I don't recall seeing too many major differences between RTM(SP0) and SP1. There may be some additions to system functionality with SP1 but in overall things appear to be the same.

SP2, however added a lot of new system functionalities, at the expense of proper PAE support, so you can no longer use more than 4GB of RAM by enabling PAE. Some notable changes at that point were Windows Firewall, revised Windows Update and the possibility to install IE7/8.

SP3 added the possibility to install .NET Framework 4.0. However, .NET 4.0 had some kind of bug that caused the system to hang for about 1-2 minutes before being usable on system startup, which may be considered as one of the major performance hit you mentioned. Other than that, I don't see too much difference with SP2.

As for the .NET 4.0 (NGEN) startup hang problem, the issue was well-known and there are some unofficial fixes available online.

NOTE: If your system's overall performance is weak, you should use RTM or SP1 as these provide better performance, unless you have software that require SP2 to run. The additions introduced in SP2 kind of bloated the system that the original system requirements no longer apply. Also, if you're considering post-EOL WinXP updates, be noted that some system updates require SSE2 instructions, which Athlon XP does not have, and will break the system.

If I recall correctly, SP2 for WinXP came out in the later half of 2004. As long as your games and drivers are older than that, you can stick with SP1 if you like.

I also don't remember any performance differences between retail WinXP and SP1. I think SP2 was a bit more demanding, while SP3 felt pretty sluggish on older hardware.

Some Athlon XP boards require at least SP2 to have working USB2.0 ports. There was no separate driver, just required updating Windows to SP2.

Take a look at Windows FLP or POS Ready 2009. They are way more updated than original standard releases and work well on lower spec machines.

Thanks for the advice everyone!

I think at this point I'll probably start with Windows XP SP1 and see how it performs.

Some of the games I plan to run are the Wadjet Eye adventure games. They're the only ones I have concerns over compatibility, since a lot of them are from late 2000's or early 2010's.

I tried running SP1 recently on an older box also for performance reasons, and I kept running into issues with supposed XP compatible software throwing up DLL issues. I quickly waved the white flag and installed SP3 and most things worked right away.

So, I reluctantly recommend SP3 now, and on lower spec systems post-install I turn off the GUI themes, then go to services and disable many as per the “tweaked”/“barebones” values on the excellent blackviper site: https://www.blackviper.com/service-configurat … configurations/
I also disable ntfs last access time stamp for a file system boost: https://www.techrepublic.com/article/tech-tip … -access-update/

Zeerex wrote on 2023-02-21, 02:00:

I tried running SP1 recently on an older box also for performance reasons, and I kept running into issues with supposed XP compatible software throwing up DLL issues.

That's concerning for sure. What software gave you trouble?

Unfortunately I do not recall, it may have been Dosbox? If you stick with 2000/2001 software, SP1 should not be a problem

athlon xp cpu? i wouldn't worry too much about raw performance in xp. lack of sse2 will be a bigger headache. you also mentioned a pci sound card, not isa, so i'm guessing you're running a newer chipset than the kt133a which means you're running ddr ram, probably dual channel. your system will be quite capable.

for awhile i ran xp sp3 on a 1st gen palomino xp 2100 on a kt-133a board with 1.5gb of pc-133 sdram. now i could overclock to xp 2200 speed (141mhz bus) and run the ram at the fastest timings (5-2-2), but even without that boost the system never had the slightest problem with anything i ever threw at it. i presume your system is even more advanced than mine.

i dual-booted win98se and eventually dropped xp from the system altogether and replaced it with q4os linux (debian). win98se is a constant struggle with software availability, but so far it's managed to remain my only windows os. i might go back to xp one day, but it would be sp2, not sp3.

you know i don't even run on an ssd. any modern high-density platter hdd is fast as hell (even 5400rpm) compared to what was available back in the day. i stripe a pair of 7200rpm 200gb hdd in a raid-0 and i'm pretty satisfied.

Zeerex wrote on 2023-02-21, 03:04:

Unfortunately I do not recall, it may have been Dosbox? If you stick with 2000/2001 software, SP1 should not be a problem

Some of the games I'm planning will be from 2006 through 2015 (Wadjet Eye games), so I'll just have to see they work.

stanwebber wrote on 2023-02-21, 03:38:

you also mentioned a pci sound card, not isa, so i'm guessing you're running a newer chipset than the kt133a which means you're running ddr ram, probably dual channel. your system will be quite capable.

It's an ASUS A7V600 board which uses the Via KT600 chipset. Though I don't have dual channel RAM in this board. Just a single stick of 512MB for Windows 98.

Which is the main purpose of this build, an overkill Win98 rig. I only want to include Windows XP for certain 2D games that I want to play with a CRT monitor. Going dual boot seemed the most convenient option.

LSS10999 wrote on 2023-02-20, 06:09:

I don't recall seeing too many major differences between RTM(SP0) and SP1. There may be some additions to system functionality w […]
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I don't recall seeing too many major differences between RTM(SP0) and SP1. There may be some additions to system functionality with SP1 but in overall things appear to be the same.

SP2, however added a lot of new system functionalities, at the expense of proper PAE support, so you can no longer use more than 4GB of RAM by enabling PAE. Some notable changes at that point were Windows Firewall, revised Windows Update and the possibility to install IE7/8.

SP3 added the possibility to install .NET Framework 4.0. However, .NET 4.0 had some kind of bug that caused the system to hang for about 1-2 minutes before being usable on system startup, which may be considered as one of the major performance hit you mentioned. Other than that, I don't see too much difference with SP2.

As for the .NET 4.0 (NGEN) startup hang problem, the issue was well-known and there are some unofficial fixes available online.

NOTE: If your system's overall performance is weak, you should use RTM or SP1 as these provide better performance, unless you have software that require SP2 to run. The additions introduced in SP2 kind of bloated the system that the original system requirements no longer apply. Also, if you're considering post-EOL WinXP updates, be noted that some system updates require SSE2 instructions, which Athlon XP does not have, and will break the system.

IIRC Net 4.0 was required for some installers and graphic card utils later in the day, along with best version of IE for the time which was the lazy way to the GUI for the API or something.

my use case was pretty much identical to yours. i started out with xp, but then switched to wine/play on linux to catch anything too modern to run on win98.

if you're limiting yourself to 512mb ram on account of win98, don't. get r loews win98 memory patch. all the other mods and tweaks floating around online have been problematic, but r loews fix is solid. i suggest using the modified cab file method before you even install win98. search archive.org for the download. after his death his estate released all of his software for free.