That's *all* you are keeping? 😉

There's a lot of redunancy here, which isn't a bad thing inherently, but it's making your sound situation more difficult than it need be. Tbh you only need two DOS systems, the 386 and the P2. You then have AWE64 for SB16 and AWE, and can pair that with CS4235 in the P2 for bug-free MPU-401. It actually has worse FM synth though... The 386 can use the SBPro2. You still need something for MIDI there; just the CS4235 woudn't be enough as a lot of MT-32 games need intelligent mode. A 386DX-16 can theoretically run SoftMPU, but the performance hit on such an old CPU would be problematic, so you really want a dedicated card with MPU, either a vintage Roland MPU-401(AT)/MusicQuest card (rare, usually expensive unless you're patient/lucky - which I have been, multiple times) or a modern remake like HardMPU.

As for VGA, the Matrox Millennium II isn't a DOS killer at all, it's no faster in DOS than competitors and Matrox VESA implementation is downright subpar. It's a great Windows card though... so long as the analog image quality is good enough, the S3 Trio/3D would be a much better DOS option.

If you do want to kit out the 486 and Pentium as well for DOS, you really need more ISA cards. I'm a big fan of C-Media CMI-8330 as a jack of all trades, having SBPro2, SB16 (including high DMA) and WSS compatibility, with a real 1:1 OPL3 clone for FM synth and bug-free MPU-401 to boot. Only problem is that you need to choose between really crappy low-end vintage cards (AudioExcel AV310 is commonest) or relatively pricey new replica (MK8330) - which by the way is excellent. If that's too... niche... any OPTi 929/930 or Aztech AZT2316 card is a safe bet for good OPL3, SBPro2 and bug-free MIDI, and they tend to be much cheaper than buggy creative cards.

Of course, depending on time and budget you can dive deeply down the rabbit hole. To give you an indication, these are my DOS systems:

1) old box
UMC U5S-33 (486SX clone)
UMC-based motherboard with turbo support for XT speeds
16MB RAM
Cirrus Logic GD5428 VLB
SnarkBarker Soundblaster 1.0 replica with CMS chips
Innovation SSI-2001 replica
MusicQuest intelligent mode MIDI card connected to MIDI patchbay with MT-32 and SC-55ST
- and I'm about to install an AdLib Gold 1000 replica too...
- also building my own Covox implementation (and failing...)

2) new box
P3-500
64MB RAM
S3 Trio AGP
Aztech 2320-based card for OPL3 and bug-free MPU-401 (hooked up to same patchbay)
AWE64 Gold
Gravis Ultrasound

This works for pretty much everything I can throw at it 😉

When you have this many machines I find it's more helpful to specialise the builds rather then try and make them all generic as compatible as can be systems. That focus can either be on hardware or a certain game. as an example

386, I'd also put the SBPro and RA50 here as it fits really well.
OS: Dos +Win 3x
This would be your early dos PC

486, Crystal 4235?
OS: Win95 -Windows wont be much use for games but nice OS for system management
Basically because everyone needs a VLB 486 but honestly no one needs a 486 as the P166 can do everything just as well or better. which is why I'm dumping the Crystal sound card here as I don't think it'll get used much.

P166, AWE64, Virge DX, Voodoo 1, SC55
OS: Win95 or 98
Late dos/Early Windows The AWE gives you SB16 and of course AWE support which is better supported in late dos plus you can mess around with the S3d games
3D Accelerated Games List (Proprietary APIs - No 3DFX/Direct3D)

P2 350, SBPCI, TNT2
OS: Win98,
Hardest one to come up with an excuse for so went for period correctness.

P3 1Ghz, SBLive! GF2MX
OS: Win98 or maybe Win2k for something different (I do most my 9x gaming in 2k just fine)
Win98 build. Good solid Win98 PC that'll do everything you ask of it for this era.

Duron, Audigy, 9800
OS: Win98
Guessing you'll end up using this as your main 9x rig so makes sense to put the good stuff here

Sempron
Windows server of some kind? just because?

Parts to add to your shopping list.
That link to the Proprietary API list has given me excuse to run up different computers that are otherwise redundant. Getting another card on that list and adding to the P2 could be a good option.
Likewise you have EAX covered but not A3D 2.0 You could get a Vortex 2 card and place it in any of your Win98 PC's
Finally as you need more ISA cards anyway (for the P2 and P3) I'd look at ESS and Yamaha cards which are highly regarded, sound different to Creative, and still somewhat cheap and easy to find (by ISA sound card standards)

P2-350 is really at the low end for Win98 - yes, it's period-correct for Win98 launch, but performance requirements increased rapidly in those years, and by the time WinME (let alone WinXP) was released, it would have been irritatingly slow. Given OP has a P3-1000, he already has a fine Win98SE machine. If you really want to do Windows with the P2-350, Win95 would make more sense. But I agree with OP, that's better as the ultimate DOS box.

I agree with dionb that there is a lot of redundancy based on these system specs.

I would likely pair it down to a max of 4 systems:

• 386 DX-16 - Late 80s / early 90s DOS
• Pentium 166 - Mid 90s DOS
• Pentium III - Windows 98 (late 90s)
• Sempron 3400+ - Windows XP (early 2000s)

In my own experience with builds of these eras, I find 486-era computers to be the most redundant. Games from the 286/386-era tend to run too fast. And games that require a 486 are typically better played on a Pentium anyways.

I also think that the P2 system is probably overkill as a DOS machine. It would be more suited for Windows 95 and early Windows 98. But since you've also got a Pentium 3 which can cover Windows 98, might as well just go with that. Unless there are specific speed-sensitive games that would be too fast on the P3, I'd leave the P2 out of the equation.

And with the P3 in the mix, the Duron is completely redundant.

Thanks for your reply : ) appreciate all the advices I can get.

dionb wrote on 2023-02-27, 12:02:

That's *all* you are keeping? 😉

There's a lot of redunancy here

: D' I know, I am trying to make them all productive non redundant.

dionb wrote on 2023-02-27, 12:02:

A 386DX-16 can theoretically run SoftMPU, but the performance hit on such an old CPU would be problematic, so you really want a dedicated card with MPU, either a vintage Roland MPU-401(AT)/MusicQuest card (rare, usually expensive unless you're patient/lucky - which I have been, multiple times) or a modern remake like HardMPU.

I forgot to mention that I have a MusicQuest (grabbed it for 20 CAD) to deal with intelligent MPU, so the RA is safe, the sound canvas is the one that needs a simple MPU401 compatible card beside the main sound card.

dionb wrote on 2023-02-27, 12:02:

As for VGA, the Matrox Millennium II isn't a DOS killer at all, it's no faster in DOS than competitors and Matrox VESA implementation is downright subpar. It's a great Windows card though... so long as the analog image quality is good enough, the S3 Trio/3D would be a much better DOS option.

Agreed! Maybe the Millennium II would pair better a (pair of : D ) V2 in windows. That's was an old wish to pair a Voodoo with a Millennium, but I totally agree that S3 make much more sense for DOS.

dionb wrote on 2023-02-27, 12:02:

If you do want to kit out the 486 and Pentium as well for DOS, you really need more ISA cards. I'm a big fan of C-Media CMI-8330 as a jack of all trades, having SBPro2, SB16 (including high DMA) and WSS compatibility, with a real 1:1 OPL3 clone for FM synth and bug-free MPU-401 to boot. Only problem is that you need to choose between really crappy low-end vintage cards (AudioExcel AV310 is commonest) or relatively pricey new replica (MK8330) - which by the way is excellent. If that's too... niche... any OPTi 929/930 or Aztech AZT2316 card is a safe bet for good OPL3, SBPro2 and bug-free MIDI, and they tend to be much cheaper than buggy creative cards.

Exactly, that's what I plan to do to have less redundancy, since most of the "basics" are covered, I could try less obvious and more exotic cards. But the purchase list will have to wait a bit : ) I will keep the eyes opened though. Adlib Gold, GUS, Yamahas ymf7... and maybe a MU module are on my list : ) ymf7s probably soon as they don't cost (yet) a kidney.

dionb wrote on 2023-02-27, 12:02:

Of course, depending on time and budget you can dive deeply down the rabbit hole.

I feel I am just inside there now as I began to pickup more computers before finish the early ones.

chinny22 wrote on 2023-02-27, 13:24:

When you have this many machines I find it's more helpful to specialise the builds rather then try and make them all generic as compatible as can be systems. That focus can either be on hardware or a certain game. as an example

Agreed, but what I am trying to do is to focus on all relevant generational and technological increment rather than games or SOs. For that reason I think one computer from each "CPU iteration" would help me do that in organized way. But the hard part is, at least try, to have less redundancy and spread video and sound cards with some logic across each of these systems.

chinny22 wrote on 2023-02-27, 13:24:

386, I'd also put the SBPro and RA50 here as it fits really well.
OS: Dos +Win 3x
This would be your early dos PC

Yes, I may ending with this config here.

chinny22 wrote on 2023-02-27, 13:24:

486, Crystal 4235?
OS: Win95 -Windows wont be much use for games but nice OS for system management
Basically because everyone needs a VLB 486 but honestly no one needs a 486 as the P166 can do everything just as well or better. which is why I'm dumping the Crystal sound card here as I don't think it'll get used much.

I think the crystal can be useful to experiment with other cards in the same build as a MPU or PCM card in a midi-only system.
Yes, I agree the 486 is more a pentium wannabe, I could use this machine with a possible more exotic build in the future.

chinny22 wrote on 2023-02-27, 13:24:

P166, AWE64, Virge DX, Voodoo 1, SC55 OS: Win95 or 98 Late dos/Early Windows The AWE gives you SB16 and of course AWE support w […]
Show full quote

P166, AWE64, Virge DX, Voodoo 1, SC55
OS: Win95 or 98
Late dos/Early Windows The AWE gives you SB16 and of course AWE support which is better supported in late dos plus you can mess around with the S3d games
3D Accelerated Games List (Proprietary APIs - No 3DFX/Direct3D)

Yes, I like this configuration, but I preferer used it in DOS rather than windows. But anyway all my machines have win98 installed because I like to have fat32 for the sake of compatibility when I need to move them between computers and USB support on anything above the 486. I just change the BootGUI to "0".

chinny22 wrote on 2023-02-27, 13:24:

P2 350, SBPCI, TNT2
OS: Win98,
Hardest one to come up with an excuse for so went for period correctness.

Yes, these cards fit well in here. But this build I think can be too weaky for windows. I could experiment this machine with other sound cards and SOs maybe.

chinny22 wrote on 2023-02-27, 13:24:

P3 1Ghz, SBLive! GF2MX
OS: Win98 or maybe Win2k for something different (I do most my 9x gaming in 2k just fine)
Win98 build. Good solid Win98 PC that'll do everything you ask of it for this era.

chinny22 wrote on 2023-02-27, 13:24:

Duron, Audigy, 9800
OS: Win98
Guessing you'll end up using this as your main 9x rig so makes sense to put the good stuff here

Yes, this one is the most obvious I think, use early winxp hard to have a killer win9x build 😀

chinny22 wrote on 2023-02-27, 13:24:

Sempron
Windows server of some kind? just because?

Why not?

chinny22 wrote on 2023-02-27, 13:24:

Parts to add to your shopping list.

Nooooooooooooo please ... 😜

chinny22 wrote on 2023-02-27, 13:24:

Likewise you have EAX covered but not A3D 2.0 You could get a Vortex 2 card and place it in any of your Win98 PC's

Yes, this is a good point. I may end up acquiring some sound cards soon to complete "The Redundants" : )

Shponglefan wrote on 2023-02-27, 15:54:

I agree with dionb that there is a lot of redundancy based on these system specs. […]
Show full quote

I agree with dionb that there is a lot of redundancy based on these system specs.

I would likely pair it down to a max of 4 systems:

• 386 DX-16 - Late 80s / early 90s DOS
• Pentium 166 - Mid 90s DOS
• Pentium III - Windows 98 (late 90s)
• Sempron 3400+ - Windows XP (early 2000s)

In my own experience with builds of these eras, I find 486-era computers to be the most redundant. Games from the 286/386-era tend to run too fast. And games that require a 486 are typically better played on a Pentium anyways.

I also think that the P2 system is probably overkill as a DOS machine. It would be more suited for Windows 95 and early Windows 98. But since you've also got a Pentium 3 which can cover Windows 98, might as well just go with that. Unless there are specific speed-sensitive games that would be too fast on the P3, I'd leave the P2 out of the equation.

And with the P3 in the mix, the Duron is completely redundant.

Technically speaking I totally agree that 486s are Pentiums wannabes nowadays, but they are the only ones that represent the VLB era, and for the people who used PCs in that time they are somehow specials. I think it was the beginning of the fast-pacing PC iteration. Before that we could have 286/386s for years, the maximum you wanted to do is to add a sound card. After that, every year there was a new game requiring new hardware and the DX2 I think plays very well as the CPU that elevated the PC as something better than consoles and Amigas. Something to be desired when our 286/386 began to struggle to play UltimaVII/Indy Car Racing/Doom and CDROMs. So, there are a lot of emotional power in this CPU : )

Yes, the redundancy I'm gonna try to deal making experimental builds as I don't need all these to cover the end 80s to early 2000s. But my idea is to play with each one CPU gen of these eras (386, 486, P1, P2.....) , and to making each of them somehow "interesting usable machines" is the trick you guys are helping me : )

Hope you have the time and space to do that.

I have five fully functioning retro systems (the two DOS ones I mention, a P3-1400 Win98SE system, a P3-1400 Win2k system and a dual P3-933 WinXP SCSI system), and a few other partial ones (Cx5x86 systems with VLB and PCI, an Alaris Leopard 386SLC2 VLB system in pristine NOS AT case, a Cx486SLC in tiny case at work for use in breaks...) but only actually use the two DOS ones regularly. Apart from that I spend more time pottering around with hardware than actually playing any games on things.

Maybe some inspiration, other systems I intended to build:
- OS/2 2.0 (possibly on the Leopard)
- OS/2 Warp 4 (to see how good the DOS-in-a-window actually was)
- Win3.11 dedicated system (not really necessary, any 486/Pentium would be fine for this, but would be good opportunity to use old ISA/VLB Windows accelerator VGA cards)
- UMC-only build (CPU, motherboard chipset, VGA, I/O, NIC - this is in fact my 486-era DOS system)
- Specific Ultima 7 build (so picky you need to build a system around it... but it works on the UMC system with the right sound)
etc etc etc. Mainly it's just a big pile of junk 😉

I forgot to mention that I have a MusicQuest (grabbed it for 20 CAD) to deal with intelligent MPU, so the RA is safe, the sound canvas is the one that needs a simple MPU401 compatible card beside the main sound card.

That Crystal CS4235 is suitable, and can act as main sound card, so long as you don't want AdLib to sound anything like it should.

dionb wrote on 2023-02-27, 23:57:

- Specific Ultima 7 build (so picky you need to build a system around it... but it works on the UMC system with the right sound)

This just gave me an idea for a custom build: an AT-case completely clad in black laminate running a 486DX-33 with a "33" emblazoned in an LED readout on the case front. Maybe painted vanta black for good measure. Just for Ultima 7.

I might give that a go. 😁

With all these machines and I will not be able to play U7 with the "correct" speed will be the biggest pain in the heart. I didn't try recently, but I remember playing in a DX2-66 with turbo off "nicely". I'm gonna try tonight. The P166 has a turbo led jumper, but no turbo switch!
Back in 92 I tried to play in my 386 SX33 , it was possible to "run" the game, but quite unenjoyable slow.

zecahue wrote on 2023-02-27, 22:39:

Technically speaking I totally agree that 486s are Pentiums wannabes nowadays, but they are the only ones that represent the VLB era, and for the people who used PCs in that time they are somehow specials. I think it was the beginning of the fast-pacing PC iteration. Before that we could have 286/386s for years, the maximum you wanted to do is to add a sound card. After that, every year there was a new game requiring new hardware...

Before 1990 (the 286 and 386 years), a lot of PCs didn't have hard drives. So actually an HDD was the ultimate upgrade for most people, not a soundcard.

The 486 wasn't exactly a flash in the pan. It came out at the end of 1989, and was only obsoleted by Windows 95 (which was available at the end of 1995).
The fast pace started with the sixth generation...1997 to be specific.

zecahue wrote on 2023-02-28, 01:33:

With all these machines and I will not be able to play U7 with the "correct" speed will be the biggest pain in the heart. I didn't try recently, but I remember playing in a DX2-66 with turbo off "nicely". I'm gonna try tonight. The P166 has a turbo led jumper, but no turbo switch!
Back in 92 I tried to play in my 386 SX33 , it was possible to "run" the game, but quite unenjoyable slow.

Pentium systems don't have turbo options, AFAIK.

As an alternative you could try a tool like SETMUL or disabling things like motherboard cache in the bios. That can help throttle speeds of faster systems like Pentiums. Depending on different parameters you could potentially achieve a range of performance options.

The other option would be to swap out the DX2-66 for a DX-33 processor. The latter are still relatively available and not expensive.

Anonymous Coward wrote on 2023-02-28, 01:40:

Before 1990 (the 286 and 386 years), a lot of PCs didn't have hard drives. So actually an HDD was the ultimate upgrade for most people, not a soundcard.

The 486 wasn't exactly a flash in the pan. It came out at the end of 1989, and was only obsoleted by Windows 95 (which was available at the end of 1995).
The fast pace started with the sixth generation...1997 to be specific.

I disagree about the 486, and about the HDD/Sound cards it depends when we are talking about. I am considering the very late 80s and very early 90 when I began to see those machines in front of me.

Sound cards became popular after the sound blaster, before that was a niche with the Adlib, CMS and Mt-32, and at the time the sound blasters began to hit massively the stores and magazines most PCs had a HDD, as 30mb or 50mb ones wasn't expensive back in 1989/90. At that time, at least for me and my friends, a sound blaster was the thing to be desired, while nobody cared much about cpu.

Between a 25mhz 286 and a 25mhz 486 we have many years, the incremental speed was very slow even beside the 16 to 32 bit jump, as there was not many softwares coded for 32 bit at that time. The DX2 was the first CPU to have a clock multiplier. Exactly there when the speed race began. Mostly 486 became obsolete when Doom came out in 93. DX2s came in 92, in 93 the pentiums... a couple years later the P3 was reaching 1ghz.
486s era was also when the multimedia kits became popular.

1992 was the year when this revolution began (DX2, SBp2, SB16, GUS...).

Shponglefan wrote on 2023-02-28, 01:55:

Pentium systems don't have turbo options, AFAIK.

Early ones have, I think around socket 7 they disappeared, but the funny thing is that the LED jumper remained in some boards, I guess some people enjoyed to see the flashy Turbo light and imagine because that the computer was at full speed.

zecahue wrote on 2023-02-28, 02:38:

Mostly 486 became obsolete when Doom came out in 93.

That's just your opinion, it's wrong.
Would you not agree that "obsolete" would mean the inability to run most available software?
By all accounts, DOOM was a pretty enjoyable game on a DX2 with VLB. At best DOOM made the 486 second rate to the Pentium, not obsolete.

In 1990, mostly people who had important work to do on their PCs had hard drives. Most families still had home computers, if at all.
Back then PC "gamers" were mostly snot nosed kids of white collar workers who probably weren't trusted to touch the PC without supervision...and unless dad liked games, soundcard wasn't happening.

Shponglefan wrote on 2023-02-28, 01:55:

zecahue wrote on 2023-02-28, 01:33:

With all these machines and I will not be able to play U7 with the "correct" speed will be the biggest pain in the heart. I didn't try recently, but I remember playing in a DX2-66 with turbo off "nicely". I'm gonna try tonight. The P166 has a turbo led jumper, but no turbo switch!
Back in 92 I tried to play in my 386 SX33 , it was possible to "run" the game, but quite unenjoyable slow.

Pentium systems don't have turbo options, AFAIK.

As an alternative you could try a tool like SETMUL or disabling things like motherboard cache in the bios. That can help throttle speeds of faster systems like Pentiums. Depending on different parameters you could potentially achieve a range of performance options.

That's the problem with U7 - it uses its own downright weird memory manager which prevents software methods, and it re-enables cache regardless of what you do in BIOS. You really need a 386DX-40 or a 486-33 (as with vast majority of games of the time no FPU support, so 486SX/DX irrelevant).

dionb wrote on 2023-02-28, 08:17:

That's the problem with U7 - it uses its own downright weird memory manager which prevents software methods, and it re-enables cache regardless of what you do in BIOS. You really need a 386DX-40 or a 486-33 (as with vast majority of games of the time no FPU support, so 486SX/DX irrelevant).

Huh. I did not know that. Learn something new every day.

I guess 486-33 it is!

dionb wrote on 2023-02-27, 13:59:

P2-350 is really at the low end for Win98 - yes, it's period-correct for Win98 launch, but performance requirements increased rapidly in those years, and by the time WinME (let alone WinXP) was released, it would have been irritatingly slow. Given OP has a P3-1000, he already has a fine Win98SE machine. If you really want to do Windows with the P2-350, Win95 would make more sense. But I agree with OP, that's better as the ultimate DOS box.

Did say it's the hardest to find a role! I'm in a similar boat. I still have my very first PC rather then the family PC. A P2-400 sitting in my parents garage. Thing is that's the PC I had in my late teens so don't really want to upgrade it yet I've a very similar P3 600 AND P3 1Ghz PC which makes the P2 even more useless with similar but better PC's.

My only problem with the dos killer PC is most dos games work fine on a P166 where as you will run into more speed problems with the P2. With all that said though I'd definitely add an ISA card to anything possible as a lot of games also run fine on even faster PC's so why limit yourself.

zecahue wrote on 2023-02-27, 22:09:

Agreed, but what I am trying to do is to focus on all relevant generational and technological increment rather than games or SOs. For that reason I think one computer from each "CPU iteration" would help me do that in organized way. But the hard part is, at least try, to have less redundancy and spread video and sound cards with some logic across each of these systems.

Plenty of people here do the CPU iteration thing but keep more period correct, for me that's too limited which is why I focus on games, video cards, OS's (it doesn't really matter it's all excuses for more PC's then I really need) in my case I have the following PC's all setup ready to go below XP or Pentium 4 mark and how I justify them o myself.

1) 486 DX266, VLB, SB16, Dos 6/Win3.11 "reason" Our first PC
2) POD83, VLB, "reason" Upgraded version of the above as trying to keep that stock.
3) 586 133, S3 Virge, AWE32, Win95 "reason" PCI based 486 that allows me to play S3D accelerated games
4) Dual PPro, Matrox Mystique, Win95 & NT 3.51 "reason" Play around with NT (and eventually Netware and OS2) also allows me to play MSI accelerated games
5) Dual P3 600, GF2 MX, V2 SLI, Audigy 2 ZS, AWE64, Win98 & Win2k Pro "reason" Always wanted Voodoo 2 SLI
6) P3 1Ghz, GF4 Ti4800, Voodoo 3, Audigy 2 ZS, AWE64 "reason" High end Slot 1 build,
7) AMD Slot A 600, 3dFX Banshee, Aureal Vortex 2, ESS ES1868, "reason" I'm mostly a Intel/Nvidia/Creative guy and this is the other side.

Honesty only PC's 1 and 5 get much use but they hold sentimental value as well.

chinny22 wrote on 2023-02-28, 14:05:

1) 486 DX266, VLB, SB16, Dos 6/Win3.11 "reason" Our first PC

That's always the best reasons: "My first PC" and "the PC I wanted but was too expensive" : )

4) Dual PPro, Matrox Mystique, Win95 & NT 3.51 "reason" Play around with NT (and eventually Netware and OS2) also allows me to play MSI accelerated games

Dual PP is in my list : D' That's the one "Too expensive back then".

5) Dual P3 600, GF2 MX, V2 SLI, Audigy 2 ZS, AWE64, Win98 & Win2k Pro "reason" Always wanted Voodoo 2 SLI

I am not a huge fan of Voodoos, I don't like too much early 3D games. I understand its importance back then, and I believe we can play very well most glide games with newer cards (not all games though). But as a collector I would like to have a SLI just because it's cool : )

7) AMD Slot A 600, 3dFX Banshee, Aureal Vortex 2, ESS ES1868, "reason" I'm mostly a Intel/Nvidia/Creative guy and this is the other side.

That's a super valid reason. I've realized all my CPUs are intel and decided to keep a Duron as high performance win 9x because that. My first PC was an am386. Still looking non-creative cards also.

Honesty only PC's 1 and 5 get much use but they hold sentimental value as well.

We try to keep our decisions as logical as possible, and many ppl will argue that if you do differently will be better, but there is not a better reason like the emotional ones : ) otherwise we could do almost everything using dosbox.