O O O

That's a Venn diagram of PCIe cards that work with 98, ATI and nVidia cards that work together in the same system and driver versions that don't argue with each other.

Well as far as I am aware the situation is that GPU and driver versions that don't argue are more like Vista/7 era than windows 98 era.

Then you find something weird like this ...
https://download.cnet.com/ati_display_8-51-ex … 8_4-207316.html
Which claims to allow 2nd monitor support on 98 for numerous ATI cards thought not so support 98... but it's from HP who were still trying to wean corporate clients off 98 in 2005. Methinks that if it works it's for windows desktop only, no D3D.

BitWrangler wrote on 2024-03-28, 23:57:

O O O

That's a Venn diagram of PCIe cards that work with 98, ATI and nVidia cards that work together in the same system and driver versions that don't argue with each other.

Well as far as I am aware the situation is that GPU and driver versions that don't argue are more like Vista/7 era than windows 98 era.

So in the current P5KPL-AM/PS motherboard, I have Win98 with both NVidia and ATI drivers installed. When I fit the ATI GPU into the mobo and start the system, ATI drivers load without a problem. And when I fit the NVidia GPU and start, the NVidia drivers load properly. Of course, since in that mobo I can't fit both GPUs simultaneously, I haven't seen if both drivers simultaneously load successfully, but I'm optimistic.

I've seen a video in which a PCIe GPU and PCI+PCI GPUs (2 Voodoos) were successfully made to work simultaneously (see here: https://youtu.be/dgu76LD_1MU?si=NLEW8Ca9DU5SpSLU&t=323). So similar to this, I was wondering if there can be a setup where instead of PCIe + (PCI+PCI), we have PCIe + PCIe.

The main question is whether Windows 98 supports multiGPU configuration at all. What about more modern OSes - a bios should have option to enable multiGPU support. An application (game or whatever) should have ability to choose a directx graphic device. Also there were Hydra chips that tried to make SLI for unmatched GPUs (but IIRC only in Windows 7).
If I were you I would start with Windows 7 and only after good result try to run the system with older Windows

Roman555 wrote on 2024-03-29, 10:27:

The main question is whether Windows 98 supports multiGPU configuration at all. What about more modern OSes - a bios should have option to enable multiGPU support. An application (game or whatever) should have ability to choose a directx graphic device. Also there were Hydra chips that tried to make SLI for unmatched GPUs (but IIRC only in Windows 7).
If I were you I would start with Windows 7 and only after good result try to run the system with older Windows

It does but in a very limited fashion, cards like the Voodoo5 and Fury MAXX are both dual GPU cards and 98 does support them. it also supports Voodoo 1/2/SLI with a Primary GPU, I suspect its down to drivers supporting the dual cards and not 98 itself since both cards employ internal PCI buses for each GPU core to talk to the other as AGP doesn't support this feature.

The question here is does 98 support two PCIe GPUs at the same time and since 98 has little PCIe support I'm pretty sure this is the real issue here its also worth considering that both AMD and nVidia never supported dual GPUs on 98 or had any such support in their drivers for it.

In the end only one GPU can be in use at any one time under 98, this problem would be quickly solved by simply using WinXP.

Dual display with extended or cloned desktop works on win98, I have had two configs running like that in the past, not PCIe though.
#1 I had Voodoo3 and Trident PCI cards installed. Annoyingly, direct draw would not work on Trident as secondary... not much troubleshooting done, and 98 was too new for a large amount of experience to be on the net.
#2 Geforce 3 in AGP as primary, Voodoo 3 PCI as secondary... I think D3D was defaulting to last installed card, I could get things to a point where I could launch a game D3D, open GL or glide, but D3D or open GL would launch on GF3 only and Glide would launch on Voodoo3, on it's own monitor.

I did not do very prolonged troubleshooting for either of these, because they were temporary "try it and see" kind of things rather than something I needed to work.

BitWrangler wrote on 2024-03-29, 13:21:

Dual display with extended or cloned desktop works on win98, I have had two configs running like that in the past, not PCIe thou […]
Show full quote

Dual display with extended or cloned desktop works on win98, I have had two configs running like that in the past, not PCIe though.
#1 I had Voodoo3 and Trident PCI cards installed. Annoyingly, direct draw would not work on Trident as secondary... not much troubleshooting done, and 98 was too new for a large amount of experience to be on the net.
#2 Geforce 3 in AGP as primary, Voodoo 3 PCI as secondary... I think D3D was defaulting to last installed card, I could get things to a point where I could launch a game D3D, open GL or glide, but D3D or open GL would launch on GF3 only and Glide would launch on Voodoo3, on it's own monitor.

I did not do very prolonged troubleshooting for either of these, because they were temporary "try it and see" kind of things rather than something I needed to work.

Yeah but that's not what the OP is talking about, I have a board here that can handle dual PCIe gpus and supports 98 so I may hook it up and test for myself if 98 can accept dual GPUs from different corps on a PCIe bus. I have a feeling it is going to ignore one of them and refuse to even install drivers for it with an error 43 or it simply wont see it.

Or I could be surprised and itll work just fine and behave much like it does with AGP and PCI Voodoo cards where you can still only use one of the two GPUs at a time and the primary card becomes the default for D3D and GL ...this may be a issue with two cards that both support it . .how does it choose the primary. (Voodoo is easy as you can disable D3D via drivers)

Trashbytes wrote on 2024-03-29, 23:37:

BitWrangler wrote on 2024-03-29, 13:21:

Dual display with extended or cloned desktop works on win98, I have had two configs running like that in the past, not PCIe thou […]
Show full quote

Dual display with extended or cloned desktop works on win98, I have had two configs running like that in the past, not PCIe though.
#1 I had Voodoo3 and Trident PCI cards installed. Annoyingly, direct draw would not work on Trident as secondary... not much troubleshooting done, and 98 was too new for a large amount of experience to be on the net.
#2 Geforce 3 in AGP as primary, Voodoo 3 PCI as secondary... I think D3D was defaulting to last installed card, I could get things to a point where I could launch a game D3D, open GL or glide, but D3D or open GL would launch on GF3 only and Glide would launch on Voodoo3, on it's own monitor.

I did not do very prolonged troubleshooting for either of these, because they were temporary "try it and see" kind of things rather than something I needed to work.

Yeah but that's not what the OP is talking about, I have a board here that can handle dual PCIe gpus and supports 98 so I may hook it up and test for myself if 98 can accept dual GPUs from different corps on a PCIe bus. I have a feeling it is going to ignore one of them and refuse to even install drivers for it with an error 43 or it simply wont see it.

Or I could be surprised and itll work just fine and behave much like it does with AGP and PCI Voodoo cards where you can still only use one of the two GPUs at a time and the primary card becomes the default for D3D and GL ...this may be a issue with two cards that both support it . .how does it choose the primary. (Voodoo is easy as you can disable D3D via drivers)

I would be extremely grateful if you can test 2 different PCIE GPUs on your board, in case you get time. If your test is successful, then I can buy the same model of motherboard that you have