Can I run an AMD k6-3 450 with a FIC VA503+ motherboard?

[Bateluer]

This brings back some memories. Built my first computer around the K6-2's heyday, ended up going with a Celeron 433. First machine was a luggable Commodore 64 though.

 

[Iron Woode]

Is it me or many of the circa 2000 motherboards have gone south due to bad caps? I was cleaning out my closet yesterday and got a PPro 200mhz to fire up with with it's 128mb EDO DRAM, but I couldn't get my T-bred 3000+ to fire up in an Asus/VIA board. I couldn't also get an old Asus board with a P4 northie 1.8 to fire up either.

I have mostly seen boards made between 2002 and 2006 with bad caps. MSI seemed to have been hit the hardest.

 

[Rifter]

I have mostly seen boards made between 2002 and 2006 with bad caps. MSI seemed to have been hit the hardest.

This has been my experience as well and why i still to this day will not buy a MSI board. Lost way to many to bad caps in the past.

 

[bryanl]

I still use this computer:

 

[coolVariable]

I loved my K6-3+ 450MHz.
I had that beast running at 650MHz stable (if I remember correctly ... might have been even more).
Ahhh self-made watercooling ... silent and efficient.

 

[formulav8]

I have a K6-2+ 550mhz that easily runs over 600mhz.

If I had the time I would start a K6 shootout for the highest possible clockspeed and highest overall performance in 2 or 3 apps or something.

 

[Netopia]

I had the same mobo as the OP and a K6-3 400 in it. I ran through a number of video cards getting better and better rates on Quake 2. Man! Those were some fun days.

If I recall, that board didn't even have dip switches, did it? Didn't it have rows of jumpers to set multiplier and FSB speed?

 

[WhoBeDaPlaya]

Holy zombie Jesus!

 

[jihe]

Funny how this thread caught on. I can beat most of you by digging out a 66mhz pentium system.

I have a 386SX-20, still works after all these years, play nethack on it

 

[coolVariable]

I have a 386SX-20, still works after all these years, play nethack on it

I wish I could fine my old 386DLC-40 (yes, essentially a 286 with a math co-processor and some added instructions, so they got away with calling it a 386)

I think it was:
386DLC-40
486-DX-33
(maybe there was another 486 in here?)
Pentium 75(I think?)
Pentium 133
AMD K6-3 (OC to 650+?)
Pentium M 600MHz (laptop) (not the "new" pentium M but the 90's/2000's Pentium M)
Pentium M 1.2GHz (laptop) ("new" Centrino Pentium M)
Pentium III HT 2.8GHz (HTPC)
Core 2 1.5GHz (laptop)
AMD Athlon x2 5050e (HTPC)

 

[chucky2]

Yeah, they had the 486 DX2 50, 66, and DX4 100...maybe others I can't recall right now. There was also a Pentium 60 and 66 before the 75.

The K6-3 had the 400 and 450, then the mobile K6-3 had the 450+, which was on a .18 process instead of the .25. Because of the better process, the 450+ was good for almost a guaranteed 550, and a slightly less guaranteed 600.

The motherboards themselves, and the craptastic VIA chipsets that were on most of them, were the problems in those days. Had AMD produced their own chipset, and made it on par with Intel's, AMD would be in a far far far different position today. The instability that made people (including vendors and Corp's) shy away from AMD was because of that really bad decision.

I think those days were the most exciting, when Intel went to Slot-1 and AMD went Super-7...just seems like things were more interesting in PC-land then...

Chuck

 

[Pneumothorax]

I have a 386SX-20, still works after all these years, play nethack on it

That was my first overclock. I took the 40Mhz crystal and swapped in a 50mhz crystal to run my 386SX at 25mhz. No wait, I overclocked an AMD 286-8 to 286-12, that was smokin' back in the day (that required a 8mhz to 12mhz crystal swap). for us oldies, even dip switch/jumper overclocking was a revelation, you youngin's are spoiled with your fancy BIOSES! lol

 

[coolVariable]

Yeah, they had the 486 DX2 50, 66, and DX4 100...maybe others I can't recall right now. There was also a Pentium 60 and 66 before the 75.

The K6-3 had the 400 and 450, then the mobile K6-3 had the 450+, which was on a .18 process instead of the .25. Because of the better process, the 450+ was good for almost a guaranteed 550, and a slightly less guaranteed 600.

The motherboards themselves, and the craptastic VIA chipsets that were on most of them, were the problems in those days. Had AMD produced their own chipset, and made it on par with Intel's, AMD would be in a far far far different position today. The instability that made people (including vendors and Corp's) shy away from AMD was because of that really bad decision.

I think those days were the most exciting, when Intel went to Slot-1 and AMD went Super-7...just seems like things were more interesting in PC-land then...

Chuck

??

AFAIR, back then (before the Pentium Pro/Pentium II) the CPUs still worked in the same sockets, so you could take an AMD cpu and put it into an intel board.

 

[chucky2]

I was talking more about the Super-7 boards...and the crappiness that was (still is?) VIA. To this day, if there is a VIA chip used to do something on a motherboard, it is an automatic no go for me. Same with Enlight power supplies...

Chuck

 

[coolVariable]

I was talking more about the Super-7 boards...and the crappiness that was (still is?) VIA. To this day, if there is a VIA chip used to do something on a motherboard, it is an automatic no go for me. Same with Enlight power supplies...

Chuck

I really miss the "good old times" when any CPU would fit into any motherboard.
The current trend of proprietary CPUs (and constantly changing sockets) is horrible.
Intel still makes the best chipsets (hands down) but I really like AMD's low cost, low wattage CPUs.

 

[chucky2]

Yeah, it was nice...but at least competition got us out of the Intel price monopoly, which, sucked for us all.

What does suck that you point out is all the chipset and socket changes. AMD isn't as bad, but, Intel....yeesh, it's insane with them.

Chuck

 

[coolVariable]

Yeah, it was nice...but at least competition got us out of the Intel price monopoly, which, sucked for us all.

What does suck that you point out is all the chipset and socket changes. AMD isn't as bad, but, Intel....yeesh, it's insane with them.

Chuck

Wasn't the price because everybody needed to license the socket (and/or chipset) IP from intel?


I even remembered the board I used to have: Asus P55T2P4

 

[aldamon]

Even the XP 3200+ is starting to show its age. Throw a bunch of flash or java on a web page and it chokes.

Is that an indictment of the 3200+ or Flash/Java?

 

[superunknown98]

The motherboards themselves, and the craptastic VIA chipsets that were on most of them, were the problems in those days. Had AMD produced their own chipset, and made it on par with Intel's, AMD would be in a far far far different position today. The instability that made people (including vendors and Corp's) shy away from AMD was because of that really bad decision.
Chuck

I know some of their early chipsets were not so good, but around the VIA KT133A, quality was acceptable. I had a few abit boards that were running untill a few years ago.

 

[JimmiG]

I had the same mobo as the OP and a K6-3 400 in it. I ran through a number of video cards getting better and better rates on Quake 2. Man! Those were some fun days.

If I recall, that board didn't even have dip switches, did it? Didn't it have rows of jumpers to set multiplier and FSB speed?

I had a K6-2 450 MHz. First system I built (well a friend built it and I mostly watched). It was a pretty crappy CPU for games compared to the Pentium II, but it was a huge upgrade from the Pentium 133 I had before... In the few games that took advantage of 3DNow!, it was a little better. Playing games at 15-20 FPS instead of 5 FPS was a huge leap for me

My next CPU was the Athlon T-Bird 900 MHz on the Asus A7V. Unlike the Abit KT133 board, which pioneered BIOS overclocking, you still had to use DIP-switches to overclock (got mine to the magical 1 GHz mark). My friend got his Duron 600 MHz to something like 850 MHz, which made me feel like I wasted a ton of money.

 

[Lark888]

My basement server running 24/7 is a K6-3+ @600MHz on a Tyan motherboard. It is running Windows 2003 Server edition. I am thinking about retiring the PC only because I can replace this 80watt (total draw) system with a 39 watt AMD BE2300 setup to save a couple of bucks each month on my electric bill. However, I dislike putting a perfectly good system on the dead electronics shelf.

I do run my IBM Aptiva 100Mhz Pentium every now and then as a stand alone PC to run a theater music rehearsal program (Win95). Nothing I have older than that is still functional although I have a RadioShack TRS-80 in parts somewhere in the attic.

 

[coolVariable]

My basement server running 24/7 is a K6-3+ @600MHz on a Tyan motherboard. It is running Windows 2003 Server edition. I am thinking about retiring the PC only because I can replace this 80watt (total draw) system with a 39 watt AMD BE2300 setup to save a couple of bucks each month on my electric bill. However, I dislike putting a perfectly good system on the dead electronics shelf.

I do run my IBM Aptiva 100Mhz Pentium every now and then as a stand alone PC to run a theater music rehearsal program (Win95). Nothing I have older than that is still functional although I have a RadioShack TRS-80 in parts somewhere in the attic.

Ugh? The new AMD is 45W ... meaning the new system would likely draw approx. the same power (or just a tiny bit less). New (green) HDDs would probably make a bigger difference.

 

[nemesismk2]

With all this talk of the K6-2 I thought I had gone back 10 years. lol

I owned the following:-

amd k6 200mhz
amd k6 II 333mhz
amd k6 II 550mhz (hot as hell)

Good days

I've been using just AMD ever since my first AMD cpu amd 386 dx 40mhz quickly followed by the amd 486 dx4 100mhz.

 

[WhoBeDaPlaya]

I still have my 386DX-40 (AMD to Intel : "Your DX-33 can suck it bitches!") system somewhere. Installing a Quantum HDD to replace the crapola Seagate actually raised the LOD I could turn on in Indycar Racing

 

[chucky2]

Wasn't the price because everybody needed to license the socket (and/or chipset) IP from intel?


I even remembered the board I used to have: Asus P55T2P4

Intel's CPU price was because they were/are greedy F'ers who can charge whatever they want because they're Intel.

The day that AMD goes bankrupt, Intel CPU development will 1/2-1/3, and likely the prices for their current and certainly their next released parts will double - triple.

Chuck