Re: Win98SE When is the hardware overkill?

Posted on 2019-07-02, 14:46

by

by WildW

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I'm in the first camp - I like to play older games and to avoid compatibility issues I run Windows 98 for some games. Like many others here I have too many old computers. One is a Gateway with Pentium III 450 because that's what I had back in that era, though this time it has AGP Voodoo 3 instead of …

---

Re: Computer builders favorite tools ?

Posted on 2019-06-20, 15:11

by

by WildW

in Milliways

in Milliways

My computer toolkit still contains the 2B pencil I used to unlock the multiplier on my Athlon Thunderbird CPU back in 2002. I haven't used it since, but it makes me smile every time I see it.

---

Re: This POS EVGA PSU died 3 days ago...

Posted on 2019-06-14, 16:23

by

by WildW

in Milliways

in Milliways

EVGA calls their power supplies "Supernova", named for a huge explosion that takes everything nearby with it.

---

Re: Your worst "terrible packaging from eBay sellers" experiences

Posted on 2019-05-29, 15:48

by

by WildW

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I recently had some packaging that was "too good" to the point that it was just annoying. A PC case wrapped in close to a dozen alternating layers of bubble-wrap, plastic bags, newspaper, and parcel tape. It took forever to get into and made so much mess. . . but it was perfectly protected so I …

---

Re: Windows 98 and Xp Slow on SATA HDD

Posted on 2019-05-20, 10:26

by

by WildW

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

High CPU usage, especially if nothing in task manager seems to match up with it, can often be caused by excessive system interrupts. This can be caused by driver problems, and might be happening to you. There's a freeware tool called Process Explorer that's like a more detailed Task Manager, and …

---

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

Posted on 2019-05-17, 10:03

by

by WildW

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Found an old Shuttle computer (Athlon XP) under my desk that I'd forgotten about. Unfortunately it shuts off (instantly) after a couple of minutes so I suspect the power supply has died. A modern PSU will be no good for the 5V-heavy Athlon, so I guess that machine is basically junk now :( Check it …

---

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

Posted on 2019-05-17, 08:53

by

by WildW

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Found an old Shuttle computer (Athlon XP) under my desk that I'd forgotten about. Unfortunately it shuts off (instantly) after a couple of minutes so I suspect the power supply has died. A modern PSU will be no good for the 5V-heavy Athlon, so I guess that machine is basically junk now 🙁

---

Re: Good value Win98 Graphic Card

Posted on 2019-05-16, 16:40

by

by WildW

in Marvin \ Video

in Marvin \ Video

The 9250 is getting 3DMark 2001SE score of about 5000 at 1024x768 and no AA. I used to have a Radeon 9600 Pro that I think scored around 9k to 10k at the same settings. There aren't so many reviews around now, and my old go-to resource (Tom's VGA Charts) are all broken images and useless now. …

---

Re: Good value Win98 Graphic Card

Posted on 2019-05-15, 10:45

by

by WildW

in Marvin \ Video

in Marvin \ Video

I've grabbed an FX5600 128MB on eBay for £15, which feels like a nice deal and should be plenty of horsepower for what I want. Anything more high-end, or a Geforce 4 TI, seems to start around £50.

---

Re: DOS game sound in Windows 9x

Posted on 2019-05-13, 16:03

by

by WildW

in Marvin \ Software

in Marvin \ Software

So the original reason for this question was when I tried to run Master or Orion, a fairly old DOS game.I have a CD version of it that has a Win9x front-end but it's basically just running an old DOS game. It runs ok but there's no sound, and while there is a sound config option it just calls the …

---

Re: Good Low profile card with windowsXP support?

Posted on 2019-05-13, 15:55

by

by WildW

in Marvin \ Video

in Marvin \ Video

I have a Radeon HD7750 in low profile that doesn't use an extra power connector - I think the TDP is 55W. I'm not sure of an exact comparison with the 8800GTX but I think it's pretty close. I run it under XP in an HP/Compaq SFF Desktop with Ivy Bridge i3. I think a 750TI would be faster though.

---

DOS game sound in Windows 9x

Posted on 2019-05-13, 11:23

by

by WildW

in Marvin \ Software

in Marvin \ Software

Trying to remember how this works. I'm talking specifically about running a DOS game within Windows 9x itself, not rebooting into DOS mode. I seem to remember that some games would work this way, some wouldn't. If running a DOS game this way (by just running the exe under Windows), does the sound …

---

Re: Good value Win98 Graphic Card

Posted on 2019-05-13, 06:01

by

by WildW

in Marvin \ Video

in Marvin \ Video

Thanks guys, that's some useful stuff to think about. I realise that most games from this era work ok in XP, but I reckon that if there's a compatibility sweet-spot as narrow as Geforce 3 to Geforce 5 then it's probably also important to have the right graphics card. I can always dual-boot to XP. …

---

Good value Win98 Graphic Card

Posted on 2019-05-12, 22:45

by

by WildW

in Marvin \ Video

in Marvin \ Video

Been looking at a graphics card for a general Windows 98 gaming build, mostly aimed at good compatibility and performance but also not spending too much. The obvious candidates for "best" Windows 98 cards, Geforce 6 or Radeon 9700/9800 are all getting very expensive, and I've also read some threads …

---

Re: Best memories of Windows or OS?

Posted on 2019-05-10, 05:58

by

by WildW

in Milliways

in Milliways

Back in 2000 I had a Pentium III machine that came with Windows 98 SE. I was starting to mess with designing web pages and stuff, and between loading IE, Paint Shop Pro and Dreamweaver the system would just run out of resources and need rebooting every hour or so. One day I upgraded to Windows 2000, …

---

Re: Customizing the "now safe" screen in Win95

Posted on 2019-05-09, 20:39

by

by WildW

in Milliways

in Milliways

I remembered that Master of Orion 2 came with some custom screens pre-made as bonus goodies on the CD. They just seem to be 256 colour Windows bitmap files of 320x400 - Paint Shop Pro opens them fine. There's a LOGO.SYS , LOGOW.SYS , and LOGOS.SYS. I guess these replace existing files somewhere in …

---

Re: De-yellowing of plastics by only leaving them under the sun

Posted on 2019-05-08, 18:20

by

by WildW

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I've got a very very badly yellowed Commodore Amiga case that I had written off . . . if/when the sunny season next reaches the UK I shall try it.

---

Re: ITX and Win98

Posted on 2018-10-16, 17:50

by

by WildW

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Although not quite as small as ITX there are Shuttle machines in Athlon XP and Pentium 4 flavours that support 98.

---

Re: Internal DVD drives period correct?

Posted on 2018-10-03, 05:44

by

by WildW

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

A friend I used to live with watched DVDs on his 500MHz Pentium 3 machine around 1999 or 2000 - I guess using one of those decoder cards.

---

Re: Retro Rig Photo Thread

Posted on 2018-09-28, 22:31

by

by WildW

in Marvin \ System Specs

in Marvin \ System Specs

While wandering around a forgotten corner of my hard drive I stumbled across some pictures of a sadly missed computer I had sometime in the mid 2000s. It wasn't retro then, but it is now. Also the digital photography is decidedly vintage. I don't remember exactly what the case was, only that it was …

---