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Type one failure.

Type two failure.

Motherboard incompatibility so far run into three catagories- Garbled display on boot up (1) display artifacts (menu ghosting) after the driver is loaded and in 16/32 bit (2) and the last is absence of the first two failures but crashing shortly when most 3d applications are launched. (3)

BIOS SETTINGS.

Set all video shadowing and caching to off, Set AGP to 1x, Shut USB support OFF and most of all set AGP aperture size as low as possible! Most motherboards go only as low as 4mb. Set all AGP related read/write settings to off.

In the Windows DXdiag panel set AGP Texture Acceleration to disabled.

Best OS to date has been Win98SE with a slight edge over WinME, running DX9.0B.

Do NOT install any VIA chipset packs, I tried 4.35 and it caused massive problems.

1) Best motherboard so far (by a longshot) has been an Abit VA6 (ApolloPro133 chipset) running a P3-800 in a slocket adapter, BIOS date 9/26/00. USB on or off seems to make no difference.

2) Next best has been Epox 8K3A+ (KT-333 chipset) if USB is left on in BIOS you will get error number two shown above. BIOS date 9/16/03

3) Abit KT7A (KT-133A) Version 1.3 with BIOS date 8/22/02 has type three failure, tried both WinME and Win98SE with little to no change.

4) Abit BE6 (Intel BX chipset) Version 1.1, rendering error two, unable to disable USB.

5) Epox 8KHA+ AMD Socket (KT-266A chipset) error number one.

6) Biostar? MT6BA Slot One (Intel BX chipset) Version 1.5, error number one.

7) Tyan Dual slot one motherboard with BX chipset, failure two.

8) Compaq OEM Slot One motherboard with LX/EX chipset, failure two.

9) MSI MS-6187 Slot A with Irongate 751-756 chipset, failure one.

10) MSI MS-6191 Slot A with Irongate 750-756. Motherboard works fairly well, on par or near to it with Abit VA6.

11) Lucky Star 6VA693A Slot one motherboard.

Motherboard resource conflict in windows with Rampage, unable to resolve.

12) ASUS A7N8X V2.0 Nforce2 Ultra 400 chipset. AMD Socket.

AGP Pro interface, no hardware issues noted which surprised me. Everest indicated AGPx1, the most I could close down the AGP aperture size was 32mb. Would run some applications but they always crashed.

13) ASUS A7PRO V1.05 KT-133 chipset AMD socket.

Runs better than A7N8X but crashes out after awhile.

So far the VA6 and MSI MS-6191 are the best.

Just a thought here, but if AGP implementation in the motherboard's chipset causes incompatibilities, how about running Rampage with the aid of an AGP2PCI adapter plugged into a PCI slot? Or with a motherboard with integrated AGP2PCI (XGP, AGP Express)? Then all AGP specific features would be excluded.

Komponent wrote on 13.07.13 at 18:06:15:

I have considered this several times, my only issue being I don't own the adapter.

IIRC, Osckhar does have both, AGP2PCI and a (partially?) working Rampage. Maybe he could try and see if this combo changes anything...

Did some testing back and forth between the Epox KT-333 and the Abit VA6 boards today, the VA6 is the clear winner in stability. I was able to complete a loop in Final Reality which is something I have not been able to do before.

I'm going to use it as a measure from now on to judge motherboard stabilty.

Installing VIA chipset packs will enable (enhance, or replace drivers) AGP. Perhaps it's worth a try to remove the AGP-related things in the Device Manager (right click My Computer > Properties > Device Manager)? My Intel based benchmark system shows Intel(R) 82815 Processor to AGP Controller - 1131 which obviously has something to do with AGP. VIA systems must have something like this too.

It's a long shot and perhaps it will kill AGP-functionality (but maybe that's also what you want) but the rest of the drivers might stay intact.

Thandor wrote on 13.07.13 at 22:44:34:

I'll check in a bit.

Edit- No dice, when the AGP control is disabled in the device manager it will lock up on reboot. Had to go back in via safe mode and turn it back on.

Athlon boards as of March 2000 (Anand)

http://www.anandtech.com/show/517

AOpen AK72
ASUS K7M, ASUS K7V-RM
EPoX 7KXA
FIC SD-11
Gigabyte GA-7IX, Gigabyte GA-7VM
Microstar MS-6167, Microstar MS-6195 K7Pro
Soyo SY-K7AIA
Tyan Trinity K7 S2380

Intel Boards, Socket 370, May 2000

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/12-socket-370-motherboards,196.html

Asus CUV4X-M
Azza 694TX
Biostar M6VCG
Elitegroup P6VAP-A+
Gigabyte GA-6VX7-4X
Gigabyte GA-6VX7-1394
IWill VD133 Pro
Lucky Star 6VA694
MSI MS-6309
QDI Advance 10
Soltek SL-65KV
Soyo SY-7VCA

Perhaps I'll focus on obtaining a few samples from these groups. Cpu's in the 800 mhz range seem to be the norm with intel just starting to roll out the socket 370 interface. AMD had not yet started shipping Socket A cpu's.

My AMD Slot One CPU finally arrived, hope to have an Irongate motherboard next week to continue testing.

Picked up a total of FOUR motherboards this week, picture to follow later today.

Good work, keep us posted!

Updated first post with the following-

9) MSI MS-6187 Slot A with Irongate 751-756 chipset, failure one.

Aborted boot up AT ONCE as there was nothing but a garbled mess on the screen. Rebooted with a different video adapter and tried different BIOS settings and then rebooted with Rampage with no change in condition.

10) MSI MS-6191 Slot A with Irongate 750-756. Motherboard works fairly well, on par or near to it with Abit VA6.

This one I had better luck. Almost on par with VA6, good for light testing. Will run the same tests as VA6 with same failures but VA6 will run them slightly longer.

Oscar this is a good testbed for you and I'll be happy to ship to your location with an Athlon 500 mhz and a Win98SE hard drive image. No garbled display in or out of DOS.

Gary

11) Lucky Star 6VA693A Slot one motherboard.

Motherboard resource conflict in windows with Rampage, unable to resolve.

12) ASUS A7N8X V2.0 Nforce2 Ultra 400 chipset. AMD Socket.

AGP Pro interface, no hardware issues noted which surprised me. Everest indicated AGPx1, the most I could close down the AGP aperture size was 32mb. Would run some applications but they always crashed.

13) ASUS A7PRO V1.05 KT-133 chipset AMD socket.

Runs better than A7N8X but crashes out after awhile.

You can try '8rdavcore' on the nForce 2 motherboards. I think the program is originally written for the EPoX 8RDA motherboards but it probably works for other nForce2 motherboards as well.

8rdavcore is able to configure a lot of settings, including a few AGP settings (Sideband adressing and latencies).

Thandor wrote on 12.09.13 at 17:06:17:

I'm thinking it will be time to find an AGP-PCI adapter, perhaps Oscar can test his out.

Good job for testing all of these Gary.

Tim wrote on 13.09.13 at 13:31:39:

Good job for testing all of these Gary.

No problem.

I'm starting to think that 3dfx did Rampage testing on a PCI riser to avoid having to deal with any AGP issues right off the bat or had motherboards with custom BIOS that let them control the settings better.

Wish I had a motherboard where the AGP slot was nothing more than a PCI-66 interface.

I'll be taking a month off at least, some seasonal projects have to be addressed in the next 30 days. If Oscar needs me to do some testing that should be no problem though, just no new motherboard work.

Gary

3dfx Archive
http://www.falconfly.de/cgi-bin/yabb2/YaBB.pl 3dfx Section >> Tech Talk >> Rampage motherboards and settings. http://www.falconfly.de/cgi-bin/yabb2/YaBB.pl?num=1373721600 Message started by gdonovan on 13.07.13 at 15:20:00