Some thoughts-

Even with a DX2-66 you would basically be at the minimum requirements for Win98se, I can't imagine that would be enjoyable. Maybe look into a DX4 486 overdrive cpu?

I would rule out 'nvidia pci' unless you do decide to go with win98se since whatever card that is, is likely to be overkill.

I have to imagine that the Sound Blaster Vibra 16 ISA is the most compatible option for dos gaming.

Very well!

So:

• 128 KB of Double Banked cache (ask the forum for details on how to find this)
• CPU 486 DX2-66 MHz (DX 66 not possible, must be DX2)
• Definitely 64 MB FPM RAM (2 SIMM x 32 MB) [I'd be careful going 128 MB, because some DOS games can go nuts], possibly 60 ns (found easily on eBay), of which:
   ○ 1 MB is allocated by DOS and stuff (EMM386, UMB, HMA, etc.)
   ○ 47 MB XMS via HIMEM (or 31 MB XMS + 16 MB EMS if you need EMS too)
   ○ 8 MB had drive cache via SMARTDRV in XMS
   ○ 8 MB Ram Disk via RAMDRIVE, setting TEMP and TMP variables in DOS (and whatever it has in Windows too) to point in the Ram Disk 😉
• 2x IDE-to-CF or IDE-to-SD adapters (in my case, I had lots of compatibility issues with CF cards, while SD cards via IDE-to-SD adapters worked greatly in old 486 and Pentium)
• IDE Primary master: CF or SD card with DOS, Windows 3.11, apps. Be careful with the cards' size due to BIOS limits (having PCI slots my guess is a 4GB limit is safe)
• IDE Primary slave: CF or SD card for data
• IDE Secondary master: Optical unit (As an alternative, you can hook it to the ISA Sound Card if it has any IDE connector)
• IDE Secondary slave: leave it for now, you never know 🤣
• Get a Gotek Floppy Drive emulator via USB memory stick to be "floppyfied" with 100 floppies in a modern computer using appropriate utility (Ask Vogons)
• Video card: go Cirrus Logic Laguna (I guess 5464), very good DOS performances and great compatibility
• Sound card: of course!! Sound Blaster AWE64 😁 (with NO DOUBTS at all forget PCI for a DOS system, go ISA)
• Definitely go purist: DOS/Win3.11 😉 (y)

Should I go with Win98se or just Win-3.11 ?

Enjoy!

aries-mu wrote:

Very well! […]
Show full quote

Very well!

So:

• 128 KB of Double Banked cache (ask the forum for details on how to find this)
• CPU 486 DX2-66 MHz (DX 66 not possible, must be DX2)
• Definitely 64 MB FPM RAM (2 SIMM x 32 MB) [I'd be careful going 128 MB, because some DOS games can go nuts], possibly 60 ns (found easily on eBay), of which:
   ○ 1 MB is allocated by DOS and stuff (EMM386, UMB, HMA, etc.)
   ○ 47 MB XMS via HIMEM (or 31 MB XMS + 16 MB EMS if you need EMS too)
   ○ 8 MB had drive cache via SMARTDRV in XMS
   ○ 8 MB Ram Disk via RAMDRIVE, setting TEMP and TMP variables in DOS (and whatever it has in Windows too) to point in the Ram Disk 😉
• 2x IDE-to-CF or IDE-to-SD adapters (in my case, I had lots of compatibility issues with CF cards, while SD cards via IDE-to-SD adapters worked greatly in old 486 and Pentium)
• IDE Primary master: CF or SD card with DOS, Windows 3.11, apps. Be careful with the cards' size due to BIOS limits (having PCI slots my guess is a 4GB limit is safe)
• IDE Primary slave: CF or SD card for data
• IDE Secondary master: Optical unit (As an alternative, you can hook it to the ISA Sound Card if it has any IDE connector)
• IDE Secondary slave: leave it for now, you never know 🤣
• Get a Gotek Floppy Drive emulator via USB memory stick to be "floppyfied" with 100 floppies in a modern computer using appropriate utility (Ask Vogons)
• Video card: go Cirrus Logic Laguna (I guess 5464), very good DOS performances and great compatibility
• Sound card: of course!! Sound Blaster AWE64 😁 (with NO DOUBTS at all forget PCI for a DOS system, go ISA)
• Definitely go purist: DOS/Win3.11 😉 (y)

Should I go with Win98se or just Win-3.11 ?

Enjoy!

So what 486 CPU's are 5v ?

I have a 528mb WD hard-drive. They are in good condition with hardly any use.
runs good and quite for old IDE drive.

I have trouble with getting Cirrus Logic laguna drivers to work under Win3x. I have better success with S3 trio in Win3x.

What about a SB live 5.1 with DOS drivers ?
https://www.philscomputerlab.com/sound-blaster-live.html

Intel486dx33 wrote:

So what 486 CPU's are 5v ?

I'm not sure but my guess is that 486 33, 50, and 66 are all 5 v. Maybe if you Vogons-post a photo of your CPU someone will surely be able to tell you.

Intel486dx33 wrote:

I have a 528mb WD hard-drive. They are in good condition with hardly any use.
runs good and quite for old IDE drive.

Oh believe me... with modern solid state technologies, which make those lovely 486s run smoothly like going nuts, you totally want to use one of those! It's totally worth it, and the adapters are super cheap on eBay, so small cards (below 4 GB).
My 486 on an SD card is so fast Windows 3.11 loads in 4 seconds. Sometimes it didn't even show the intro screen (showing the Windows version).

Intel486dx33 wrote:

I have trouble with getting Cirrus Logic laguna drivers to work under Win3x. I have better success with S3 trio in Win3x.

Ops! I didn't know that.
If you want an advice, try this trick: have a look at a branded-proprietary drivers for Win3.11. For example, the ATI Rage Pro Turbo was a relatively modern card with no drivers for Win 3.11. But some manufacturers actually developed them. I found the Win 3.11 drivers in the Support section for the Deskpro EN in the Compaq/HP support website.

If I recall, certain Compaq models of Deskpro or Prolinea had the latest Cirrus cards. You should go through all the models in their support website:

https://support.hp.com/us-en/products/

Try first searching among the DESKPRO models.
Then PROLINEA models (from the 466 and above, like 590, 5100 etc. I doubt the older versions having the slash in the name carried any Cirrus card, like the 4/33 or the 4/66, except maybe the 4/100 if I recall!).
Select Windows, then Windows 3.x as version, and you should find your drivers showing all the possible SVGA models for the computer model you selected before.

If not, the S3 Trio is very good and powerful. I just don't know about its compatibility with old DOS software. VOGONS guys??? For example, if in a DOS game you select S3 928 or 968, would the driver work in a S3 Trio?

Intel486dx33 wrote:

What about a SB live 5.1 with DOS drivers ?
https://www.philscomputerlab.com/sound-blaster-live.html

WOOOOOW MAN! Thank you SO MUCH! I didn't know about that!!!

Also, more info on your cirrus card on page 214 here:

https://books.google.ca/books?id=AnmwQa8W3JUC … 0gd5464&f=false

BinaryDemon wrote:

Some thoughts-

Even with a DX2-66 you would basically be at the minimum requirements for Win98se, I can't imagine that would be enjoyable. Maybe look into a DX4 486 overdrive cpu?

Yes, I want to be able to turn off the cache in the bios so I can run old games that require a slow CPU.

Also, for the Cirrus Laguna, try these drivers, some of them show Windows 3.11 in the list of supported OSs:

https://members.driverguide.com/matches ... c+546X+PCI

link doesn't seem to work, lets' try like this:

https://members.driverguide.com/matches ... c+546X+PCI

Yes, There are so many versions of the CS Laguna driver for Win3x and I have only gotten one to work in my IBM 350 running WinNT351.
But I forgot which driver I used. I have not been able to get it to work again under Win3x.
And even at that it was NOT totally working properly.

Works fine under Win95 and Win98 however.

not surprised as it was a "modern" card.

In the corrected link I edited above (gotta do highlight, copy, and paste), there are many Lagunas / GD5464 drivers for Win 3.11 specifically, you can try them all if you want.

Brackets in URLs messes with BBCode, yeah. Better to use a URL shrink/redirection service to make it linkable (if you care) in this case. Ew. DriverGuide, always classing things up. 🤣

Excellent. I too have bought this motherboard.
It is a reasonable motherboard with one crippling limitation, 5V CPU's only. This will generally limit you to DX2's, and only some of those will work, many of the cheaper ones are low voltage versions.

I intend to go with an Evergreen AMD 5x86 133Mhz. They are reasonably common, but not particularly cheap, on ebay. I already had an evergreen so this board suited me. These have the circuitry to convert 5v to the voltage the cpu needs.

I will start a thread on here about this build. But it isn't my highest priority right now.

Okay, I built this computer however I get no video ?
Any Idea’s as to what is wrong ?
Could it be the CPU ?
The Ram is good and the video cards are good. I tried different video cards and none produce an output.
The Motherboard is NEW old stock.
At first it beeped but now it does not even beep.
I see the keyboard lights light up so It appears to recognize the keyboard.
And the hard driver spins up and the motherboard appears to be trying to access the hard-drive.

Any Ideas on how to trouble shoot this problem ?

Try completely disconnecting the floppy drive, both power and IDE... let us know

Ah, also, double check the Master/Slave situation of the IDE drives and optical drives, making sure the master units are connected at the end of the cable and the slave units to its central connector. If the cable/motherboard have no blocking frame, make sure the verse of the cables is appropriate and matches both the motherboard and the units.

Thanks, Yes it was the Cables.

Thanks for the update, glad it helped! Enjoy the "new" system 😀

tbh i wouldn't bother with 98SE on a 486 but hey

Okay, I received the NEW cables today and hooked them up.
Now I have a NEW problem.
The bios recognizes my Hard-drive just fine. But when I try to boot from the hard-drive I get an error message
"Hard drive failure, 80 error "
So I can't boot even from a floppy.
I did have to set the jumper on the hard-drive to "Master" other wise I would get a beep error.
Cable select jumper setting does not want to work. ( Error beeps )
floppy appears to be working fine.
Bios can not detect CDROM, So just set to Auto for now.

usually 486 BIOS cannot see CD-ROMs but you can still use them with MSCDEX or equivalent in DOS