Right, I've tried so much stuff to get games working properly but I'm struggling...

I've tried using a Pentium II laptop which worked well but lacked any 3D acceleration and a lot of games were very laggy in software mode.

Tried virtual machines, none worked well and all had issues of some sort.

More recently I've purchased a Compaq E500, Pentium III 900Mhz laptop with a ATI Rage Mobility 8MB GPU and 512MB RAM.

This features Direct 3D acceleration and even in software mode (where the only alternative is 3DFX) it runs great! It did have a couple of issues. First was Worms 2 where it wouldn't display the game correctly at all. I fixed this with a driver update and it now displays fine:

Another issue was Sub Culture. It was perfect apart from the underwater mines would display white and had no texture in Direct 3D mode. I'm yet to test this under the new drivers so it might be fixed.

Now, the one main issue I have now with this machine is sound... Games have really odd sound where sounds are either missing or get stuck like an old record and repeat over and over mid game. The games this happens most on is PowerSlide and Uprising Join or Die. The sound card is a ESS Maestro 2.

Can anyone give me any advice on how to get this running properly? Is there anyway i could some how emulate SB Pro or anything on this machine? I want to relive my childhood but I'm really struggling to get this working right and I don't really have the cash right now (or space) to invest in a proper PC with 3DFX cards, Sound Blaster 16 etc etc...

Any advice greatly appreciated.