On 23 Mar 98 at 19:48, Alan Bentley wrote:

> About 1 1/2 years ago I assembled a computer using a Triton
> motherboard (i430fx pci chipset). The manual says it will support
> up to a pentium 200 MHz cpu.

  The 430FX chipset was succeeded by the HX (Triton II, large
memory), VX (Triton III, vanilla) and TX (fast (UDMA and SDRAM) but
not large).
  Many of the 430FX machines I've seen recently have used Socket 5,
and so are obsolescent, but with an advertised upper limit of 200
MHz, your machine should have a Socket 7.

> However,  it does not say anything about whether it will support a
> 200 MHz MMX chip. How can I find out if it will accept the MMX
> chip or if I have to use the MMX upgrade CPU.

  For a non-OverDrive MMX CPU, it needs to use Socket 7 -- and we've
pretty much established that yours does.
  But the other thing it needs is "split voltage"; I/O at 3.3v and
"CPU core" somewhat lower, typically about 2.8-2.9v.  I doubt that
there has ever been a 430FX board built that provides this.  So you'd
need either a voltage regulator (such as the PowerLeap "PowerStacker"
or similar) to fit between the socket and MMX CPU, or one of Intel's
MMX OverDrive CPUs (which include the rectifier).

  You may find the rectifier and a fan/heatsink marketed together as
an "MMX Upgrade Kit".  Look closely -- these will allow you to use an
MMX CPU (which you must purchase separately...) in an older board;
they will *NOT* add MMX to your existing CPU.

David G