Honestly, I wouldn't use a 486 box to run any of the Quake games, except maybe if I were playing around with GLQuake or VQuake on a PCI-equipped system. For Quake 1 on the software renderer, you really need at least a Pentium 1, though a Pentium II is even better. As for Quake II, it runs great on a Pentium II with a decent OpenGL-supporting GPU, and Quake III is fairly playable as well. To really make the first three Quakes run well though, go with a Pentium III box.

As for other Voodoo 1 DOS games, again, I would go with at least a Pentium 1.

Well, the idea is to make a 486/5x86 socket 3, no pentium or pentium overdrive, and push to limits

If i want to play Quake 3 at brutal FPS, i will do in my Pentium D + 8600GT, with High Quality Textures, no need for a P3 😀

I was reading this great benchmark

The Ultimate 486 Benchmark Comparison

I can see that the FPU in the 5x86 in a stock 100mhz, is at least 30% more strong that the 486 at 100hz

Someone tested in Quake 2 or 3?

Thanks for reply

mr_bigmouth_502 wrote:

For Quake 1 on the software renderer, you really need at least a Pentium 1

or d_mipcap 3 😀

r_dynamic 0 helps as well, at least in GLQuake. I did implement that in software too. 486s just get real upset with the lightmap surfaceblocks and the dynamic light marking routines

theelf wrote:

Quake 3 + Voodoo 1 + tweaks

Why would you do that?..

People, a question, find a Cyrix 5x86 100mhz is impossible, at least not possible without spend a lot of money

I can get a AMD 5x86 133 P75 for 5 euros, like 6 USD

The difference in "real world" (Quake, Quake 2, etc), between a AMD 5x86 vs a Cyrix 5x86 is soo big?

The AMD 5x86 for this price looks very good...

Thanks!!

leileilol wrote:

mr_bigmouth_502 wrote:

For Quake 1 on the software renderer, you really need at least a Pentium 1

or d_mipcap 3 😀

r_dynamic 0 helps as well, at least in GLQuake. I did implement that in software too. 486s just get real upset with the lightmap surfaceblocks and the dynamic light marking routines

Thanks, nice tweaks!
for Quake 1 and 2, small tweaks like this, make this two games very playable at normal quality

For Quake 3, is necessary heavy tweaks, and lowering all to minimum quality, to get some small playability

RacoonRider wrote:

theelf wrote:

Quake 3 + Voodoo 1 + tweaks

Why would you do that?..

..mmm... to check how much a 486 can do, to check if Quake 3 is Pentium only , etc... but...

the best is to read when Quake 3 start in the log "PROCESSOR: Pre-Pentium" 😊

the AMD P75 is nothing more than a 486DX5 133, it does not get any FPU improvements.

The AMD X5 P75 133mhz can be overclocked to atleast 160mhz. If you're lucky and a have a 486 PCI board it may also run at 3x60 (180mhz). At that speed it minimum equals a Cyrix 5x86 133mhz and the POD at 100mhz.

leileilol wrote:

mr_bigmouth_502 wrote:

For Quake 1 on the software renderer, you really need at least a Pentium 1

or d_mipcap 3 😀

r_dynamic 0 helps as well, at least in GLQuake. I did implement that in software too. 486s just get real upset with the lightmap surfaceblocks and the dynamic light marking routines

That makes me wonder, what would Quake have been like if iD weren't so hell-bent on optimizing it for the Pentium?

Probably still a first-person shooter game with lots of brown blocks.

theelf wrote:

People, a question, find a Cyrix 5x86 100mhz is impossible, at least not possible without spend a lot of money

Keep checking the scrap computer parts listings being sold for gold recovery. I found a Cx5x86-120 in one of those once and didn't pay anywhere close to the going rate for the parts that were in the lot. I could sell off everything else I got in the lot and keep the Cyrix chip for myself and still be in profit. You take a chance with the scrap lots that the parts you get may not work, but I haven't had very much not work yet.

d1stortion wrote:

Probably still a first-person shooter game with lots of brown blocks.

I agree, the color scheme on Quake (and to a certain extent Quake II) was quite bland. They really could've done a lot more with 256 colors. 🤣

I thought a 486 wouldn't be able to run Quake at all, due to the lack of certain math functions.

Only the 486SX (and 386SX too. Yes a 386dx can run Quake)

mr_bigmouth_502 wrote:

d1stortion wrote:

Probably still a first-person shooter game with lots of brown blocks.

I agree, the color scheme on Quake (and to a certain extent Quake II) was quite bland. They really could've done a lot more with 256 colors. 🤣

Quake II was pretty awesome with its obnoxious bright colored lighting. That really was a good recipe against blandness in FPS games of the late 90s. Of course Quake III had to be a brown mess again.

Q3A isn't a brown mess - though it does have a lot of red and gray. Team Arena added a crapload of blue if you're wanting the flavor of "millenium cheese". 😀

Q2's colored lighting suffered from clamping out its volume though - it was very dark compared to the software renderer.

I was working on a new ref_soft.dll that would bring its colored lighting into software mode with overbrights. The only id Tech 2 game that even bothered to enhance the software renderer is SiN.

Hi,

after some researching, i believe the best option to upgrade my AMD 486 DX4 100 is the AMD 5x86 133mhz

From feipoa benchmarks, i can see the AMD 5x86 stock, give 82.3 ALU / 54.6 FPU, vs the 69.6 ALU / 63.6 FPU

While the Cyrix will give me 10% more FPU speed, it lost in the ALU

Sadly, in my motherboard when i use a bus of 40mhz, the cache get crazy.... 🙁 only works ok in 25/33mhz bus

I tried to overclock the AMD 486DX4 100, using 3x40mhz, and i get 120mhz, but i need to disable L2

100mhz with L1 is more fast than 120mhz without L2

Hope i can find a solution...

My motheroard is a AB-PB4

http://www.amoretro.de/2012/01/abit-pb4-rev-1 … otherboard.html

Quake and Quake 2 will for sure like a lot this 10% best FPU, but emulators, like Callus or Genecyst for sure will be more happy with the better ALU of the AMD... no?

By the way, talking about Quake, in the AMD DX4 i get solid FPS in Quake 1 iw/ Voodoo 1 and very good fps in Quake 2, only drops in big outside areas or with lot enemies , but still playable

Quake 3 is slow to be fully playable, but, the idea was never play Q3 in the 486, but, just be happy to know my 486 can run Q3 😀

Yesterday i was "optimizing" Callus, and after install SDD vesa, use linear, reduce sound quality to 11025, give me 19-29 fps (no less, even in heavy games), then with a frame-skip of 2, i can get full speed

Very playable, is beautiful to se Final Fight in my 486

If benchmarks are correct the 5x86 133 will give me a 33% more raw speed.. that means that even in worst situation i can get 25fps

What do you think guys about this? someone have a AMD 5x86 133mhz and can test callus on it? 😀

Sorry, here in Spain, old computers parts are very expensive

Bye!

What about Vampire Savior on the 486? Is that possible? 😀
it's sort of possible on Pentium MMX and the qsound is faster to process than fm synthesis because that's nothing more than raw 16-bit PCM on 16 channels...

uff... Vampire Savior is CPS2...

In callus Street Fighter Alpha 1 CPS CHANGER works really good, like other CPS titles, 19-25fps

But CPS2 even in my 233mhz @260 using DOS Raine (fastest CPS2 emulator) skip some frames jeje, but really need 64mb ram

Anyway.. will test..jeje 😀 later i will came back with results

Oh, by the way, the NeoGeo CD emulator, without FX sound, but with audio CD, give me constant 20-27fps!! sadly the emulator dont have any frameskip option 🙁

If the emulator have frameskip, neogeo in the 486 !!! sad

The emulator I used on the Pentium was WinKawaks. Gets real fast in mono sound with the music turned off (not sound! Kawaks can disable music if it has the proper jukebox dat files), playable enough to complete
I haven't really ran vsav on my 486 because I lack the ram 😀