A couple of benchmarks:

For the 3DMark tests, the default benchmarks were used. For the game benchmarks, the following versions were used:

• FarCry v1.4 benchmarked using the "HardwareOC FarCry Benchmark" at the "Ultra Detail" preset
• Doom 3 v1.31 benchmarked at the "Ultra Quality" preset using the built-in "timedemo demo1 usecache" console command
• Splinter Cell Chaos Theory v1.05 benchmarked using the stock "Timedemo.bat" file. VSync and Anti Aliasing are turned off, all other settings have been fully maxed out
• Crysis (GOG version) benchmarked using the stock "Benchmark_GPU.bat" file at the "High" graphical settings

Nice rig!

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2022-05-23, 09:57:

CPU

This Core i5 3550P CPU is more than enough for most WinXP games that I intend to play on this rig. The only downside is that I have to force CPU affinity to a single core for a few titles which have problems otherwise. I've replaced the stock cooler with an aftermarket one and also added two case fans. This keeps temperatures below 50C, even under full load.

Forcing the cpu affinity is just one of those things, even though using something like imagecfg to force troublesome games to use only one core is very reliable and easy it still felt somehow... wrong. Hopefully you find it less bothering than I did 😀

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2022-05-23, 09:57:

Motherboard

This MSI board is based on Intel's Z77 chipset and works fine for my needs. Its WinXP drivers are stll hosted on the manufacturer's website and stability has been very good. I also like that it has a few PCI slots, in case I decide to put some older hardware in this rig at some point.

Nice, that's the first Ivy Bridge motherboard I've seen that straight up offers XP drivers right from the manufacturers site, I knew there had to be some out there! I gave up finding one myself when I built my first "retro" WinXP PC and just went with Sandy Bridge.

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2022-05-23, 09:57:

Graphics card

This Gigabyte GTX 650Ti fits my needs well enough, since I game at the 1280x1024 resolution 99% of the time. I appreciate that its DVI output paired with 320.18 drivers allows me to select the scaling options under WinXP and set them to my liking. This is useful for those few, edge case games which only run at a single, fixed resolution like 1024x768. BTW, I would have gone with something more powerful like a 960Ti, if GPU prices from that era were a bit more reasonable.

Should be just fine for 1280x1024, I used to have a GTX 660 and remember only Deus Ex: Human Revolution being a bit sluggish at times @1920x1080 maxed out and that came out 2011. But do me a favor, let me know if you ever run into any driver issues with early XP games with it, I'd be interested to hear how well compatibility holds up.

Sombrero wrote on 2022-05-23, 11:40:

Forcing the cpu affinity is just one of those things, even though using something like imagecfg to force troublesome games to use only one core is very reliable and easy it still felt somehow... wrong. Hopefully you find it less bothering than I did 😀

I'm curious, how frequently did you need to set affinity for pre-2005 WinXP games? I usually look up whatever I'm going to play on the PC gaming wiki to see if I need to make any compatibility adjustments. It surprised me that Max Payne 2 apparently has issues with multi-core CPUs, since I wanted to replay that on this rig.

Nice, that's the first Ivy Bridge motherboard I've seen that straight up offers XP drivers right from the manufacturers site, I knew there had to be some out there! I gave up finding one myself when I built my first "retro" WinXP PC and just went with Sandy Bridge.

Heh, it was totally unexpected for me as well. About a year ago, I was looking at the MSI website to check if there were any BIOS updates for this board, when I noticed that WinXP drivers were officially supported. I immediately grabbed everything from there, fearing that it might disappear at some point.

But do me a favor, let me know if you ever run into any driver issues with early XP games with it, I'd be interested to hear how well compatibility holds up.

Cheers, will do! If that happens, I have an Athlon64 system with a GeForce4 Ti4200 which I can use for comparison purposes. From prior experience, I know that Gothic has some problems and that the original Splinter Cell doesn't look right on newer GPUs.

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2022-05-23, 13:35:

I'm curious, how frequently did you need to set affinity for pre-2005 WinXP games? I usually look up whatever I'm going to play on the PC gaming wiki to see if I need to make any compatibility adjustments. It surprised me that Max Payne 2 apparently has issues with multi-core CPUs, since I wanted to replay that on this rig.

With the Sandy Bridge rig I built I just disabled the second core and hyper threading to make it single core to maximize compatibility so I didn't need to even think about it. To me there isn't really "late XP games", games that benefit/need dual cores are already in Win7 territory in my mind. But with the Q9500 I had back in the day I don't remember having to do it often at all, Knights of the Old Republic and Neverwinter Nights were two that did need it but I can't think any other from top of my head right now. I'm sure there were others but surprisingly few in the end.

From what I remember I think I was more bothered by the always looming possibility of issues than by the real actual issues that did crop up 😁

Settings affinity was extremely rare and barely anything to worry about. For those that do you can either manually do it through task manager or setup a batch file for the game to do it.

As for dual-core I noticed the benefit greatly on 2000 and above on a dual P3 on everything since the OS was multi-threaded and for the few games ath the time that were as well it was a nice bonus.
Also all it takes is one process to max your cpu whereas with 2x you have a lot more wiggle room.

DosFreak wrote on 2022-05-23, 15:26:

Settings affinity was extremely rare and barely anything to worry about. For those that do you can either manually do it through task manager or setup a batch file for the game to do it.

Is the batch file method possible on Windows XP? I got the impression that it doesn't support he AFFINITY command.

OTOH, the task manager method works fine I just have to remember to do it every time I start a problematic game. 😁

And since I got asked about older games on this machine, here's a screenshot of the Gothic 1 issue that I mentioned before. This is how the inventory looks like on my GTX 650Ti:

And here's how it's supposed to look, as displayed by my GeForce4 Ti4200:

There doesn't seem to be a simple fix for this issue, other than using mods. But I prefer to play my games stock, which is why I now have four retro rigs. 😀

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2022-05-23, 16:10:

DosFreak wrote on 2022-05-23, 15:26:

Settings affinity was extremely rare and barely anything to worry about. For those that do you can either manually do it through task manager or setup a batch file for the game to do it.

Is the batch file method possible on Windows XP? I got the impression that it doesn't support he AFFINITY command.

OTOH, the task manager method works fine I just have to remember to do it every time I start a problematic game. 😁

There are different tools to do so.
Start /Affinity works (XP 64bit but not XP 32bit, mabye the 2003 32bit one does and can be used?) but I prefer psexec since I never use start for anything whereas I use psexec alot.
There is also imagecfg for permanent affinity but I never do so since I usually test for compatibility.

Also
Utility to automate Single Core CPU usage for games - RunFirst

DosFreak wrote on 2022-05-23, 16:38:

Also
Utility to automate Single Core CPU usage for games - RunFirst

Cheers!

RunFirst seems to be the simplest solution for my use case. Just tested it with Thief 2 and it worked like a charm.

Sombrero wrote on 2022-05-23, 11:40:

Nice, that's the first Ivy Bridge motherboard I've seen that straight up offers XP drivers right from the manufacturers site, I knew there had to be some out there! I gave up finding one myself when I built my first "retro" WinXP PC and just went with Sandy Bridge.

Nah, I have two and they both do.
ASUS Maximus V Gene (Z77) https://www.asus.com/SupportOnly/MAXIMUS_V_GE … pDesk_Download/
MSI Z77 GD65 https://www.msi.com/Motherboard/Z77AGD65/support#driver

Add ASRock and Gigabyte to that list as well. I'd be surprised if any manufacturer didn't offer XP drivers for Intel 7-series and older. Or, rather, they may not still have them readily available for download NOW, but they certainly would have been at the time. The 8-series is where XP drivers die off ( thanks, Intel, for locking up your USB3 drivers . . . ).

I just got done completely revamping my XP system a few weeks back with some leftover desktop parts. Went from an XP 1500+ on an nForce 2 board and X1600 Pro to a 2600K, Z68, and GTX 750 Ti. That project is actually what led me to finding this forum. It's been awfully helpful, and I figured I should stop just lurking. At first it felt wrong using so much computing power for WinXP, but I can't argue with the results! Dungeon Siege at 1280x1024 and 60fps is quite nice!

In terms of reliability and weird hitches, I haven't noticed problems yet either. I've disabled hyper-threading on the CPU, more to save on heat and power draw than anything else, but haven't disabled any cores yet. As NWN was mentioned previously, I don't remember having any multi-core problems with it on my E8400 C2D, but that's hardly authoritative. The only problem I've had so far is EAX suddenly having fits in Dungeon Siege 1 and everything turning to a loud buzz ( I've got a SB0100 Live! card ). If I disable EAX, play for about 10 minutes, then re-enable it in game settings, it usually goes back to normal. So I'm chalking that up to the game right now, not the system.

Now I'm going through my old Win98 system ( PIII 450, P2B, TNT2, Voodoo2 ), seeing if I want to do anything with that. I mainly kept it around for Glide and FF7 ( 640x480 and proper MIDI soundbanks makes that game AMAZING ).

Jaron wrote on 2022-11-12, 03:30:

I just got done completely revamping my XP system a few weeks back with some leftover desktop parts. Went from an XP 1500+ on an nForce 2 board and X1600 Pro to a 2600K, Z68, and GTX 750 Ti. That project is actually what led me to finding this forum. It's been awfully helpful, and I figured I should stop just lurking. At first it felt wrong using so much computing power for WinXP, but I can't argue with the results! Dungeon Siege at 1280x1024 and 60fps is quite nice!

Welcome to Vogons! That's a very nice WinXP system you built, and it will serve you well. As you say, it might be a bit overpowered, but it's great not having to worry about frame rates dropping below 60, even with Anti Aliasing and Anisotropic Filtering cranked up in all but the latest games.

Jaron wrote on 2022-11-12, 03:30:

The only problem I've had so far is EAX suddenly having fits in Dungeon Siege 1 and everything turning to a loud buzz ( I've got a SB0100 Live! card ). If I disable EAX, play for about 10 minutes, then re-enable it in game settings, it usually goes back to normal. So I'm chalking that up to the game right now, not the system.

I'm not super familiar with Dungeon Siege and it's entirely possible that the sound issue is specific to that game, or potentially caused by bad drivers. That said, you likely want a more powerful sound card for WinXP. That SB0100 tops out at EAX2 while most games made from 2002 onward support EAX3 and higher. Here's a list showcasing this. An X-Fi Titanium PCIe SB0880 would fit nicely with the rest of your system but, if that's too expensive, even a cheap Audigy card would give you a much improved EAX experience.

A couple of tips. With the X-Fi line, note that Titanium HD and later cards don't support WinXP and are therefore unsuitable for retro gaming. Also, avoid the Xtreme Audio X-Fi varieties since they don't have hardware accelerated EAX. For similar reasons, ignore the LE, SE and other cut down "value" editions of Audigy cards. In terms of drivers, just grab the latest ones from DanielK's website and you're all set.

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2022-11-12, 05:12:

I'm not super familiar with Dungeon Siege and it's entirely possible that the sound issue is specific to that game, or potentially caused by bad drivers. That said, you likely want a more powerful sound card for WinXP. That SB0100 tops out at EAX2 while most games made from 2002 onward support EAX3 and higher. Here's a list showcasing this. An X-Fi Titanium PCIe SB0880 would fit nicely with the rest of your system but, if that's too expensive, even a cheap Audigy card would give you a much improved EAX experience.

Thanks. I know it's not a great sound card, it's simply what I had on hand. Almost everything I used were parts I already had, accumulated from from the various systems I've built and owned over the years. I bought that SB0100 in 2002 for my main computer at the time ( to upgrade the CT4780 I got in in 1999, which is now in my Win98 machine ). The 2600K was my main computer from 2011 until 2019. I did buy a smaller case to replace the Thermaltake Chieftain, and the 750 Ti off eBay since I didn't have a GPU old enough ( like you, I would have preferred a 950, but I couldn't find one at a price I liked ). Used prices on the X-Fi look to be about $30, so I might end up getting one. I'm also deciding if I want to pick up an MX 440 to replace the TNT2 in my Win98 system. If I can offload the old WinXP parts, I'll certainly grab them both.

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2022-11-12, 05:12:

A couple of tips. With the X-Fi line, note that Titanium HD and later cards don't support WinXP and are therefore unsuitable for retro gaming. Also, avoid the Xtreme Audio X-Fi varieties since they don't have hardware accelerated EAX. For similar reasons, ignore the LE, SE and other cut down "value" editions of Audigy cards. In terms of drivers, just grab the latest ones from DanielK's website and you're all set.

Thank you, I'll definitely keep that in mind. I'm also going through your guide on Audigy/Live! drivers for Win98, so I'll see how that goes. I'm having to relearn all the tricks I forgot over the last 25 years.

Jaron wrote on 2022-11-12, 23:59:

I'm also deciding if I want to pick up an MX 440 to replace the TNT2 in my Win98 system.

The MX440 is a great budget GPU for Win9x gaming, and will perform much better than the TNT2. Try to get one with a 128-bit memory bus, as the 64-bit versions are a fair bit slower. Usually (but not always), you can recognize the 128-bit versions as having 8 memory chips in total. Or grab an MX460 which are always 128-bit, but somewhat rarer.

Jaron wrote on 2022-11-12, 23:59:

I'm having to relearn all the tricks I forgot over the last 25 years.

Heh, that's the fun part. 😁

I've been down the same path a few years back. Re-learning all the WinXP and Win98 tweaks and tricks to make them run smoothly really takes you back in time.

I'm now using a Samsung SyncMaster S24B420BW 24" LCD monitor on this system as well. You can see some pics of it in this thread. I really like the ability to choose the aspect ratio on the monitor, without needing to rely on Nvidia driver scaling, which can sometimes be difficult to set up under WinXP.

I will primarily be using the 1600x1200 resolution as most WinXP era games support that natively, though I do plan on selecting 1920x1200 in games which allow it.

I've added an Intel Pro/1000 GT PCI network card to this build. It will serve exclusively to connect this system to my retro LAN, as I want to keep that completely cut off from the internet. The on-board NIC will still be used for internet access (only from Debian Linux).

Basically, this just makes it a bit easier for me to transfer GOG offline game installers to my other retro systems.

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2023-02-01, 14:03:

Basically, this just makes it a bit easier for me to transfer GOG offline game installers to my other retro systems.

Are those even working on your older OSs? I've tried a few offline GOG installs on my Win98 and WinXP computers and all the ones I've tried won't even install on anything older than Win7. Even the old-old stuff like Descent.

Jaron wrote on 2023-02-01, 15:30:

Are those even working on your older OSs? I've tried a few offline GOG installs on my Win98 and WinXP computers and all the ones I've tried won't even install on anything older than Win7. Even the old-old stuff like Descent.

I guess it might depend on the game and when its installer was last updated. Here are some games that worked fine for me using their offline installers on WinXP + SP3: Prince of Persia: Sands of Time, Gothic, Gothic 2, Jazz Jackrabbit 2, Thief: Deadly Shadows etc.

I don't think any of the GOG offline installers can run on Win98, but you can always install a game on WinXP (or a modern system) and then copy over the installation folder to your Win98 rig. Most of the time, this works without any issues, but sometimes you do need to delete Glide wrappers and such if you're running the games on real, period-correct hardware.

Updated my benchmarks to include the 1600x1200 results. I have to say, most WinXP games do actually have enough texture detail to justify this resolution (and higher ones). This is in stark contrast to Win9x games, because they often only used low-res textures (256x256 and such). Of course, that makes perfect sense considering the hardware of that time period. But it's still a bit jarring to see blurry textures paired with ultra-crisp polygons when you crank up the resolution in some Win9x games like Quake 2.

Anyway, I can see why 1600x1200 remained popular well into the late 2000s under WinXP. I never experienced it back in the day, since the monitor and GPU which I was using at that time couldn't handle it. Now, it's a real treat to finally play games like Doom 3 and Far Cry at that resolution.