A geforce 4200 would smoke very game up to 2001 and would be a perfect match for this system together with 98SE. If it is hard to find or expensive a geforce 6600 standard would provide an even bigger performance at a lower cost. I do not know much about sound cards but I think Creative live would be a very good choice for 98SE.

Aopen made blue sound cards. I have one with a yamaha chip. Aopen Cobra.
And I also have a blue FX5900 Witch I think is Gigabyte, but they are both stored away, so I have no pictures.

Edit: the fx5900 is a chaintech.

Hercules Fortissimo 4 is also blue. But i am not sure how good it is on W98 games.

Edit:
Just remembered, also i have an FX5500 which is quite good for W98 build.
Looks just like this but with blue pcb:

I havent checked the prices lately but they are quite common so probably they dont cost a fortune

psychofox wrote on 2024-03-08, 05:52:

Hercules Fortissimo 4 is also blue. But i am not sure how good it is on W98 games.

I have Hercules Muse 5.1 in my W98 build and it works fine, and yes, it's blue.

Only listing what would fit this system:

Blue sound cards:
Sound Vision SV550 (Yamaha)
AOpen cobra aw-850 (CMI8738)
Some audiophile stuff but that’s not exactly for games.

Blue video cards:
Some gigabyte (GA-660) and Abit siluro (GF4MX) models.
Hercules 3D prophet (Kyro)
Blue voodoo2 exists as well (by ProVideo)

Also, “Blue Lightning” is a 386 cpu name so you might be confusing people searching the fora.

IBM already confused ppl, with the 486 DX2 following on from the supercharged 386 SLC3/BL3 ...

That's actually running in SL2/BL2 mode 2x multi there.

There, fixed the title 😀

Lodge_ wrote on 2024-03-08, 06:18:

psychofox wrote on 2024-03-08, 05:52:

Hercules Fortissimo 4 is also blue. But i am not sure how good it is on W98 games.

I have Hercules Muse 5.1 in my W98 build and it works fine, and yes, it's blue.

I actually found a Muse sound card in one of the boxed the other day 😀 Although I might still go with Audigy 2 ZS as I have an X-Fi front panel and always wanted to use it.

Could maybe go for Blue Thunder, which was a "what if we crossed CHiPs and Airwolf" 80s TV show .. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8_ZQIf6YB7E

Scratch my scratch that.

Ok, someone less distracted - this would fit that board, right?

Because I found a '98 driver that supports the BCM5703 chipset.

It says Apple Computer on the card so I'm guessing that's an Apple card. The slot connector is definitely not for the PC.

Half-Saint wrote on 2024-03-11, 19:37:

It says Apple Computer on the card so I'm guessing that's an Apple card. The slot connector is definitely not for the PC.

It's standard PCI-X, nothing proprietary. A perfectly normal connector for PC's of the era, not just Macs. And yes, it's an Apple card - but if you're not needing it at boot time, that shouldn't matter.

In the interests of time, here's a HP PCI-X card using the same chip. Sadly however, only Apple made it in blue.

Funny enough I have an Albatron blue GF4 Ti 4600 that spoils my green themed P3.
Would be perfect for your build not exactly cheap though.

I really like this idea though!

Will that pcix card even work in a normal pci slot? Is it in any way backwards compatible?

H3nrik V! wrote on 2024-03-12, 05:08:

Will that pcix card even work in a normal pci slot? Is it in any way backwards compatible?

It *should* be. Most PCI-X cards are compatible with standard 32bit. The BCM5703 chipset is also listed as natively supporting PCI32 in addition to 64 bit PCI-X. That said, there's always a chance that something will not work, this is 20 year old vintage hardware from the days where two brands of PC would barely co-exist, let alone two competing platforms.

InTheStudy wrote on 2024-03-12, 09:31:

H3nrik V! wrote on 2024-03-12, 05:08:

Will that pcix card even work in a normal pci slot? Is it in any way backwards compatible?

It *should* be. Most PCI-X cards are compatible with standard 32bit. The BCM5703 chipset is also listed as natively supporting PCI32 in addition to 64 bit PCI-X. That said, there's always a chance that something will not work, this is 20 year old vintage hardware from the days where two brands of PC would barely co-exist, let alone two competing platforms.

So really, there just needs to be room for the rest of the edge connector to not hit anything on the mainboard? Cool!

The HIS HD 4670 IceQ RV730 XT was blue. There was an AGP and a PCI version. I have one of each.

H3nrik V! wrote on 2024-03-12, 13:54:

So really, there just needs to be room for the rest of the edge connector to not hit anything on the mainboard? Cool!

I'm about 80% confident. Which is pretty low to be fair, but they're like €20 on eBay right now so at least it's not silly money if it doesn't work out. And if it doesn't work out, it's the specific card and motherboard - not a general PCI-X/PCI compatibility issue!

And it's the only blue PCI gigabit nic I found. 😁

This project is different enough to really catch my interest.
Seems like Albatron made a number of blue graphic cards so may be able to get something more within your price range.

BitWrangler wrote on 2024-03-11, 15:25:

Could maybe go for Blue Thunder, which was a "what if we crossed CHiPs and Airwolf" 80s TV show .. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8_ZQIf6YB7E

Show about flying police motorbikes!? 80's me would have loved that! hell, I'm now in my 40's and probably still watch it 😉