"'90s games" is quite a range. The most CPU intense games in 1990 barely required an Intel 386 CPU, while games released around 2000 were recommending Pentium MMX 200MHz or higher.

CPU/Mobo:

I would strongly recommend avoiding K6-2 series CPUs, although they may work for your application - especially if *not* paired with a VIA motherboard chipset.

GPU:

The Voodoo 5 looks like the best video card you listed, and it may support a good number of DOS Glide games. You may need to play with the VESAFIX tool (here: VESA Fix Utility Listing (for old video cards) ) to get good VESA support in DOS.

The other option would probably be whatever the best 2D PCI card you have is (in terms of speed, memory, VESA and DirectDraw support), paired with the Voodoo2 for 3D. Direct3D/OpenGL games will kill that setup no matter how much CPU power you have behind it, but it should do fine for most late '90s games.

Sound:

Lots of choices here:
- Aureal cards are great for Win9x games that support A3D.
- For DOS the PAS16 might be the best choice since it is supposed to be SB compatible and has an OPL3 and MPU401 MIDI via the gameport.

If you're open to building 2 systems, you could optimize one for DOS and one for Win9x and possibly get a better experience on both as a result.

I'd use the Micronics HX board with a classic Pentium 166, S3 Trio card and maybe AWE64G, though a card with good SB Pro emulation and MPU401 header is preferable if you can get it.

Yeah, I would probably build 2 boxes out of what you have for the most part. The voodoo3 and the p5a would make a nice dos machine for sure. Pentium 200/233 w/mmx or so.

For later 90's games I would for sure use that voodoo5, but I would get something like an asus P3B-F motherboard and a good PIII to put in it, you can get an 800 mhz for it for dirt. The turtle beach card is real nice, or the sound blaster live would also go well with that. A 440BX chipset is pretty nice.

Thanks for the responses.

OK, first off, maybe I should explain my overall idea: Use this machine to basically cover the mid '90s... say, '93 through '98, give or take. Anything newer than that, which won't run well on this machine, will probably still work on my main XP box. Then for earlier games, assemble a nice 386 or 486. I already have an XT machine for really old software, and for particularly troublesome games like Wing Commander and such, I'll either play the Amiga version, or not bother with it at all. There are plenty of good games out there to keep me busy for a long time, so missing a couple isn't a big deal to me.

None of that is set in stone, of course, but it seems like a good balance, without crowding myself out with too many different machines.

So what's the reasoning for recommending Pentiums over a K6-2? I mean, what is it that a P166 can do that a K6-2 can't? Most older games that would be too fast on a K6, would also be too fast on a Pentium, no? And there's a whole lot of software that needs more power than a P166 can provide. I agree that a P233MMX might be a better choice than an AMD, but I already have a bunch of AMD chips and no MMX chips.

Here's sorta what I had in my mind: P5A board, ~400mhz K6-2, Voodoo3, MX300 with a wavetable board of some sort (DB50XG probably), and the PAS16.

A 350 or 400mhz K6-2 should be at least as good as a P233, I'd think. The Voodoo5 would be wasted on such a machine, but the Voodoo3 seems like a good match, while still maintaining passable performance and good VESA compatibility. The MX300 is a good card, it's supposed to have decent DOS support in addition to A3D and such, and anything it lacks (i.e., OPL3) could be taken care of by the PAS16. At least in theory.

How about I revise my original question and ask: What would you change about the above combination, and why?

It might be fine since the motherboard does not have a VIA chipset, but my experience with K6-2 + VIA is that you will get abysmal performance and stability compared to an Intel PII or PIII CPU+chipset. It *will* probably be better than a P233 (especially non-MMX) though, and will probably be fine for what you want to do with it.

Definitely make sure to install motherboard chipset drivers for AGP stability and performance! It's a must.

Also, I'd put the Voodoo5 in to start with unless you plan to use it in something else. Most of 3dfx's stuff was pretty incremental so I doubt you'll lose any compatibility or features going from a Voodoo3 to a Voodoo5.

If you had unlimited access to parts, I'd probably recommend building a Pentium between 133 and 233MHz with a 2D PCI card and a Voodoo2, and a PII or PIII system with the Voodoo5. The reason for this is that you're likely to run into a few speed issues even at 400MHz. For example, Daggerfall (1996, right in the middle) never ran optimally on my PII-450 because it had timing issues at that high of a CPU speed.

Your aim - "to get the best balance of compatibility for '90s games into the fewest separate systems" - IMHO, to meet this requirement I would get a slot 1 Intel 440 mobo (eg Asus, but there are lots of others), and get a selection of slot 1 CPUs (eg P2 and P3, and also a slotket adapter - to go as high as 1.4Ghz). With just one cheap and readily available mobo, you could go from a celeron 266 (or a P2 233), right up to a powerful Coppermine (eg 800 or even 1000) or even further with a Celeron Tualulin 1.4GHz.

For ancient DOS games that are "speed sensitive", use DOSBox on a modern machine. There are very few games which must be run on a Pentium 1 CPU which won't run on a P2 or P3. Anything that needs more than a 1.4GHz CPU can be run on a modern machine.

IMHO that means you only need 2 machines, 1 being your modern one, the other being your retro box.

There just isn't any slockets that support the FPGA-2 the tualatin uses (trust me, I've tried many times). You could get a FPGA->FPGA2 socket adapter for the slocket, but these aren't available anymore, I searched for a couple of years to find one, and no one has them anymore, and if they do, they want a crazy amount of money for em. However there is a guy on ebay selling modded chips w/slocket. But the chips are hard modded and you can't put them back to use them in a native FPGA-2 board.

The max you can do, is a celeron 1ghz. But that is usually more than enough.

There just isn't any slockets that support the FPGA-2 the tualatin uses (trust me, I've tried many times).

Yeah there are. Powerleap and Upgradeware were the most popular ones, though there are some generic ones floating around too. You can also modify a regular Slotket by insulating a couple pins and soldering in a couple bridge wires.

I think I've formulated a plan on what to build, I'll get back to that later when I have more time to write it out.

I bet the A-team could build a space station from all those parts 😁 they always manage to build a tank from old bits of metal stored in a shed 🤣

Anyway from your list of parts i would use this lot (for a win95/Dos machine):

Micronics M55Hi+ mobo
Pentium 166mhz CPU
S3 Trio or the Ati Rage II paired with the 8mb Voodoo 2
SB AWE64 sound card

Old Thrashbarg wrote:

Here's sorta what I had in my mind: P5A board, ~400mhz K6-2, Voodoo3, MX300 with a wavetable board of some sort (DB50XG probably), and the PAS16.

I like your original plan best, since it is one of the most versatile machines you can build for this kind of games.

The most useful upgrade would be a K6-2+ or K6-3+, because it would add a lot of speed (internal L2 cache), and the possibility to change the multiplier on-the-fly via software. The K6+ versions used to be rather expensive (especially the higher ratings), but recently there seem to be a lot of 400 MHz cores for sale for cheap. Any K6+ can easily do 500 MHz, which is plenty for games from 1998, even if you take the weak FPU into account.
A classic Pentium couldn't compete against this, and a Slot1 machine would be too fast (and difficult to slow down) for mid-90s games.

5u3 wrote:

... a Slot1 machine would be too fast (and difficult to slow down) for mid-90s games.

You could use the free slow down utility called Throttle:

http://www.oldskool.org/pc/throttle/DOS

Ok, continuing from earlier, now that I'm not rushed for time. A new part has come into the equation, it was too cheap to pass up, so I have a Voodoo1 on the way. 4MB Diamond Monster 3D.

I think what I'll do then, is build two systems. I don't need two, but, meh, why not? I could always throw together a PIII, but all my spare ones at the moment are either dual CPU, or are Dells with limited expansion options (no AGP, only a couple PCI slots, etc.). Besides, I deal with that sort of hardware everyday, and I kinda feel like playing with something different.

So, I'm going to go: M55HI+, P166, either a Trio or the Millennium, Voodoo1, and.... not quite sure what I'm going to do with the sound. I noticed that motherboard has a Vibra16 onboard, and I think it's one of the ones with an OPL3 integrated in, so that aspect is probably covered, but there's no wavetable header or anything. I'll figure that out later. Add in a 3Com NIC and an Adaptec 2940 SCSI card with a 2.1GB Seagate Barracuda and an 8X SCSI CD-ROM, and I'll basically have the system everybody was drooling over for Christmas '96.

Then the other box will be the P5A, with a K6-2 for now, but start hunting for a K6+ chip. Voodoo3 for now, maybe switch over to the Voodoo5 once I get a CPU that won't choke it as badly. MX300, PAS16, etc.

Now the other issue is, I only have one spare case at the moment, so I need to decide which to put together first...