could it maybe just be low on ram?

Windows 95 is pretty underpowered on a 486DX and 8 megs of RAM, it was more optimized for, maybe, early Pentiums or very late 486's (5x86, etc). It will run, but pretty slowly.

More RAM would almost certainly help. A 486DX2 or DX4 would help too, but RAM is probably the main problem.

Windows 95 IMO is useless on a 486 regardless of what most people say. All it will do is chew your resources up and give less access to core resources, and on a 486 where EVERYTHING is at a premium, this will make it REALLY HARD to get a good system going ESPECIALLY on a DX 33/40/50

Use PC-DOS 2000. It's the best retro DOS IMO and comes with everything you need (Except CD driver) out of the box. Newer (But impossible to find) versions of PC-DOS have FAT32 support, but that's really not needed here.

Windows 3.1 is an alright option for games you NEED to run on Windows, but nothing newer.

RAM is an issue, but not the one at fault here. It will help, but not a lot. Use DOS.

cj_reha wrote:

Windows 95 is pretty underpowered on a 486DX and 8 megs of RAM, it was more optimized for, maybe, early Pentiums or very late 486's (5x86, etc). It will run, but pretty slowly.

I'm not having slow running/booting issues with the system.

Ampera wrote:

Windows 95 IMO is useless on a 486 regardless of what most people say. All it will do is chew your resources up and give less ac […]
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Windows 95 IMO is useless on a 486 regardless of what most people say. All it will do is chew your resources up and give less access to core resources, and on a 486 where EVERYTHING is at a premium, this will make it REALLY HARD to get a good system going ESPECIALLY on a DX 33/40/50

Use PC-DOS 2000. It's the best retro DOS IMO and comes with everything you need (Except CD driver) out of the box. Newer (But impossible to find) versions of PC-DOS have FAT32 support, but that's really not needed here.

Windows 3.1 is an alright option for games you NEED to run on Windows, but nothing newer.

RAM is an issue, but not the one at fault here. It will help, but not a lot. Use DOS.

I'm really not going to be using a non gui operating system. It's too far back for someone like me and frankly right up until the machine locks up , it works and performs perfectly fine. The issue I'm having is finding out why the machine locks up vs simply slowing down to process the information. I suppose windows 95 doesn't have a lot of diagnostic tools for determining crashes so it's sort of a guessing game.

Are there any BIOS options that might help you out? PIO/DMA, etc? Have you tested the RAM? I'm not sure if memtest86 will run on a 486...

Have you looked for updated chipset drivers?

Confirm there are not IRQ conflicts?

Win9x does not handle being constantly forced to swap very gracefully. This is part of why WinNT/Win2k hork less than 9x does.

You could try using OS/2 as well, but even then, I'd want more RAM (16MB or so)

Is it only during intense graphical operations? Can you give it some I/O benchmark tasks to see how it does?

What is the status of jumpers -
JP3
JP11
JP17, JP18
JP8, JP9, JP21? (Apparently JP21 is a factor depending on what clock you have)
JP4, JP5

Also you said 486DX 33 / 50 based on the BIOS, but what is on the actual processor?

CkRtech wrote:

Is it only during intense graphical operations? Can you give it some I/O benchmark tasks to see how it does? […]
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Is it only during intense graphical operations? Can you give it some I/O benchmark tasks to see how it does?

What is the status of jumpers -
JP3
JP11
JP17, JP18
JP8, JP9, JP21? (Apparently JP21 is a factor depending on what clock you have)
JP4, JP5

Also you said 486DX 33 / 50 based on the BIOS, but what is on the actual processor?

I suppose graphical operations are the only intensive task I can think of for the system. I'm not sure if it will crash with only a cpu intensive task. Could you recommend some benchmarks that'll run with these specs?

After having a look at the jumper diagram my jumpers appear to be different in location even though the board has the same layout. My boards bios string is "40-0000-428003-00101111-111192-UMC491-H" which i can't seem to find a result for on google but "40-0101-428054-00101111-111192-UMC491-H" is the closest match.

I popped off the heat sink and the cpu itself says it's an amd 486dx-40

Looking at the BIOS string and checking out a BIOS guide online for AMIBIOS, it looks like your board was made by QDI. UMC491 chipset thanks to that part of the string. Something closer to this? http://s7.directupload.net/images/131020/lrfswtfl.jpg

Is there any writing along the edges that perhaps you are overlooking? You may also have some silkscreened jumper info on the board.

Maybe one of the other guys can recommend some benchmarking software.

My guess is a dodgy PSU.

Scali wrote:

My guess is a dodgy PSU.

My guess is your right. either that or the CPU is set at 50 MHz.

Based on the previous postings, if I had to take a guess, then this is probably your motherboard: http://arvutimuuseum.ee/th99/m/P-R/33302.htm
Otherwise, takes pictures of the motherboard and try to identify the correct one on the above mentioned site.
You can also run a utility like NSSI 0.60 (http://www.navsoft.cz/nssi060.exe). This will normally tell you what motherboard you have.

Since you have a VLB graphics card in your system, and you're running your Front Side Bus at > 33 MHz, there must be a jumper somewhere to apply a wait state to your VLB (otherwise, check the settings in your CMOS setup).
Make sure you configure your CPU correctly according to the motherboard's settings. An incorrect configuration will undoubtedly lead to stability issues.

Then use Windows 3.1

DOS is what people were forced to use in a way. You had GUIs but they would absolutely hog any and all resources. Maybe you want a Socket 5 system, it will probably work a bit better.

Or alternatively, a DX4/5x86/POD and more RAM - Win95 and even NT4 will work on a 486, but it's gotta be a pretty skookum one.

Ok I'm hating this site a little bit as I typed out a huge paragraph but it made me login to post it , then kindly deleted everything I typed.

But essentially summed up , I think the hard drive is just failing so I'll have to look into trying a different drive solution.

Is this board:
https://theretroweb.com/motherboards/s/qdi-us491p3

If you still have it, we'd like a dump of the bios 😀

I used Win 95 "A" on a 486 with 8MB of RAM daily in 1995 and it ran fine. I played tons of games and wrote tons of documents on it. People saying it's unstable because of system specs have no idea what they are talking about.

jade_angel wrote on 2017-04-30, 22:13:

Win9x does not handle being constantly forced to swap very gracefully. This is part of why WinNT/Win2k hork less than 9x does.

You could try using OS/2 as well, but even then, I'd want more RAM (16MB or so)

LMAO OS/2 is a dumpster fire and is worse, in every way, than Win9x. This recommendation is the most laughable thing I have seen on this forum.