I got confused. What are memory sensitive games? Are you talking about speed sensitive games like these https://www.vogonswiki.com/index.php/List_of_ … sensitive_games ?

Sorry, yes. I meant speed sensitive.

Kahenraz, nowadays you can choose from anything starting with Socket 7 through Socket 370 (probably Slot 1 as well) to 478-775 platforms, as all of them can be slowed down to play all those games (as well as those that are not even in the list) at the right speed. And there's always the Super Socket 7 - the only slowdown platform somebody made a proper video about 😀

There is also Pentium 233Mhz mmx that has good options for slowing it down. Also I have a 486 33Mhz retro pc that can be slowed down to 386 and 286 speeds by disabling caches and combining that with using the turbo button. I can say that 486 is my favourite retro pc.

There are actually quite a few options for adjusting speed in DOS games.

In my opinion, the most flexible setup is Phil's 4-in-1 DOS machine based on a SS7, K6+. This computer can easily scale down to a 386DX33 all the way up to the equivalent of a Pentium II 450mhz. K6+ processors on an SS7 board are capable of disabling L1 cache in software, have an toggleable L2 cache on the board, and have a multiplier scaling from 2x-6x using setmul. You can even toggle between 60mhz-100mhz fsb for very granular speed adjustments, although only by accessing jumpers or dip switches on the board. The downside to this platform is that now, thanks to Phil, everyone knows about it, and boards in particular can be very expensive. Finding a board the is compatible with K6+ and larger disk drives can also be very challenging.

https://www.philscomputerlab.com/4-in-1-retro-gaming-pc.html

The next best thing IMO is a 200mhz or 233mhz pentium MMX with socket 7. The pentium MMX processors are a bit pricey, but you can use it with a lot more boards. The pentium MMX CPUs can have caches disabled and multiplier adjustments, but they can also disable specific instructions in software, allowing you to go as low as a 386DX25. The great thing about this setup is that you have a lot of control over the speed in the 386 and 486 speed zones, and it can go a bit slower than other platforms. The downside is that the pentium MMX is not fast enough for a lot of 3D windows games, you don't have access to AGP or larger drives unless you get SS7.

https://www.philscomputerlab.com/136-in-1-pentium-mmx.html

Another option is Slot 1 with a Via C3 processor. These processors can scale from a 386 all the way to a slow Pentium III (depending on the model) by adjusting multipliers and cache in software. The slot 1 boards are relatively affordable and support lots of features like AGP, DMA, and larger hard drives. Via C3 chips are a good choice for speed sensitive DOS, but their performance in windows is all over the place because of their weak FPU performance.

SetMul - Multiplier control for VIA C3 / AMD K6+7+8 Mobile / Cyrix 5x86

Finally, a real 486 platform can do a lot, scaling in performance as high a slow pentium with certain CPUs and motheboards, down to a very slow 386 or even 286. 486 board are hard to find, and not very convenient to work with, but it is an option.

Those are hardware solutions, there are software options as well.

Any slot 1 or socket 370 pentium III, and even socket 478 pentium 4s (and later I believe) can work with a piece of software called throttle. Throttle lets you use clock skipping to adjust the speed of your processor in software, down to as low as 12.5% of its normal performance. I haven't tried it with my p3 setup yet, but from what I have read you can reliably get around crashing and bugs in speed sensitive DOS games using it, and gameplay performance in a lot of games is more or less where it should be. Slot 1 and socket 370 boards also can be found with ISA slots for sound cards, are rather affordable, and have lots of features. A pentium III at 600-800mhz can get down to a 386 with l1 cache disabled, can approximate a 486 and a pentium with throttle, is great for early windows games, and they are very cheap. These boards also have lots of features like AGP, DMA, larger hard drives, USB, PS2, ect.

The downside to throttle is that it is not hardware control. From what I have read, clock skipping will get speed sensitive games to run, but you can still experience speed issues and inconsistencies.

http://www.oldskool.org/pc/throttle/DOS/

Finally, there is software like mo'slow and similar, that run a programs in the background to trip up your CPU and hog a bunch of resources in a configurable way. I haven't tried it yet, but from what I have read you can get your CPU to run very slow, but the performance is a bit erratic. Hardware based slow down solutions are really preferred.

Before you go crazy though, consider the list of speed sensitive dos games, and decide how important they are too you. For price and availability, any pentium 4 computer with a good PCI sound card will run lots of great DOS games just fine, is super cheap and has performance to spare for windows, will have lots of more modern board feature, ect. You can use throttle and often times disable some caches to get slow enough, and of course, there is always DOSbox to play some games you can't get to run on your hardware 😀.

https://www.vogonswiki.com/index.php/List_of_ … sensitive_games

mothergoose729 wrote:

The downside to throttle is that it is not hardware control.

Throttle.exe essentially just activates the "throttle duty cycle" thingy (available in many motherboards' BIOS menus) - which is a low-power mode for CPUs in doze/standby mode - only during normal operation. So it kinda is 😀

mothergoose729 wrote:

From what I have read, clock skipping will get speed sensitive games to run, but you can still experience speed issues and inconsistencies.

What are those, exactly? Did they mention in which games and on which CPUs/platforms?

About the only problem I've ever encountered during my year-long (and quite enthusiastic) venture into the i815 slowdown project - is the slight increase in mouse lag during some heavy slowdown numbers (62.5% and up) in, for example, Terminator: Future Shock (the difference is akin to comparing the mouse behavior between Quake and Unreal: very sharp, unfiltered movements in the former, and more smoothed-out behavior in the latter). Otherwise the games are exactly where they should be speed-wise with no inconsistencies - but this probably comes down to the right choice of CPU and how slow it can actually go via FSB and Mhz before getting to the throttling part.

I've no idea about Throttle.exe & Netburst/Core/Athlons combination. But yeah, according to what I've read - it's not very good.

Revolter wrote:

Throttle.exe essentially just activates the "throttle duty cycle" thingy (available in many motherboards' BIOS menus) - which is […]
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mothergoose729 wrote:

The downside to throttle is that it is not hardware control.

Throttle.exe essentially just activates the "throttle duty cycle" thingy (available in many motherboards' BIOS menus) - which is a low-power mode for CPUs in doze/standby mode - only during normal operation. So it kinda is 😀

mothergoose729 wrote:

From what I have read, clock skipping will get speed sensitive games to run, but you can still experience speed issues and inconsistencies.

What are those, exactly? Did they mention in which games and on which CPUs/platforms?

About the only problem I've ever encountered during my year-long (and quite enthusiastic) venture into the i815 slowdown project - is the slight increase in mouse lag during some heavy slowdown numbers (62.5% and up) in, for example, Terminator: Future Shock (the difference is akin to comparing the mouse behavior between Quake and Unreal: very sharp, unfiltered movements in the former, and more smoothed-out behavior in the latter). Otherwise the games are exactly where they should be speed-wise with no inconsistencies - but this probably comes down to the right choice of CPU and how slow it can actually go via FSB and Mhz before getting to the throttling part.

I've no idea about Throttle.exe & Netburst/Core/Athlons combination. But yeah, according to what I've read - it's not very good.

That's awesome, like I said I haven't tried it. I read some posts on vogons where people were complaining that it didn't work for them as well as they wanted it to.

What CPU/processor do you use?

mothergoose729 wrote:

What CPU/processor do you use?

I've only tried a Pentium III 600/256/133 and a Celeron 800/128/100 (the Celly is not the best choice for this purpose, but I've chosen to keep it for other reasons). BTW, the PIII at 300Mhz and FSB66 with L1 Cache disabled behaves almost exactly like the Phil's K6-2/3+ in his videos when shown with both caches disabled 😀

With throttle, via chipsets are good because they allow finer control and more slowdown.
It does not help with all speed sensitivity issues though. For examples certain games that can't detect voodoo card because of fast cpu or fsb also won't detect with throttle slowdown and I was only able to make it detect the card by underclocking the fsb to slow down the cpu.

Baoran wrote:

There is also Pentium 233Mhz mmx that has good options for slowing it down. Also I have a 486 33Mhz retro pc that can be slowed down to 386 and 286 speeds by disabling caches and combining that with using the turbo button. I can say that 486 is my favourite retro pc.

The Pentium MMX chip is the most flexible, IMO. K6-2 chips are okay, avoiding the problem P2 and later chips have with only really doing fast and slow. Pentium MMX has more fine grained control than pretty much anything.

My K6-2 can't do this, even with FSB and multiplier manipulation.

Baoran wrote:

I got confused. What are memory sensitive games?

I know of one 😀, Juiced by THQ doesnt want to run on >4GB ram systems and throws "Juiced requires virtual memory to be enabled"

Sorry for resurrecting this thread, but I am curious does anyone know for sure if Throttle works with Intel PIIX4E chipset (440BX)? I know it works with PIIX4 (440LX), I didn't know if there was enough of a difference that it may not work? I am considering buying a 440BX motherboard and would nice to know beforehand.

UPDATE: The 440BX chipset does work with Throttle.