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The 180MHz Vista PC (screencaps)

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Name: jackbomb
Date: October 17, 2007 at 21:32:01 Pacific
OS: Vista and XP
CPU/Ram: Various
Product: jackbomb
Comment:

Make sure that your computing.net pictures are turned on in order to view the screen caps!

Bill Gates would sigh. I got Vista Home Premium, complete with Aero Glass, to run on a 180MHz (underclocked) Pentium II with 256MB of RAM and a Geforce FX 5200 graphics card.

Background info:
I originally wanted to get Vista to install on a Pentium 133MMX on a Super 7 board, just like I did with XP a couple of years ago on computing.net. Unfortunately, that did not work out. The system would always hang during installation, no matter what I tried.

So I went on to the next best thing: an unlocked Pentium II-300 underclocked to 180MHz on a Slot 1 440LX-based board.

The Procedure:
I completed the first stage of Vista installation on a much faster machine--a 1.66GHz Pentium III with 2GB of RAM. This was done to avoid any potential road blocks that may have popped up if I had tried the first part of the installation on the P2 (minimum system requirement issues).

After part 1 of Vista Setup completed, I re-installed the hard drive in the P2 system to finish the rest of the installation. Surprisingly, it went very smoothly and finished without any glitches, unlike the Super 7 board.

The processor was a very old, multiplier-unlocked Pentium II-300. I ran the motherboard at its lowest multiplier setting (3.0X). This created what CPU-Z calls a Pentium II 200MHz processor. I underclocked the CPU even further by reducing the bus speed to 60MHz. This resulted in a 180MHz Pentium II.

I then installed 256MB of PC100 memory, which was automatically underclocked to 60MHz to match bus speed. I installed an Asus Geforce FX 5200 video card to ensure that the Aero Glass interface would/could be enabled. The card ran in AGP 2X mode.

Still with me?
Good! This is where the fun starts! :-)

Screenshot 1:
Vista doesn't seem to think too highly of my hardware. WEI gives the system a 1.0, thanks to the uber-fast processor. You can also see CPU-Z proudly showing off the 180MHz Pentium II and 256MB of PC60 memory. Also notice that CPU usage is always at 100%, even when 'idling'. Vista fits into 256MB of RAM rather well!


AMD Opteron 185 @ 3.0GHz
4.0GB of OCZ DDR400 RAM
8800GTS 640MB at 625/2000 core/mem, 1500 shader
Asus A8N32-SLI Deluxe
X-Fi, Vista 64-bit, yada yada



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Response Number 1
Name: jackbomb
Date: October 17, 2007 at 21:35:37 Pacific
Reply:

Screenshot 2:
Playing an MP3 file on the server under Vista with the compact Winamp program (much smaller than WMP 11) is impossible. Audio skips all the time. Under XP, this same machine plays MP3s with only 15-20% CPU usage.

You probably noticed that some of the elements of Winamp's interface are missing. That's because the system was still in the process of drawing them when I pushed Print Screen.

AMD Opteron 185 @ 3.0GHz
4.0GB of OCZ DDR400 RAM
8800GTS 640MB at 625/2000 core/mem, 1500 shader
Asus A8N32-SLI Deluxe
X-Fi, Vista 64-bit, yada yada


0

Response Number 2
Name: jackbomb
Date: October 17, 2007 at 21:38:17 Pacific
Reply:

Screenshot 3:
In order to really stress the video system (which was already plenty stressed at 800x600), I upped the resolution to the display's maximum 1920x1080. Aero Glass was extremely sluggish, but never crashed. You can also see that all of the Windows interface options are available for tweaking on this system. This PC just never gives up!

AMD Opteron 185 @ 3.0GHz
4.0GB of OCZ DDR400 RAM
8800GTS 640MB at 625/2000 core/mem, 1500 shader
Asus A8N32-SLI Deluxe
X-Fi, Vista 64-bit, yada yada


0

Response Number 3
Name: jackbomb
Date: October 17, 2007 at 21:40:11 Pacific
Reply:

Screenshot 4:
Flip 3D in all of its glory. Not very smooth, but still workable. Is Wikipedia trying to tell us something?

AMD Opteron 185 @ 3.0GHz
4.0GB of OCZ DDR400 RAM
8800GTS 640MB at 625/2000 core/mem, 1500 shader
Asus A8N32-SLI Deluxe
X-Fi, Vista 64-bit, yada yada


0

Response Number 4
Name: Outlander
Date: October 18, 2007 at 06:22:41 Pacific
Reply:

Hah! Awesome! Try it on a P-III CPU and see if SSE makes any difference in performnace at the same speed.

Core2 Duo 1.86
2GB DDR2 667
Nvidia 6800GS
Asus P5L-MX


0

Response Number 5
Name: jackbomb
Date: October 18, 2007 at 16:57:32 Pacific
Reply:

I did try Vista Beta 2 on a 500MHz first-gen P3 around two years ago. It felt at least ten times faster, but that was probably because it had 512MB of RAM and a higher-clocked processor. SSE maybe helped a little bit.

AMD Opteron 185 @ 3.0GHz
4.0GB of OCZ DDR400 RAM
8800GTS 640MB at 625/2000 core/mem, 1500 shader
Asus A8N32-SLI Deluxe
X-Fi, Vista 64-bit, yada yada


0

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Response Number 6
Name: UnR3aL
Date: October 19, 2007 at 14:19:33 Pacific
Reply:

180mhz on Vista looks painful.

MSI P35 Platinum
Intel Core 2 Duo E6750 2.66ghz @ 3.8ghz
HiS Radeon 2900 Pro 512mb @ 803/886
Crucial 2GB Dual-Channel DDR2 800 Lanfest
Corsair HX620W PSU


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Response Number 7
Name: jackbomb
Date: October 19, 2007 at 23:43:29 Pacific
Reply:

It was painful, but not as bad as you might think. Even with a mere 256MB of RAM (4 times less than what MS wants for Aero Glass), bootup time was just around 2 minutes, and as you can see from the Task Manager in screenshots 1 and 2, only 150-190MB of physical RAM was being used.

The worst part by far was the time it took for the CPU to render and then display the Aero glass effects. All animation was choppy as heck.

AMD Opteron 185 @ 3.0GHz
4.0GB of OCZ DDR400 RAM
8800GTS 640MB at 625/2000 core/mem, 1500 shader
Asus A8N32-SLI Deluxe
X-Fi, Vista 64-bit, yada yada


0

Response Number 8
Name: Mattwizz3 (by mattwizz3)
Date: October 20, 2007 at 05:45:45 Pacific
Reply:

I cant believe it could do Aero Glass at all, even if it is incredibly slow I'm still impressed.

heh, I'm currently working on my own super P3 jackbomb. But having a bit of trouble with getting the hardware to play nice. Once I get it going I should try vista on my P3 to see how it runs for myself.

Good work though!

Mattwizz3 :

Vista Home Basic
A7N8X-E Deluxe
2.2GHz Sempron
2GB DDR400
GeForce 6800Ultra


0

Response Number 9
Name: jackbomb
Date: October 20, 2007 at 09:46:46 Pacific
Reply:

I was pretty shocked as well. I guess all Aero Glass needs is a Pixel Shader 2.0-compliant video card, and doesn't really give a damn about RAM or processor speed.

If you're looking to run Vista on your super P3, you might want to use a board that has a VIA chipset. The very common Intel i815 only takes up to 512MB of PC133 memory--not really enough for Vista. My board is based on the VIA Apollo Pro 266T, which has native Tualatin support and up to 3GB of DDR. You could probably get a board like this for cheap on eBay.

Whatever you do, have fun with it!

AMD Opteron 185 @ 3.0GHz
4.0GB of OCZ DDR400 RAM
8800GTS 640MB at 625/2000 core/mem, 1500 shader
Asus A8N32-SLI Deluxe
X-Fi, Vista 64-bit, yada yada


0

Response Number 10
Name: Cobra_R
Date: October 20, 2007 at 22:46:57 Pacific
Reply:

Tried it on a Socket 7 AMD K6-2 550mhz 512mb ram, problem is the onboard vga will not display normal mode, but it will display in safe mode. I take it that old VIA 64mb IGP can't handle it.


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Response Number 11
Name: jackbomb
Date: October 20, 2007 at 23:31:01 Pacific
Reply:

I'm pretty surprised that a Super 7 system has a 64MB IGP!

I think whatever caused my Super 7 system to hang during Vista installation was also video-related. On the P2 180MHz system, the screen would blank a few times during installation, but then come on again after a few seconds. However, on the Super 7 system, the screen would blank and stay dark.

AMD Opteron 185 @ 3.0GHz
4.0GB of OCZ DDR400 RAM
8800GTS 640MB at 625/2000 core/mem, 1500 shader
Asus A8N32-SLI Deluxe
X-Fi, Vista 64-bit, yada yada


0

Response Number 12
Name: Mattwizz3 (by mattwizz3)
Date: October 21, 2007 at 01:58:38 Pacific
Reply:

Yeah, I have a Via based board. bu this particular M/B only has a Via Apollo Pro 133 chipset which supports a max of 768MB of PC133. Although the FSB is actually running at 150MHz which gives the system some more kick. The system needs an adapter to use a Tualatin processor but otherwise it's a reasonably capable. The only thing that doesn't like a higher PCI clock was my USB 2.0 card. I'll have to make do with the onboard USB 1.1

I just bought a 1.4Ghz P3 so I'm waiting for that to come. I was wondering if i should get a 1.4GHz Tualatin based Celeron instead, with a multiplier of 14x I think I could get at least 1.7GHz that would be sweet.

Heh, Super Socket 7 systems and Tualatin systems are the best!


Mattwizz3 :

Vista Home Basic
A7N8X-E Deluxe
2.2GHz Sempron
2GB DDR400
GeForce 6800Ultra


0

Response Number 13
Name: Cobra_R
Date: October 21, 2007 at 21:19:25 Pacific
Reply:

I love my old super socket 7 system. My board is odd it has 2 slots but they are dual channel slots, it was one of the last super socket 7 boards made.



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Response Number 14
Name: jackbomb
Date: October 21, 2007 at 22:01:43 Pacific
Reply:

Mattwizz3, that 150MHz bus speed will definitely give it a boost. P3s, especially Tualatins, benefit greatly from faster bus speeds. They're pretty bandwidth-starved at the stock 133MHz.

Heh, just the opposite happened to my USB system. At my current 158MHz bus speed, the onboard USB 1.1 won't work. I had to buy a USB 2.0 card for it.

Cobra, 64MB IGP and dual channel memory on a Super 7 board? I'm intrigued! Which model is it?

AMD Opteron 185 @ 3.0GHz
4.0GB of OCZ DDR400 RAM
8800GTS 640MB at 625/2000 core/mem, 1500 shader
Asus A8N32-SLI Deluxe
X-Fi, Vista 64-bit, yada yada


0

Response Number 15
Name: Cobra_R
Date: October 22, 2007 at 11:55:10 Pacific
Reply:

Sorry I meant 32mb. It's a PC Chips motherboard with an ALi Aladin 7 chipset.

I tell you what was a solid cpu back in the day, those old Athlon slot 1's. I remember my friend having one and that thing had some performance for 550 mhz. It blew my K6-2 550 out of the water.


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Response Number 16
Name: Mattwizz3 (by mattwizz3)
Date: October 23, 2007 at 06:32:39 Pacific
Reply:

Yay! I got my 1.4GHz Tualatin in the mail today! Running like a dream @ 1.58GHz. Strangely the motherboard is able to correctly identify this CPU when it couldn't identify the older 1.13GHz Tualatin in before it.. Next on the list for this PC is a hand-me-down SATA hard drive, Its already got a PCI SATA controller ready. This thing is gonna fly!


Mattwizz3 :
My Take of the super P3:

P3 Tualatin @ 1.58GHz
SL-65DVB Motherboard
640Mb PC133 @ 150MHz
Sparkle 6200 256MB DDR2


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Response Number 17
Name: jackbomb
Date: October 23, 2007 at 10:21:05 Pacific
Reply:

Cobra, the Slot A Athlons were what actually made me notice AMD for the first time. Back in '99 when I was in the market for a new PC, I was definitely considering the Athlon-600. Benchmark scores were off the charts! Unfortunately, my wife, who would also use this PC, did not trust AMD and persuaded me to get a P3-550. Those first-gen P3s blew chunks...I regretted it. Damn TV ads.

Mattwizz, a Tualatin at 1.58 does fly! I was running mine at that speed till recently. Curious, what does it score in 3DMark01 (usually pretty CPU-bound)?

AMD Opteron 185 @ 3.0GHz
4.0GB of OCZ DDR400 RAM
8800GTS 640MB at 625/2000 core/mem, 1500 shader
Asus A8N32-SLI Deluxe
X-Fi, Vista 64-bit, yada yada


0

Response Number 18
Name: Mattwizz3 (by mattwizz3)
Date: October 23, 2007 at 21:55:01 Pacific
Reply:

4509 3D Marks. I just installed it then ran it so all at defaults. Not sure if thats a crap score or what. I'm pretty sure it could get better.

I'll keep trying. Got a few more things to tinker with before I'm happy.
Edit:
PS: What is the stock V-core voltage for the 1.4GHz Tualatin processor. Is it 1.45V or 1.5V?

Mattwizz3 :

Vista Home Basic
A7N8X-E Deluxe
2.2GHz Sempron
2GB DDR400
GeForce 6800Ultra


0

Response Number 19
Name: jackbomb
Date: October 24, 2007 at 16:09:22 Pacific
Reply:

There's gotta be a video bottleneck going on there. What's you video card? My Tualatin @ 1.66GHz manages 14,500 with a 9800Pro and 19,200 with a 7950GT (and with the 7950GT, it's completely CPU-limited; that video card isn't even trying).

As for the voltage, I believe that one stepping ran at 1.5v while the other(s) ran at 1.45v. Mine runs at 1.45v.

AMD Opteron 185 @ 3.0GHz
4.0GB of OCZ DDR400 RAM
8800GTS 640MB at 625/2000 core/mem, 1500 shader
Asus A8N32-SLI Deluxe
X-Fi, Vista 64-bit, yada yada


0

Response Number 20
Name: Cobra_R
Date: October 24, 2007 at 18:28:02 Pacific
Reply:

jackbomb why don't you put up your old p3 specs again in your sig. People seemed a heck of a lot more impressed by those specs and you seemed to have started some cult following by overclocking old prcoessors.


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Response Number 21
Name: Mattwizz3 (by mattwizz3)
Date: October 24, 2007 at 22:59:01 Pacific
Reply:

My P3 Has a 64Bit 6200 350MHZ Core 530Mem (DDR2) Its running at AGP 2X because of the motherboard. This thing plays Flatout2 flawlessly at 1024x768 high settings (No AA or AF). It strangely struggles to play the intro videos but is fine in-game. It is also playing Dawn Of War and GTA Vice City all fine. Dont know why I'm getting bad 3D marks.. Oh well

Mattwizz3 :

Vista Home Basic
A7N8X-E Deluxe
2.2GHz Sempron
2GB DDR400
GeForce 6800Ultra


0

Response Number 22
Name: Cobra_R
Date: October 25, 2007 at 00:47:38 Pacific
Reply:

whats the gpu on it?


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Response Number 23
Name: Mattwizz3 (by mattwizz3)
Date: October 25, 2007 at 06:13:14 Pacific
Reply:

A Sparkle GeForce 6200 "Ultra 2"
http://www.sparkle.com.tw/product_d...

Mattwizz3 :

Vista Home Basic
A7N8X-E Deluxe
2.2GHz Sempron
2GB DDR400
GeForce 6800Ultra


0

Response Number 24
Name: Cobra_R
Date: October 25, 2007 at 13:56:38 Pacific
Reply:

You try overclocking it?


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Response Number 25
Name: jackbomb
Date: October 25, 2007 at 14:31:24 Pacific
Reply:

There's the bottleneck. The GeForce 6200 (especially the 64-bit memory version) is not a very powerful card. The fact that the motherboard only supports AGP 2X doesn't help.

AMD Opteron 185 @ 3.0GHz
4.0GB of OCZ DDR400 RAM
8800GTS 640MB at 625/2000 core/mem, 1500 shader
Asus A8N32-SLI Deluxe
X-Fi, Vista 64-bit, yada yada


0

Response Number 26
Name: jackbomb
Date: October 25, 2007 at 14:36:59 Pacific
Reply:

Cobra, I'll show you why I took down my P3 sig.
Read responses 8 to 13 of this:

http://computing.net/gaming/wwwboar...

lol.

But I guess since it's back by popular demand (from you, lol) I could put the P3 sig back up. :P
I just hope I don't come across Sabertooth while it's up. :)

AMD Opteron 185 @ 3.0GHz
4.0GB of OCZ DDR400 RAM
8800GTS 640MB at 625/2000 core/mem, 1500 shader
Asus A8N32-SLI Deluxe
X-Fi, Vista 64-bit, yada yada


0

Response Number 27
Name: Cobra_R
Date: October 25, 2007 at 16:39:21 Pacific
Reply:

Who cares what people think you just do what you continue to do. :)

Nah, I noticed people look at your p3 and are interested in how you did it, I mean you converted Mattwizz3 to classic overclocking.



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Response Number 28
Name: Sabertooth
Date: October 25, 2007 at 17:48:52 Pacific
Reply:

"I just hope I don't come across Sabertooth while it's up. :)"

Don't worry you won't come across him & if you do tell him you've got a sharp fanged Cobra behind your back .... boo hoo hoo :-(


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Response Number 29
Name: jackbomb
Date: October 25, 2007 at 19:50:55 Pacific
Reply:

All right, so if I come across Sabertooth I'll just...WAIDAMINUTE!

You're psychic, aren't you?

So what do you think of the 180MHz Vista PC?

AMD Opteron 185 @ 3.0GHz
4.0GB of OCZ DDR400 RAM
8800GTS 640MB at 625/2000 core/mem, 1500 shader
Asus A8N32-SLI Deluxe
X-Fi, Vista 64-bit, yada yada


0

Response Number 30
Name: Sabertooth
Date: October 25, 2007 at 20:45:42 Pacific
Reply:

The 180MHz Vista rig is another "killer" idea & you should perhaps patent it.

As we all know, there are literally thousands of folks with decommissioned machines that wouldn't mind running Vista -- decently or otherwise. Although, you will need one heck of a salesman to pitch the exercise on a broader scale ..... LOL!


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Response Number 31
Name: Cobra_R
Date: October 25, 2007 at 21:48:16 Pacific
Reply:

Whats the next project, run xp with a 66mhz Intel DX chip with 32mb of EDO ram? :)


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Response Number 32
Name: jackbomb
Date: October 25, 2007 at 22:06:32 Pacific
Reply:

XP won't run on a 486, no matter what you do to it. It needs at least a Pentium.

However, back in 2000 a friend of mine was seriously running (this was not just for fun) a stripped-down Windows 2000 on his DX4-100 web server.

Can't wait for Microsoft's next OS though. I'll definitely be experimenting with how low it will go. :-)

AMD Opteron 185 @ 3.0GHz
4.0GB of OCZ DDR400 RAM
8800GTS 640MB at 625/2000 core/mem, 1500 shader
Asus A8N32-SLI Deluxe
X-Fi, Vista 64-bit, yada yada


0

Response Number 33
Name: Mattwizz3 (by mattwizz3)
Date: October 25, 2007 at 23:16:57 Pacific
Reply:

XP has run on a 8MHz PC with 20MB of RAM:
http://www.winhistory.de/more/386/x...
Its near the bottom of the page.

Yeah Cobra I have overclocked the 6200:
http://www.computing.net/cpus/wwwbo...

I might run 3D mark again with it overclocked and see what happens though. Cant do it now though because I need to get some thermal paste before I can fire her up again.

Mattwizz3 :

Vista Home Basic
A7N8X-E Deluxe
2.2GHz Sempron
2GB DDR400
GeForce 6800Ultra


0

Response Number 34
Name: jackbomb
Date: October 25, 2007 at 23:29:58 Pacific
Reply:

Holy crap! That's freaking sweet!
But notice that the 8MHz processor is an underclocked Pentium, not a 486.

AMD Opteron 185 @ 3.0GHz
4.0GB of OCZ DDR400 RAM
8800GTS 640MB at 625/2000 core/mem, 1500 shader
Asus A8N32-SLI Deluxe
X-Fi, Vista 64-bit, yada yada


0

Response Number 35
Name: Outlander
Date: November 7, 2007 at 06:44:23 Pacific
Reply:

Now does Vista run on an Original socket 4(I think) Pentium 60 is the question?


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Response Number 36
Name: Jaw-Dun Thai Wraa
Date: December 16, 2007 at 13:17:27 Pacific
Reply:

Windows Vista Ultimate may be better than stupid Home Premium for testing. Windows Vista btw is a waste for old computers, it takes up every cpu usage, but good job testing.


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