I've never gone past my trusty Thrustmaster GP1 - the one with paddles on the wheel instead of peddles on the floor, which are more trouble than they're worth IMHO

badmojo wrote:

the one with paddles on the wheel instead of peddles on the floor, which are more trouble than they're worth IMHO

Why? Seems a bit counter-intuitive. Are peddles too hard to press or something?

A steering wheel and pedals are basically like a joystick with a slightly different interface. Any racing/driving game will be fine with a gameport wheel on the machine you're saying you'll be using.

For reasonable prices, Thrustmaster is going to be the go-to option for steering wheels of the era. The MS SideWinder Pro Force Feedback is too new for a P166 machine (I have one in the closet) as nothing will use the force feedback and you will have a better feel with a true centering spring on those old games. The GP1 badmojo posted is a fine wheel, but the paddles for the brake and gas are limiting because they are on a combined axis. This means you can't gas and brake at the same time. I would highly suggest getting something that supports separate axises for brake and gas.

I have some variation of the Thrustmaster NASCAR Pro wheel for my retro PC and it works great for the old DOS Papyrus sims and NFS.

jheronimus wrote:

badmojo wrote:

the one with paddles on the wheel instead of peddles on the floor, which are more trouble than they're worth IMHO

Why? Seems a bit counter-intuitive. Are peddles too hard to press or something?

Extra cables, more things to go wrong but more importantly I never found them comfortable to use. They slide away when you stomp on them and feel nothing like actual car peddles anyway. The paddles on the wheel on the other hand are comfortable and accurate all day long.

y2k se wrote:

I have some variation of the Thrustmaster NASCAR Pro wheel for my retro PC and it works great for the old DOS Papyrus sims and NFS.

Any opinions on the Thrustmaster Formula Sprint?

Looks similar to NASCAR Pro (not sure about the specs/functionality) and I can source one pretty cheaply.

I'm not familiar with that one. Looks like its just missing the shifter and the pedal base is a bit different. Otherwise its probably about the same.

jheronimus wrote:

Any opinions on the Thrustmaster Formula Sprint?

Did you get this in the end?

chinny22 wrote:

jheronimus wrote:

Any opinions on the Thrustmaster Formula Sprint?

Did you get this in the end?

Nope. I've decided to wait and research a little more. To be honest I can't get over its looks — just seems a bit too spartan and cheap — more like Quickshot.

Could very well be that because wheels of this era simply weren't as popular as joysticks, vendors did not put too much thought into their design.

ok thanks,
Keeping 1/2 eye out myself for a good dos wheel. Had a Mad Catz wheel back in the day, but even then it felt cheap and didn't last that long.
Where as 9x and above your have plenty of choice (Love my Wingman Formula Force "big red" not the crappy GP)

At the same time, I must admit, Thrustmaster GP1 looks great when attached to a Thinkpad laptop. Here it is at the end of the video.

I've always really liked the Microsoft Sidewinder force feedback ones:

You can get them either in 15-pin analog or USB versions. USB is recommended for newer systems, but I don't know if they can be used in DOS.