speeddemon wrote on 2021-06-16, 06:00:

I'm planning on using this rig for late-80s DOS games to early 2000s Windows games.

That's an excellent Windows 9x rig, but it won't be so good for DOS gaming due to a couple of reasons.

First, some DOS games are speed sensitive and the slowdown capabilities of a Pentium 4 are limited. You might be able to reach 386 speeds by disabling both caches, but that doesn't cover games that work best on a late 486 or an early Pentium. ACPI Throttle might give you a bit more slowdown range, but it doesn't work so smoothly on non-VIA chipsets.

Second, the FM synthesis on both the Audigy and the Aureal cards sounds pretty bad. If you care about early DOS games that primarily use FM synth music, you want something like a Yamaha YMF7x4 card or an ESS Solo-1. Additionally, certain games may have compatibility issues with PCI sound cards, but that varies on a case by case basis.

My experience with an Asus P4P800E Deluxe board (intel 865PE), a Quadro FX 2000 and a Voodoo 2000 PCI was very good. On my board I could switch between the two cards in the bios and windows 98 didn't seem to mind. I did lose access to my 3dfx control panel once my nvidia drivers were installed so keep that in mind. I made sure to setup my preferred resolution and settings before adding the nvidia drivers.

I think you have nailed it, it's the perfect high performance windows 98 machine in my opinion. I believe the 5950 ultra requires nvidia driver version 53.04 or later, while some people claim that driver version 45.23 is more compatible, although I am not sure exactly why they say that.

Hardware wise you've done your research well, I would have gone with the same build.

I have a V3 and GF4 Ti in one of my builds and found for the most part it just works. I do have a separate screen attached to each card as well (dual monitor 9x setup, 90's me would be impressed)
Set the GF as the primary card and everything plays on that by default.
Setting a game to Glide will force it over to the 3dFX card automatedly.
Powerslide been the only game in my collection that doesn't like this setup and go into bios as you say.

Soundcard is much the same. Some games will allow you to select the sound device, if not just set the card you want as the primary in control panel first.

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2021-06-16, 06:54:

That's an excellent Windows 9x rig, but it won't be so good for DOS gaming due to a couple of reasons. […]
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speeddemon wrote on 2021-06-16, 06:00:

I'm planning on using this rig for late-80s DOS games to early 2000s Windows games.

That's an excellent Windows 9x rig, but it won't be so good for DOS gaming due to a couple of reasons.

First, some DOS games are speed sensitive and the slowdown capabilities of a Pentium 4 are limited. You might be able to reach 386 speeds by disabling both caches, but that doesn't cover games that work best on a late 486 or an early Pentium. ACPI Throttle might give you a bit more slowdown range, but it doesn't work so smoothly on non-VIA chipsets.

Second, the FM synthesis on both the Audigy and the Aureal cards sounds pretty bad. If you care about early DOS games that primarily use FM synth music, you want something like a Yamaha YMF7x4 card or an ESS Solo-1. Additionally, certain games may have compatibility issues with PCI sound cards, but that varies on a case by case basis.

I didn't realize how many DOS and Windows games are speed sensitive. I'll attempt to use some of the slowdown methods mentioned on the wiki page you linked to, but I'll likely get carried away and dig up one of my older Pentium MMX 200 CPU/Motherboard combos and put together another rig, but it sounds like even that wouldn't be slow enough.

I wasn't aware of the FM Synth issue with the Aureal and Audigy cards, but I actually have a Yamaha PCI YMF-724F sound card I could use. I figured it seemed a little over the top to throw a third sound card in the system, but would you recommend I do this?
Are there any other options for adding OPL FM Synth to either the Audigy or Aureal cards?
Can I use something like an DreamBlaster S2 for OPL or is that MIDI only?

mothergoose729 wrote on 2021-06-16, 06:59:

My experience with an Asus P4P800E Deluxe board (intel 865PE), a Quadro FX 2000 and a Voodoo 2000 PCI was very good. On my board I could switch between the two cards in the bios and windows 98 didn't seem to mind. I did lose access to my 3dfx control panel once my nvidia drivers were installed so keep that in mind. I made sure to setup my preferred resolution and settings before adding the nvidia drivers.

I think you have nailed it, it's the perfect high performance windows 98 machine in my opinion. I believe the 5950 ultra requires nvidia driver version 53.04 or later, while some people claim that driver version 45.23 is more compatible, although I am not sure exactly why they say that.

Thanks for the heads-up that you lose access to the 3dfx control panel once the NVIDIA drivers are installed.
Could you just use Hardware Profiles to work around this?
I figured I can use the GeForce4 Ti4800SE if the FX5950U doesn't end up working with old enough drivers; I had a hard time finding concrete info on difference in compatibility between some of those Nvidia driver versions.

chinny22 wrote on 2021-06-16, 09:08:

Hardware wise you've done your research well, I would have gone with the same build. […]
Show full quote

Hardware wise you've done your research well, I would have gone with the same build.

I have a V3 and GF4 Ti in one of my builds and found for the most part it just works. I do have a separate screen attached to each card as well (dual monitor 9x setup, 90's me would be impressed)
Set the GF as the primary card and everything plays on that by default.
Setting a game to Glide will force it over to the 3dFX card automatedly.
Powerslide been the only game in my collection that doesn't like this setup and go into bios as you say.

Soundcard is much the same. Some games will allow you to select the sound device, if not just set the card you want as the primary in control panel first.

I'll definitely give this a try, but I wonder why so many people say you need to manually disable one of the AGP primary card for the PCI Secondary 3dfx card to work. This would be a best case scenario if this works though because that would be the best of both worlds and effectively function like a 3d-only Voodoo2 which is what I want.

speeddemon wrote on 2021-06-16, 22:15:

Maybe I'll get carried away with this though and dig up one of my older Pentium MMX 200 CPU/Motherboard combos and put together another system, but it sounds like even that wouldn't be slow enough.

A Pentium MMX is actually quite versatile when it comes to running speed sensitive DOS games. Check this video by Phil for more details.

I wasn't aware of the FM Synth issue with the Aureal and Audigy cards.

You might want to take a look at this thread of mine: OPL3 vs. ESFM vs. CQM vs. SBLive
For reference, SBLive and Audigy FM synth emulation sounds roughly the same.

I actually have a Yamaha PCI YMF-724F sound card I could use, but I thought it seemed a little over the top to throw a third sound card in the system.
Would you recommend that I do this?

No. It would be better to replace one of the two cards with the YMF724. Or just go with a different system for DOS games that rely on FM synth music.

Are there any other options for adding OPL FM Synth to either the Audigy or Aureal cards?
Can I use something like an DreamBlaster S2 for OPL or is that MIDI only?

There are external FM synth devices like the OPL3LPT but haven't personally used them.

There are ways to get DOS games working with a PCI sound card if you want to do that and assuming you have an extra PCI slot. The Yamaha cards are among the best at it, and with some other software you can even control DMA and IRQ assignment, apparently.

If it were me though I am not sure I would bother with it. There are much better DOS machines you could build for a fraction of the price.

If you already have the making of a Pentium MMX I wouldn't worry about OPL on this.
For my P4 Win98 rig I kept it simple and just have the Audigy 2 ZS. I'm not saying the Audigy's implementation sounds great but it does the job.
But something as fast as a P4 your probably going to be mainly playing later games with digital sound and EAX or A3D.

Where as the MMX will have enough grunt for even the latest dos SVGA games and ISA slots opening up many many sound card options.

It is possible though, I've a Slot 1 PC with 3 soundcards (AWE, Audigy 2 ZS, onboard Yamaha) but it is over the top.

No idea why people think they need to disable the non voodoo card, maybe I'm just lucky that majority my 3dfx games work but I suspect its a case of assumption.
Up till only a few years ago people said you had to disable HT if installing Win98 so everyone did, it's only in the past 5 years people tired and found it doesn't actually make a difference.
Or maybe its just easier if using 1 screen, forcing start up to show on the same card you intend to use.

Also I didn't loose my 3dfx control panel after installing Nvidia drivers. I installed Nvidia first then the reference V3 drivers. but maybe the V5 drivers behave different?

chinny22 wrote on 2021-06-17, 08:32:

If you already have the making of a Pentium MMX I wouldn't worry about OPL on this. For my P4 Win98 rig I kept it simple and jus […]
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If you already have the making of a Pentium MMX I wouldn't worry about OPL on this.
For my P4 Win98 rig I kept it simple and just have the Audigy 2 ZS. I'm not saying the Audigy's implementation sounds great but it does the job.
But something as fast as a P4 your probably going to be mainly playing later games with digital sound and EAX or A3D.

Where as the MMX will have enough grunt for even the latest dos SVGA games and ISA slots opening up many many sound card options.

It is possible though, I've a Slot 1 PC with 3 soundcards (AWE, Audigy 2 ZS, onboard Yamaha) but it is over the top.

No idea why people think they need to disable the non voodoo card, maybe I'm just lucky that majority my 3dfx games work but I suspect its a case of assumption.
Up till only a few years ago people said you had to disable HT if installing Win98 so everyone did, it's only in the past 5 years people tired and found it doesn't actually make a difference.
Or maybe its just easier if using 1 screen, forcing start up to show on the same card you intend to use.

Also I didn't loose my 3dfx control panel after installing Nvidia drivers. I installed Nvidia first then the reference V3 drivers. but maybe the V5 drivers behave different?

I'll try with the Yamaha too given that I have enough PCI slots and that it sounds like it's possible to get it all working in a single system (I'd use a different ISA sound card anyways for building an older system anyways).

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2021-06-17, 06:20:

A Pentium MMX is actually quite versatile when it comes to running speed sensitive DOS games. Check this video by Phil for more details.

Out of curiosity, what's the fastest processor/chipset combo that can be slowed down to 386/486 speeds for DOS compatibility?

speeddemon wrote on 2021-06-18, 18:00:

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2021-06-17, 06:20:

A Pentium MMX is actually quite versatile when it comes to running speed sensitive DOS games. Check this video by Phil for more details.

Out of curiosity, what's the fastest processor/chipset combo that can be slowed down to 386/486 speeds for DOS compatibility?

Most any processor can be slowed down enough, but there are caveats. Mo slo and throttle are amazing and you can get a lot done, but there are compromises.

There are also some misconceptions in the community about which speed reference points are actually important, IMO. There is only one game I know of out of my entire DOS collection of some three hundred plus games that actually needs a 486DX2 66 to run as intended (it's Magic Carpet btw). Most games that people think are 486 era are actually 386 era, and by the time a 486 was required most of that software (read: very nearly all of them) will run fine on a Pentium or better. I would add to that there are more games that need a particular speed pentium to run as intended than 486 games - oddly enough (at least in my library, many caveats, please don't write a novel correcting me). The good news is that there is a lot more CPUs that can hit 386 speeds without software slow down utilities than 486 speeds.

So the answer really is it depends. What games, what is your goals for the system, ect. The CPU I use is the Via C3 "Nehemiah" with a slotket adapter on a very particular motherboard for lots of reasons not relevant to the discussion yet. Many people build pentium 3 based or socket A based machines for that reason because with L1 cache disabled they end up somewhere around a fast 386.

You can play DOS games on a pentium 4... I never had much success in disabling both L1 and L2 cache on my socket 478 setup but I also didn't spend a lot of time tinkering with it either. Personally, I abandoned it for a build that had DOS as a stronger focus, and that is why I think a dedicated DOS machine makes more sense. It's a deep discussion with lots of options each with their own pros and cons.

speeddemon wrote on 2021-06-18, 18:00:

Out of curiosity, what's the fastest processor/chipset combo that can be slowed down to 386/486 speeds for DOS compatibility?

Possibly an Athlon64. But I haven't personally tried running DOS games on that CPU.

I do have an AthlonXP build that is quite versatile (link in signature) and can be slowed down to 386 and 486 speeds using SetMul + Throttle. However, there are some instances where this is suboptimal. On that AthlonXP rig, my CH Flightstick starts misbehaving when the Throttle slowdown utility is used. OTOH, I didn't encounter any such issues when I slowed down my Pentium MMX rig using only SetMul.

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2021-06-18, 18:33:

hrottle slowdown utility is used. OTOH, I didn't encounter any such issues when I slowed down my Pentium MMX rig using only SetMul.

I just went through my parts and here are some components I'm thinking about using for a Socket 7 build:
- Pentium 233 MMX (So7)
- ASUS TX97-X (So7 Intel 440TX)
- 64MB SDRAM
- Voodoo3 3000 PCI

I'd still need to figure out what to do for an ISA sound card...

Also, I'm kind of thinking it might make more sense to track down a 2D graphics card like a Matrox Millenium and use it with a Voodoo2 or Voodoo1 instead (both of which I already have). I for some reason never held onto a 2D-only graphics card.

What do you think?

Thanks for all the help!

speeddemon wrote on 2021-06-19, 23:26:

I just went through my parts and here are some components I'm thinking about using for a Socket 7 build: - Pentium 233 MMX (So7 […]
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I just went through my parts and here are some components I'm thinking about using for a Socket 7 build:
- Pentium 233 MMX (So7)
- ASUS TX97-X (So7 Intel 440TX)
- 64MB SDRAM
- Voodoo3 3000 PCI

That looks great to me. You'll be able to play pretty much everything from early DOS titles up to moderately demanding 3D accelerated games such as Quake 2 on that rig. Some Windows games released in 1998 and onward (e.g. Half-Life and Unreal) might be CPU bottlenecked though.

As for getting a 2D card + an older Voodoo, that would give you better compatibility with DOS Glide games and some early Windows titles too, but you would suffer a reduction in 2D image quality due to the passthrough cable. Also, while Matrox cards do provide a very sharp picture, they have some compatibility issues with certain DOS games. In the end, it all depends on what your priorities are.

I'd still need to figure out what to do for an ISA sound card...

That's probably the hardest part to choose when building a DOS retro rig. In short, no single sound card is perfect, and there are always some tradeoffs that you need to make.

Personally, I would suggest an ESS AudioDrive 1868F for its low self-noise, nice FM synth and a bugfree MPU-401 interface. Pair it with a Dreamblaster S2 and you've got yourself an affordable yet great sounding DOS setup. OTOH, you could instead go with an Orpheus paired with an X2GS daughterboard as a (much) more expensive solution. That would give you genuine OPL3, SPDIF out and Roland quality General MIDI.

Another option would be getting a Sound Blaster 16 or AWE32/64 card. Those are generally well supported in most games and can deliver slightly better sound in a few late-era DOS titles such as Crusader: No Remorse. But then you'd have to deal with these issues so you need to ask yourself if it's worth it. Top of the line AWE cards are also very expensive.

There are many other sound cards that you could go with instead, these are just a few examples. You might want to search the forums a bit more to get a better understanding of what the optimal solution for your particular use case would be.

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2021-06-20, 07:19:

That looks great to me. You'll be able to play pretty much everything from early DOS titles up to moderately demanding 3D accele […]
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That looks great to me. You'll be able to play pretty much everything from early DOS titles up to moderately demanding 3D accelerated games such as Quake 2 on that rig. Some Windows games released in 1998 and onward (e.g. Half-Life and Unreal) might be CPU bottlenecked though.

As for getting a 2D card + an older Voodoo, that would give you better compatibility with DOS Glide games and some early Windows titles too, but you would suffer a reduction in 2D image quality due to the passthrough cable. Also, while Matrox cards do provide a very sharp picture, they have some compatibility issues with certain DOS games. In the end, it all depends on what your priorities are.

That's probably the hardest part to choose when building a DOS retro rig. In short, no single sound card is perfect, and there are always some tradeoffs that you need to make.

Personally, I would suggest an ESS AudioDrive 1868F for its low self-noise, nice FM synth and a bugfree MPU-401 interface. Pair it with a Dreamblaster S2 and you've got yourself an affordable yet great sounding DOS setup. OTOH, you could instead go with an Orpheus paired with an X2GS daughterboard as a (much) more expensive solution. That would give you genuine OPL3, SPDIF out and Roland quality General MIDI.

Another option would be getting a Sound Blaster 16 or AWE32/64 card. Those are generally well supported in most games and can deliver slightly better sound in a few late-era DOS titles such as Crusader: No Remorse. But then you'd have to deal with these issues so you need to ask yourself if it's worth it. Top of the line AWE cards are also very expensive.

There are many other sound cards that you could go with instead, these are just a few examples. You might want to search the forums a bit more to get a better understanding of what the optimal solution for your particular use case would be.

Thanks for talking me out of using a Matrox Millenium and sharing that link.

I ended up digging through my old video cards and found a GeForce FX 5500 PCI I'm now considering using. It actually seems more compatible with DOS than the Matrox cards based on the 2D DOS compatibility list you shared which surprised me given my recollection of using a Matrox card back in the day with Win311/Win95 and the majority of my DOS gaming.

I'll probably pair the FX 5500 with a Voodoo2. The Voodoo3 doesn't feel like a good fit for this system (I think I'll probably use it for another project) even though I have no interest playing any of the Voodoo1-only DOS games. I figure with the FX 5500 I'll have the added bonus of an excellent OpenGL & Direct3D card in the system (that's free to me).

You also bring up a good point about the degrading image quality due to the passthrough cable so I'll possibly just use a KVM so I can easily toggle between different video cards.

Can you think of any problems with using the FX 55000 aside from it obviously not being period appropriate?

Also, great recommendation for the ESS AudioDrive 1868F sound card. That seems like a great starter sound card for my Pentium MMX machine for the price (I was able to find one of super cheap on eBay). I ended up watching this video of Phil's which further sold me on the card: https://youtu.be/fWOdIuRO5fI

Here's what I'm probably going to put together now:
- Pentium 233 MMX (So7)
- ASUS TX97-X (So7 Intel 440TX)
- 256MB PC133 CL2 RAM
- Nvidia GeForce FX 5500 PCI (2D, OpenGL, Direct3D)
- 3dfx Voodoo2 SLI (Glide)
- ESS AudioDrive 1868F ISA sound card

speeddemon wrote on 2021-06-24, 05:39:

Can you think of any problems with using the FX 55000 aside from it obviously not being period appropriate?

For pure DOS gaming, it should be fine. However, if you want to play Win9x 3D accelerated titles on that card (without the Voodoo), performance would be suboptimal on your system.

In short, the Nvidia drivers which an FX card needs are too new for that CPU and will give you a lot of overhead. Not sure if this would affect a Voodoo card paired with it, but it's doubtful.

Also, great recommendation for the ESS AudioDrive 1868F sound card.

It's a very nice sound card for DOS gaming. But if you want slightly clearer output and possibly EAX support under Windows, I would recommend getting a SBLive as well. Under Windows, it's possible to use both sound cards at the same time without any issues. You basically select which of the two is your default sound device in the Control Panel and Windows games will use that.

I would also disable the DOS emulation on the SBLive (or simply not install its DOS drivers) so that it doesn't conflict with the ESS card.

256MB PC133 CL2 RAM

That's way too much RAM for that system.

The 430TX chipset can only cache 64 MB. If you go over that amount, you will experience a performance decrease.

> Can you think of any problems with using the FX 55000 aside from it obviously not being period appropriate?

How is a FX not period appropriate for a pentium4 system?

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2021-06-24, 05:57:

For pure DOS gaming, it should be fine. However, if you want to play Win9x 3D accelerated titles on that card (without the Voodo […]
Show full quote

speeddemon wrote on 2021-06-24, 05:39:

Can you think of any problems with using the FX 55000 aside from it obviously not being period appropriate?

For pure DOS gaming, it should be fine. However, if you want to play Win9x 3D accelerated titles on that card (without the Voodoo), performance would be suboptimal on that system.

In short, the Nvidia drivers which an FX card needs are too new for that CPU and will give you a lot of overhead. Not sure if this would affect a Voodoo card paired with it, but it's doubtful.

Also, great recommendation for the ESS AudioDrive 1868F sound card.

It's a very nice sound card for DOS gaming. But if you want slightly clearer output and possibly EAX support under Windows, I would recommend getting a SBLive as well. Under Windows, it's possible to use both sound cards at the same time without any issues. You basically select which of the two is your default sound device in the Control Panel and Windows games will use that.

I would also disable the DOS emulation on the SBLive (or simply not install its DOS drivers) so that it doesn't conflict with the ESS card.

256MB PC133 CL2 RAM

That's way too much RAM for that system.

The 430TX chipset can only cache 64 MB. If you go over that amount, you will experience a performance decrease.

I think Phil was saying in this video that you can actually use the 45.23 drivers with the FX 5500. Does that change your opinion?
Thanks for reminding me of that! I'll just keep it to 64MB... I completely forgot about that limitation with the 430TX.
I have a PCI SB Live card I could throw in the system too.

kolderman wrote on 2021-06-24, 06:01:

> Can you think of any problems with using the FX 55000 aside from it obviously not being period appropriate?

How is a FX not period appropriate for a pentium4 system?

Joseph talked me into building a second Pentium MMX system... so that's why 😉

For a pentium MMX there really isn't any reason to go faster than a single voodoo 2. From what I remember the Voodoo 2 is fully featured for DirectX 6 and compatible with directx 7, which is well beyond anything you would want to play on a socket 7 PC anyway. I would pair it with a S3 virge DX or something similar and focus on DOS.

speeddemon wrote on 2021-06-24, 06:04:

I think Phil was saying in this video that you can actually use the 45.23 drivers with the FX 5500. Does that change your opinion?

No.

The 45.23 drivers came out in July of 2003 and are optimized for CPUs that were common at that time. The Pentium MMX was heavily outdated by then.