Celebrating 7 years of LGR: Building a 486 PC!

Oh man! I remember having to plug the CD drive into your sound card to get audio out of it! Man! It's just weird that my current PC has no mechanical drives at all, and that's not once been and issue for me. Sometimes I forget just how far we've come in the last 20 years!

Bolthouse

wow.. so much nostalgia right there! I remember wanting a 486DX2 a lot when I was chugging away on my 386 back in the day ^_^ Ahh memories!

Evan B

Great build. I forgot how fraught with danger and uncertainty these PC builds were. It was always a major accomplishment for me when the machine actually came to life for the first time.

Lon Seidman

Really insanely cool vid ! Thank you so much for it. :) I had a blast watching it. Loved all the progression, the problems and fixes. It reminded me so much of the different builds I tried over the years of a very late DOS/Windows games machine. In fact, thanks to you I finally managed a few months ago to find a motherboard that would accept a P3 800 Mhz CPU. I don't know why, but I always wanted to have this kind of CPU that heats a lot. :D Also I can run a lot of old DOS games and "newer" Windows games with one PC, and considering my lack of storage space, it was nice to have. P3-based PCs with a capable GPU, a Voodoo, a CDROM, Windows 98SE and a SoundBlaster are really the most versatile DOS/Windows machines. The only downside are CPU-tied old games which run way too fast and the compatibility with some of early DOS games. But 486s are legendary, and I know the feeling of wanting to build an old machine to fulfill a childhood goal. Congratulations on making this awesome video, with the awesome intro and everything ! :D Here to more and more years of LGR ! \o/ (PS : Maybe you'll build a PPC Amiga for the 10th anniversary ? ;-) I've seen screenshots of a PPC Amiga 1200 running AmigaOS 4 and... Quake ! )

Maximilien Noal

The potential of that front panel in concert with the woodgrain... It's a baited hook for someone like me...

Paul

Man, I missed that old awesome intro.

Justin Neve

That intro though! Loved the slurp sound from the soda

MrMattan

Ah that should be fun. Thanks for everything.

Zabe

I didn't realise Duke 3D had SVGA resolutions?! Although it's a game I'm not particularly keen on, I immediately grabbed a copy from GOG to try it! I actually had a blast playing the first two levels again after all these years! You should be on commission 👍

Stuart Marshall

Thanks!

Jonathan Patterson

Fixed!

LGR

Hmm. When I try to play the video here on Patreon, it's telling me the video has been disabled for playback on other websites...

Jonathan Patterson

D:

LGR

Heh, ah it's cool; it's engraved with drops of my blood from accidentally cutting myself on all those sharp bits ;)

LGR

Greetings right back! Thanks for the support for so long :)

LGR

Totally should've, I'd love to watch other people's similar experiences!

LGR

You bet, I'm glad you liked it

LGR

Ahh, endless tweaks and editing of text, hoping that one altered line would play the latest game. Such wonderfulawful times

LGR

I was hoping it might, glad to hear it!

LGR

Report back if you find out anything!

LGR

Haha, happy to hear it. Spent quite a bit of time trying to get it just right

LGR

Awesome, I hope you found it enjoyably educational

LGR

I'm sad it's over too, I had so much fun with this. I'll probably revisit it before long though, gotta add some more things and tweak others!

LGR

Thanks!

LGR

I'd love to do more, I've got a ton of ideas for fun builds

LGR

You're very welcome :)

LGR

Thanks for the continued support all this time!

LGR

Now if only you can invent time travel to let me know this useful info back in the mid-90s ;) And I'll definitely have to give the VESA 2.0 in 320x200 a shot!

LGR

Thank you!

LGR

I had to cut a few holes and slits in this vinyl woodgrain, and it was surprisingly easy seeing how stretchable the stuff is! Best of luck with your own project :)

LGR

Aye. Woodgrain is a criminally undervalued resource.

LGR

"Address the RAM", lol.

Just started watching. Whoa, that intro! A blast from the past with a new twist.

I never heard of the AMD DX2 66mhz being any faster then the Intel part. Is yours the write-back cache version? I know Intel made write-back versions of the dx2 as well.

Justin Laughlin

heh, that's my machine there. I love that case. I have a soft spot for desktop form factor. I specifically got this case for all the drive bays as many desktop cases I looked at only had two 5 1/4 and one 3 1/2 bays.

Justin Laughlin

My wife saw me watching this video just as Clint entered his storage locker... "No way" she immediately said! Aww... there goes my plan to have my own personal computer museum :(

Peter Bridger

Great work. I felt your frustrations from working on such machines myself. Also, you forgot to write your name in sharpie on the case :)

Joseph Coco

Great build! The turbo button is killer. When I was a kid I had an AMD K6 (lightning fast compared to your DX2, lol), in a case with a turbo button...still my favorite case of all time. This blogger did a build with an identical case to the one I used to have: <a href="https://ancientelectronics.wordpress.com/2014/04/23/anatomy-of-a-386-dos-pc/" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">https://ancientelectronics.wordpress.com/2014/04/23/anatomy-of-a-386-dos-pc/</a>

I'been watching you these 7 years. Greetings from Costa Rica!

Christian Meneses

Now this video I love! Recently did a retro build of my original PC (at least the first that was truly mine). P166 w/ MMX variety...Intel TC430HX mobo, etc. Should have recorded and narrated it.

Chad Keck

It was wonderful to see/hear your reactions when building this PC and playing the games, thanks for sharing this with us!

Robbin

486! Reminds me of my early teens, tweaking the config.sys and autoexec.bat files to get enough EMS / XMS to run the latest game!

Stuart Marshall

Awesome video! Brought back so many memories of PC gaming when I was a kid.

Chris Roy

I love you clint and this makes my day, week etc. My 486 is out of commission right now that my dad built in 1993 but this really makes me wanna figure out what the heck is up with it.

Still Haven't Shown Up

I've only just started watching the video, but that new intro was already all kinds of great.

Renzo Thönen

I neverhad to build a 486 pc, never even owned one. So this is like a time travel adventure for me.

Tapani J.

Amazing job and finish to an amazing 7 years. I'm just sad that the video is over. I could totally understand how it felt finally getting SC2k up and running.

Zabe

well that was quite enjoyable, nice early 90's system

ZombieRonSwanson

Just finished this episode. When you turned on SC2k I laughed and smiled about as much as you did. I really hope to see more LGR Builds soon!

Zem Hysong

Now that sounds like a solid holiday. Enjoy :)

LGR

I corrected that as well, just wasn't shown in the video :)

LGR

hung over on 4th of july, a monday but no work. time to get some coffee, some cold pizza, and settle in for an hour of awesome LGR shenanigans. seriously a morning well spent.

mavrick

this was great, you could sense you excitement...

Simon Paynton

I noticed that one of the rubber grommets in the CD-ROM wasn't in the right position. I bet that is why the mechanism was grinding. It bugged me a little that you didn't notice that, but it was otherwise a fantastic episode. I miss my old 486 (though not enough to get a new one).

John Arild Lolland

I built something like that. It plays pretty much everything from 1985 to 2005. Somewhat problematic are older games relying on CPU speed and early 3DFX games. But I got even most of those to run. (I also have a 486 for especially difficult cases.)

Has it really been 7 years, wow, you've come a very long way since doing the shatner, here's to another 7 years *pops top of a can of soda and goes ahhh*

Zach Highwind Spoonamore

I used to build PCs with my dad, so thanks a lot for reminding me of those awesome times! I love these kind of videos and I hope there will be more to come!

Antonio M Buonomo

Awesome dude. Awesome. So much nostalgia and joy, even though I came from the 1999-2004 era of computing.

Roy Taylor

Feeling great hearing that heavy metal version of opening lol! Wait it's 67 minutes long?! EDIT: Finished watching! Congratulations on 7 years! These old PCs always trigger me and watch it building from scratch is more than fulfillment. Thanks again Clint! Thanks for all these great videos!

Luke Chang

Thats a short 17 mins video. Let's watch while the microwave spins my pizza around. Wait..what...where does this "0" come from? ONE hour....what a treat....pizza..lgr...486...

Who ever used ScanDisk? "Slowly raises hand."

Jason Livingston

Dude, I would kill to build one of those computer for myself, unique problems and all. Though maybe I should build something more late 90s like, since I grew up more at the time... Hmm, Voodoo card, big honking sound, something that would steamroll any game of the era that I'd throw at it. Ugh, it would be lovely. And that BIOS.. Wow, I thought UEFI ones were the first to do some GUI-like interfaces, and yet there's this so much before those even were a thing..

Curus Keel

Can't thank you enough for all the awesome entertainment you've done, Clint. Thanks a million.

Cyberian Tiger

egads! I don't think I spent much over $100 for mine in 2000 ... I was working at one of my first tech jobs. A company called Surplus Village in Des Plaines, IL. They got bulk returns from Sears and other retailers and my job was to refurbish the systems. The Mavica was new in box so no brainer. Some of the stuff we got though .... A high volume of iBooks (the original clamshell ones) wish busted keyboards and Compaq Presario machines with missing processors, memory and hard drives. IN other words someone bought the machine, removed those parts and took it back to customer service "It just won't work I need to return it" *sigh*

DGDW (Derek G. Weber)

I've only seen one Mavica in a thrift store since I started paying attention to such things, and they wanted $75 for it. That store was known for massively overpricing electronics though

Scott Holder

7 years! Congratulations! I've been following for 4 years, best web show out there!

You might've been able to get later versions of UniVBE working on your old computer from your childhood. Trouble is, they weren't free. As for the Duke Nukem 3D framerate, I found out way back when that if you run a 320x200 Mode-X mode by editing the config file, instead of using the default 320x200 mode, that will actually improve the framerate considerably for some mysterious reason. If you have VESA 2.0 support, you can even run 320x200 as a VESA mode and get even MORE speed! :o

Kris Asick

Oh hey, that's a fantastic solution there, dude! Never knew that one existed! I also absolutely LOVE that BIOS. I want that kind of board in my next custom build I want to do, must track that down! Haha! Absolutely freaking awesome! I have that same mouse too, I think, or one similar. I like it, for some reason. =D That woodgrain looks so freaking awesome, now the front looks like it needs some help to go well with it. =D This video has been great, and very inspirational at that! Congratulations on the 7 year run, dude! Now maybe you could hook that SX-1050 up to that DOS machine and have some real wood grain audio equipment to go with it. =D

ReeseRiverson

My new favorite LGR video :) Excellent job!

Daniel Fowler

This was a fun and interesting watch! I especially like how the wood grain came out - I'm building a new mini-ITX gaming PC pretty soon here and I've already got the case, and I'm really tempted to do the exact same thing! It'd be a lot less straightforward, though, since it's got some ventilation parts that'd need to be cut out...

T. Ashley Jenkins

Oh heck yea... looking forward to this. I remember our old 486 - pretty sure it was our final computer with a "turbo" button on it.

Over an hour? Welp, time to get the popcorn ready. Edit: Aw yeah, that woodgrain. I feel like I want to go back to the 70s and woodgrain everything. My floors. My walls. My roof. All woodgrain, all the time.

The Enforcer

We needed a lot of storage so building a Hackintosh was really the only way to go. We have about 13TB of storage space on the current box. We did this in 2013 and the system gets a little janky at times though. I'm told the newer motherboards with the newer intel architecture handle it even better. So the plan is to turn this box into a freenas machine (KIND OF overkill for that ... It's an i7 with 16GB of RAM haha) and building a new Hackintosh with the latest and greatest.

DGDW (Derek G. Weber)

I'd love to build a Hackintosh sometime. Tempted to see what I can do with my current i7 machine, actually!

LGR

Thank you!

LGR

True that! I was referring to one of these setups though, which has a PCB to prevent recharging: <a href="http://amigakit.leamancomputing.com/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=1093" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">http://amigakit.leamancomputing.com/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=1093</a> But yeah, didn't go into detail about it. Added an annotation to clarify!

LGR

Ugh after the 386 SX-16 was hopelessly incapable we built a 486 DX2-66 then a 486 DX4-100 ... Then some Pentiums later. Every time both my mom and I ended up with cut up hands. Terrible designs. A couple of years ago I built a Hackintosh with a Corsair case and power supply. It was like a religious experience. Excellent packaging, no more cuts ... Building a PC is a pleasure in comparison now :)

DGDW (Derek G. Weber)

Happy 7th Birthday! I'm still watching the video, but loving the choices so far.

BaudBand

Actually, you can't simply replace the barrel batteries with CR2032 because the barrel style batteries are rechargeable. Can be a bad day trying to recharge a CR2032. My favorite solution though is external battery backs, like double AA or triple AAA backs you could find in radioshack. :)

ReeseRiverson

I had a memory stick to floppy disc adapter for mine .... Gave it away probably about 10 years ago now.

DGDW (Derek G. Weber)

Balls yeah it is

LGR

Hehe, yeah I've got a couple of them kicking about! Fun cameras, I just love that it uses floppy disks :)

LGR

It's about time!

ReeseRiverson

I spy one of the floppy disc Sony Mavica cameras in your storeroom! It took a LONG time before I got another digital camera that could take pictures as nicely as my old 1.2 megapixel Sony did. Fantastic lens for a point and shoot!

DGDW (Derek G. Weber)