VOGONS


Windows 95 Build Question

Topic actions

First post, by MetalMilitia

User metadata
Rank Newbie
Rank
Newbie

Hey guys. I’m looking to put together a Win 95 build based around a Pentium II 233. I was wondering what a somewhat “period accurate” graphics card might fit with it. I would love to use a voodoo 1 but eBay prices are still crazy on them. If I do go that route, what’s a good pairing for it?Any suggestions would be appreciated!

Reply 1 of 20, by leonardo

User metadata
Rank Member
Rank
Member

There's tons. ATi has the Rage-series (both PCI and AGP). Rage 128 Pro is probably on the faster end of all that. Anything with S3 plastered on it is period correct, if not always completely desirable. Matrox has the Mystique and Millennium series with the G200 likely being the top of what you'd see in a Pentium II-system. The G400 is also good on the higher end, and went up against the TNT and TNT2-based cards from nVidia. All of those are also excellent alternatives to a 3Dfx-card. Matrox tended to have the best analog signal quality, but unless you're using a big CRT with a resolution above 1024x768, you probably wouldn't notice it. TNT2/G400/V3 are roughly comparable in performance for 3D-gaming, each with their own particular strengths and quirks, shall we say.

[Install Win95 like you were born in 1985!] on systems like this or this.

Reply 2 of 20, by Cuttoon

User metadata
Rank Oldbie
Rank
Oldbie

That CPU was introduced in 1997 and surpassed by the "Deschutes" line of P2 in 1998:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_I ... 2_(350_nm)

Strictly by time period, that would correspond with a Riva 128 card by Nvidia:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Nvidia_ … its#Pre-GeForce
But the TNT and TNT2 are much more common and affordable to find.

Else, Matrox G200 - probably better VGA signal for a CRT.
Or ATI Rage 128, S3 savage, but the latter is almost rare, I'd say.

I like jumpers.

Reply 3 of 20, by Con 2 botones

User metadata
Rank Member
Rank
Member

I believe G200 is from 1998 as well as Rage128.

Ati 3D Rage Pro and nVidia Riva128 are 1997 hardware (both still available and inexpensive in AGP form).

Reply 4 of 20, by acl

User metadata
Rank Oldbie
Rank
Oldbie

I have a thing for Intel 740 cards. (I have a thing for weird stuff)
Performances are Ok-ish but iirc some operations are not very well implemented (transparancy ? Filtering ?)
But that's an original/unusual card that you can have for cheap.

"Hello, my friend. Stay awhile and listen..."
My collection (not up to date)

Reply 6 of 20, by MetalMilitia

User metadata
Rank Newbie
Rank
Newbie

Alright so I had a Rage 128 Pro. Installed Windows 95 drivers and now I get an error on startup saying "Invalid VxD dynamic link call from ATI2VXAA(01) + 000247EE to device "VMM ", service 1AE. Your Windows configuration is invalid. Run the Windows Setup program again to correct this problem."

Generally when I get past this error it boots fine, but I am having issues running 3D applications. Any ideas on how to fix this? Is it a bad driver?

Reply 7 of 20, by leonardo

User metadata
Rank Member
Rank
Member
MetalMilitia wrote on 2022-05-20, 18:42:

Alright so I had a Rage 128 Pro. Installed Windows 95 drivers and now I get an error on startup saying "Invalid VxD dynamic link call from ATI2VXAA(01) + 000247EE to device "VMM ", service 1AE. Your Windows configuration is invalid. Run the Windows Setup program again to correct this problem."

Generally when I get past this error it boots fine, but I am having issues running 3D applications. Any ideas on how to fix this? Is it a bad driver?

Did you have DirectX 7 or 8 installed before you installed the video drivers? I've found not having an up-to-date version of DirectX sometimes causes video- and sound-card drivers to bug out or not install correctly.

[Install Win95 like you were born in 1985!] on systems like this or this.

Reply 8 of 20, by flupke11

User metadata
Rank Oldbie
Rank
Oldbie
acl wrote on 2022-05-11, 12:26:

I have a thing for Intel 740 cards. (I have a thing for weird stuff)
Performances are Ok-ish but iirc some operations are not very well implemented (transparancy ? Filtering ?)
But that's an original/unusual card that you can have for cheap.

A bit off topic:
Riva 128 or i740 was the staple AGP card with the arrival of the i440LX platform. I also have a lot if i740 cards, some with cooler, some with just a heatsink and some with the chip exposed. The i740 cards I have that were made by Intel were built to last till Kingdom come.

Reply 9 of 20, by MetalMilitia

User metadata
Rank Newbie
Rank
Newbie
leonardo wrote on 2022-05-22, 14:56:
MetalMilitia wrote on 2022-05-20, 18:42:

Alright so I had a Rage 128 Pro. Installed Windows 95 drivers and now I get an error on startup saying "Invalid VxD dynamic link call from ATI2VXAA(01) + 000247EE to device "VMM ", service 1AE. Your Windows configuration is invalid. Run the Windows Setup program again to correct this problem."

Generally when I get past this error it boots fine, but I am having issues running 3D applications. Any ideas on how to fix this? Is it a bad driver?

Did you have DirectX 7 or 8 installed before you installed the video drivers? I've found not having an up-to-date version of DirectX sometimes causes video- and sound-card drivers to bug out or not install correctly.

It actually wouldn’t let me install the drivers until DX6 was installed. Once I did that it installed then I started getting the error. I used the Catalyst installer. I wonder if I should’ve just tried to point it to a driver instead.

Reply 10 of 20, by 1541

User metadata
Rank Member
Rank
Member

When pure DOS titles are also relevant in your Win95 build, you may want to check the following list for conflicting titles with your desired graphics card:

https://gona.mactar.hu/DOS_TESTS/

💾 Windows 9x resources (drivers, tools, NUSB,...) 💾

Reply 11 of 20, by leonardo

User metadata
Rank Member
Rank
Member
MetalMilitia wrote on 2022-05-20, 18:42:

Alright so I had a Rage 128 Pro. Installed Windows 95 drivers and now I get an error on startup saying "Invalid VxD dynamic link call from ATI2VXAA(01) + 000247EE to device "VMM ", service 1AE. Your Windows configuration is invalid. Run the Windows Setup program again to correct this problem."

Generally when I get past this error it boots fine, but I am having issues running 3D applications. Any ideas on how to fix this? Is it a bad driver?

Seems like it could be a bad driver. I found this support article which seems to detail the particulars of your error. I don't know if it will be helpful or not. Where did you find the driver? Do the errors go away if you uninstall through the Control Panel?

[Install Win95 like you were born in 1985!] on systems like this or this.

Reply 13 of 20, by leonardo

User metadata
Rank Member
Rank
Member
MetalMilitia wrote on 2022-05-24, 01:48:

Ok so I got the error to go away but now I have no Direct3D acceleration. I’ve uninstalled and reinstalled a couple of times to no avail

Are you confirming the absence of Direct3D by testing specific games or with DirectX Diagnostics? If the latter, what's it say with regards to the driver?

What's the precise driver and source? ...and which exact Rage-card is this? AGP/PCI?

ATi was slightly confusing as for their drivers in the 90's... which is the reason many people went with other brands then - not necessarily because their cards weren't performant.

[Install Win95 like you were born in 1985!] on systems like this or this.

Reply 16 of 20, by Jasin Natael

User metadata
Rank Oldbie
Rank
Oldbie

Probably the wrong driver version. As much as I love ATi cards.....anything previous to Radeon had dodgy drivers and a straight up confusing mess of a product stack. Throw in the various OEM versions and it gets even worse.

Reply 18 of 20, by leonardo

User metadata
Rank Member
Rank
Member
MetalMilitia wrote on 2022-05-25, 20:16:

So I pulled the card out. The PN is 109-63100-10. According to the Vogons Wiki, it is a Rage Fury Pro. Could this be the problem? I've been looking for Rage 128 Pro drivers the whole time.

Hmm... confusingly those seem to be different monikers for the same card? ...or the Rage Fury uses the Rage 128 Pro-processor or something like that? Good ol' ATi...

See Phil's page for example.

[Install Win95 like you were born in 1985!] on systems like this or this.

Reply 19 of 20, by leonardo

User metadata
Rank Member
Rank
Member

Someone recommended this for the Windows 95-driver: https://archive.org/details/atirage105g01070105iso
edit: someone else recommended this: http://vogonsdrivers.com/getfile.php?fileid=1 … 9&menustate=6,1

[Install Win95 like you were born in 1985!] on systems like this or this.