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Greeting once again LTT. following the completion of Project Nalu recently, I had some discussions on facebook regarding what I was planing next. I can Finally give out the next project. My 5th retro PC build, Project Ruby. Project Ruby is be based around 2005-6 hardware. Below I will have an ever updating list of hardware as I confirm the final parts. Unlike Project Nalu where it was aimed at the end of era agp. Project Ruby is something slightly different. Ruby will be a high end multimedia gaming PC. What do I mean by that? back before HDMI ports where added and the switch to "HD" gaming. ATI used to make GPU's sporting the name "All-In-Wonder" These where GPU's with an onboard analog/digital TV tuner as well as a huge array of VIVO ports. This build will mix high end gaming with live tv & AV capture capabilities. Think the ability to watch a live Cricket match, while playing & capturing Nintendo 64 gameplay footage, then switching to something like Crysis for a bit of serious gaming. This original post will be dynamic and update each step, things may change and evolve along the way so keep an eye on it for major updates to the build. However I will post photos, benchmarks & comments about the build process along the way down the thread as well. Core Hardware - so far. AMD Athlon FX-62 2.8Ghz AM2 ABIT AM2 Motherboard (TBA) 4x2Gb Crucial Ballistix Tracer DDR2 800Mhz ATI Radeon X1950XTX 512Mb (Crossfire variant) ATI Radeon X1800XL All-In-Wonder 256Mb Creative X-Fi XtremeGamer Fatal1ty Pro WD Raptor SATA Drives WD Storage Drives Lian Li PC Case (TBA) This is very early in the process, so updates will be slow, especially since I will also be going overseas for a 3 week holidays in feb. I am hoping to post photos of the main hardware before then. I do already have a couple of the parts in my display cabinet so they will be posted up soon.

Hello people's. (Hell I realised it's a long post so I'll post a shorter thing at the bottom) So as it stands, I'm looking at buying a optiplex 9010 from eBay at the end of the week. I've seen a few between £100 and £200. I am getting it with the sole purpose of having a play around with a few flavours of Linux along with doing a few things on them. (Thinking along the lines of a email client, Minecraft server, pfsense box, nas box, Plex server to see how it goes). After i have satisfied my want of messing around with this I'm looking at running it as a retro gaming machine. This brings me to here with you lovely people. When I am content I am looking at putting a low profile GPU into the machine, 2x HDD and maybe a blue ray drive. My question to everyone is as follows, what upgrade path should I take? The machine will have 4 dimm slots (for possible up to 33gb ram), 3 sata data connections (it comes with 1 dvd and HDD) and 1x pcie x16 and x4 slot. I have not got a budget yet though cheaper the better atm, I am hoping to fill all slots. Tanks for any suggestions (Bit at the bottom) Hoping for suggestions on low profile GPUs (single slot would be perfect) to play retro games and guild wars? Hoping for advice on if I should also upgrade ram to a suitable level? (getting one with 8gb pre installed) Should I also put extra hard drives and a different dvd drive in?

1.2 BUILD UPDATE: Due to ongoing and unfixable issues with Steam, Web browsing, software & driver stability due to the lack of SSE support on the CPU. I have decided to switch to an Intel Pentium 4 platform. All parts will remain the same except for CPU & Motherboard. I have updated the list to reflect the new parts that are already in transit. Now I have done quite extensive researching into what chip northbridge/prescott etc to get. The Northwood while on average is 3-5% slower, it runs much cooler. The 3.4Ghz version I have bought is roughly 15-20% faster in gaming performance over the AMD XP 3200+. So performance numbers are still within the range of what I want. 1.2 Upgrade Perks: CPU Support for SSE2 - This will fix all the unforeseen issues I'm having. Hyper Threading - Effective duel core, almost. Support for upto 4Gb of System Ram - opposed to the 3gb limit on the AMD board. 2 SATA Raid ports - This means I can look at getting 1 or 2 Western Digital Raptor drives. (not wanting SSD's) Background: (1.2 updated) This project started out as an idea to build a 2nd gaming PC dedicated to run games from between the 2000-2005 era. The idea was to focus the build on 2 great icons from that era of pc gaming. The Intel P4 Northwood 3.4Ghz HT & the Nvidia Geforce 6800 ultra AGP 256mb GPU. Now I know the Intel P4 & 6800 Ultra don't align together in the hardware universe timeline perfectly. But they both had a decent crossover and both represent the end of an era. The Twist: I wanted to build the system in a modern case, but have it still look as retro. The Thermaltake View 27 was the perfect case for this. Its unique window design shows off the hardware perfectly and paired with their TT Riing fans it looks stunning. Chuck in a couple cold cathodes and it looks right out of 2004. Below are the parts I have so far obtained over the past 12 months. Most of these are near new or brand new. In hand/In system: Intel Pentium 4 3.4Ghz HT Northwood. Soltek SL-86SPE-L Intel 478 865PE Motherboard. OCZ Platinum Edition 4x1Gb PC3200 CAS2.5. (In-transit) Nvidia Geforce 6800 Ultra Extreme Edition 256mb AGP. Creative Audigy 2 ZS Platinum. M-Audio Audiophile 24/96 MIDI Card. BFG Tech Ageia PPU PCI Card. Western Digital 320Gb 16mb cache IDE drive. Western Digital Raptor 10K SATA Drive. (In-transit) Zalman CNPS9500 Copper Blue LED CPU HSF. (In-transit) (now backup) EK Supreme Plexi/Copper Waterblock. (In-transit) XSPC 240mm Radiator. EK-XRES 140 DDC 3.2 PWM Elite. Zalman Mini Rose Northbridge Cooler. Sony External USB DVD/CD Reader. Seasonic 500 Watt PSU. Thermaltake View 27 Case. Thermaltake Riing Blue LED fans. 19" 1280x1024 LG LCD 4:3. Bitspower 30cm Blue Cold Cathode. DFI UV Green IDE ribbon Cable. UV Green SATA 15cm Cable. Logitech G518 Mouse. Razor Marauder SIlver/Blue LED Keyboard. (In-transit) Build 1.2 Overclocking Results: SEE POST LATER IS THREAD FOR DETAILS. ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Retired due to lack of SSE2 extension support Retired Build 1.0 Hardware AMD Athlon XP 3200+ Barton. OCZ Platinum Edition 2x1Gb PC3200 CAS2 Shuttle AN35N Ultra Motherboard. Thermaltake Silent Boost HSF. Apevia 520W PSU ATX-AS520W-BK. Build 1.0 Overclocking Results: XP 3200+ @2.425Ghz stock voltage. FSB @220Mhz / Multiplier @x11 OCZ Ram @440Mhz CAS2.5:3:3:5 2.7v 6800 Ultra Extreme Edition @450/1100Mhz (stock) ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Please see replies for photos, screenshots & videos.

So I recently set out to build a vintage Sony Vaio desktop setup. I just got the system in today and I turn it on and go about setting everything up seems fine. It came ready out the box as if it was new system I just clicked threw the options set it up. Updated to SP3 as the default system was on sp1. The issue im having is every time I reset the pc it goes into a default lowest resolution of 800x600 and windows XP tells me I can of course raise the resolution higher. If I use windows display properities it will list the max resolution as 1900x1440. However if I use my Ati settings I can use the monitors actual native resolution which is 2304x1440. Once i've set the resolution with the ati settings I can go back to the windows display setting and it now shows the max resolution as 2304x1440. Running Windows XP Sp3 Direct X 9.0c Hardware Pentium 4 2.9ghz 478 socket ( will up to 3.4ghz ) 1GB DDR ram ( will max the board with whatever its max is, probably 2gb ) HIS ati 4670 1 GB GDDR3 version Im just trying to stablity test with the system before changing out to a ssd and doing a complete clean install just wanna make sure it works.

So I have all of the parts for my old computer, now I just need to bring it to my grandma's this weekend and hope she has her camera at home (otherwise I'll have to take pictures with my mom's Lumia 520). The specs are below. Intel WS440BX Intel Slot 1 Pentium 3 @ 500MHz (512KB cache, 100MHz FSB) 512MB PC100 RAM (1x256MB, 2x128MB) Some random DVD/CD-RW drive Maxtor DiamondMax Plus 8 (I think) 40GB 3dfx VooDoo 3 3000 16MB AGP 2x Either my SoundBlaster 16 or my old Riptide (leaning towards the Riptide) ASUS IDE cables Allied AL-A300ATX 300 watt Windows 98 SE Right now, I don't have a name picked out, but I'm thinking Steve will be the codename for it.