Especially when you consider that back in DOS/9x days most people used dial-up, which gave your PC a direct internet connection with no firewall. It WAS in a "DMZ" so to speak. Now, everyone has broadband and a base router (with NAT, port screening/firewalls, etc.). Besides, my 98 system is only on while I'm messing with/gaming on it. Otherwise, I turn it off. I mean, the thing boots in under 15 seconds. It's not like I'm wasting a lot of time turning it on or off. My Windows 10 gaming PC with a PCI-Express SSD boots in roughly the same amount of time...and that SSD has ~2,100 MB/s read speeds.

Also, come on. What is a hacker trying to steal from me on a 9x machine anyway? What level I'm currently on in Quake 1? Seriously. These old-ass computers never contain any personal information like tax forms or credit card info anymore. There's no reason to target them. I run the 98 box on my network via 10/100 Ethernet, no anti-virus software, no firewall software, nothing. Perfectly fine.

Well, to be honest there are reasons to force your way into an exposed IP. Once there the bad guy has easier access to the whole LAN, including phones, tablets, printers, and other devices. But 99 plus percent of all the hackers who do things like that are script kiddies, who wouldn't be able to figure out its a 9x rig let alone find the right "tools" to force their way in. Being hacked on a 9x box connected only for gaming, would be so rare it would be akin to winning a major lottery.

Except that he WOULDN'T have access from a computer inside the DMZ. That's the whole point of the router with a built-in firewall.

But there are ways through the DMZ, and more so if you know make/model of the router. That's why many modern routers either stopped giving the option of a DMZ, or blast you with warnings if you try to enable it.

It's such a small worry with an old 9x rig, it's hardly worth mentioning. I just wanted to point out there is a very small risk, but being smart will limit it even further. Only hook up the rig to the DMZ when playing. Shut off the DMZ when done. Quick, simple, and makes life easier with multiplayer games on retro rigs. And yes, Kali does work on most IPX games played on a 9x box. I've done it with quite a few. Of course if the game requires a proprietary multiplayer server, you may need to use other options that can't be discussed here, as some software options aren't legal.

Jo22 wrote:

Um, I don't know how it is in the US, but in my place the analogue telephone line (landline) is getting replaced by a digital co […]
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Anonymous Freak wrote:

"router's telephone plug"? Extraordinarily few routers have phone lines built in to them. Yeah, if you have a service that provides home phone service over the internet connection (like through a cable company) it will, but you have to be paying for it.

Um, I don't know how it is in the US, but in my place the analogue telephone line (landline) is getting replaced by a digital connection (internet)
and most DSL or cable routers (or modems) do normally have a connector for a classic analogue telephone (like RJ11).
And doing a local call doesn't cost very much, I think. But again, I don't know how it is in the US (and how "local" is defined there).

(Edited.)

You must be talking about a port for a VOIP service. Generally speaking the VOIP systems do not transmit analog signals well. I've tried VOIP services for analog fax capability and it's unreliable at best and fax is not nearly as finicky as a data connection.

The best option is Kali or something similar which basically bridges IPX over TCP/IP.

Even if all the malware out there for Windows 9x is dead and the system is no longer actively targeted, I feel like it's generally bad practice to expose such a vulnerable system to the web. It could be used as an attack vector onto the much more interesting gear inside the LAN.

Thanks for keeping the conversation going, though.

I've got my hands full of unexpected compatibility issues and await my new video- and sound cards. I'm also seeking a new CRT since I doubt the old one would get fixed for less than a "new" one would go for any way.

I thought these old Compaqs were foolproof, but turns out I'm thinking of 94-97 era systems. 98 and later apparently have all the ill quirks of Compaq (ie. unstandard power supplies and other odd hardware modifications) and somehow even lost compatibility with things such as SoundBlaster etc.

It's such a shame. I guess good hardware from this era really has entered "vintage" status, as every dummy out there now is asking for 50€ for a floppy drive or even a S3 Virge...

That's cool. Personally I have an image I can toss onto a new drive if I think it's infected, problem solved in 10 minutes. But you are right about the LAN being compromised being an issue. It's just that it's not something that is easy for a modern script kiddie to do an I thought it would give you one more option.

As far as the hardware goes, yeah it's getting harder to find quality, name brand, top feature gear at reasonable prices. I have to say being patient on ebay still pays off, but it is getting harder with each passing month. Good luck getting thing back up and running, and with your online games.

Rhuwyn wrote:

You must be talking about a port for a VOIP service. Generally speaking the VOIP systems do not transmit analog signals well. I've tried VOIP services for analog fax capability and it's unreliable at best and fax is not nearly as finicky as a data connection.

Yup. As I said, the analogue landline here is getting replaced by the internet.
The cableing (the landline's infrastructure) which once carried normal telephone calls is kept and now used for DSL instead.
So it's just normal that most DSL or cable modems here do have a telephone jack on them (see black cable in the pic).
The ISPs here do usually provide VOIP with little to no extra costs. I had no idea that this is less common over there.

Yes, VOIP can be tricky for last-gen connections (like 56k) or similar I assume.
However, from a personal experience it worked most of the time (it went better with that new fax mode).
Back in time I had used a fax device several times for sending faxes over our DSL router and it often worked.

What I also did was connecting my old iMac G3 (tray-loading) to the internet via dial-up connection,
because the operating system it had installed (MacOS 8.x) needed an update and I wasn't able to
use a FAT32 formatted USB pen drive. And even if I was, it wouldn't have helped, because that old MacOS stored
the file type/file extension (type code ?) in the resource fork.
That's some meta-data which isn't stored on FAT or NTFS volumes, so I had to somehow download the update from the
web. That way, the Macintosh was able to derive the file type from the server via the MIME type.
Now, the crazy thing was that I established that dial-up connection via VOIP! I connected to the internet via the internet. 😁

I think the reason of putting the PC on the DMZ was to confirm if it was a port blocking issue or not, as there may be other ports that need opening up.
Kind of make sure everything works on a basic level then start locking down from there.
Not best practice I know, but 100 times more easy.

Good luck though, you picked the classy rather then easy option. I think I'm like most, LAN games I use period correct PC's/networking but for WAN games I just use some modern alternate/emulator/whatever

Jo22 wrote:

Yup. As I said, the analogue landline here is getting replaced by the internet. The cableing (the landline's infrastructure) whi […]
Show full quote

Rhuwyn wrote:

You must be talking about a port for a VOIP service. Generally speaking the VOIP systems do not transmit analog signals well. I've tried VOIP services for analog fax capability and it's unreliable at best and fax is not nearly as finicky as a data connection.

Yup. As I said, the analogue landline here is getting replaced by the internet.
The cableing (the landline's infrastructure) which once carried normal telephone calls is kept and now used for DSL instead.
So it's just normal that most DSL or cable modems here do have a telephone jack on them (see black cable in the pic).
The ISPs here do usually provide VOIP with little to no extra costs. I had no idea that this is less common over there.

Yes, VOIP can be tricky for last-gen connections (like 56k) or similar I assume.
However, from a personal experience it worked most of the time (it went better with that new fax mode).
Back in time I had used a fax device several times for sending faxes over our DSL router and it often worked.

What I also did was connecting my old iMac G3 (tray-loading) to the internet via dial-up connection,
because the operating system it had installed (MacOS 8.x) needed an update and I wasn't able to
use a FAT32 formatted USB pen drive. And even if I was, it wouldn't have helped, because that old MacOS stored
the file type/file extension (type code ?) in the resource fork.
That's some meta-data which isn't stored on FAT or NTFS volumes, so I had to somehow download the update from the
web. That way, the Macintosh was able to derive the file type from the server via the MIME type.
Now, the crazy thing was that I established that dial-up connection via VOIP! I connected to the internet via the internet. 😁

I tried one VOIP provider here and I never had any luck with it. I would love to accomplish this somehow.

Rhuwyn wrote:

I tried one VOIP provider here and I never had any luck with it. I would love to accomplish this somehow.

I guess it really is hit and miss. I don't know the details, but there are/were different standards out there (like Hayes vs. Bell for modems),
so it's hard to compare. Plus, there are also different implementations of VOIP, I think. Seems like every provider is doing things differently (speaking under correction). 😅

One thing that is bad about VOIP and ATAs is that there is no clock synchronization between endpoints. High speed modems rely on a steady clock, especially if you want to use V.90 and V.92.

You might have some luck with VOIP if you use a very low bit rate such as 2400bps. 9600bps and 14.4kbps might work too, but modems will probably retrain often. You will want to make sure that you use a 64kbps codec such as u-law, that you have ZERO packet loss, and that your jitter is kept to a minimum. You could have a large jitter buffer, but that will increase latency.

Here is how I would have done it:

You will need 2x DDWRT compatible routers with wan ports and at least one spare lan port, you can use Mikrotik as well but it is much more troublesome to setup.

Install DDWRT onto both routers , and configure it to use internet via DHCP over the wan port,add a DHCP server with a IP Range outside of what you usually use , you can then setup one as a OpenVPN Server, I recommend adding SSL certificate as well and repeat it the exact same way on the other one but as a Client.

The last part is fairly simple on the network with the OpenVPN Server log into your home router (not the DDWRT ones) make sure you forward the OpenVPN port to the DDWRT Router, and setup a Dynamic DNS, you can then use the Dyndns web address to configure the openvpn client on the other DDWRT device.

Simply plug the Wan side into your network and one free Lan ports onto the retro box and repeat on the other computer, and bobs your uncle.