VOGONS


First post, by gaffa2002

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Hello everyone.
First, a little bit of background:
Currently I have as my main retro computer an Athlon classic @750mhz with 256mb of RAM and a Geforce 4 MX440 64MB running on a EP7KXA motherboard. After ironing out some stability issues (initially it had 512mb of RAM, which was causing major instability under win 98 even when limiting the memory, so I installed 256 instead, plus for some reason it doesn't like my 40GB HDD, which works fine only if I set the jumper to limit it to 32GB). Anyways, now the thing is working great and stable for both windows 98 and MS-DOS gaming, with SETMUL (thank you so much, gerwin!) I can disable L1 cache and it becomes a 386 DX 40. I can also use THROTTLE and the VIA chipset allows me to select between 16 different speeds (from 100% to around 6%) allowing me to play games that run too fast on an Athlon but too slow on a 386 (Alone in The Dark 2 and Theme Park are some of them). Sound compatibility is also great since the motherboard has an ISA slot in which I use a Sound Blaster AWE 64 PnP (which also gave me some trouble in order to be mapped to IRQ 5, but in the end it worked). I'm very satisfied with that machine and plan on using it for DOS, Windows 9X gaming (until late 2001 games) and Sega Genesis development (Dosbox works fine for it, but its not as fun 😁).

Now, I have some spare parts left and I'm feeling tempted to make another build with them to cover DOS gaming just for fun:

  • K6-2 450Mhz (regular one, which does not allow me to change multipliers on the fly)
  • Pentium MMX 233Mhz
  • V72MA motherboard (Super 7 board, has one isa + 3 PCI slots, no AGP, Ali chipset)
  • Diamond Stealth 2000 video card (Virge S3 with 2mb vram)
  • 20GB 5200 RPM HDD

My first question is about the CPU: I used the K6-2 before as it was clearly faster for Win 98 games and late DOS games, but since I already have a machine that covers that area, maybe I should use the P233 MMX now that the focus is to cover older DOS games. Is there any advantage in using a Pentium MMX over a K6-2 for playing older DOS games? Only game I know which does not run on the K6-2 at all is FIFA International Soccer. I watched Phil's video about the P233 MMX having more ways to fine tune CPU speed using SETMUL, so that's why I'm inclined to go with the Pentium this time.
For the video card, I was suggested before to use the virge S3 as it has better DOS compatibility, but in my personal experience I had issues with one of my games with it (Super Frog), but no issues with the onboard ATI Rage Pro Turbo, plus the ATI allows me to have some basic 3D acceleration (ATI proprietary API in DOS, plus Direct3D and OpenGL in Windows) so I'm also inclined to use the ATI one.
As for memory, I plan on going with no more than 64mb to avoid issues.
As for OS, I plan on going with Windows 95 for nostalgia reasons (plus, I already have a W98 machine).

Any suggestions or comments are welcome. Thanks in advance!

LO-RES, HI-FUN

My DOS/ Win98 PC specs

EP-7KXA Motherboard
Athlon Thunderbird 750mhz
256Mb PC100 RAM
Geforce 4 MX440 64MB AGP (128 bit)
Sound Blaster AWE 64 CT4500 (ISA)
32GB HDD

Reply 1 of 4, by ShovelKnight

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Personally I think Pentium MMX is better for DOS gaming than K6-2 and even better than K6-2+/3+. It scales smoothly and you can emulate both slow 386 and fast 486 which the K6-2 doesn't do.

Also Intel chipsets are quite a bit better than Super Socket 7 chipsets, so a Pentium MMX on an i430TX board is likely to be more stable.

If I had space for 2 retro PCs, I would build a Pentium MMX rig for DOS games and a fast Tualatin rig for mid to late Windows games.

Reply 2 of 4, by matze79

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For FPS DOS Games even a K6-2 can be too slow.
Playing SVGA HighRes Games above 1024x768 etc.

there is no general answer, it really depends on what you will play.

With older DOS Games i mostly think about Games on 286/386.
And here a P200MMX can be to fast also.

https://www.retrokits.de - blog, retro projects, hdd clicker, diy soundcards etc
https://www.retroianer.de - german retro computer board

Reply 4 of 4, by gaffa2002

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Thanks for all the comments.
Sorry, I should have been more specific. What I mean by "old" DOS games are games from between 1985-1995.

LO-RES, HI-FUN

My DOS/ Win98 PC specs

EP-7KXA Motherboard
Athlon Thunderbird 750mhz
256Mb PC100 RAM
Geforce 4 MX440 64MB AGP (128 bit)
Sound Blaster AWE 64 CT4500 (ISA)
32GB HDD