You lose ISA on that system, so check if that's an issue for you. Otherwise, it will be a decent Win98SE performer. This is as low end as you can get with the P4.

You could cover those last few dos games that don't like your 486 if you use a compatible PCI card but it'll be a compromised experience. Where as a P4 has enough power to run dosbox and play those same games somewhat ironically.
What will limit you next is the graphics card. You can either get say a GF5 and have a great Win9x box but will mean XP era gaming is bottlenecked, or a later card and run into compatibility issues with some 9x games. (although for XP you may want to upgrade the CPU)

chinny22 wrote on 2022-04-08, 10:45:

You could cover those last few dos games that don't like your 486 if you use a compatible PCI card but it'll be a compromised experience. Where as a P4 has enough power to run dosbox and play those same games somewhat ironically.
What will limit you next is the graphics card. You can either get say a GF5 and have a great Win9x box but will mean XP era gaming is bottlenecked, or a later card and run into compatibility issues with some 9x games. (although for XP you may want to upgrade the CPU)

Why do you say I have a compromised experience with a PCI card? I have an ESS that Philcomputerlabs indicates as very compatible, and anyway it would be very few DOS titles, I guess I might need the P4 from a lot of DOS titles like quake and win98 titles. after 2000 I don't care that the P4 is efficient. My only doubt is if the ICH2 is compatible with PCI cards in SoundBla emulation

You might be able to install two graphics cards (if the BIOS has the option to switch between AGP and PCI graphics card). E.g. a Riva 128 PCI for DOS games and a fast AGP card for Win9x 3D games.

Probably 1998-2002 stuff - at best. I'd settle for 2000 minimum for true period gaming though, p4 1.5's indicative of someone duped by the big marketing, ignoring the big disappointment, and going to play the can't-possibly-be-disappointing Tribes 2, Red Faction, Black & White, everything on RealArcade, etc.

flupke11 wrote on 2022-04-08, 10:19:

You lose ISA on that system, so check if that's an issue for you. Otherwise, it will be a decent Win98SE performer. This is as low end as you can get with the P4.

Yep, in theory, the P4 should do anything down to, say, Duke 3D?
https://www.mobygames.com/game/dos/duke-nukem-3d/techinfo
While I remember the Duke to still feel somewhat at home on a DX2-66, the later build engine game Shadow Warrior asks for a Pentium:
https://www.mobygames.com/game/dos/shadow-warrior/techinfo
So, could be that by today's standards of fps and resolution, something as ancient as Duke 3D will feel sub standard to you on a DX4. Meaning, that's as early as it will get - games from a time when most people would have considered a PCI sound card utter blasphemy.
Quake definitely needs a Pentium.

While in theory, the PCI Solo-1 or the SB live should do most things in DOS, it's a deliberate complication as it requires drivers and some things may not work in plain DOS but only the Win9x DOS mode and some games might bitch about that and so on...

IMHO, a man should have a Super Socket 7 or a Slot system. 😉

leileilol wrote on 2022-04-09, 23:30:

Probably 1998-2002 stuff - at best. I'd settle for 2000 minimum for true period gaming though, p4 1.5's indicative of someone duped by the big marketing, ignoring the big disappointment, and going to play the can't-possibly-be-disappointing Tribes 2, Red Faction, Black & White, everything on RealArcade, etc.

But the cpu could be brought up to 3.4ghz, however I am not interested in going beyond 2000 but making up for the shortcomings of DX4 in the latest dos games or playing very fluid games like Screaner2 where the DX4 struggles too much. I already have an ss7 but it is too little powerful to get to the games of 2000. Of the P4 I am not interested in the qualities of the ss7 to go down to the levels of 386 (for that I have the dx4) but to run the games dos heavy and get to the strategic of 2000 in a comfortable way.

SpectriaForce wrote on 2022-04-09, 22:27:

You might be able to install two graphics cards (if the BIOS has the option to switch between AGP and PCI graphics card). E.g. a Riva 128 PCI for DOS games and a fast AGP card for Win9x 3D games.

yes but the problem should be the sound card. Ess solo1 pci work under dos on a ICH2 chipset?