Bringing a old rig back to life - ***NEED YOUR ADVICE***

[hoax32]

Jo!
I was at my friends house and back there in the corner there was this lonelly busted PC which was looking at me and crying for help.....

I couldn't resist - bought it off my friend for $15 ....


Here the specs:
------------------------

MBR: uATX Gigabyte 8VM533M-RZ
CPU: Intel Celeron 2GHz, 128kb
GPU: Onboard S3 Graphics 32MB
RAM: 256MB DDR 333MHz RAM
HDD: Seagate ATA/IDE 40GB 7200RPM [kinda impressed.....7200rpm....]

It's in blue (some kind of special eddition???) and has a alme via chip......onboard sound.....you know - all the standards.

It also has a AGP 4x SLOT and 3 PCI slots.
2 RAM slots for DDR and it's Socket 478 (for P4's and Celereons and "D's")

I want to use it as a "spare PC"
I ordered following cheap case: CLICK ME >: )

This is how I want the specs to be after all upgrades:

MBR: uATX Gigabyte 8VM533M-RZ
CPU: Intel Pentium 4HT 3.06GHz
GPU: nVidia geForce 6200 / 6600 / or maybe a Radeon 9800pro ......
PCI1: PCI Wireless G/N Card
PCI2: Sound Blaster Lite 5.1
PCI3: USB 3.0 / leave it empty / something else....
RAM: 2GB DDR PC400
HDD: 120GB 7200RPM
OS: Windows XP Prof.

Total expenses: $80

Tasks I wish to do with it:
--------------------------------------
720p youtube
light multi tasking
Windows Media PLayer
PLay following games: GTA: SA / CoD2 / CoD4




Does this project sound reasonable?
Will the new hardware be able to do all of that?
Give me some advise if you have any plaz!!!

Thanks palz!!!!

[AthlonX2]

your cpu might not be supported if i recall the HT ones were 800fsb

[hoax32]

According to the website the best CPU that I can run would be a P4HT 3.06GHz 533FSB. $13 on ebay lol

[brandonwh64]

That board does not support 800Mhz FSB cpus

best one is a P4-Northwood 3.06G (HT)

[hoax32]

isn't that what it says?

[MGF Derp]

Sounds like fun to me

[NdMk2o1o]

Makes me want to build an old school rig just for shits and giggles, thinking maybe an P3 Tualatin, 2x256MB DDR RAM and an old school AGP card, voodoo 5500?

[Iciclebar]

I've got an old nvidia 7800gs OC agp 4x/8x 256mb kicking around in a shoe box somewhere. No idea if it works though It did when I put it there.

My old rig was an athlon 64 2800+ socket 754 an nforce 3 gigabyte k8nspro with that card (upgraded from a 9800 pro AIW) and a sound blaster audigy 2 zs

Board had a promise IDE raid controller so id run 2 80 gig IDE drives in raid 0.

[hoax32]

ok.....after playin arround a while I noticed that the S3 = Used toilet paper......
Can't even watch 360p without stuttering.....and you don't even wanna know, how it plays with all the youtube-flash commmercials all around it.....so I just ordered a $4 Radeon 7000 which I can use till something better shows up on eBay.....

Also - by default the FAN keeps spinning while in hibernation.......and the option to turn that off was hidden behind 3 sub-options in the BIOS.......this is getting exiting lol

Some more questions:
Why isn't the FAN slowing down??? - it's always at full speed......already tried a different FAN......nothing......and the temps of 1 of the 4 sensors in SpeedFan jumps arround like carzy!!!! [10c - 55c]

lol help !?

[AthlonX2]

speedfan isnt very reliable,try HWmonitor instead

[Mussels]

Originally Posted by hoax32

ok.....after playin arround a while I noticed that the S3 = Used toilet paper......
Can't even watch 360p without stuttering.....and you don't even wanna know, how it plays with all the youtube-flash commmercials all around it.....so I just ordered a $4 Radeon 7000 which I can use till something better shows up on eBay.....

Also - by default the FAN keeps spinning while in hibernation.......and the option to turn that off was hidden behind 3 sub-options in the BIOS.......this is getting exiting lol

Some more questions:
Why isn't the FAN slowing down??? - it's always at full speed......already tried a different FAN......nothing......and the temps of 1 of the 4 sensors in SpeedFan jumps arround like carzy!!!! [10c - 55c]

lol help !?

1. video playback is CPU, not GPU. use better codecs/players, such as MPC-HC with 2D overlay renderer.

2. its using S1 sleep, change it to S3

3. because old hardware rarely had fan speed control.

3.1 because speedfan sucks.


bonus point: USB 3.0 on PCI is a complete waste. its 125MB/s (or was it 133? cant remember) for every device on the bus shared between them, so it wont be much faster than USB 2.0.

[hoax32]

my other via 266 board had fan controll......friggin IBM thinkpads back from 1999 had Fan-controll......(i have a T20)

[Jetster]

Ive done this a couple times. Its really not worth putting the money into except for a HTPC. But if you can find a AGP Nvidia 6600GT it might play some old games

[hoax32]

This is the shit!!!!! CLICK

Is the 3GHz P4HT gonna bottleneck it alot?

[Jetster]

Way to expensive. You should be able to fine a AGP Nvidia 6600 or 6800 or ATI X800 for $20

[BlackOmega]

I've got a BFG 6200OC that works pretty well. Plays 1080p just fine, can play the aforementioned games with the only exception being COD4. Possibly on low settings. It's in use at the moment, however, I was planning on building my folks a "newer" rig any way (socket 939 with 6800's in SLI ).

[hoax32]

The link ive posted is just to show yall the card - actuall price = $27

[hoax32]

This Case comes with a 400W power supply - is that enough for 3 PCI devices, 1 AGP (X1600 Pro), 2 HDD's 2CD's, Manual Fan controller?

Also do you guys think that it has IDE-Power cables on it?

thx

[ThE_MaD_ShOt]

Kudos to you for bringing old hardware back to life. You'll have fun with it. I am planning on a k6-2 build to run win 98se soon for kicks and giggles. I do still have 5 old school systems running. My sig has the details. They can do much more then htpc work. One is running Ubuntu 11.04 very smoothly. As for your video card choice. Be very careful on which card you use. Your board does 4x max so the card has to be able to be run in a 4x board. The voltages are different for the 8x agp slots. You can fry a card quickly. As far a memory goes your good there and if you can get the ht proc kewl. I have some parts laying around. I have a 2.0 p4 proc and a geforce fx 5500 256 card if you need them. I may end up with a 9800 xt 256 ( better then the pro) depending on how I build my 939 server and which system get retired for now. Just pm me and we will work out the details if interested.

[Jetster]

Originally Posted by hoax32

This Case comes with a 400W power supply - is that enough for 3 PCI devices, 1 AGP (X1600 Pro), 2 HDD's 2CD's, Manual Fan controller?

Also do you guys think that it has IDE-Power cables on it?

thx

You mean a 4 pin molex? yes Im sure it does But ask him. You will also need a 12 volt 4 pin CPU plug
But buying a $30 case with a power supply off e-bay is not the best idea

[hoax32]

Originally Posted by Jetster

You mean a 4 pin molex? yes Im sure it does But ask him. You will also need a 12 volt 4 pin CPU plug
But buying a $30 case with a power supply off e-bay is not the best idea

Im already investing more in the case than the hardware is worth!!! xD

[Jetster]

Originally Posted by hoax32

Im already investing more in the case than the hardware is worth!!! xD

Build a case! Bum a PSU of someone

There are most likely a pile of old white cases with power supply's at the local computer shop.$10

[hoax32]

In live in Texas - next Civilization is 100 miles away.....and inbetween it looks like wjat you see in old western movies

Pal the case has already bin ordered and arrives tomorrow - I dont think that there will be a friggin 400 watt PSU in a ugly Computer case in the desert for $10.

[Live OR Die]

I wouldn't buy parts for a P4 you probably find some one selling mobo cpu and ram for $60 which is a C2D.

[hoax32]

well but since I already have a nice flat screen monitor, keyboard, mouse, a motherbord, hdd, ram,....why not invest in this case and later upgrade to another uATX?