imi wrote on 2020-09-10, 14:50:

appiah4 wrote on 2020-09-10, 14:45:

I have a Hardware By Year table I swear by:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1Fqh7a … dit?usp=sharing

I think it's pretty accurate and spot on for period correct builds, including OSs available at the time. Most components listed are for top of the line hardware available at the time but for some things (Hard Drive, Memory, and occasionally GPUs where I excluded SLI/CF and Titan cards) I shied away from listing the absolute maximum possible and going for the what was commonly a luxurious amount for the time.

mhhh rainbows, that's pretty nice actually 😁

The color codes are my build guides. I feel the hardware from within the same color code are mostly within similar performance envelopes. As a result, I usually build targeting three years periods; ie. my 1998 build targets games of 1996-1998 and draws from hardware of the same period.

This is what I usually have in my head when thinking about this.
Just a rough draft.

gerry wrote on 2020-09-10, 07:28:

Warlord wrote on 2020-09-10, 04:04:

Rule of thumb dont install XP on anything that can't handle 2gb of ram. Since the OS will run like crap with less.
As you can consume 1gb of ram with just a browser or some game running leaving you zero headroom

of course I can run XP on something under powered but from a gaming standpoint there is no practice reason to really do that. Besides if a game runs on XP it probs will run on win 10 so what r u even doing here.

XP needs 2gb ram? in my experience XP is ok down to 256mb for 'normal windows' applications of the 2000's, and ok with games when it has 512mb+, unless we're trying to run the latest games on it and go browsing the heaviest websites with Chrome - then I'd agree, but that's not an OS issue as the same 2gb minimum would be needed by Linux, Vista, 7, 8, 10 etc (even more now)

Good point regarding games - if it runs on W10 then why not have it on W10 and take advantage of the modern systems specs

Perhaps XP on 1gb of ram is fine. Sure you can launch notepad on a 233mmx with 256 mb of ram. But I think that beyond that its not a good OS choice for that platform.

XP SUCKS big time on less than 1GB RAM. I used to try to get businesses to upgrade to 1GB from 512MB on their XP machine (back in the day when XP was current). Their RAM usage would normally be up around 90-95% and the drive would be grinding away swapping constantly and they would complain that their computer was slow.

But no.. they refused to spend a measly $30 or so on another 512MB stick of RAM. So instead we would do what we could which was usually not much and charge them 2-3 times as much as they would have had to spend if they just got the RAM upgrade because their computers were so bogged down by the stuff they had to run.

My rule of thumb is, set up a multiboot of all OSes that are either period correct for the hardware in question, or are older than it but have drivers available. As an example for my 2003 PC I quadrobooted win98se, win2000 sp3, winxp sp1 and win server 2003... also tried longhorn build 4011 but had some trouble with it so had to drop it. On my main PC I multiboot win10, win7, winXP, arch linux, android-x86 and os x, so I don't take this route only for retro PCs either

cyclone3d wrote on 2020-09-10, 05:51:

Warlord wrote on 2020-09-10, 04:04:

Rule of thumb dont install XP on anything that can't handle 2gb of ram. Since the OS will run like crap with less.
As you can consume 1gb of ram with just a browser or some game running leaving you zero headroom

of course I can run XP on something under powered but from a gaming standpoint there is no practice reason to really do that. Besides if a game runs on XP it probs will run on win 10 so what r u even doing here.

Because you don't have to do stupid workarounds and other needless crap to get EAX and other things working that just work in XP.

I would rather have an XP machine and have stuff just work instead of fighting with it to get it to work.

I second this, regarding EAX with Doom 3 & Quake 4!

Tali wrote on 2020-09-10, 13:24:

kolderman wrote on 2020-09-10, 07:43:

...

The retro era ended in 2006. From 2007 (vista/dx10) on, games tend to work well on the latest PCs and are on Steam.

Wish it was so. Quite a few games (especially by EA, such as Dragon Age Origins) aren't too happy with Win10 for some reason. Even on Steam.

Apparently that was just DRM not the game itself, and the GOG version works fine.

I'm pretty loose with this. Rather than lock an OS in according to hardware, it's more about what focus I want the machine to have.

I have a 386DX40, 486SX25 and Pentium 90 (soon to be upgraded to 200mhz) which are all pure DOS. The Pentium has a Voodoo1 so it's a pure DOS/Glide rig and nothing else. Because why not.

I have a K6-2+ 533 and a PIII 550, which are Win98 machines. As an aside it's kinda funny which games each system caters to best. For example the K6 is my preferred machine for Screamer and Descent, but I go back to the P90 for a far better experience in their sequels!

keeping the oldest and newest significant part within a 2/3 year gap of each other. ez.

keeping the OS/driver support together is more important than the age tho. my fastest w98 system (athlon xp 2200+) is running a 2004 motherboard (a7n8x-deluxe) and a late 2003 video card (radeon 9600xt) and i've not had any problems at all. it should be running XP but i dont care. w98 on an SSD and pushing 100hz at 1920x1080 over VGA is a meme i love.

I start with what OS the games need to run best or with the least amount of headaches, hacks and tweaks. Glide and A3D games run best on Win98, and some of those like Half Life, Unreal or Deus Ex need a fast P3 to run well. And if building a Win98 rig, might as well have an ISA slot for DOS games. So that ends up being a S370, Slot1 or Socket A build.

If using DosBox however, then I might as well skip the ISA slot and use something faster like Core2 or Athlon64 with AGP. As long as parts are relatively easy to find, not expensive, and not a pain in the rear to get working. A cheap P4 will also work if I'm not picky. Or an Athlon XP if I already have a good board for it.

For DirectX 8 & 9 games, it's WinXP. Also for those games utilising EAX. That territory belongs to A64, Core2, or newer. As long as the board has IDE compatibility mode available on its SATA ports, or has AHCI drivers for WinXP.

Don't see much point of installing the latest OS the hardware can support. Yeah, I can try Win7 on a P3 or Win10 on a P4, but that only makes for clickbait material while the system is too slow for practical use.

kolderman wrote on 2020-09-10, 22:02:

Tali wrote on 2020-09-10, 13:24:

kolderman wrote on 2020-09-10, 07:43:

...

The retro era ended in 2006. From 2007 (vista/dx10) on, games tend to work well on the latest PCs and are on Steam.

Wish it was so. Quite a few games (especially by EA, such as Dragon Age Origins) aren't too happy with Win10 for some reason. Even on Steam.

Apparently that was just DRM not the game itself, and the GOG version works fine.

Then I should retest it, since I did specially buy GoG version in hopes it would run (after Steam one didn't), and it wouldn't run either. At this point it's hard for me to imagine what else it didn't like. It would be strange for a "non-vintage" game to dislike having "too much memory" or something. And it shouldn't care about 2 CPUs... So if it's not DRM, I wonder what else could be the issue.

Tali wrote on 2020-09-11, 06:58:

kolderman wrote on 2020-09-10, 22:02:

Tali wrote on 2020-09-10, 13:24:

Wish it was so. Quite a few games (especially by EA, such as Dragon Age Origins) aren't too happy with Win10 for some reason. Even on Steam.

Apparently that was just DRM not the game itself, and the GOG version works fine.

Then I should retest it, since I did specially buy GoG version in hopes it would run (after Steam one didn't), and it wouldn't run either. At this point it's hard for me to imagine what else it didn't like. It would be strange for a "non-vintage" game to dislike having "too much memory" or something. And it shouldn't care about 2 CPUs... So if it's not DRM, I wonder what else could be the issue.

I think I read some comments that a patch fixed a bunch of issues.

pixel_workbench wrote on 2020-09-11, 04:05:

For DirectX 8 & 9 games, it's WinXP. Also for those games utilising EAX. That territory belongs to A64, Core2, or newer. As long as the board has IDE compatibility mode available on its SATA ports, or has AHCI drivers for WinXP.

I always thought of dx8 as the finale swansong of win98. And eax 1/2 was a win98 classic.

cyclone3d wrote on 2020-09-10, 21:18:

XP SUCKS big time on less than 1GB RAM. I used to try to get businesses to upgrade to 1GB from 512MB on their XP machine (back in the day when XP was current). Their RAM usage would normally be up around 90-95% and the drive would be grinding away swapping constantly and they would complain that their computer was slow.

Business users tend to have multiple applications open at once, plus an internet connection. I actually think that sometimes they stretch the system more than a lone home user, even an enthusiast. using one app at a time, even gaming, is often much less demanding. for me XP is fine at lower specs but add browsing + keeping outlook, excel etc open and im sure it would bog down

keenmaster486 wrote on 2020-09-10, 17:15:

This is what I usually have in my head when thinking about this.
Just a rough draft.
pc_timeline.png

a very handy guide!

appiah4 wrote on 2020-09-10, 14:45:

I have a Hardware By Year table I swear by:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1Fqh7a … dit?usp=sharing

I think it's pretty accurate and spot on for period correct builds, including OSs available at the time. Most components listed are for top of the line hardware available at the time but for some things (Hard Drive, Memory, and occasionally GPUs where I excluded SLI/CF and Titan cards) I shied away from listing the absolute maximum possible and going for the what was commonly a luxurious amount for the time.

This is awesome! Do you mind if I save this to make a copy?

Mephusto wrote on 2020-09-22, 09:13:

appiah4 wrote on 2020-09-10, 14:45:

I have a Hardware By Year table I swear by:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1Fqh7a … dit?usp=sharing

I think it's pretty accurate and spot on for period correct builds, including OSs available at the time. Most components listed are for top of the line hardware available at the time but for some things (Hard Drive, Memory, and occasionally GPUs where I excluded SLI/CF and Titan cards) I shied away from listing the absolute maximum possible and going for the what was commonly a luxurious amount for the time.

This is awesome! Do you mind if I save this to make a copy?

Sure, knock yourself out, I share it openly anyway.

appiah4 wrote on 2020-09-22, 09:50:

Mephusto wrote on 2020-09-22, 09:13:

appiah4 wrote on 2020-09-10, 14:45:

I have a Hardware By Year table I swear by:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1Fqh7a … dit?usp=sharing

I think it's pretty accurate and spot on for period correct builds, including OSs available at the time. Most components listed are for top of the line hardware available at the time but for some things (Hard Drive, Memory, and occasionally GPUs where I excluded SLI/CF and Titan cards) I shied away from listing the absolute maximum possible and going for the what was commonly a luxurious amount for the time.

This is awesome! Do you mind if I save this to make a copy?

Sure, knock yourself out, I share it openly anyway.

Thank you, I appreciate it. I am building some old retro computers in my free time and this helps me figure out a good place to start

I know this is nominally a gaming subforum, but the situation changes a bit if you're more trying to capture the nostalgia of various PCs. People were totally running Windows 3.0 on slow 286s with MFM disk drives and EGA or 256KB VGA. Word 2 and early desktop games like Taipei, Chips Challenge, Castle of the Winds and Boxworld are certainly usable. It's a really different experience than running Windows 3.11 for Workgroups on a 486 or Pentium with a 1024x768 resolution. Both are super authentic, as Windows 3.1 shipped on new Pentium systems too and many people never upgraded. It can run things like The Incredible Machine, Simcity 2000, Civilization II, and the slew of early multimedia titles people don't really mention around here -- but CD-ROM drives and software like Myst and Phantasmagoria was huge at the time.

Most serious, commercial games that require Windows 95 also require a Pentium or late 486, but the operating system itself is really fast on a 486DX2 with 16MB and usable on pretty much every reasonable 486 with at least 8MB of RAM. Many people rushed out to upgrade at the time and it was widely run on 486SX boxes and even faster 386DX machines. It was shipped well into the Pentium II era. I've seen many malign it because of its instability and suggest Windows 98, but I personally haven't found it less stable if running OSR2 with updates.

My formula..... Is kinda no formula. Depends on the situation.

Whenever something has USB and doesn't need to do much DOS, I go Windows ME. When something doesn't have USB, but is something like a Pentium/PMMX I tend to go 95 or 3.1. 486's tend to be DOS or DOS/Win3.1. USB + desire for DOS means 98SE.

Sometimes I'll do odd builds for specific experiments, like the SS7 build with a faster K6-2 & an S3 card that I had running Win3.1 for the express reason of being a fast 3.1 machine to play around with old browsers.