slot swapping? coz i know hardware of that era had some kind of funky weird pci/isa slot irq issues and such. it wouldnt work in some pci/isa slots but worked ok in others. creative sound blaster cards are notorious for such issues.

[momaka]

Re: Topcat's Weird Pentium Pro Builds

A little piece of my soul dies when someone scraps one of these treasures for gold scrap.

What's sad is we will never see PCs made with this kind of quality anymore.
So yes, every single one is worth saving at this point. I don't imagine there are too many left either.

On that note, I have an old Alpha Server 400 [4/233] that I need to get going into something, but it not being a Windows -native system, I'm not sure how to go about it.

This is what was rattling.....the CPU air guide....

https://www.badcaps.net/forum/attach...1&d=1692760469

Plastic just crumbled. No saving it, and you'll never find a replacement....

That's what I was trying to warn you about being careful with that 19" Dell monitor in the free/cheap scores thread - it seems that even without yellowing, some of these old ABS+PS/PC plastics become very brittle over time and just crack and crumble upon looking at them past a certain age.

Next up was a solution to the ruined air guide....and it was a simple solution; just install active cooling on the CPU's. The fins on the stock coolers were too wide to install fans on (no way to get fasteners to bite), so I found a couple more in the bin, along with some 60mm fans that came from a defunct shop about a year ago.

https://www.badcaps.net/forum/attach...1&d=1692760469

https://www.badcaps.net/forum/attach...1&d=1692760469

Problem solved. The 80mm fan on the rear of the case that drew air into the air guide had to be reversed so it's pulling air out....but this overall worked well.

Probably an upgrade to the cooling of both the CPUs and the case with those
mods, so no frets about it.

The HDD was missing, but judging from the internal cabling, it was IDE. I pulled that cable and slipped a 50-pin SCSI in its place along with one of Momaka's 50-pin SCSI drives I've been saving for just the right build. This one is a 9.1gb 7,200RPM Quantum.

https://www.badcaps.net/forum/attach...1&d=1692760469

YAY!
Glad to see more of those stuff I sent you came to be of some use.

For a second, I though this was one of the double-height 3.5" HDDs. I think I sent you one or two of those as well (?), but I can't remember anymore. They were quite noisy, though - perfect for anyone wanting that "old computer HDD sound" ... though I think these 9.1 GB Quantum drives aren't far behind.

If I could, I would have sent you more... if I was able to save more of them back then.

"Short" story for anyone that care (ay, here we go again, get your reading glasses and a cup of tea ) behind them is I got them from my last job - same place where that SBC came from.
These HDDs were inside removable / hot swap cages for some old lane servers for a toll road, IIRC. By the time I came to work at the company, the old system that used these drives was retired and all of these hot swap HDDs were sitting in a huge clear plastic tub with the size of a... real bathtub. ... waiting in the warehouse, to get sent for scrap. Of course, they couldn't be just thrown away due to "sensitive data" (not really, since the system they were in used proprietary software and none of the data would make sense to anyone without all of the original hardware.) But you know how modern IT dept. operate these days with the whole "better be safe than sorry" saying even when it doesn't make any sense (at least not in this case here.)
Anyways, I asked our boss and IT dept about them - that is, whether I can LLF the drives for them (outside of my working hours, so I don't waste company resources) and keep them for my own personal [re]-use (almost everyone at work knew about my retro PC hobby.) Our dept. boss almost approved, but sadly big boss refused.
Then one day, I was called to help in the warehouse... and it turns out me and a few other techs were assigned with destroying these HDDs rather than sending them to a shredding company (because big boss was known to be a big cheapskate after all.) Basically, we were to drill holes through them with the 3 drill presses we had in the shop. Sadly, I had to come a little late to the warehouse as I had some toll machines to take care of. By the time I came, most of the HDDs from that tub were drilled / destroyed and only a few remained. Of course, I quickly grabbed a few and stashed them in a small junk box. My colleagues knew what I was up to (again, they picked up on my retro PC / dumpster diving hobby pretty quickly) so didn't say anything and only laughed a little. Of course, they couldn't save all of the HDDs and give them to me, as big boss had already checked on them a few times, so they had to have some of the HDDs destroyed. And so, from the few HDDs that remained, this was what I was able to extract. I believe I kept only one 50-pin SCSI HDD - same 9.1 GB, but full height.

Anyways, that's how I got to the possession of these drives. Once I got them home, I used an old PC and zero-filled them. Then the rest is history.

I also picked up a number of the drilled / destroyed drives for scrap parts. You'd be amazed at the variety of small screws I got out of those full height ones.

Cards back in. That is a Matrox Millennium with that actually has the RAM upgrade on it! Whopping 8MB!

https://www.badcaps.net/forum/attach...1&d=1692760469

Ah, so that's what this connector is for!
IIRC, I also have a Matrox Millenium and for the longest time wondered what some of the long connectors were for on it. Pretty cool.

Momaka's HDD!

https://www.badcaps.net/forum/attach...1&d=1692760469

Next up was fixing this little plastic bezel thingy....it was held on with a piece of electrical tape and loose/flopping around. I'm just glad they tried taping it rather than just throwing it away!

https://www.badcaps.net/forum/attach...1&d=1692760469

The reason why; the tabs that would normally hold it in place are broken off.

https://www.badcaps.net/forum/attach...1&d=1692760469

Here's the proper fix...

https://www.badcaps.net/forum/attach...1&d=1692760469

Just like it should be!

https://www.badcaps.net/forum/attach...1&d=1692760469

I always laugh at people who laugh at me for using hot glue or thinking hot glue is a crappy solution / fix / adhesive.
For certain things, it's more than fine, if not proper indeed.

....but at the end of the day, a beauty from 1996 was not scrapped!
...
The case this one is housed in is absolutely magnificent!

Couldn't agree more.
Nice work, as usual!

[Topcat]

Re: Topcat's Weird Pentium Pro Builds

This thread has grown by two P-Pro systems in the last couple months. I've been crazy busy and just not posted about them....but here's one, just to let everyone know that I'll never quit breathing life back into things that people deem junk..... A little piece of my soul dies when someone scraps one of these treasures for gold scrap. This was dropped off for recycling.

The beauty in question is an HP Vectra 6/200 Dual Pentium Pro workstation. When the guy got it out of his truck and handed it to me, I heard things rattling around inside....I knew this couldn't be a good thing and that I'd have my work cut out for me.

Case opened up....



This is what was rattling.....the CPU air guide....



Plastic just crumbled. No saving it, and you'll never find a replacement....so some ingenuity had to be done....but there were other problems.... The system wouldn't POST.... In order to work on it, I had to remove it from the case. Which resulted in more plastic breakage; the rails that hold the motherboard in place....but I was able to repair those.... Anyway:



The board.



After narrowing it down to a bad CPU, it came to life. I'd render a guess that with the air guide damaged, it overheated and died. I had a replacement in my bin. I did examine the inside of the PSU first. All caps were UCC and good. PSU has a peachy clean output.



Next up was a solution to the ruined air guide....and it was a simple solution; just install active cooling on the CPU's. The fins on the stock coolers were too wide to install fans on (no way to get fasteners to bite), so I found a couple more in the bin, along with some 60mm fans that came from a defunct shop about a year ago.





Problem solved. The 80mm fan on the rear of the case that drew air into the air guide had to be reversed so it's pulling air out....but this overall worked well.



After repairing the motherboard rails, its starting to go back together.



The HDD was missing, but judging from the internal cabling, it was IDE. I pulled that cable and slipped a 50-pin SCSI in its place along with one of Momaka's 50-pin SCSI drives I've been saving for just the right build. This one is a 9.1gb 7,200RPM Quantum.



More reassembly.





Cards back in. That is a Matrox Millennium with that actually has the RAM upgrade on it! Whopping 8MB!



Momaka's HDD!



Almost ready to fire!





...and here we go! Fired up and installing the OS intended to run on it...



Next up was fixing this little plastic bezel thingy....it was held on with a piece of electrical tape and loose/flopping around. I'm just glad they tried taping it rather than just throwing it away!



The reason why; the tabs that would normally hold it in place are broken off.



Here's the proper fix...



Just like it should be!





Buttoned up.





...and here we are!!



I wasted a day on this....but at the end of the day, a beauty from 1996 was not scrapped!

Specs:

HP Vectra 6/200 Workstation
2x Pentium Pro 512k l2 CPU's
512mb (8x 64mb) Buffered/ECC EDO DIMM's (had 128mb, I added 6x additional 64mb sticks)
Matrox Millennium 8mb PCI
SB16 Audio (has onboard but this was in it)
3COM 10/100 LAN
9.1GB 7200RPM Wide SCSI using the onboard AHA2940W controller

...and to anyone wondering, yes the 'super cap' for CMOS retention is good...

The other P-Pro addition was a cheap ebay score. It'll be a bit more involved, and I'm not done with it.... The case this one is housed in is absolutely magnificent! Stay tuned!

[Topcat]

Re: Topcat's Weird Pentium Pro Builds

This thing has been on hiatus for a few years....I kind of got annoyed with it and put it in the closet....and really just kind of forgot about it.... Well, I was in there for something else today and saw it in the corner....and figured what the hell!

No matter what config I tried, I could not get it to run stable with the scsi RAID....so I just dumped it; and used all period specific hardware (everything is 1998 +/- a year) and IDE interfaces. A blistering fast 8.4gb IDE HDD, IDE CDROM....but the rest is pure retro gamer beast; the Overdrive CPU's and the Voodoo3.....but it's buttoned up and can say it's complete.

Yea, still the 'money shot'!!





Fresh install of Win2k.



Some quake 1.... This is in 1024x768 and silky smooth!!



For a game made in 1996 and made to be playable on a pentium 133MHz, not bad graphics! Pretty skies & passing clouds!



...and this one is done!



I didn't bother with a browser or a post from it....browsing from this would be agonizing, even here if it's a thread with a lot of images.... Quake 1 and Quake 2 play smooth as can be. Quake 3 makes it sweat, but it's playable in 800x600. 1024x768 is a bit too much for it, choppy especially if there's a lot of action.

I still have the Micron single socket 8 board here.....not sure what that one will become, but it will get built.

[Topcat]

Re: Topcat's Weird Pentium Pro Builds

Since this build is a function over form build (retro gaming performance), I just went ahead and removed the SCSI. I could probably get away with a different controller, but I just decided to remove it and make it perform versus look cool....so an IDE cdrom and the 'mystery' HDD!





Right now, it's kind of cobbled together....I have to get it put together correctly.

[Topcat]

Re: Topcat's Weird Pentium Pro Builds

It ain't period correct, but I have a 2-port IDE 3ware 7000 card sitting. No BBU or the header for such (but I have the SMD headers to fix that if it's like the 9500 )

This most recent mod involves period-specific size SSD's fitted into some of these antiques. Speed-wise, they stellar...and far more reliable than ~20yr old spinners... I'm on one right now.

[ratdude747]

Re: Topcat's Weird Pentium Pro Builds

This post created from this machine with the Voodoo3. The issue is apparently the SCSI controller and the GPU not playing nice with eachother....I've had this issue with others in the past with this controller, it can be fickle. I removed the controller and installed an IDE HDD, all is fine. I'll sacrifice the SCSI for 3DFX! I'm cooking up a new plan for drives (something I've done with a few retro builds I've sold).....details soon.

It ain't period correct, but I have a 2-port IDE 3ware 7000 card sitting. No BBU or the header for such (but I have the SMD headers to fix that if it's like the 9500 )

[Topcat]

Re: Topcat's Weird Pentium Pro Builds

This motherboard and this card don't get along very well, its quirky in windows....but run GL stuff perfectly. I thought the card was wonky after sitting in a box for ~21 years, but I tried it in 2 other systems and it was 100% fine in every aspect....so I may have to divert this card to a different build and do something else in this one. I think I have a PCI period-specific ATI radeon with 128mb RAM....I just don't remember which GPU it is...

This post created from this machine with the Voodoo3. The issue is apparently the SCSI controller and the GPU not playing nice with eachother....I've had this issue with others in the past with this controller, it can be fickle. I removed the controller and installed an IDE HDD, all is fine. I'll sacrifice the SCSI for 3DFX! I'm cooking up a new plan for drives (something I've done with a few retro builds I've sold).....details soon.

[Topcat]

Re: Topcat's Weird Pentium Pro Builds

A New Old Stock 3DFX Voodoo3 installed.



Yay, POST!



The Quake1 test in 1024x768:




This motherboard and this card don't get along very well, its quirky in windows....but run GL stuff perfectly. I thought the card was wonky after sitting in a box for ~21 years, but I tried it in 2 other systems and it was 100% fine in every aspect....so I may have to divert this card to a different build and do something else in this one. I think I have a PCI period-specific ATI radeon with 128mb RAM....I just don't remember which GPU it is...

[momaka]

Re: Topcat's Weird Pentium Pro Builds

One of the CPU's even came with the manuals.
https://www.badcaps.net/forum/attach...1&d=1585434483

CPU manuals?! That is soo funny.
Nowadays, you get a fancy-ish box... but everyone is supposed to know what the CPU they are getting is capable of and how to install it, so no instructions or manual... which is a shame, because you do have to go online to actually check the full specs of a CPU (namely, TDP, voltage, and etc.) since the boxes barely say anything on them for the sake of the "design". I also find Intel tends to be very cryptic with their CPU TDP specs and apparently, Intel TDP and AMD TDP are not the same. For AMD, TDP typically states the maximum power a CPU can use. For Intel, is somewhat more of an average under some load... but not really specified (for example, an average 67W TDP Core 2 Duo can pull about 100 Watts under max CPU load - and that's not at the wall.) So sometimes I wish we had a little bit more clear CPU specs included with the box.

Awesomesauce!

[Topcat]

Re: Topcat's Weird Pentium Pro Builds

Another rather boring day....I dug the PR440FX build back out to install the Overdrive CPU's that have been sitting here for about a month.... When all this virus nonsense is finished, this build will be finished up with a nifty GPU upgrade.....so what the hell, I'll toss the CPU's in it and make sure everything is playing nice...

Seen by the BIOS. These essentially turn your socket8 pentium pro system into a pentium2. Much better performance, no FDIV bug (not that it was really a factor), full speed L2, Add in MMX, plus 133MHz additional core speed!! What a win!



What a money shot!!



One of the CPU's even came with the manuals.


I rounded up some enlight drive rails that I needed.


CPU-Z sees it as a Klamath core, when in reality it's a (SL2KE) Deschutes...which apparently is a normal thing for it to be detected this way because of the stepping.


Awesomesauce!



THis thing will run some GL Quake1 and other older sordid Glide games with a bliss & classiness that will make any p-pro system blush!

[ChaosLegionnaire]

Re: Topcat's Weird Pentium Pro Builds

damn thats a shame man! truly really a shame! such a valuable antique left behind like that! poor voodoo card! hopefully, the card wont get angry at u for abandoning it and doing some voodoo back on u in revenge! hehehe!

[RJARRRPCGP]

Re: Topcat's Weird Pentium Pro Builds

Ya know I have a nice Phenom II X6 1045t and a biostar motherboard I would be willing to trade for a voodoo 3 AGP.

Shet! I don't even have the slot 1 system anymore! I think I popped the Voodoo 3 AGP in there! The slot 1 motherboard, is the Asus P2B-F. But, I left it behind in a dumpy house! I had it before sometime on June 12, 2016.
Looked like we couldn't fit the rig in the vehicle we had on that day!

[BigTroll]

Re: Topcat's Weird Pentium Pro Builds

Reminds me of back in the later-2010s, when I wanted to build a Phenom II X6 rig, but the Phenom II X6s were at least $200-ish! Wouldn't have been surprised if they were often more than an FX 8350.

Wouldn't surprise me if getting socket 1366 stuff is ironically easier! In the very-late-2010s, words that I received was, that hex-core socket 1366 processors are a piece of cake to get!

Ya know I have a nice Phenom II X6 1045t and a biostar motherboard I would be willing to trade for a voodoo 3 AGP.

[RJARRRPCGP]

Re: Topcat's Weird Pentium Pro Builds

I'm not running anything newer than that. No need. PC Processor technology hasn't made leaps & bounds of progress in the last 10 years. The improvements that have been made are not so much speed, but instead being more efficient & smaller with the mobile market in mind.

I'm with you there, albeit I still got very new stuff recently!

But, my socket 1366 system may be genuinely broken. I may be needing to give a verdict of a broken trace or contact. I may be forced to do another motherboard change again! True, if I can't run with 3 RAM channels without a Windows error!

I could be back on eBay again, hunting for another motherboard! I'm definitely thinking of getting a socket 1366 hex'er!

[Topcat]

Re: Topcat's Weird Pentium Pro Builds

...hex-core socket 1366 processors...

I'm not running anything newer than that. No need. PC Processor technology hasn't made leaps & bounds of progress in the last 10 years. The improvements that have been made are not so much speed, but instead being more efficient & smaller with the mobile market in mind.

[RJARRRPCGP]

Re: Topcat's Weird Pentium Pro Builds

The Overdrive 333's pop up regularly on ebay, but go for $200-ish (I need 2)....I'm not spending that much

Reminds me of back in the later-2010s, when I wanted to build a Phenom II X6 rig, but the Phenom II X6s were at least $200-ish! Wouldn't have been surprised if they were often more than an FX 8350.

Wouldn't surprise me if getting socket 1366 stuff is ironically easier! In the very-late-2010s, words that I received was, that hex-core socket 1366 processors are a piece of cake to get!

[Topcat]

Re: Topcat's Weird Pentium Pro Builds

Just to complicate this build thread a little, the same source that I acquired the Intel PR440FX from said there was another one just like it here in some more tech junk....

Well, it wasn't identical....but close. It was a single CPU Micronics "Invader" (M8S-FIN) motherboard.... New old stock.

Blasphemous that this old soul had never had the opportunity to be ran, loved, and appreciated!! ...but y'all know me!! That's about to change!!

...and here she is:


The first thing I noticed were the caps.... 85*c on a motherboard? Seriously? Some brand I've never heard of. Yea, that aint happening! I'm not even going to fire it with these, although they did *appear* ok.



Recapped with some Rubies and test fired. The first thing I always do with boards like this is check for BIOS updates....this board is so obscure, I couldn't find any BIOS information on the interwebs...









Win2k installed on a test drive. Everything is working and happy.



Not sure this ones path....but it certainly deserves a build....

[Topcat]

Re: Topcat's Weird Pentium Pro Builds

VCORE is not adjustable on these.

I never got to the point of running prime95....the OS was never stable enough to worry about it. It will be fun to play with the overdrives though. Digging through some really old archives, these boards love them!

[RJARRRPCGP]

Re: Topcat's Weird Pentium Pro Builds

Did some more diddling around, found a spec sheet that Intel never published for this board with some 'undocumented jumper settings'. First one was the multiplier, which 'officially' only goes to 3.0x. I already found 3.5x on my own, but there's also 4.0x, which allowed the CPU's to run @ 266/66.....but that was a failure, the CPU's were not stable....and I wasn't really expecting them to be. Historically with the P6 core, 233 was about as high as they would ever run stable.

The second one was a FSB tweak, which allows 60FSB bumped to 63, and 66FSB bumped to 70....it's basically an undocumented 'turbo' function....which from 3.5x @ 70FSB, the CPU's are @ 245MHz, which was also unstable

Did you test them with Prime95? It's easy to think they're stable when not using Prime95 then when the Prime95 test is running, boom! An error is scrolled or you get a Windows error or it just crashes (hard freezes)

SuperPi apparently would be a joke, because it probably can't reveal core instability the way Prime95 and of course, Linpack does!

But there's a good chance that Linpack isn't compatible at all with an old school Pentium.

But, usually, if Prime95 fails, you shouldn't panic and just raise the Vcore a bit and make sure the core temps aren't high. But, you will need to make a thermometer mounting place for the CPUs. Otherwise, you possibly just need to make do with something like 61x3.5.