Recommendations for a mobo upgrade ?

[BogdanV]

I have a Gigabyte GA-8IPE775 motherboard (my mobo's specs) and I want to replace it with a newer mobo on which I can run Win98SE/ME.

I'm replacing this mobo because all supplies of AGP, Win98-compatible video cards with SM3.0 support (new and second-hand) have been exhausted in my town and I have to upgrade to PCI-E.

All that I want to change is the graphics card (X1300-incompatible with 9x) and the motherboard.

The minimum, vital specs that I need are :

- 775 CPU Socket (for my P4 CPU that I don't want to change)

- DDR 400 support (I recently bought a RAM upgrade and I don't want to ditch 2GBs of RAM)

- PCI-e support

Oh and my budget would be of maximum 100 EUR.

If someone from Romania knows a big IT company that sells mobos with these specs, please tell me. I'm really exasperated because every mobo I find has only DDR II support and those with DDR 400 are either of the wrong socket or with AGP and no PCIe.

Thanks in advance!

[the xt guy]

You already have one of the best MB's for running Windows 98. I have a Gigabyte 8I865-GME-775RH (which seems very similar to yours) which I bought new in 2007 from Newegg. It has a Pentium 3.6 ghz CPU. It has Intel 865/ICH5 chipsets like yours, which fully supports 98. Newer Intel chipsets such as ICH7, 8 or 9 do not have any Win98 drivers. You would have to use a board with a VIA chipset.

PCI-E video does NOT support Windows 98. There aren't any PCI-E cards that have Win98 drivers and you will be stuck with 640x480 in 16 colors (not 16 bit!) I know there is some generic PCI-E driver (Bearwindows?) but it is very limited on 98. I can't recall for certain but I think it is only VESA VGA (which goes back about 20 years, pre Windows 3.1) and likely doesn't even support DirectX (any version).

Edited July 15, 2009 by the xt guy

[BogdanV]

Well, in "Compatible hardware with Windows 9x", it is stated that

Windows 9x supports PCI, AGP (1,2,4,8) and PCIe graphics cards if a suitable driver is available.

Also I recall reading through some threads that there were unofficial drivers made for Geforce 7000-9000? series.

EDIT: Oh, here it is, from the same thread as mentioned above :

GeForce Fx --- AGP & PCIe

GeForce 6 --- AGP & PCIe (6800 last card to be officially supported by nVIDIA)

GeForce 7 --- AGP & PCIe (Requires UnOfficial Driver)

GeForce 8 --- AGP & PCIe (Requires UnOfficial Driver)

Edited July 15, 2009 by BogdanV

[dencorso]

It's complicated... There is some support for PCI-e cards. It's worked OK for some and just didn't work for others.

You can take your chances. But I think a GeForce 8 is too much risky. Now, if I were you, I'd try harder to get an AGP card before giving up. There is eBay in some places, and similar services are popping evrerywhere, so I'm sure something like that must be available to you in Romania. That's a way to widen your search beyond your city and have more options...

[Guest wsxedcrfv]

Look at the Asrock dual-VSTA or 4-core dual-VSTA. Based on VIA PT-880 chipset.

It's got AGP *and* PCIe.

It's got DDR *and* DDR2 memory slots.

Win-98 drivers for everything on the board except the ALC-888 (?) sound chip.

I've tried to get Nvidia 6200 PCIe cards running on it under win-98 but have had no luck, but I haven't tried for over a year. Maybe I'd be able to do it today.

[cooksy]

Agree, the 4coredual sata is an excellent mobo, I have one running with win98se, WinXP and Win7. Both AGP and PCI Cards are working for Win98. Even a 7900gs with the modified nvidia-drivers (in PCIe slot).

At first I had a P4 at 3.2 GHz, upgrade to Pentium Dual Core 5200 is simple, and you may increase the FSB to 230 MHz easily. The Mobo and a Pentium Dual Core is together about 100 Euro.

[BogdanV]

No chance in hell to find anything on AGP. Its either Nvidia FX5500 or ATi's HD series. That's all I've found, either on the net or locally.

Given the situation, I'm willing to risk using PCI-E.

Although I'd gladly follow your mobo recommendations , I'm afraid that 4core/dual-VSTA shares the same fate as with my AGP cards. Its nowhere to be found.

Alas, what I did manage to find is a ton of mother boards with Intel ICH7 (which, unofficially, it seems that it can be made to work) coupled with a Intel G31 chipset.

I'd risk going for such a board, but I couldn't find anything about this Intel G31 (it seems to be something, multimedia-related; that's all I could find).

What do you guys know about this G31 ? Is it vital and if yes, can it be made to run (un/officially) ?

Thanks again for your help!

[BogdanV]

Excluding the G31 chipset, I think I've settled for MSI's P4M900M3-L board which looks pretty decent. (I'll have to ditch the DDR400s unfortunately)

Next thing is to find a suitable GeForce and pray that all will work in the end. (I'd also have to check the shop's return policy)

EDIT:

Upgrade proposal : mobo -> MSI P4M900M3-L

video -> Asus Geforce 7300GT (256mb)

RAM -> 1GB Kingmax (667Mhz)

I'll probably try to expand the RAM in the future, but these are the specs I'm running for now. If anyone has any comments/advice/warnings, please tell.

Edited July 22, 2009 by BogdanV