Motherboard modification

[nki69c]

I was wondering if anyone could point me in the direction of somewhere I could find information about modifying onboard graphics on motherboards. I want to be able to put an AGP card on a board that doesn't have an AGP slot. Does anyone know anything about a mod like this or when I can find some info on it?

[Áedán]

I suspect it's really not worth trying to do. Unless the board is just missing the physical connector and has the wiring in place, it's going to be a nightmare to acheive.

Even if the chipset supports AGP, trace lengths and crosstalk are so critical that you might find it impossible to get them right in a reliable fashion. If you've ever wondered why some tracks on the motherboard do strange squiggles for no apparent reason, it's basically to ensure that all the signals arrive at the connector at the same time.

If you do want to continue on this plan, then you'll need to find out if the chipset supports AGP. If it does, you then need to identify the AGP pins on the chipset, and there are a fair few. You'd also need a power supply to generate and provide the correct voltages for the AGP interface.

[Gizmo]

Aye! Follow Aedan's advice on this. A mod like this is NOT simple to do, assuming your chipset even supports it. By the time you get done, you'll discover that you would've been better off to have just bought a mobo with AGP on it.

[nki69c]

I plan on doing this for the joy of modifying a mobo to an AGP state. This isn't supposed to be utility or cost effective it is simply something that I want to do to expand my lis of generally useless things that I have done.

[Gizmo]

Errr............ok. I still don't think you truly appreciate the complexity of what you are trying to accomplish. Be that as it may; we learn by doing so a good place to start would, I think, be here. It contains links to lots of other AGP-related stuff, including Intel's specs.

[danrok]

Much can be learnt by trying and failing - I should know.