You mentioned you have a lot of hardware laying around, that's good 😀
If you want to play the vast majority of Windows 95 games, I'd say you'll be needing hardware of around the 97 or 98 era. So possibly a fast Pentium 1 or a slower Pentium 2 or Super 7 would suffice?
For a harddrive, I'd just use something I have laying around and is fitting for what you consider important (some want large space and others prefer something that is silent, it all comes down to what you think is important).

Graphics card? I dunno. I'll toss up a coin, how about a Virge 4 meg graphics card along with a Voodoo 1?

I mostly have Pentium 3 hardware . i think i have a 233mhz slot 1 pentium 2 some were .

So what period correct hardware do you have laying around?
Pentium 3 is more Windows 98SE/ME territory 😜

have a pentium 1 133mmx cpu , slot 1 pentium 2 233cpu , isa 3 com network card , isa sound blaster awe32 .i have an Aopen slot 1 motherboard with apg . I have a complete 100mhz pentium packard bell tower , win95 , on board video , soundblaster awe32 , realtek network card . i was wanting something faster than the packard bell .

Packard Bell you say? Lets see some pics!

pizza box tower in front , i have the media remote and original sound card for it . pretty neat system .

Assuming you use the W98 release date as your upper limit you could go with the following:

intel AN430TX motherboard
Pentium 200 or 233
64mb ram
Diamond 3D-2000 Pro/4mb
Voodoo 1 Monster 3D/4mb
<10gb hard drive
CDR
FDD
SBLive! - a simple, highly compatible one card PCI audio solution, but there is lots to choose from in the sound department

These would form a pretty tricked-out W95 system

I think a voodoo 2 and a pentium II 350mhz would still fall in before win98 release.

i'm still building my own win 95 machine but i'm stretching the time frame a bit and installing a Pentium III 450mhz (there basically P II's anyways)

Windows 95 machine ver 3.0

I think I ended up putting a matrox G200 with added ram into it as the main card

My own personal Win95 machine is as follows:

ASUS P2B-S
P2-266
64MB RAM
Matrox Millenium 4MB PCI
Cardex Dragon 1000 (Voodoo1)
Soundblaster AWE64 Standard

It's not exactly pushing the limits, but my own personal machine at the time that Win98 debuted was a Compaq Presario 4808, P200MMX machine with 32MB RAM, S3 Trio64/V2, and integrated sound. The machine I've built up is a damn nice step up, but still not an "Ultimate" win95 machine.

thanks for the info guys . i have a p2 200 with no heat sink and a 266 with a heat sink so big it wont fit any of my mother boards . slowest p3 i have is a 450 . Looks like I'll have to keep an eye out for some parts .

I dug around in my parts bins and found a Pentium 2 350 and a STB riva 128 with dvd decoder card . The date on the cpu and video card are both 97 so thinking this might work for starters . i also have a pair of asus p3b-f mother boards but pretty sure those are newer than what i am looking for .

Can you guys recommend any online shops with vintage/classic parts ? I keep an eye on craigslist and ebay but more often that not stuff is very overpriced .

If you dont want to spend an amount of money, and really doesnt care which parts you want to use i should recommend to get something that itsnt faster then a PII 266mhz..
I know those asus p3b-f boards are maybe out of period, but those boards are very flexible on installing older and newer processors..
Try to find a Pentium II 233mhz and you are done.. If you want more time period parts, then you have to pay.

Iam more a man thats going for the period correct parts if i want to make a win95 system. Then i should recommend a Pentium 200 / 233 mhz mmx. (it should be slow / fast enough to play the whole 95 period.)

Were you able to use that P2-233 you said you had? That would be ideal.

I should go for:

slot 1 pentium 2 233cpu
Asus P3b-F
ATX case
64 or 128MB memory
Creative AWE 32
STB riva 128
20GB - 40GB hard drive (depents how far the motherboard support the harddrive (i think it would do 40GB)

senrew wrote:

Were you able to use that P2-233 you said you had? That would be ideal.

No its missing the heat/sink fan .I'll pick one up for it when i get paid . I'll need a hard drive and a power supply as well but i should be able to pick one up as well .

Ideal windows 95 system? Here are some recommendations:
486SX /w 8MB RAM /w 200MB HDD <--- NO LOWER
486DX/4 /w 16MB RAM /w 500MB HDD
Pentium 133 /w 32MB RAM /w 1.5GB HDD <--- This is what you want
Pentium MMX 233 /w 64MB RAM /w 3GB HDD <---- This is my highest end W95 PC
And....
Pentium 2 266 MMX /w 80 MB RAM /w 4GB HDD <---- Over doing it