I spotted a vintage computer in the basement.
I spotted a vintage computer in the basement.
My wife and I were cleaning out the basement when I stumbled upon this old PC. Back in the early 2000s I had volunteered to collect donated computers and install them into local school networks. Some of the computers were defect and got shelved until I had the time to repair them. I couldn't buy new parts for them, so I canabalized parts from the others to build ones that I could use in the installs. After the project was over I had a couple of boxes of parts that normally would have been tossed, so I took them home. At the time, my mother-in-law needed a computer to surf the net, so I built the one shown in the photos from some of those parts.
Blew all the dust out and surprisingly it still works.
Specs:
CPU: AMD Sempron 2200+ 1.5GHz
CPU Cooler: Thermaltake TR2
RAM: 2x 512MB DDR 1 PC2700 333MHz
GPU: Club 3D ATI (now AMD) Radeon 9600 Pro 128MB 128bit AGP (max power draw 18 watts)
Motherboard: ASRock K7S41
Hard Drives: 2x Maxtor 80GB IDE
Drives: Plextor PX-708A CD/DVD burner and LG CD/DVD player
PSU: Golden Field (??? no idea where this came from) 350 watt
Also, there was an old 15" TFT display that still worked too.
At first I was going to toss it all into the dumpster, but changed my mind. Now I want to use it for older games like: Act of War, Red Alert 2 and such...
It seems you've got a solid setup with your old gear. You're considering a fresh Socket A build and have a variety of components ready, including an Athlon XP 3200+, Radeon 9700 Pro, GTX 6800 Ultra, KT800, and Nforce 2 boards. Your current rig runs Windows 98 and DOS with GeForce 2 MX400, 64GB SSD, and Sound Blaster Live.
I was aiming to make a small improvement, so I checked some older CPUs and RAM units. But I don’t have any other Socket A CPUs that would be better than what’s already there. The same goes for the RAM—my only DDR1 modules are 512MB. About a year ago I discarded a NVIDIA GeForce 6800 and a 7800 GPU. That was a shame, I could have used one of those here. Also, the CPU cooler is quite noisy, so I’ll need to replace the fan.
That case looks very familiar and I probably have a bunch of Celeron and Sempron computers gathering dust up in the roof space.
The only thing I'd caution against is the age of the PSU. There's always a nagging doubt that a 17-year PSU might stop working the next time you switch on the PC (the Sempron 2200+ was released in August 2004)
There's no easy way to determine if the PSU's electrolytics are drying out, unless you possess an oscilloscope and can measure the DC ripple on the +12V, +5V and +3.3V supply rails under load, but this only checks out the secondary circuits.
If the main 420V DC bulk electrolytic in the primary circuit dries out, the PSU will die, sometimes with a bang and a puff of smoke.
Assuming the PSU is a standard ATX unit with a 20-way or 24-way main connector, plus a 4-way or 8-way 12V DC supply for the CPU, consider changing it for something newer.
That's helpful guidance. The only additional PSU I own is a Bequiet! Straight Power 750 watt. I keep that one on hand in case I need to return the one in my system. I checked out some 400 watt PSUs and they usually cost around 35 Euros, so I think I'll likely get one of those.