Ok, I will get the E4700.

I'm starting to buy the motherboard. The seller says that the board has never been mounted in a PC, it still has its box, cables and manual. He doesn't guarantee that it works, but I really like the fact that it has never been used.

About the RAM, I don't know what to do, can't find a new one from Corsair or Kingston on eBay.
Should I get those new 2x1 GB Corsair CL3?

Personally i'd save money with new generic ram with same specification but at least buying those you are questioning you will be sure they're not the reason your system doesn't misbehave with probably better warranty options
INTEL SL7KL will work on it as well a single core with more speed than your duo option only that 98se will use only 1 duo core of 2 at a lower speed.
Duo at least will allow better xp and 7 experiences if you choose to use them.
Just to tell other readers that i know this is a duo thing

Ok, I just ordered the motherboard.

What do you guys think about these RAM sticks?

https://www.ebay.it/itm/124613596252

I would buy this 512 MB just for Windows 98 SE installation:

https://www.ebay.it/itm/224242203021?hash=ite … TwAAOSwYVRhBXFy

What do you think?

Not meaning to sound like a killjoy, but this seems on the extreme high-end for Windows 98. What are you looking to play on this kind of hardware with Windows 98 that wouldn't also work on Windows XP? For proper DOS mode/legacy gaming you'd want something older to not run into issues -

...and btw. "just because" is a valid answer. I just thought I'd check since you were asking for advice.

leonardo wrote on 2021-10-26, 20:24:

Not meaning to sound like a killjoy, but this seems on the extreme high-end for Windows 98. What are you looking to play on this kind of hardware with Windows 98 that wouldn't also work on Windows XP?

Hi Leonardo, the fact is that Windows 98 brings me a lot of nostalgia, and back then I couldn't afford a good configuration, I always went to friends house just to watch others playing.

Windows XP doesn't bring me that level of nostalgia, so I can "exchange it" with DOSBox or source ports without feeling to lose something. But still this PC should be able to dual boot on it.

So this is like a "Windows 98 dream machine", and I also thought that getting the "last possible hardware" could also mean a more "reliable" PC.

I know those are dumb ideas, but that OS really brings back memories.

vinxi2 wrote on 2021-10-26, 21:17:

Hi Leonardo, the fact is that Windows 98 brings me a lot of nostalgia, and back then I couldn't afford a good configuration, I […]
Show full quote

leonardo wrote on 2021-10-26, 20:24:

Not meaning to sound like a killjoy, but this seems on the extreme high-end for Windows 98. What are you looking to play on this kind of hardware with Windows 98 that wouldn't also work on Windows XP?

Hi Leonardo, the fact is that Windows 98 brings me a lot of nostalgia, and back then I couldn't afford a good configuration, I always went to friends house just to watch others playing.

Windows XP doesn't bring to me that level of nostalgia, so I can "exchange it" with DOSBox or source ports without feeling to lose something. But still this PC should be able to dual boot on it.

So this is like a "Windows 98 dream machine", and I also thought that getting the "last possible hardware" could also mean a more "reliable" PC.

I know those are dumb ideas, but that OS really brings back memories.

Running it on the wrong hardware is not going to bring back good memories. And you are all but ruling out DOS gaming.

Wrong hardware means that it's not going to be stable?

Why am I ruling out DOS? Because I'm missing the ISA Slot?
In the first page we said that Sound Blaster Live! or Audigy 2 ZS have DOS drivers. They're not like ISA sound cards for sure, but I would have to build another PC just for that.

Basically I'm targeting games from Indiana Jones and the fate of Atlantis (1992) to Tomb Raider Last Revelation (1999) or Soldier of Fortune (2000).

I started this "project" by reading Phils thread.

There are no Win98 drivers for any Core2Duo platform. It may well be unstable.

The CPU is too fast for many DOS games and cannot be effectively slowed down.

And yes an ISA slot would be helpful too.

You are trying to do what many consider impossible -- spanning the Win98/XP divide.

You are much better off building a DOS/Win98 PC that has ISA and can be slowed down, and a separate WinXP PC. Your experience will be so much better.

vinxi2 wrote on 2021-10-26, 21:24:

Audigy 2 ZS have DOS drivers.

While drivers exist, I wouldn't really call the end experience "good" when I used it under the pure DOS prompt. Basically no point in handicapping the entire card (and getting some "meh" sound out of it) when you can just run what you want under the prompt in 98SE and get to load different, and better, soundfonts. Probably why many like to pair something like this with a YMF7x4.

If you really want Win98/WinXP dual boot, highest I believe you could go is Pentium 4 and I know the 865 chipset will have drivers for either (but that may be down to the board and manufacturer) but you're SoL on any speed sensitive games you run across and it'll be mostly pointless dropping into pure DOS.

I'm gonna second kolderman's option of separate 98/DOS and XP machines

This Asrock 775i65G has the Intel 865G chipset and in the support page has Windows 98/ME drivers:

https://www.asrock.com/mb/Intel/775i65G%20R2.0/#Download

Also Phils website have them:

https://www.philscomputerlab.com/intel-chipset-drivers.html

About the DOS games that are affected by the CPU speed I understood the problem you're mentioning.

kolderman wrote on 2021-10-26, 21:39:

There are no Win98 drivers for any Core2Duo platform. It may well be unstable.

not true, 865-chipset s.775 mobos with c2d support and win9x drivers are a thing, the asrock 775i65g being one of the more popular ones of those. These do work really well for both 98 and XP. Of course you're right that they're not ideal for DOS, though. But, instead of building a DOS/Win98 PC and a separate XP PC, why not build a Win98/XP PC and a separate DOS PC... or, hell, why not build a Win98/XP PC and just use emulation for DOS, after all there isn't much that real DOS hardware can bring that emulators can't

As said earlier, the Asrock 775i65g r2.0 pairs great with a C2D E4700, or alternatively if you would like a low tdp single core cpu, you can go for a Celeron 450, which is basically a tualatin p3 on steroids.
For PSU, just use any good quality modern PSU that you'd like, no need to use a retro PSU with a system like this. You will not need much power, a 300-450 watt psu is more than enough. So get any new, good quality brand-name PSU you wish. That CM should do fine.
2 gigs of ram is a good idea as well, XP could certainly use that. 98 by default has trouble with more than 512mb, but you could either use a rloew patch to fix that, or alternatively use some method like himemx to limit the available ram to under 512mb under win98, and have the whole 2 gigs available on XP only.
For case, if you like that Silverstone SG11, you can use it, no reason not to, will do fine.
GPU: here things are a bit more complicated. Nvidia FX 5900 will have splendid game compatibility for 98, but performance for XP will be rather poor. Nvidia 7800 GS AGP or 6600/6800 series AGP card would be very fast for win98 and decent for XP, but the game compatibility for 98 is not perfect. Also these cards suffer from "bumpgate" (meaning that sooner or later they will die, they're not exactly long-term reliable). Probably best to go for ATi instead, like a Radeon 9800 could do quite nicely here. Same as Nvidia 6800/7800GS it won't have ideal game compatibility on 98, but at least it's quite a bit more reliable, and has nice image quality to boot. A Radeon X800/X850 can work too, the 98 drivers are beta but they seem to do the job just fine, and those cards will net you much needed performance for XP games to run nicely.
Sound card - definitely the Audigy 2 ZS. And make sure it's a retail card, should have "SB0350" in the serial number on the back. If it has like "SB0358" or "SB0359" - pass.
Finally, HDD, anything you like really, as previously said. IDE, SATA, SSD, HDD, it will all work. Win98 unpatched will work with up to 64gb if you try to format it trough the win98 setup, or up to 128gb if you format it in advance from a newer OS. WIth bhdd31.zip patch you can go beyond 128gb and up to 2tb even, so don't shy away from large HDDs if you have any handy
Finally, optical drive, you do need, a lot of win98 games with redbook audio (music that plays from the CD while you play the game), and because you will want to use .vxd audio drivers for win98, you won't be able to virtualize it with daemon tools or similar software, so a real optical drive is a must. And it has to be IDE, no SATA, because you will need to run a cable from the optical drive to the sound card and only the IDE drives have the connector. CD or DVD up to personal preferense, as is the brand as well, just make sure it works fine, a lot of the older optical drives have various deffects and issues by now, its surprisingly tricky to find one in perfect working condition up for sale.

God Of Gaming wrote on 2021-10-26, 22:11:

As said earlier, the Asrock 775i65g r2.0 pairs great with a C2D E4700

It is just what I'm planning, I just found a E4700 on eBay. It seems the most "powerful" CPU supported without "overclocking" the FSB. I'd like just a stable and long-term reliable system.
I saw that there is also a CPU cooler that Arctic still seems to produce (hoping I'm correct).

2 gigs of ram is a good idea as well, XP could certainly use that. 98 by default has trouble with more than 512mb, but you could either use a rloew patch to fix that

I bought a 512 MB stick with the CPU just for installing Windows 98 before applying the rloew patch as chinny22 said.
Do you think these new 2x1GB sticks are good?
https://www.ebay.it/itm/124613596252
It seems they're CL3.

For PSU [...] That CM should do fine. [..]
For case, if you like that Silverstone SG11, you can use it, no reason not to, will do fine.

Thank you. I really like the "small form factor".

GPU: here things are a bit more complicated

So the right spot is a Raden 9800 that is compatible, stable and powerful both for Windows 98 and XP?

Sound card - definitely the Audigy 2 ZS. And make sure it's a retail card, should have "SB0350" in the serial number on the back. If it has like "SB0358" or "SB0359" - pass.

That's the same that chinny22 said, I will look into that. I'm planning to keep this thread updated when I have news.

Finally, HDD, anything you like really

About the HDD, one thing that I didn't understand is how to set it up. If I buy for eg. a 500GB/1TB SATA WD Blue HDD, how should I partition it? For eg:

2 GB for Windows 98 installation (as chinny22 said)
100 GB for Windows 98 games and documents
50 GB for Windows XP installation
Rest of the drive for Windows XP games and documents

If yes, can I partition it in Windows 10 with something like Partition Magic? Or should I get two 500GB to separate the OS?

Finally, optical drive, [...]. And it has to be IDE, no SATA

Ok I will have to search for that as well. Aren't there any new IDE optical drive, right?

God Of Gaming wrote on 2021-10-26, 22:11:

kolderman wrote on 2021-10-26, 21:39:

There are no Win98 drivers for any Core2Duo platform. It may well be unstable.

not true, 865-chipset s.775 mobos with c2d support and win9x drivers are a thing, the asrock 775i65g being one of the more popular ones of those. These do work really well for both 98 and XP. Of course you're right that they're not ideal for DOS, though. But, instead of building a DOS/Win98 PC and a separate XP PC, why not build a Win98/XP PC and a separate DOS PC.

- win98 and DOS fit together well -- DOS literally underpins Win98, can run in a win98 VDM or under true DOS
- no AGP graphics card on that asrock mobo will be adequate for the full range of WinXP gaming
- the amount of ram needed for WinXP often causes problems for Win98
- almost all late-win98 games will run just fine under WinXP
- win98 is actually the best for certain ISA sounds cards that only support midi soundfonts through their Windows drivers, e.g. AWE32/64
- being able to slow down a cpu cam benefit both win98 and dos games
- probably more reasons

Don't go for a GPU higher than a FX series with older drivers 4x.xx series with win 98. All you will find are headaches. I've been down this rabbit hole a couple times. However there is always glide wrappers. I would plan on being ready that youll need glide wrappers to run a lot of 98 games properly. It's less to do about glide and more about the way those games engines work.

and here i will post my win98se pc
mobo: qdi advance 10f version 2 133ata
1x agp slot 4x speed 5xpci slots 1xisa slot
cpu: pentium 3 800 133
ram: 512mb
gpu: nvidia 5600xt
hdd: 20gb
audio cards: pci aureal vortex 2 sq2500 (for a3d games) and isa awe64 with simmcon 28mb ram
that pc is ok for win9x games and late era dos games. i only have 2 problematic dos games. aladdin and lion king. aladdin is ram sensitive game i need to reduce ram for this. a full start to dos with himemx.exe as memory manager instead of himem.sys and with this parameter (/32000) will reduce the ram lower than 32 mb and the game will work corectly. for lion king i can play it inside windows 9xdosbox but with slomo utility. for me a pc build win a 9x os needs a full dos support that meens isa at least one slot. but again you have to pick what games you want to play no dos pc is the best. if your aiming for late era dos games and want faster possible pc then a socket 487 (pentium 4) with isa slot is what you need. be prepare though those motherboard are called industrial and cost a lot. for me is not worth it.

kolderman wrote on 2021-10-26, 22:53:

- no AGP graphics card on that asrock mobo will be adequate for the full range of WinXP gaming

How high do you really need to go for XP though, after about 2005 or so games started supporting hor+ widescreen and work just fine on any modern PC. A late AGP card can run games up to 2004 pretty fine.

kolderman wrote on 2021-10-26, 22:53:

- the amount of ram needed for WinXP often causes problems for Win98

as I already said, there's multiple workarounds for that

kolderman wrote on 2021-10-26, 22:53:

- almost all late-win98 games will run just fine under WinXP

yes, if running them is all you want, but many of them might still have reasons to be run under win9x, for example EAX in NFS 4 is broken with wdm audio drivers (that you need to use on XP) and only sounds correctly with vxd drivers (used on win9x). A particularly big reason for me is that I have an aureal vortex 2 which I love and many games have A3D sound and theres only good drivers for win9x for that card. Then theres older win95-era games that will often not work quite right on XP.

kolderman wrote on 2021-10-26, 22:53:

- being able to slow down a cpu cam benefit both win98 and dos games

To be able to properly slow down the CPU for the games needing a 486dx2-66 or a 386dx-25, you will really need a socket 7 pc, disable l2 cache and you get 486, disable l1 cache and you get 386. Anything above socket 7 and super 7 will be much more troublesome. But socket 7 while good for DOS is weak for win9x games.... And as I said, is there really any good reason not to just use emulation? Any dos games you know of that will not work, look or sound correctly on emulators and will just need real hardware? I have yet to discover any

God Of Gaming wrote on 2021-10-27, 08:29:

And as I said, is there really any good reason not to just use emulation? Any dos games you know of that will not work, look or sound correctly on emulators and will just need real hardware? I have yet to discover any

Emulation is great 95% of the time, especially if you're just looking for the standard DOS gaming experience. But if you grew up with something a bit more exotic like a PowerVR or Rendition Verite card, that's when emulation falls short. Sure, you can emulate a 3DFX card and play Glide versions of DOS games, but that's not quite the same.

For example, vQuake has quite a distinctive look and feel compared to GLQuake. Same goes for the PowerVR version of Tomb Raider compared to the Glide version. Also, maybe someone grew up playing Eradicator on an AWE card with the special effects that only such a card can provide. Emulation can't currently replicate that.

Of course, these are edge cases, and most people will be happy with emulation. But at the same time, it should be made clear that it is not (yet) a perfect substitute for real hardware in every single use case.

vQuake was nice in its day, but is there much of a reason to play that today instead of QuakeSpasm or Mark V, or, dare I say it, darkplaces? Tomb Raider has modern source ports as well, besides the PC version lacks some content from the PS1 version which you can emulate instead. AWE32 is emulated on PCem, though I admit I have not compared Eradicator on real hardware vs PCem to see if theres any differences yet, gonna fix that soon

God Of Gaming wrote on 2021-10-27, 08:58:

vQuake was nice in its day, but is there much of a reason to play that today instead of QuakeSpasm or Mark V, or, dare I say it, darkplaces?

If we're including source ports in addition to pure emulation, things do get a bit better for Quake. I'm not sure if any of them can replicate the unique water effects of vQuake, since I haven't had much experience with them. The guys from Digital Foundry discuss the specifics of vQuake including the water thing in this video.

Tomb Raider has modern source ports as well, besides the PC version lacks some content from the PS1 version which you can emulate instead.

I played the TombATI version a few years ago and it was indeed great, especially with the added PlayStation music tracks. But it doesn't have the unique look of the PowerVR version (most notable in underwater sequences).

These are just a few examples though, there are many others. How about the S3D version of Terminal Velocity? Maybe one of the games that were designed for Creative's 3D Blaster? Or the native ESFM music in supported DOS games? I don't think emulation or source ports can mimic those, at least not yet.

I again thank anyone who is helping me.
This "project" started with Windows 98SE and possibly the gaming era between 1995 and 2000 in mind.

I consider DOS and XP as "sidequests", if they'll work I'll be happy but I'm not into 100% into that. I was born in 1983, the first game I saw on DOS was Prince of Persia (before that I had the Amiga), but I really "started to use DOS" when I had my first PC (after the Amiga), and it already came with Windows 95. I played DOOM, Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis, Carmageddon as my first games on DOS as I recall.

To me Windows 95/98 and then 3DFX sounds like a "magic era", back then almost all I was playing were demos from magazine, didn't have much money, and pretty much everything was spent to get a Vodoo 1 Card.

Having said that, I now understand that I'm not targeting a DOS machine (even if I will get that sound card) or even an accurate 3DFX machine that I could have had in the past, but I think (and hope) this is the "right spot" to make "the past myself" happy to see Windows 98 stable with official drivers and without limits, and build a really cheap system since I saw that P4/Core2Duo are way cheaper than a P3+Vodoo. I could have bought this same motherboard with CPU and RAM for just 10€, but I choosed a "not-used" one for 40€. Plus it comes with mATX format, integrated LAN and SATA, so I should be able to save space too.

I also know that DOSBox, SCUMMVM, source ports, patches, are all the way more convenient since they can also provide expansions and "one complete package" for every game. I bought on GOG and played Tomb Raider 1 and 2, Duke Nukem (eduke32), Descent (d1x rebirth) and a lot of other games via DOSBox. I just wanted to see Windows 98 again.

@God of Gaming, there is a post with more questions in reply to your first one. Can you take a look? 😁