Re: 1997 period correct retro PC build

Posted on 2024-04-24, 20:51

by

by Shponglefan

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

havli wrote on 2024-04-24, 20:41: Most of them were manufactured in 1998 or later, sure... but V2 was anounced in November 1997, so for me it would be good fit for 1997 PC, along with PII 300. I suppose this depends on how one defines "period correct". I always go by when the hardware was released …

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Re: Weren't sound artists frustrated to know that very few players would be hearing the true sound of their creations?

Posted on 2024-04-24, 20:43

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by Shponglefan

in Marvin \ Sound

in Marvin \ Sound

I recall reading something about how a composer for early Sierra games ( Ken Allen or Mark Seibert maybe? William Goldstein) only worked for them because they could use the MT-32 since it allowed for better sounding compositions. Not sure if they were overly concerned with how many people who hear …

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Re: 1997 period correct retro PC build

Posted on 2024-04-24, 15:31

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by Shponglefan

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I tried to look for Riva 128 in PCI flavour (AFAIK there was no AGP on 1997 MBs). It was scarce and too expensive. I already invested in Voodoo2 anyways. $210 AUD damn :) The AGP spec was released mid-1997 and there were AGP options (motherboards + graphic cards) available later that year. Voodoo2 …

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Re: 1997 period correct retro PC build

Posted on 2024-04-24, 13:45

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by Shponglefan

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

1997 is just a kind of shitty year for graphics cards. You get pretty rudimentary, low powered 3d accelerators with 4 MB of VRAM that really struggle to be playable on games that came out by even 1998 like Unreal or Half-Life. Even Quake 2 which was a 1997 game runs about 15-30 FPS on a Riva 128 or …

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Re: 1997 period correct retro PC build

Posted on 2024-04-24, 13:42

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by Shponglefan

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

drone16 wrote on 2024-04-24, 13:39: Namrok wrote on 2024-04-24, 13:34: For the video card I chose a Riva 128. It has to be 3dfx, simply because I did not get it when I was young, 🤣 You could technically do both. The Riva 128 is a 2D/3D card. It would take the place of the Millennium II. Although …

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Re: What retro activity did you get up to today?

Posted on 2024-04-23, 16:30

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by Shponglefan

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

There isn't a lot of restoration material out there for restoring old boxes There is a RMC episode where he is ironing his boxes... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uarvsGKRXKI That's certainly one of the better restoration videos I've seen. I'm impressed with the DIY 'hot plate' they used. Also …

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Re: What retro activity did you get up to today?

Posted on 2024-04-23, 16:27

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by Shponglefan

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I had no idea that cardboard box restoration was a thing. It never would have crossed my mind. It's not super common, that's for sure. I think it might be more of a thing in the toy collecting community. But there are a handful of videos/YouTubes that do retro box restorations. Very cool! I would …

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Re: What retro activity did you get up to today?

Posted on 2024-04-23, 01:38

by

by Shponglefan

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

This is more retro hardware adjacent than actual hardware related, but it's something I've been wanting to do for a long time. I have a workbench I had previously built for model and miniature painting. I've decided to re-purpose it for papercraft and attempt restoration of old hardware and game …

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Re: What retro activity did you get up to today?

Posted on 2024-04-23, 01:26

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by Shponglefan

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I also won a prize from a drawing I entered a couple months back and had completely forgot about! I literally just got the email and thought it was a scam at first, thankfully I quickly remembered entering the drawing before I marked the email as spam. It's a silver metal commemorative Doom floppy …

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Re: To remove shrinkwrap or not?

Posted on 2024-04-20, 22:05

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by Shponglefan

in Milliways

in Milliways

I'd remove the shrink wrap to prevent further bowing / damage to the underlying box. You can always reseal it if you invest in the equipment to shrink wrap boxes.

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Re: Pentium 4 Multi-OS Build Log (DOS/3.11/95/NT4/98/2k/Me/XP)

Posted on 2024-04-20, 20:24

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by Shponglefan

in Marvin \ System Specs

in Marvin \ System Specs

Did some more benchmarking at the other end of the spectrum, running 3DMark2001 SE and 3DMark03 under Windows XP. The 3DMark03 results were predictably poor, especially since it couldn't run all the tests due to lack of Shader Model 2.0. At some point I need to test some later AGP cards to see how …

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Re: What retro activity did you get up to today?

Posted on 2024-04-20, 17:11

by

by Shponglefan

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Been testing throttling and benchmarking of this Cedar Mill Pentium 4 651 (SL9KE). Turns out it can nicely approximate a 486 DX-33 with both L1 & L2 cache disabled. Adding in additional throttling options pushes it into 386 and even 286 territory.

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Re: Pentium 4 Multi-OS Build Log (DOS/3.11/95/NT4/98/2k/Me/XP)

Posted on 2024-04-20, 16:48

by

by Shponglefan

in Marvin \ System Specs

in Marvin \ System Specs

I've done some basic benchmarking of various throttling options and compared these to a real 486 DX-33 and 386 DX-40. I haven't tried all the permutations yet, but wanted to get a rough idea of how scalable South Bridge and multiplier settings are. Between the eight South Bridge settings (1 to 8 ) …

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Re: Pentium 4 Multi-OS Build Log (DOS/3.11/95/NT4/98/2k/Me/XP)

Posted on 2024-04-20, 16:46

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by Shponglefan

in Marvin \ System Specs

in Marvin \ System Specs

I've been doing some throttling and DOS games testing this past week. I had previously have done extensive testing using the previous Prescott 2M processor (Pentium 4 650). But hadn't done much since replacing it with the Cedar Mill Pentium 4 651 (D0 stepping). An issue the previous Prescott 2M had …

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Re: Pentium PRO?

Posted on 2024-04-20, 00:13

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by Shponglefan

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I don't get the Voodoo-hype either. Back in the day everything from the Voodoo3 to Voodoo5 were considered feature-inferior compared to nVidia cards. It felt like 3Dfx had fallen behind and was constantly playing catch-up. Though admittedly some of the more exotic Quantum Voodoo cards would have …

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Re: what is the funniest or oldest cpu/watercooling combo you have ever seen?

Posted on 2024-04-19, 22:53

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by Shponglefan

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

If I had a milling machine, I'd be so tempted to do an utterly ridiculous water cooling setup, like on a 286 or something nonsensical like that.

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Re: Are there regular users here with profession away from tech industry?

Posted on 2024-04-19, 21:43

by

by Shponglefan

in Milliways

in Milliways

...

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Re: Pentium PRO?

Posted on 2024-04-19, 21:34

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by Shponglefan

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I feel like for many enthusiasts, that is the whole appeal of these chips. "retro-no-man's-land" the ppro is something that needs to be desired enough to actually be used and acquired by someone in 2024. The idea of not having a regular old socket 7 pentium 1 "like everyone else" makes people drop …

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Re: Pentium PRO?

Posted on 2024-04-19, 20:53

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by Shponglefan

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

My only reason for building a PPro system was to see how it performed relative to other systems of the era (e.g. 1996-1997). It does occupy a bit of a retro-no-man's-land in my opinion. Not a daily-driver retro rig by any stretch.

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Re: Pentium PRO?

Posted on 2024-04-19, 20:31

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by Shponglefan

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Identical till you try running 16bit DOS applications on that PPro at which point the P166 should be much faster, 32bit stuff though they should be neck and neck. My experience is that traditional DOS games are roughly comparable between a Pentium Pro versus Pentium / Pentium MMX. The big exception …

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