Reply 20 of 43, by gdjacobs
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- l33t++
wrote:Regarding the bold: […]
wrote:As j^aws suggest, those two builds would work, but I don't have the hardware for it and I can easily have three builds in my setup:) I have no experience with VIA C3 systems, and finding an LGA775 board with Core2 and Win98 support which also supports the unlocked X6800 is hard. I do own the X6800, but my LGA775 board Asrock 775Dual-VSTA do not allow multiplier changes. It's also the problem to find a video/sound card that covers all the periods well.
Regarding the bold:
Video: A multi-card setup with Tseng ET4000AX for ISA and S3 ViRGE DX-GX /Voodoo 5500 for PCI are extremely compatible for VGA. For 3D, Voodoo 5500 and Vodoo 1/2 combo with a GeForce 2/3/4/5/6 are extremely compatible. And for good measure, chuck in a PowerVR PCX2.
Sound: A multi-card setup with a SBPro 2/ AWE32/ GUS for ISA, and YMF 7x4/ Vortex 2/Live 5.1/ Audigy 2/4 setup for PCI should cover the entire aforementioned range very well. You can use SoftMPU or a hardware Intelligent MPU solution with external MIDI modules to round off the sound setup.
Does anyone know any Win9x or newer era games that don't run properly on a high clocked CPU? I haven't personally found any, but I think it's an important question to answer for the purpose of this topic.
You don't require a C3 for good CPU scaling, a K6-2+ or K6-3+ will work great for a classic retro time machine build if your socket 7 board can supply the appropriate CPU voltage. I'd even check your POD system to see if that CPU supports test register settings with SETMUL. It wouldn't have the top end performance of a K6-2, but would certainly handle P5 and 486 duties. With those performance ranges taken care of, you can use your PT880 board for both Win98 and WinXP as well as DOS games requiring maximum CPU performance. I wouldn't even worry about downclocking that machine subject to feedback from my question above.
The faster machine can have a good 3D accelerator card supporting both OpenGL and Direct3D (probably an nVidia card) as well as an SLI setup and perhaps a PCX2 card, as suggested above. You can further tune your requirements if you have specific games in mind, like Splinter Cell. The more moderate machine can have a card with good DOS 2D compatibility and perhaps a Voodoo 1 if you want to run one of the more difficult games like Alain Prost Grand Prix.
All hail the Great Capacitor Brand Finder