Greetings!
I'm thinking of ditching my 486 and doing a 386 build to have better compatibility with older games. I'm working on a Pentium 4 build (thanks phil) which will handle all my late 486-pentium DOS stuff just fine, and handle all the awesome Win 98 gaming stuff too.
What should I look for? What speed CPU should I want? What else?
When it comes to 386 systems a 386DX33 with cache or a 386DX40 without cache is optimal for some games... but not for others.
If you can get your hands on a 486DX33 or DX40 or SX33 or SX25 (less than $10 on Ebay) and your 486 motherboard supports 20 MHz FSB then underclocking a 486 should work as good as a 386DX40, at least if you remove all cache memory from the motherboard.
New PC: i9 12900K @5GHz all cores @1.2v. MSI PRO Z690-A. 32GB DDR4 3600 CL14. 3070Ti.
Old PC: Dual Xeon X5690@4.6GHz, EVGA SR-2, 48GB DDR3R@2000MHz, Intel X25-M. GTX 980ti.
Older PC: K6-3+ 400@600MHz, PC-Chips M577, 256MB SDRAM, AWE64, Voodoo Banshee.
I would re-consider. The 486 is more flexible with cache option and turbo.
With a 386 you are "stuck" at one set speed. Don't get me wrong, that's still cool, but if you have a working 486 already, maybe take another look 🤣
Can you tell us more about your 486 and compatibility?
Do what I did.
Find an IBM Blue Lightning 386 and Alaris Cougar motherboard.
It's the best of all worlds.
Different combinations of cache/FSB clocks will let you do everything from a fast 286 to a mid-range 486 and everything in between.
Bubble Ghost, for example, runs perfectly on it.
It also has built in I/O and VLB.
I'm using a DX2-66.
I was looking into this a while back and I don't really remember why. I just remember having the feeling that the 486 wasn't suiting me, and that perhaps I needed to go down to a 386. Coming back to it now, I'm not totally sure. But I wanted to throw this thread up there so that I could better understand my options.
AWEUTIL seems to hate it if internal cache is off or if turbo is off and never comes back from loading the TSR.
Perhaps just going to a slower 486 is the cost effective and easier option.
Would suggest an 486 DX 25-33
~ At least it can do black and white~
I have a 386DX-25/33/40Mhz dedicated to Wing Commander....just saying. =)
386DX-40MHz-8MB-540MB+428MB+Speedstar64@2MB+SoundBlaster Pro+MT-32/MKII
486DX2-66Mhz-16MB-4.3GB+SpeedStar64 VLB DRAM 2MB+AWE32/SB16+SCB-55
MY BLOG RETRO PC BLOG: https://bitbyted.wordpress.com/
I built a machine almost specifically for playing the Duke Nukem 3D prototypes. Of course, these never actually materialized so the machine ended up being re-purposed.
To be honest I knew they'd never happen, I never trusted Interceptor or Gearbox and to be honest, I think Interceptor probably just hyped it to distract from their cock up with Bombshell and possibly never meant to release them at all. Funny thing is how they also ruined Bombshell further in this time. The original design of the character model, for example, used to be much better.
486 machines tend to be better value overall and scale further and more predictably that a 386. At least, in what I've used such machines for anyway.
