First post, by speeddemon
Someone asked in my P4 build thread if I was dual-booting XP and that discussion convinced me to assemble a dedicated Windows XP rig...
The build started for me with the following goals:
- Focus on primarily Windows XP era games that utilize EAX and that don't run on Windows 10 anymore.
- Primarily use parts I already have in my collection. The only part I needed to buy was the Sound Blaster X-Fi since my existing X-Fi Titanium HD card wasn't compatible with Windows XP and it's nice being able to keep that card in my Windows 10 build.
- Keep the build as small as possible.
- Use my TITAN X since it's the fastest card I have that works with Nvidia's last Windows XP driver.
- I wanted to use drivers that were built for Windows XP originally without needing to install modified drivers and I wanted drivers to be available for all components. For this reason, I stuck with a motherboard that had native XP drivers available. I may consider modifying drivers and swapping in my Titan X later though, but performance is far more than necessary so far with the GTX 960.
- I wanted as modern of a chipset as possible without needing to stray from enthusiast class gear. I know there were some later chipsets geared toward business/industrial use that have XP drivers, but I really wanted an Intel Z-series chipset and ideally an Asus board.
Here's what I ended up assembling:
- Asus P8Z77-V Pro/Thunderbolt (LGA 1155 Intel Z77)
- Core i7-3770K 3.9GHz (Ivy Bridge - Overclocked to 4.4GHz)
- 4GB DDR3 1600 RAM (2x2GB Crucial BL25664BN1608.Z16F63)
- Nvidia GeForce GTX TITAN X
- Sound Blaster X-Fi (SB0880)
- 250GB Samsung 850 Evo SATA SSD
- Fractal Define 7 Compact Case
- Corsair H150i 360mm AiO CPU Cooler
- 750 Watt PSU (Corsair RM750x)
- LaCie electron22blueIV CRT
Yes, it can run Crysis!
Enjoy and let me know what you think!
PC#1: K6-3+ 500 / Asus TX97-X / Voodoo3 / Orpheus + PCMIDI + WP32 / Win98
PC#2: P4 HT 670 / Asus P5P800 / FX5950U + V2 SLI / Audigy 2ZS + Vortex2 + X2GS / Win98
PC#3: i7-3770K / Asus P8Z77-V Pro / TITAN X / X-Fi / WinXP
PC#4: i9-9900K / Gigabyte Z390M / GTX 1070 / X-Fi Ti HD + SC-88 / Win10