Strange Asus motherboard supporting two different processor and memory generations

[Kevin the Editor]

Ok, I'm sure that absolutely no one cares about this at all, but I didn't know it existed so I figured that I might as well share the knowledge with everyone else. 

 

Brief background: I received a donor desktop system (not at all worth it) from a Tweaker Tammy who got it from... Somewhere? Didn't ask questions. Just took the old junker to see if it was at all worth salvaging for who knows. Usually these end up as tinker projects I sit in a corner until I find something useful out of it and move on.

 

Anyway, this one "gaming" looking machine that had 1 gig of memory paired with a 128mb stick was at least interesting, so I took it and cracked it open. Realized problem 1 was that the pin layout for the cheapo power supply did not match the motherboard, which probably explains why it didn't cut on. 

 

Then when doing a bit of internet sleuthing on it, I came across the Asus P5VDC-MX, which was compatible with both Pentium 4/Celeron and D lineup, but also the Core2 extreme and duo processors. 

 

The extra interesting thing I found was that this was both DDR and DDR2 compatible as well. This machine came with DDR. 

 

Still pulling it apart, so who know what other finds I might have in here. Definitely not worth taking off of Tweaker Tammy's hands. Maybe I can repurpose the bent case for something.

 

Anyhow, thought this was an interesting side trip down computing memory lane. Enjoy!

[Guest]

Nice little retro rig there. 

I love coming across old hardware like this.

 

Somebodies old gaming rig, they wanted to increase memory. I've seen that quite a bit.

 

Back when overclocking would bring positive results and frame rates. 

What video card is that?

[Kevin the Editor]

No clue. I do know that it included a 2.93ghz Pentium 4...

 

Here's pic of video card.

[Guest]

Sticker on the back should have a part number. Probably includes the Gpu model. If not, remove the heat sink and it'll be on the core.

[svmlegacy]

Very similar to my Asus board with 6 DIMM slots, 4 DDR and 2 DDR2. LGA 775 was certainly an odd time for boards. I don't think mine supports Core 2, though.

[Guest]

Just now, svmlegacy said:

Very similar to my Asus board with 6 DIMM slots, 4 DDR and 2 DDR2. LGA 775 was certainly an odd time for boards. I don't think mine supports Core 2, though.

For sure. AsRock made some oddity boards like this too. 

 

Dual Sata II I think it was?

[svmlegacy]

Here's my board, for reference.

 

ASUS P5GDC Deluxe (https://www.asus.com/Motherboards/P5GDC_Deluxe/)

Somebody once told me it doesn't support P4 Cedar Mill CPU's, though I haven't verified that yet. Certainly no Core 2 Support.

 

 

[Kevin the Editor]

11 minutes ago, ShrimpBrime said:

Sticker on the back should have a part number. Probably includes the Gpu model. If not, remove the heat sink and it'll be on the core.

Finally took the heatsink off. This is a GeForce 4.

[Guest]

1 minute ago, Kevin the Editor said:

Finally took the heatsink off. This is a GeForce 4.

Very likely an MX 440. Very common card. AGP. Vintage at its finest.

[Kevin the Editor]

4 minutes ago, ShrimpBrime said:

Very likely an MX 440. Very common card. AGP. Vintage at its finest.

I had one of those back in the day.

 

As an aside, the amount of thermal paste on the graphics card and CPU was way more than needed.

[Guest]

1 hour ago, Kevin the Editor said:

I had one of those back in the day.

 

As an aside, the amount of thermal paste on the graphics card and CPU was way more than needed.

Me too. Was able to get some 10% OC on it too.