I still remember the times when I used an HORRIBLE 8600GT in my Windows XP build back in 2008 - 2009, those were the years right before I purchased the GTX 470 in 2010.

I completed Crysis at roughly 5 FPS with the 8600GT, that's my achievement for sure, and I'll never forget that experience... I REALLY wanted to play and finish Crysis yet I managed to do so at 5 - 6 FPS with medium-high settings.

(I then replayed it with the GTX 470 and it was WAY MUCH better of course)

I scored a GTX 285 recently for 30E, thought it was a deal I just couldn't pass on! Do you guys have any drivers to recommend for WinXP?

F2bnp wrote:

I scored a GTX 285 recently for 30E, thought it was a deal I just couldn't pass on! Do you guys have any drivers to recommend for WinXP?

It does depend a little on the game. You can start with the latest one, see how you go.

In general the older drivers do perform better in older games. And newer drivers can brake some games, for example with some drivers SLI doesn't work well in Doom 3 or AquaMark gives a really low result and things like that.

Elia1995 wrote:

I'm not ready to upgrade to Windows 8.1 or 10, as much as the curiosity grows, I already tried both of them (10 only on virtual machine) and I'm completely disappointed by the new explorer and overall compatibility.

The new and "improved" Explorer was my biggest disappointment with post-XP versions of Windows. The Explorer in Win7 is so broken and annoying as to make it unusable. Win10's Explorer is better, but still pretty bad.

If you're contemplating running Win7 or newer, you need these to make the system usable:

7+ Taskbar Tweaker
You can fix various annoyances with this one.

Classic Shell
You need this to fix the various problems with Explorer in post-XP versions of Windows. I actually like Win7's start menu and use a 3rd-party file manager (Q-Dir and/or xplorer2), so I don't use Classic Shell with Win7. However, Win8's and Win10's start menus are so horribly awful bad that Classic Shell is practically required. Since you need to install it anyway for Win8/Win10, use it to also fix the problems with the built-in Explorer.

Ultimate Windows Tweaker
This one is also good. It is described as a TweakUI for Vista and Win7.

Anyway, to keep things semi-on-topic:
I still would like to eventually get a GTX 750 Ti for my Dell T3400 XP system. I'm hoping to maybe get one during the Black Friday sales. If prices aren't good, I may just find a used Radeon 5770/6770 and go with that instead. Gerwin's comments from a previous thread indicate that it may also be a very good choice for XP systems. I would prefer a 7770, but Catalyst 11.x drivers won't work with it.

Which AGP card would be best for a CPU for example a P4 (northwood core) with 2000 to 3000MHz? OS can be Win98 or XP.

• - GF 4 Ti4400 / 4800SE
  - GF FX5700
  - GF 6800
  
  - Radeon 9800 Pro
  - Radeon X800 (Pro)
  - Radeon X850 XT

melbar wrote:

Which AGP card would be best for a CPU for example a P4 (northwood core) with 2000 to 3000MHz? OS can be Win98 or XP. […]
Show full quote

Which AGP card would be best for a CPU for example a P4 (northwood core) with 2000 to 3000MHz? OS can be Win98 or XP.

• - GF 4 Ti4400 / 4800SE
  - GF FX5700
  - GF 6800
  
  - Radeon 9800 Pro
  - Radeon X800 (Pro)
  - Radeon X850 XT

For XP I like the 6800. Performs well on the P4.

PhilsComputerLab wrote:

melbar wrote:

Which AGP card would be best for a CPU for example a P4 (northwood core) with 2000 to 3000MHz? OS can be Win98 or XP. […]
Show full quote

Which AGP card would be best for a CPU for example a P4 (northwood core) with 2000 to 3000MHz? OS can be Win98 or XP.

• - GF 4 Ti4400 / 4800SE
  - GF FX5700
  - GF 6800
  
  - Radeon 9800 Pro
  - Radeon X800 (Pro)
  - Radeon X850 XT

For XP I like the 6800. Performs well on the P4.

My personal pick would also have been the GF6800. I'd use a 3GHz P4 for such a card though instead of a 2GHz one, the 2GHz P4 would feel a bit underpowered I think (kinda like a Tualatin 1400). I'd probably pick the GF4 for a 2GHz P4. Or the FX5700, just because I never used one.

Tetrium wrote:

PhilsComputerLab wrote:

melbar wrote:

Which AGP card would be best for a CPU for example a P4 (northwood core) with 2000 to 3000MHz? OS can be Win98 or XP. […]
Show full quote

Which AGP card would be best for a CPU for example a P4 (northwood core) with 2000 to 3000MHz? OS can be Win98 or XP.

• - GF 4 Ti4400 / 4800SE
  - GF FX5700
  - GF 6800
  
  - Radeon 9800 Pro
  - Radeon X800 (Pro)
  - Radeon X850 XT

For XP I like the 6800. Performs well on the P4.

My personal pick would also have been the GF6800. I'd use a 3GHz P4 for such a card though instead of a 2GHz one, the 2GHz P4 would feel a bit underpowered I think (kinda like a Tualatin 1400). I'd probably pick the GF4 for a 2GHz P4. Or the FX5700, just because I never used one.

Those are all win98 cards for me. I consider XP cards from X1900/GF7800 onward. I'm currently using a GTX 280 in my XP rig. Sure, the 6800 and X800 are XP era cards (even older then those in fact) but they're too slow for what I play on my XP rig (Stalker, B&W2, HW2, Call of Duty 1&2, Quake 4, etc). I want to be able to run all these games at 1600x1200 with 16AF and a little AA. The 280 is the oldest cards that will allow for this.

A few weeks ago I was using a pair of 8800GTS cards but I had to swap my XP rig's nf 780i motherboard with an intel P35 (asus P5K64-WS) and I had to let go of SLi because it's not supported on the P35...

There are so many XP era games, a ton of them will run great on a GeForce 4 or Radeon 9700. You just go back a few years.

Also, there is one massive reason to use a GF4: Splinter Cell 😊

kanecvr wrote:

Those are all win98 cards for me. I consider XP cards from X1900/GF7800 onward. I'm currently using a GTX 280 in my XP rig. Sure, the 6800 and X800 are XP era cards (even older then those in fact) but they're too slow for what I play on my XP rig (Stalker, B&W2, HW2, Call of Duty 1&2, Quake 4, etc). I want to be able to run all these games at 1600x1200 with 16AF and a little AA. The 280 is the oldest cards that will allow for this.

A few weeks ago I was using a pair of 8800GTS cards but I had to swap my XP rig's nf 780i motherboard with an intel P35 (asus P5K64-WS) and I had to let go of SLi because it's not supported on the P35...

I see. I play at lower resolutions and I hardly ever use stuff like AA.
I did find BF2 on busy maps using A64 and GF6800/GF7600GS to be about the max that will run ok-ish.

The GF7900GT was great too.

filipetolhuizen wrote:

The GF7900GT was great too.

A friend of mine still has a PCI-E version. I never took the opportunity to get me a better (AGP) GF7 than the 2 AGP 7600GS's I already got and those performed without any issues.

My PCI-E 8600GT otoh...for some reason it really hated BF2 and the rig (AM2) this card ended up in got traded in for a slightly older defective sA rig containing a GF4. It was supposed to be temporarily, but I don't miss that card all though much.

For Windows XP thats a loaded question

2001-2004 - Geforce 4 Ti/FX/Radeon 9xxx

Past that point games are largely DX9 and honestly a GTX 590 would support them just as well as a 6800GT

candle_86 wrote:

Past that point games are largely DX9 and honestly a GTX 590 would support them just as well as a 6800GT

^This. When it comes to winXP newer is always better. I think you can go as high at GTX 7xx and Radeon 7xxx when it comes to XP. I've been finding HD 7870 and 7950 cards at really good prices recently - 35-40e for the 7870 2gb and 40-50 for the much faster 7950 3GB. The GTX 760 on the other hand held up it's price, costing about as much as a second hand R9 280X witch is a much faster card, so I can't recommend the nvidia 7xx series right now.

I'd have to say the sweet spot would be a GTX 580 or a HD 6970 if you can find one cheap enough - if not look for a cheap HD 7870 2GB - you can't go wrong with those.

I know these are modern cards, but some XP games are demanding (Crysis, S.T.A.L.K.E.R., etc) and since this hardware is cheap now, it would be a shame not to enjoy these games with everything cranked up to ultra.

Like I said, gf4 to 6800 are best used in 98 machines, and 7900/x1900/8800/HD2900 cards are just awkward valley. They do OK if you're not to picky about visuals in later games. A 8800GTX will net you 30 to 60FPS in stalker at 1600x1200 on high w/o AA and a little less at 1920x1080 - playable, but there are the occasional frameskips witch you don't get on a 280x for example. Two 8800GTS cards also work, but there's quite a bit of tearing and stuttering. Crysis really wants a GTX 480 / HD 5870 to run fluently maxed out.

If you limit yourself to Doom 3, Quake 4, GTA 3 and alike, a X1900XT or 7900 GTX will do very well - but at one point you will want to go higher.

Right now my collection of XP and later era cards include: 2x7950GT 512MB (XFX), 2x8800GTS 640MB (leadtek), 1x8800GTX (EVGA), 2xGTX280 (BFG and EVGA), 2xGTX 480 (gainward) as well as x1950XT (GeCube), HD 2900XT (OEM), HD 3850 (palit), HD 3870 (Sapphire) and finally a HD 7950 (sapphire).

When I built my first XP rig for eary DX9 games, I satarted with a single X1950XT. Then moved onto two 7950GT cards, then a single 8800GTS. I wanted to play stalker on my 27" widescreen LCD so I added a second 8800GTS, It ran OK, but I wanted to play Crysis on it since I can't get any audio from the game (steam version) on my main PC so I replaced them with a 280x witch can't really keep up with the game at 1920x1080 to my liking. Now I have to upgrade the PSU, get a Zalman GTX 480 cooler and use one of those OR use my HD 7950 and be done with it - witch is probably what I'll end up doing.

Also remember that once you get to 2006 era games, they are also Vista and 7 compatabile except for a few odd balls so no need for a retro computer to play them, Crysis works just as well on XP as it does on 10

candle_86 wrote:

For Windows XP thats a loaded question

2001-2004 - Geforce 4 Ti/FX/Radeon 9xxx

Past that point games are largely DX9 and honestly a GTX 590 would support them just as well as a 6800GT

GTX 590 won't support AGP though and sometimes the point for someone building any particular retro rig is the machine itself and not the games one wants to play on it. So to me this is a bit of a personal taste thing. I'd probably never use a 6800 for 9x myself, but if others want to use em that way, it's all fine by me 😀

If someone wants to play FEAR using some hacked exe that makes FEAR run @ 40k pixels & 20k pixels with everything enabled with no dips below 5000fps, by all means, go ahead and enjoy the game that you like in the way you enjoy it the most 😀

But however, KT7Aguy's question wasn't about AGP but about XP and in this regard you are correct about there being better cards for XP then anything that comes in AGP, but the 6800 for 9x-only thingy won't be for everyone.

I really appreciate everybody's replies and comments in this thread.

I like the GTX 285 for its performance and compatibility, but it draws alot of power.

The GTX 750 Ti has great performance and is very efficient, but a lack of older drivers may limit solutions to problems with older games. Is this something to be concerned about?

The Radeon 7770 performs well and doesn't guzzle power too badly, but like the 750 Ti, you're stuck with newer drivers.

The Radeon 5770/6770 performs OK and still isn't too much of a power hog, and you can use some older Catalyst drivers. However, no PhysX support. Does this even matter?

Pick your poison, I suppose.

candle_86 wrote:

Also remember that once you get to 2006 era games, they are also Vista and 7 compatabile except for a few odd balls so no need for a retro computer to play them, Crysis works just as well on XP as it does on 10

No it doesn't. No sound in win7/8/10. Works fine under Vista and XP.

http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/forum/24222-63- … problem-windows

I tried all possible "fixes" found online - I tried updating it - no dice.

KT7AGuy wrote:

I really appreciate everybody's replies and comments in this thread.

I like the GTX 285 for its performance and compatibility, but it draws alot of power.

yup. Makes a lot of heat too. When my friend comes over to play WoT I have to turn the heaters off 😜 - the 280x in my Xp rig goes over 85C in world of tanks, but it's able to handle the WOT SD client at 1600x1200 on medium-high and still churn out 35-60 fps witch is impressive for such an old card. When my friend comes over to play WoT I have to turn the heaters off 😜

candle_86 wrote:

The GTX 750 Ti has great performance and is very efficient, but a lack of older drivers may limit solutions to problems with old […]
Show full quote

The GTX 750 Ti has great performance and is very efficient, but a lack of older drivers may limit solutions to problems with older games. Is this something to be concerned about?

The Radeon 7770 performs well and doesn't guzzle power too badly, but like the 750 Ti, you're stuck with newer drivers.

The Radeon 5770/6770 performs OK and still isn't too much of a power hog, and you can use some older Catalyst drivers. However, no PhysX support. Does this even matter?

Pick your poison, I suppose.

Weird, I tried the HD 7950 under XP and it ran fine. Tried Doom 3, crysis and stalker, they all worked w/o a fuss. Why would the 7770 be any different?

I play STALKER games at the moment with my main everyday rig: i7 875K @ stock 2.93 GHz, 16GB RAM, 160GB SSD (for boot)+2TB WD Caviar Black for storage, GTX 570, resolution is at 1920x1080, everything maxxed (including DX10 HDR lighting etc), love it! No hiccups, nothing.

BTW, I have Radeon HD 6870 (Gigabyte GV-R687OC-1GD) for sale if anyone is interested.

kanecvr wrote:

Weird, I tried the HD 7950 under XP and it ran fine. Tried Doom 3, crysis and stalker, they all worked w/o a fuss. Why would the 7770 be any different?

It's not that the 7xxx series has problems with WinXP. It's just that it's a newer card, so you are limited in your choices of drivers. There are fewer older drivers to choose from if you should have problems with the newer drivers.