Hi again.
Heres an update about my retro pc build;
The system:
ABIT BX6 Rev2
PIII 850MHz
512MB PC133 RAM Samsung brand
Geforce3 TI 200
Voodoo2 12MB SLI
Audigy 2 zs
SB32 flashed as AWE64 with 32MB RAM
OPTi929
PNY 120GB SSD with generic adapter
I have been playing alot of games on it and it works great!
All sound cards works and I can setup touse wichever suits the game best. Could not be happier with them.
Some initial troubles I had with the ssd, I would get random read errors and crashes. I replaced the adapter and the problem went away.
Glide games works really good, Im having no issues there.
Have been playing Hexen2 and Unreal alot.
The games that have been giving me the most trouble is older titles as expected.
Some examples are the Elder scrolls 1 and 2.
The first one would work sometimes and sometimes not. I think the problem I was having is due to lack of conventional memory but as Im running winme there wasnt much I could do about that. So I resorted to DOSBox.
The second game worked better, but Im having some keyboard input problems. Its like it thinks Im just tapping the keys.
This I could not resolve, and I cant get it to work with DOSBox either. It just gets stuck with a black screen. Its fully playable thou, awesome game by the way! 😀
The two first Monkey Island games where also a bit troublesome, the adlib would just create the most aweful sounds and screeches.
I tried some slowdown tools and using Throttle solved the issue.
The newest title I tried was Elder Scrolls 3 Morrowind.
And to my surprise it worked better then expected.
When I first tried I had just 256MB ram but the game where really unplayable. Would get around 15-22FPS.
I upgraded with one more 256MB ram stick and then the FPS where way more stable. Its running at 25-30FPS in city areas. Playable!
When testing Morrowind I where curious about how overclocking the CPU would affect performance.
So I did play around abit and just increasing the FSB to 112MHz (~950MHz cpu speed) gave great result with Morrowind but now Throttle wont slow down the CPU enough for Monkey Island to have working adlib.
When using 112fsb the system got abit unstable, when clicking folders it would sometimes give dll errors. This was with 256MB ram, I havent noticed it with 512MB, yet.
Is my assumption that the fsb oc is not only increasing the pci bus speed but also the ide speed?
My motherboard can only oc the pu in steps.
66MHz (1/2)
75MHz* (1/2)
83MHz* (1/2)
100MHz (1/3)
112MHz* (1/3)
117MHz* (1/3)
117MHz* (1/4)
124MHz* (1/4)
129MHz* (1/4)
133MHz* (1/4)
138MHz* (1/4)
143MHz* (1/4)
148MHz* (1/4)
153MHz* (1/4)
The 117MHz pci speed seem to be more in spec then the 112 one but when increasing the fsb anymore Im just getting a black screen.
Could this be a sign that my GF3 just wont support higher agp oc?
Some final thought after all this rambling.
Would a newer gpu might solve the oc problem or is it more probably a cpu issue?
Im wainting for a Geforce4 TI 4280 that a friend is sending me, its agp 8x but my motherboard o ly supports 2x. It got both key slots and I have read that other gf4 works with 2x. Do I dare to try in my motherboard?
Lastly, if I where to upgrade my cpu with a slocket am I assuming correct that I can buy one of those cheaper ones that supports coppermine as the cpu Im using now is a coppermine?
And if my motherboard supports lower voltages, an I use the same slocket with a tualatin or do I need a powerleap slocket?
I can change cpu voltages in bios but I dont know how low I can go.
Are there any alternatives to slowing down the pc fron Windows. I have been using Throttle but maybe there is something better? Or a combination of programs maybe?