[ADVICE NEEDED] Retro Gaming Rig - HP dx2000 MT (Windows XP Professional - 32bit)

[K11_Jupiter]

Hello All! I've recently started quite an ambitious build, as you may have gathered already from the title of this thread. The idea of building something like this has always got my brain ticking over but I have never had the means to create something like this. Until now. I'm now looking to upgrade the heck out of this machine and completely rinse this thing for the most performance as possible and so I'm now asking what people think I should seek out in terms of the following:

- CPU

- Video Card

- PSU

- IDE HDD/SSD

- Optical Drive

 

Here are some photos to help you folks get some idea of what I am working with. any help will be most appreciated!

 

 

Sincerely - Jupiter. 

[it_dont_work]

Without having an agp or pcie slot its probably not the best option for an xp era retro rig

[K11_Jupiter]

12 minutes ago, it_dont_work said:

Without having an agp or pcie slot its probably not the best option for an xp era retro rig

Still doable though. It doesn't bother me if its not gonna be the best in the world but it will be something not many people would have.

 

[RBorshuk]

You're really limited in video cards on PCI only. you kinda have 3 options with XP drivers, if you can even find them, they were all made by Zotac back when they made weird stuff for no apparent reason.  If you want to run an even older OS, you might need older cards than these for driver support.

Best PCI Card is a GeForce 430.  This is the most powerful PCI card ever made.  The second best, and newest was the GeForce GT 520.  There was also the GeForce GT 610, but that was just a rebranded GT 520.  Exactly the same card, just a new name.

 

With any of these cards though, you'll notice a bottle neck with the PCI slot even just scrolling in a web browser.  The cards are faster than the slot.

[K11_Jupiter]

56 minutes ago, RBorshuk said:

You're really limited in video cards on PCI only. you kinda have 3 options with XP drivers, if you can even find them, they were all made by Zotac back when they made weird stuff for no apparent reason.  If you want to run an even older OS, you might need older cards than these for driver support.

Best PCI Card is a GeForce 430.  This is the most powerful PCI card ever made.  The second best, and newest was the GeForce GT 520.  There was also the GeForce GT 610, but that was just a rebranded GT 520.  Exactly the same card, just a new name.

 

With any of these cards though, you'll notice a bottle neck with the PCI slot even just scrolling in a web browser.  The cards are faster than the slot.

Would you be able to link the cards mentioned?

Thank you

[RBorshuk]

17 minutes ago, K11_Jupiter said:

Would you be able to link the cards mentioned?

Thank you

No, in fact on PCI (non express) systems, all of the PCI slots share the same bandwidth.  So you have standard 33mhz PCI slots in this rig, which translates to a total of 133 Mbps.  Slower than USB 3.0.  But it is shared with all the slots, so if you have a video card in slot one, and a network card in slot two, they both have to share that 133 Mbps between them, so they both slow down.

 

While you could run 2 video cards, (but not in SLI of Crossfire modes) if you say needed more plugs for more monitors, performance would tank.

 

The exception would be way back in the day on even older hardware than what we're talking about when 3dFX invented SLI on their Voodoo 2 cards.   Those were PCI cards that linked together, but they were much slower than these GeForce we're talking about now, and pre-windows XP.  More like DOS gaming retro days.

[K11_Jupiter]

9 hours ago, RBorshuk said:

No, in fact on PCI (non express) systems, all of the PCI slots share the same bandwidth.  So you have standard 33mhz PCI slots in this rig, which translates to a total of 133 Mbps.  Slower than USB 3.0.  But it is shared with all the slots, so if you have a video card in slot one, and a network card in slot two, they both have to share that 133 Mbps between them, so they both slow down.

 

While you could run 2 video cards, (but not in SLI of Crossfire modes) if you say needed more plugs for more monitors, performance would tank.

 

The exception would be way back in the day on even older hardware than what we're talking about when 3dFX invented SLI on their Voodoo 2 cards.   Those were PCI cards that linked together, but they were much slower than these GeForce we're talking about now, and pre-windows XP.  More like DOS gaming retro days.

Okay. As for tracking these down, do you think you could help me find websites that sell this.

[RBorshuk]

49 minutes ago, K11_Jupiter said:

Okay. As for tracking these down, do you think you could help me find websites that sell this.

EBay is your best bet.

[K11_Jupiter]

13 minutes ago, RBorshuk said:

EBay is your best bet.

Thank you!

[RBorshuk]

3 hours ago, K11_Jupiter said:

Thank you!

Of course.  Honestly, I'd say for a retro XP gaming pc, you probably want to start with a better motherboard with an AGP, or PCI-E slot.  This PCI only one is going to prevent you from really making anything decent.