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Project MBOX
maidtina - Mar 15, 2002

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 maidtina Mar 15, 2002
To all the sega Xtreme group, I am developing a PC based system in the shell of a mark 1 european mega CD / megadrive. I already have the, erm, case and am planning the motherboard, and thinking about fan placement and cooling. It will have a Gig processor at least, preferably AMD on a MATX footprint board. What i am looking for is ideas to use, aesthetics suggestions and general feedback on this idea.

rich

 Ratamahatta Mar 15, 2002
how are you going to build something like that? you'd need a micro powersupply and micro atx board, is video and such going to be built onto the board?

 MasterAkumaMatata Mar 15, 2002
Are you doing this all by yourself?

 Gear Mar 15, 2002
remember to bring space for a tv out plug.

also, you will have a lot of heat problems...

 Grifter Mar 16, 2002
Actually you can have a better chance of doing that using a VIA C3 processor, therefore you will lower the need for cooling sense those processors only require a heatsink. And put that together with Small Form Factor (SFF) motherboard , and your pretty much set. if you've seen the shuttle SV24 barebone systems you can see that they're not too bad with intergrated video, audio,usb, LAN, and firewire. You would save a lot more space, and probably need one fan to cool things down. And Shuttle will release the SS40 and SS50 SFF systems which use DDR with either Intel or AMD processor support within this month I think.

The only problem you would have then besides getting it in that case would be to pay for that little system...which I hear will be pretty expensive. But much cheaper than using laptop parts, and you aviod all the size, power, and heat problems micro-atx platforms require for the size of the case you are planning to use.

Here are links to a preview of the new SS50 system, and a review of the SV24 system that's avaliable already:

http://www.viahardware.com/ss50preview.shtm...

http://www.viahardware.com/sv24_1.shtm...

Hope that helps.

 maidtina Mar 16, 2002
Yes, there is a new board coming out called a via eden, it is 17cm square with everything on board. It is so cool it doesnt need a fan

its too slow for my linink, I am planning a MATX board and use a coolermaster, the heatsink will go under the dome at the top. I was thinking about using a riser card for the graphics and mount it horizontally.

Yep this is my puppy

I will probably use a laptop hard drive and take the case off a micro power supply. Also for cooling i will dremel out the cooling grill on the left side and mount a fan in the riser on the right hand side. The fan sits nicely between the mountings for it - i checked

I am still working out whether to use blue LEDs or go Old Skool

 Pearl Jammzz Mar 17, 2002
old skool! old skool! old skool! old skool! old skool! old skool! old skool! old skool! old skool! old skool! old skool! old skool! old skool! old skool! old skool! old skool! old skool! old skool! old skool! old skool! old skool! old skool! old skool! old skool! old skool! old skool! old skool! old skool! old skool! old skool! old skool! hehe, go old skool!

 Captian Crazy Mar 17, 2002
Laptop hard drives are easy to find. Good luck.

 maidtina Mar 17, 2002
Got a 6 gig one on my desk i got for 35 quid

okok, i get the hint, old school lights, but i might stick a blue behind the CD logo..

anyway, off for a kebab

 Captian Crazy Mar 17, 2002
If you wernt in the UK, I'd see if I could give you some online stores for parts.

 maidtina Mar 17, 2002
Thats ok, i got some shit hot online shops.

Am wondering at the moment whether to buy a slimline CD drive or to inverse mount the motherboard and use a full size one.

 maidtina Mar 18, 2002
OK, got a big design problem. Im going to have to epoxy most of the case together but i need to make it so i can get in it, hopefully in a manor that i can show off the contents. Looking at a hinged lid but where to put the hinges?

 maidtina Mar 20, 2002
Oh well, given up desoldering bits of megadrive for the night (cant find my soldersucker) and making a big vat of chips. Starting to get the parts for the volume control / reset / power board. Gone on to finding the sexiest switches to control the region crack for my mega CD

Just having a though. I know some people in this channel have collected mega modems. Has anyone tried to reverse engineer them yet? I think i can rewire the third port on a board. Probably not worth the effort but the thought of a megadrive with a modem appeals to me

 gamefoo21 Mar 20, 2002
well if your going to go with the older school 1 gig amd i would advise a p3 instead they run faster than the equivalent amd athlon and they run cooler. P4 sucks i am sorry to say but P3's are better than there amd counterparts.

 SkankinMonkey Mar 20, 2002
moron, amd's run faster than intel chips, i don't know where you get your information from.

 gamefoo21 Mar 20, 2002
uh no and thank you for not flaming me in the future. but even my pro amd friends say that a p3 runs as fast even faster than a heat generating beast amd at the same speed intel screwed up with p4's but even so an amd that is posed to be equal or plus to a p4 looses out in some bench's to the p4 equivalent. so and i have had alotta exp. with both chips and amd's have gotten better. but p3 and is still equal or better than the equivalent athlon. oh and pentiums still run cooler. so

all p1,2,3 were great amd killers. but p4 is a intel killer.

 ExCyber Mar 20, 2002
IIRC, the Athlon and P3 series kind of leapfrogged. I think it went something like:

K7 beat Katmai

Coppermine beat K7

Thunderbird beat Coppermine (but not by much)

Tualatin beat Thunderbird (but not by much)

I've got no idea how Palomino fits into this, since everyone's been putting it up against P4...

A Tualatin P3 would probably be your best bet for a good heat/power to performance ratio from what I've heard - the core was supposedly designed for laptop use. Going with a P3 system probably also opens up the mainboard selection a bit more so you'd be more likely to find one that fits your needs.

edit: come to think of it, I think Palomino (i.e. Athlon XP/MP) was designed for laptop use too, but I'd still suggest scanning the mainboard market before you decide which one to go with...

(Edited by ExCyber at 8:35 pm on Mar. 20, 2002)

 maidtina Mar 21, 2002
From what i gather AMDs have more grunt than intel and they are a fraction of the price. Sod the heat, thats what fans are for Who cares if its a mega CD that sounds like an aircraft taking off

 ExCyber Mar 21, 2002
Yeah, regardless of the way these procs are benchmarked, AMD has offered a #### of a lot more power per dollar for about as long as I can remember...

 gamefoo21 Mar 21, 2002
i dunno oh all the amd's i have ever owned. they have all been finicky buggers that like to stall every once and awhile. although i had some luck with underclocking the amd's seemed to make em run cooler and more stable.

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