Hi Lance,
Your quandary seems to have 2 points, upgrading the Gateway, and power-user
graphics.
Your cheap solution is a 233mhz pentium MMX cpu and matching PCI
motherboard.
I am guessing you would really like AGP graphics, however.  The most likely
motherboard candidates for supporting AGP cards tend to also need ATX power
supply cases and a Pentium II cpu.  Your case probably would not accept an
ATX style motherboard.

I would look for a bare-bones Pentium II and move the hard disk, sound,
modem, CDROM, etc out of the Gateway into the new case.

You can sell the Gateway as a bare-bones to someone else or put a cheap
hard disk in it and sell it to someone "just getting started" in computers
and internet, etc.

Assuming your Gateway motherboard is a 166mhz max or even slower, it won't
support the last generation Classic Pentiums.  That also means the board is
worth more in a case than as a separate part when trying to sell it, since
experienced builders will be less interested in it.

As for graphics cards, any Nvidia RIVA chip based card is fine, and I hear
manufacturers using the 3dfx Voodoo and Voodoo2 chips are hot.  Some of the
Disney Studio-grade cards get extremely pricey.
----------
From:   Lance Cummings[SMTP:[log in to unmask]]
Sent:   Tuesday, February 17, 1998 8:35 AM

Lance has a P5-120 from Gateway, circa mid-1995.  He's pumped
the RAM up to 48 megs, and he's added a BusLogic 958, a
Seagate Barracuda, and an Archive PYTHON DAT drive.

But Lance has discovered computer graphics.  I mean he's
*really* discovered them -- big time.  Now, realizes he needs raw
processing speed, and a motherboard that can cache more than the
measly 64 megs his Aladdin can handle.  :(


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