Old Packard bell

KaiserDJG

KaiserDJG

KaiserDJG

Associate
Joined
24 Jul 2012
Posts
523
Location
Sheffield UK
Hi everyone

I recently aquired an old packard bell and can't find a list of specs anywhere, it's an imedia 1901, UTOW-PAR.

I've opened it up and its got a pentium 4 3.2 with a GIGABYTE motherboard, 2x 256DDR ram, an unknown/ unbranded Graphics card and a seagate 160gb.

Could someone find me full spec, it originally ran on XP.

My idea was to see if anything in this is useable for a startup build just to get things going... or to upgrade the ram and graphics card in this to see if it'll be ok for awhile?

but if not could i buy Win 7 and run it on this until i finish my build and then just swap Win 7 over to the new rig as i don't have a pc at the moment
 
Try using GPU-Z to see if it can shed some light on the unknown GFX card.

CPU-Z should hopefully tell you details about the CPU/Board.
 
stulid said:
Try using GPU-Z to see if it can shed some light on the unknown GFX card.

CPU-Z should hopefully tell you details about the CPU/Board.
Click to expand...

Hi thanks but the Pc dosent even boot, i've loaded xp onto it but it got half way through the install before blue screening, this is why im going to see if its worth it to buy a new Harddrive and boot it with Win 7 as i need it for my new build anyway.
 
Look on the motherboard around the CPU socket or between the expansion slots for a model number.

Are there any labels at all on the GFX card?
 
Not really worth it, the motherboard will probably have a proprietary PSU connector, so you can't put a bigger power supply in it to drive a modern GPU. For Dell ones at least they wire the sense wire correctly (to check that there is power) but swap the power and grounds around so that rather than simply not working, it can actually damage the PSU and/or blow the motherboard up. You can also kill standard ATX motherboards if you plug the proprietary PSU into them, again due to the sense wire thing (If it was up to me I'd make it illegal, because it's almost like deliberate sabotage).

You can sort of reuse the cases, generally the stand-offs are correctly positioned as are the backplates but the PSU mount almost certainly won't be, it'll either be too big or too small so you'll need to do a bit of sawing to get another PSU to fit.
 
JonSmith said:
the PSU mount almost certainly won't be, it'll either be too big or too small so you'll need to do a bit of sawing to get another PSU to fit.
Click to expand...

True its too small for anything else and it's got a specific mounting for the PSU, i was going to scrap the case anyway
 
Can't seem to find the board on google unless I'm searching for the wrong thing, but the GPU may be AGP instead of PCI-E if it's using a P4 and DDR RAM, meaning none of the new GPUs will be compatible.
 
Orcvader said:
Can't seem to find the board on google unless I'm searching for the wrong thing, but the GPU may be AGP instead of PCI-E if it's using a P4 and DDR RAM, meaning none of the new GPUs will be compatible.
Click to expand...


probably just bin it then, or will it run win 7 do you think?
just something to use until i've finished my build
 
Well the chances of Windows 7 drivers for it could be pretty low as well. If you can get it to work and just use for normal use, then it should be fine for until you get a proper build.
 
i think i'll set it on fire and watch all the pretty colours then...


only kidding i'll move some pieces around what i've got and see if it makes a differnce when i boot XP but i dident want to mess about testing it if it's not worth it... i guess i just loooove messing.
 
Ok so i got this too boot with a GFX i had laying around, problem is it boots, tells me theres a Unknown Flash Device moves to a screen to boot from Vista or use an older version of windows then shuts down before i can press anything... any ideas

I'm trying to run a fresh instal of XP Media centre edition on it
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom