Ensure you have at least one PS/2 mouse and PS/2 keyboard

Really depends on what kind of PC you're building, but I'd add a NIC controller and a somewhat modern CD-ROM (any generic 52x will do).

You don't say, but based on the hardware you listed, I'm guessing retro to you means Windows 9x? That's roughly the era of V3 and SB16. The answer to your question depends on what era you focus. If you are focusing on 386/486, for example, then AT-compatible hardware would be more important. For Win9x or late DOS eras, ATX and PS/2 is usually fine.

Are you interested at all in DOS games? That would be the only reason to choose an SB16 over an A3D or SBLive!

clueless1 wrote:

You don't say, but based on the hardware you listed, I'm guessing retro to you means Windows 9x? That's roughly the era of V3 and SB16. The answer to your question depends on what era you focus. If you are focusing on 386/486, for example, then AT-compatible hardware would be more important. For Win9x or late DOS eras, ATX and PS/2 is usually fine.

Are you interested at all in DOS games? That would be the only reason to choose an SB16 over an A3D or SBLive!

Retro to me spans a very wide timeframe.

I figured that the people building their first (like me) would aim for a system that can support the widest range of games (like me). So I went for a DOS/9x PC build. Anybody looking for support for games that PC can't run would probably build a second PC (if it's a lot of games), or look at another method for just those few games (if it's just a few games).

Cool. Well, to me, harder-to-find things are up there, and what I look for when I'm getting freebies. I try not to pay for retro gear if I don't have to, which means I won't spend money unless the price is reasonable and I REALLY want it bad. 😀 It also depends on how patient you are. I'm willing to wait months if I know something will eventually be gifted to me.

Things like AT cases and PSUs, serial mice or serial to PS/2 adapters, old hard drives, PCI graphics cards (for DOS systems), anything 486 and earlier, those are all important to me to have extras of. Another thing that can be very important if you want two systems and are limited on space is an old KVM so you can share keyboard, mouse and CRT between 2 systems.

oeuvre wrote:

Ensure you have at least one PS/2 mouse and PS/2 keyboard

Yeah, no kidding. Old motherboards can be fussy. Mine won't take a USB keyboard during boot. It also refuses to acknowledge any graphics cards at all if I have both an AGP and a PCI card installed.

it really depends on the timeframe.
If you want to use 9x software you should go with a Pentium II, a Pentium I MMX would also be good.
A Pentium III may be a little bit too much, because it will run to fast so you will get problems with older games.
I wouldn't consider a SB16 for this purpose, because it is really a DOS card, and lacks clearity in Windows.
Look more for more modern models like SB AWE32 or 64 Gold. Or try a Soundblaster clone with a Yamaha chip on it, so you've get the downwards compatibility.
If you want to use a Voodoo 3 it may be better using a Pentium II instead of a Pentium I MMX, because for these machines a Voodoo 2 or 1 is more suited + 2D graphic card.

I second the suggestion for a P2 build, an ATX Slot 1 board with ISA is probably the easiest to find for a beginner who wants to do both high-performance DOS gaming and reasonable 9x gaming, the best part about ATX boards is that they'll most likely fit in nearly any half-modern full tower case which means you won't have to be tortured by trying to find affordable AT cases, but do make sure the case has external 5.25" (and possibly 3.5") drive bays because I've noticed a lot of modern cases are stripping those away.

What model is your Sound Blaster card? there should be a model number starting with CT or SB (example: CT4800) that can help us identify the card you have so we know for sure if it would be useful for your project.

Staticblast wrote:

Yeah, no kidding. Old motherboards can be fussy. Mine won't take a USB keyboard during boot. It also refuses to acknowledge any graphics cards at all if I have both an AGP and a PCI card installed.

Most motherboards have a BIOS setting to use a certain video adapter for POST, usually it's in a column labeled "Default Video Adapter" and the settings are usually "AGP only" or "PCI only", maybe set it to AGP only if you have multiple PCI adapters and one AGP adapter?

KCompRoom2000 wrote:

I second the suggestion for a P2 build, an ATX Slot 1 board with ISA is probably the easiest to find for a beginner who wants to […]
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I second the suggestion for a P2 build, an ATX Slot 1 board with ISA is probably the easiest to find for a beginner who wants to do both high-performance DOS gaming and reasonable 9x gaming, the best part about ATX boards is that they'll most likely fit in nearly any half-modern full tower case which means you won't have to be tortured by trying to find affordable AT cases, but do make sure the case has external 5.25" (and possibly 3.5") drive bays because I've noticed a lot of modern cases are stripping those away.

What model is your Sound Blaster card? there should be a model number starting with CT or SB (example: CT4800) that can help us identify the card you have so we know for sure if it would be useful for your project.

Staticblast wrote:

Yeah, no kidding. Old motherboards can be fussy. Mine won't take a USB keyboard during boot. It also refuses to acknowledge any graphics cards at all if I have both an AGP and a PCI card installed.

Most motherboards have a BIOS setting to use a certain video adapter for POST, usually it's in a column labeled "Default Video Adapter" and the settings are usually "AGP only" or "PCI only", maybe set it to AGP only if you have multiple PCI adapters and one AGP adapter?

Heh, no need to worry too much over my build, It was just to slap together the hardware I already had laying around. I'll be improving it as I go along. (Would have used my Slot 1 board, but it died.) Just for interest's sake, my current sound card is an SB Prelude.

I figured this thread could be used more as a general guideline for people just starting off, and I know a lot of people here have more experience with older hardware than me.

w.r.t. the cases, yeah, I noticed that the budget cases are more likely to still have the bays.

w.r.t. the graphics cards, that's certainly a possibility. Mine had (unknown to me at the time) a corrupt BIOS, so maybe that's why.