Not sure if it's practical, but I got some pretty high FPS while running Quake in software rendering on a Core2 Duo E8600 paired with a Radeon X800 GTO.

I don't really use that system for DOS gaming though, that was just a proof of concept test.

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2024-01-20, 21:49:

Not sure if it's practical, but I got some pretty high FPS while running Quake in software rendering on a Core2 Duo E8600 paired with a Radeon X800 GTO.

I don't really use that system for DOS gaming though, that was just a proof of concept test.

Thank you for the example, this is exactly what I'm interested in. 😀

I've got a decommissioned E8600 setup from my old Win XP build, so I should give it a try with DOS and see how it performs.

I mean technically you can run DOS on a 13900KS with a 4090 and a 12.5Gb/Sec SSD, not sure how good of an experience it would be but it can be done.

Trashbytes wrote on 2024-01-21, 00:03:

I mean technically you can run DOS on a 13900KS with a 4090 and a 12.5Gb/Sec SSD, not sure how good of an experience it would be but it can be done.

I suppose getting a DOS compatible sound card in such a setup might be a challenge, though...

Shponglefan wrote on 2024-01-21, 00:38:

Trashbytes wrote on 2024-01-21, 00:03:

I mean technically you can run DOS on a 13900KS with a 4090 and a 12.5Gb/Sec SSD, not sure how good of an experience it would be but it can be done.

I suppose getting a DOS compatible sound card in such a setup might be a challenge, though...

yes I imagine it might be a tad uhh difficult, though if you get a PCI to PCIe adapter it might be possible with something like a Yamaha card or Aureal card.

Not sure if anyone has ever attempted to setup a sound card like that.

My guess would be to find the highest end board that still has PCI slots, something around Sandy/Ivy Bridge or even Haswell.

Trashbytes wrote on 2024-01-21, 00:44:

yes I imagine it might be a tad uhh difficult, though if you get a PCI to PCIe adapter it might be possible with something like a Yamaha card or Aureal card.

Not sure if anyone has ever attempted to setup a sound card like that.

My guess would be to find the highest end board that still has PCI slots, something around Sandy/Ivy Bridge or even Haswell.

I don't know if just having PCI slots would be enough though, since I believe the chipsets would also need to support certain legacy technologies to work under DOS.

Found a thread here on legacy PCI sound card support: PCI sound cards and Chipsets from various manufacturers...

Looks like it gets a bit dicey past Intel BX chipsets.

I wonder if industrial motherboards might be an option instead. Some of them even have ISA slots.

Shponglefan wrote on 2024-01-21, 01:08:

I don't know if just having PCI slots would be enough though, since I believe the chipsets would also need to support certain le […]
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Trashbytes wrote on 2024-01-21, 00:44:

yes I imagine it might be a tad uhh difficult, though if you get a PCI to PCIe adapter it might be possible with something like a Yamaha card or Aureal card.

Not sure if anyone has ever attempted to setup a sound card like that.

My guess would be to find the highest end board that still has PCI slots, something around Sandy/Ivy Bridge or even Haswell.

I don't know if just having PCI slots would be enough though, since I believe the chipsets would also need to support certain legacy technologies to work under DOS.

Found a thread here on legacy PCI sound card support: PCI sound cards and Chipsets from various manufacturers...

Looks like it gets a bit dicey past Intel BX chipsets.

I wonder if industrial motherboards might be an option instead. Some of them even have ISA slots.

You may still run into chipset issues there too, I wonder is a Yamaha YFM754 PCI card might still work, people have gotten them working ok on H81 chipsets with the PCI to PCIe adapters though they did have to setup XP to install the required drivers for DOS support.

Reading further, DOS/9x still requires DDMA support or the card breaks, so yeah will need to find a board with that at the minimum.

I've pure DOS gamed on a Northwood 2.4 before. An AudioPCI 128 was the ticket

Keep in mind that DOS games dont know how to properly deal with the stepping model of many newer chips, and CSM firmware hasn't been a thing in recent builds.

There is also issues with getting UMBs free on really new boards, as the AHCI controller often gobbles down large, and 'unworkable' chunks of the adapter rom region.

Then there are the issues with 'not good' / 'not complete' VBE bios on modern-ish video cards.

I would hazard a guess, that these compounding sets of issues constrains the newest board/chip generation to the P4/core 2 era, with PCI, IDE controllers (no sata), PCI video, PCI audio, with actual BIOS and not EFI with CSM.

Well here is a (not 100% serious) attempt to give your idea a try...

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=bS9hiSwL1KY

Trashbytes wrote on 2024-01-21, 01:18:

Reading further, DOS/9x still requires DDMA support or the card breaks, so yeah will need to find a board with that at the minimum.

I might be in luck then. Apparently one of the chipsets that retained DDMA support is SiS 962 and I happen to have such a board on hand.

I'll set up a testbench and try out some sound cards.

Would it be faster and have better compatibility if you ran like Dosbox-X or a Dos compatible raw VM?

douglar wrote on 2024-01-21, 03:55:

Would it be faster and have better compatibility if you ran like Dosbox-X or a Dos compatible raw VM?

That's not as interesting. 😉

Got things set up and tested an ESS Solo-1 with a Yucatan FX daughtercard. Took a couple attempts to get it working. I ended up having to reserve IRQ 5 on its specific PCI slot.

After which, it seems to work perfectly. Tested Doom, Doom2, Duke 3D, Warcraft 2, Wolfenstein 3D... Digital sound, FM and MIDI all work.

For video I installed a Voodoo Banshee card for now. I'll play around with different AGP cards and see what works from a compatibility perspective.

Even tested Arkanoid II and continued to be impressed at how this game works on everything. Is this possibly the most compatible DOS game in the world?

Shponglefan wrote on 2024-01-21, 04:49:

Got things set up and tested an ESS Solo-1 with a Yucatan FX daughtercard. […]
Show full quote

Got things set up and tested an ESS Solo-1 with a Yucatan FX daughtercard.

Pentium 4 DOS setup.jpg

Took a couple attempts to get it working. I ended up having to reserve IRQ 5 on its specific PCI slot.

But it seems to work perfectly. Tested Doom, Doom2, Duke 3D, Warcraft 2, Wolfenstein 3D... Digital sound, FM and MIDI all work perfectly.

For video I installed a Voodoo Banshee card for now. I'll play around with different AGP cards and see what works from a compatibility perspective.

Even tested Arkanoid II and continued to be impressed at how this game works on everything. Is this possibly the most compatible DOS game in the world?

Arkanoid 2 on Pentium 4.jpg

Hmmm from an AGP DOS standpoint nvidia cards are pretty solid for DOS compatibility, I use a MX400 paired with a Voodoo1 in my DOS box. Went with a MX400 as they are stupidly cheap and are way more than what DOS actually requires, their compatibility is also really good.

Next best is the S3 Virge GX2 with the Voodoo1, its a very solid combination for DOS compatibility for older DOS games wanting mode-X or using UniVBE that doesn't always like Nvidia GPUs. (There is a patch to fix UniVBE and nVidia NVPatch - making UniVBE work on NVidia cards )

Honestly that Banshee is also a very solid choice, doesnt matter that its PCI. This link may help you in choosing other cards https://gona.mactar.hu/DOS_TESTS/

Get a Geforce 2 mx for an inexpensive all-rounder. Should be able to run Half-Life, Quake 3, Carmageddon 1 & 2, GTA 1-3.

MikeSG wrote on 2024-01-21, 05:17:

Get a Geforce 2 mx for an inexpensive all-rounder. Should be able to run Half-Life, Quake 3, Carmageddon 1 & 2, GTA 1-3.

It should but not on this computer. DOS only. 😉

Trashbytes wrote on 2024-01-21, 05:03:

Hmmm from an AGP DOS standpoint nvidia cards are pretty solid for DOS compatibility, I use a MX400 paired with a Voodoo1 in my DOS box. Went with a MX400 as they are stupidly cheap and are way more than what DOS actually requires, their compatibility is also really good.

Next best is the S3 Virge GX2 with the Voodoo1, its a very solid combination for DOS compatibility for older DOS games wanting mode-X or using UniVBE that doesn't always like Nvidia GPUs. (There is a patch to fix UniVBE and nVidia NVPatch - making UniVBE work on NVidia cards )

Honestly that Banshee is also a very solid choice, doesnt matter that its PCI. This link may help you in choosing other cards https://gona.mactar.hu/DOS_TESTS/

Don't think I have either an MX400 or Virge GX2. I'll have to dig through my cards and see what else I've got.

Also the Banshee is AGP.

Shponglefan wrote on 2024-01-21, 05:29:

Trashbytes wrote on 2024-01-21, 05:03:

Hmmm from an AGP DOS standpoint nvidia cards are pretty solid for DOS compatibility, I use a MX400 paired with a Voodoo1 in my DOS box. Went with a MX400 as they are stupidly cheap and are way more than what DOS actually requires, their compatibility is also really good.

Next best is the S3 Virge GX2 with the Voodoo1, its a very solid combination for DOS compatibility for older DOS games wanting mode-X or using UniVBE that doesn't always like Nvidia GPUs. (There is a patch to fix UniVBE and nVidia NVPatch - making UniVBE work on NVidia cards )

Honestly that Banshee is also a very solid choice, doesnt matter that its PCI. This link may help you in choosing other cards https://gona.mactar.hu/DOS_TESTS/

Don't think I have either an MX400 or Virge GX2. I'll have to dig through my cards and see what else I've got.

Also the Banshee is AGP.

AGP banshee is just fine though, you can even set it up to run Glide DOS games, should run them better than a Voodoo1, I would personally just use the Banshee.