Dell hacking; is it possible?

[Error 404]

Ok, a new project for me: my friend's "gaming machine" is an old P4 Dell, which was his best PC until we bought his new one (custom, of course.).
Problem is, he still wants to upgrade his old Dell. Since he's not so good with PCs, I decided to run CPU/GPU-Z to see what could be done in the way of upgrades.
His current specs are:
Pentium 4 Prescott @ 3.2 GHz, with HT and 800 MHz FSB
1 GB DDR-400 RAM in two slots.
nVidia Geforce 5500 w/ 128 MB DDR VRAM
80 GB IDE HDD
Dell BTX motherboard. I think.

Anyway, I opened it up (which was quite simple) because I wanted to see what other ports there might be, and how much room there was.
As soon as I saw the motherboard, I was on the floor LMAO!
Here's the pic I took:

As you can see, Dell has not even bothered to attach two of the RAM DIMM slots, a SATA port (although there is a second one attached), and the AGP slot!
My friend has been playing various Star Wars games, Soldier of Fortune II, and Penumbra on it, even Photoshopping on it, using a crappy little PCI graphics card!

So, I'm wondering: if I can find a donor motherboard, can I solder on the extra RAM and AGP slots? I'm up to the job, as I can solder quite well, and another of my friends has a vacuum-desolderer to remove the donor parts.
Can it be done without destroying the mobo?

 

[candle_86]

ill donate boards yea, there kinda old though lol

What i have parts wise laying around is this

DDR slots early Athlon board

AGP4X slot Pentium3 board

The AThlon board had AGP4x but the slot is broke (dont AsK)

 

[WhiteLotus]

This is going to be a nice little project! Make your own motherboard - blue peter styley though please!

 

[Error 404]

Blue Peter? Link to whatever he did please...
Anyway: would the AGP bus be useable? Would Dell have disabled it in their BIOS?
It'll be interesting, certainly. I wonder if we can shove in a Pentium D while we're at it...
Should I replace Dell's heatsink and reverse the original intake fan? We have a stock Intel LGA 775 cooler lying around, and although the mounting for 478 isn't the same, we'll make it fit anyway; better cooling.
Also, if I attached the second SATA port, would the motherboard be able to RAID?

 

[btarunr]

It's not just the slots that they remove, could also be components associated with the slots (capacitors, diodes, chokes, MOSFETs, etc.). Unless you have the blue-print of that mobo, it becomes difficult.

 

[Katanai]

You should change the motherboard to a PCIE one and add another GB of ram and a decent card. That P4 can handle most games at medium settings.

 

[spud107]

id get another mobo before experimenting, and getting an agp/ram slot from an old mobo is a bit tricky, blowtorch?

 

[Wozzer]

Blue Peter?QUOTE]

I was a TV show ran in the UK Years back. Showing you how to make real crap stuff out of things such as paper, straws, etc.

 

[crazy pyro]

blue peter's still going http://www.bbc.co.uk/cbbc/bluepeter/

 

[cdawall]

ot possible sorry mate best i can say is snag a cheapy s478 mobo

go with this one and get him a 3850 256mb

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813138079R

 

[Kreij]

Personally, I think you would have better odds killing a Great White with a rubber knife than successfully modding that mobo.

But Hey! I could be wrong.

 

[evil bill]

Would Dell have disabled it in their BIOS?

From my experience of Dell machines, this would be your biggest problem even if you were able to successfully Macgyver RAM and AGP slots to that board. If you cant setup the BIOS to utilise them then you are just wasting your time. Best option woudl be to get a cheapo 478 board like the one above or this and transfer the components.

http://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Comp...P4i65G+Socket+478+Motherbord+?productId=23284

 

[hat]

Personally, I think you would have better odds killing a Great White with a rubber knife than successfully modding that mobo.

But Hey! I could be wrong.

yeah I agree with Kreij... even if you managed to sucessfully solder on the parts I doubt the BIOS would recgonize it anyway.

 

[GSG-9]

I would also buy another bored, dell loves removing things from their bios's. If the slot is physicly gone I would be the bios is also handicapped. If its not in the bios before you sodder on the extra slot I doubt it will appear after.

Good Luck

You should change the motherboard to a PCIE one and add another GB of ram and a decent card. That P4 can handle most games at medium settings.

I hope your joking.

 

[hat]

He cant just buy a new motherboard though I bet because of the case.
Tell him to forget the dell, he's got a much better computer to play with.

 

[Kreij]

Also, you may have a bit of a problem getting another mobo in the Dell case without heavy modding, as they are usually proprietary back panels.

 

[hat]

Well the case is just sheet metal there's nothing electronic to it, he could mod that I'm sure

 

[GSG-9]

I have never had issues modding back panels, Take the motherboard set it on a piece of aluminum or steel. mark the holes with a sharpie, remove motherboard punch the holes with a nail (yes I used a nail) put the mounting screw through the whole, make sure they line up, place epoxy or superglue on the back to secure the mounting holes. Screw Sheet to back of case. No need to worry about grounding as all parts are metal.

 

[candle_86]

From my experience of Dell machines, this would be your biggest problem even if you were able to successfully Macgyver RAM and AGP slots to that board. If you cant setup the BIOS to utilise them then you are just wasting your time. Best option woudl be to get a cheapo 478 board like the one above or this and transfer the components.

http://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Comp...P4i65G+Socket+478+Motherbord+?productId=23284

actully that boards onboard is AGP so AGP settings should be intact you need the missing parts look on the silkscreen to see whats missing and try to find what you need.

 

[Kreij]

I am with Btarunr on this one.
Dell reduces the cost of their low end systems by not putting components that are unneeded in specific configurations. No ports, connectors, caps, VRs etc. that are not going to be used in the configuration.
That way they save money and can also pass the savings onto the consumer.

Like I said, you might be able to pull it off, but don't hold your breath.

 

[Dell_Man]

He CAN get a normal mATX Mobo in there

my specs in this dell case
AMD 64
1gb ram
asus mobo
x1650

 

[Urbklr]

I have to say, there is only one way to find out

 

[panchoman]

wouldn't he end up having to mod the bios as well?

 

[candle_86]

shouldn't have to the intel extreme grahpics on it are AGP already, some bios options such as apture size ect may be hidden of course and its AGP 4X so it is limited in a few ways of course. But if you can get the missing parts for the port installed and the port itself installed it will run fine. Thats part of the chipset.

 

[Error 404]

So, if it fails we can just shove a different motherboard in... good to know!
Hopefully it will work, my friend likes doing things cheap (he spent every cent on his PC).
It didn't look like many other components were missing, so they shouldn't be too much of a prolem.
Any recomendations for a cheap graphics card?