chinny22 wrote on 2024-11-03, 23:19:

Good point! Win98 era was a strong Intel vs AMD, 3DFX vs Nvidia, Creative vs Aureal battles. WinXP (P4) era you still had Intel […]
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Aui wrote on 2024-11-02, 14:19:

Is the interest in retro PC hardware decreasing? 

Nah - quite the opposite - our interest in modern hardware is dwindling...

Good point!
Win98 era was a strong Intel vs AMD, 3DFX vs Nvidia, Creative vs Aureal battles.
WinXP (P4) era you still had Intel vs AMD and lesser extent Nvidia vs ATI/AMD, Creative vs Asus Xonar.

But now I don't really hear people get passionate about new hardware. Last thing I can think of people were excited for Ryzen.
and sure people are interested in new GPU's or whatever but more as a simple upgrade rather then "wow this new thing is amazing"

I had an Asus Xonar D1 PCI soundcard, it was my second modern soundcard after an Sound Blaster Live! 24-Bit USB, I think.
The Xonar featured a fine DAC with an high SNR. I've used it with headphones.
AKG Monitor K 141, Sennheiser HD 515, HD 600, 424 (classic!), 433 etc.

Speaking of GPUs or graphics in general, the last "fascinating" thing to me was introduction of Tesselation in DirectX 11.

Mantle was interesting, too. Unfortunately, it had been abandoned (yes, I know, Vulkan uses parts of it).

Metal on Mac is cool, too, but a bit akward to program, I think.

PS: When I look back, I can't see much progress in PC/games in the past ~20 to 25 years. It's all the same each year, nothing really new.
Some notable things I remember, though:
Windows 98SE/DirectX 6.1 had introduced bump mapping and DirectX 6.x supported MMX.
GeForce 256 had introduced Transform&Lighting (T&L).
GeForce FX had added support for Shader Model 2, which could render Vista's Aero Glass.
The Geforce 8 had added support for accelerated Flash (v10.2 or so), I remember.

chinny22 wrote on 2024-11-03, 23:19:

Good point! Win98 era was a strong Intel vs AMD, 3DFX vs Nvidia, Creative vs Aureal battles. WinXP (P4) era you still had Intel […]
Show full quote

Aui wrote on 2024-11-02, 14:19:

Is the interest in retro PC hardware decreasing? 

Nah - quite the opposite - our interest in modern hardware is dwindling...

Good point!
Win98 era was a strong Intel vs AMD, 3DFX vs Nvidia, Creative vs Aureal battles.
WinXP (P4) era you still had Intel vs AMD and lesser extent Nvidia vs ATI/AMD, Creative vs Asus Xonar.

But now I don't really hear people get passionate about new hardware. Last thing I can think of people were excited for Ryzen.
and sure people are interested in new GPU's or whatever but more as a simple upgrade rather then "wow this new thing is amazing"

Gamers have gotten excited about 4K gaming, ray-tracing, frame-generation, and variable refresh rate hardware, all of which comes with the newer GPUs. As far as performance goes, there hasn't really been anything great happening, but that's because the shift to 4K gaming has neutralized any serious performance progression from GPU advances, hence the need for frame-generation to fill in the gaps that the GPU's rendering can't.

Anyway, in my own experience I'm interested as always, but definitely not on-hands with the hardware as often as during 2020-2021 COVID boredom

jakethompson1 wrote on 2024-11-04, 17:15:

...but definitely not on-hands with the hardware as often as during 2020-2021 COVID boredom

Feel lucky you felt boredom, most people had to do the same work as always (or even much more) or got it very bad with a hard infection and some even died from the infection. I never had the chance to feel this boredom because life was as always (except for wearing masks, some social distancing and doing tests) and I always had to go to work. Most people were upset about the situation and I always thought "Why? I would be happy, if I had have this amount of free time w/o going to work!" (and I wouldn't call itboredom).

kind regards
soggi

soggi wrote on 2024-11-07, 02:54:

Feel lucky you felt boredom, most people had to do the same work as always (or even much more) or got it very bad with a hard in […]
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jakethompson1 wrote on 2024-11-04, 17:15:

...but definitely not on-hands with the hardware as often as during 2020-2021 COVID boredom

Feel lucky you felt boredom, most people had to do the same work as always (or even much more) or got it very bad with a hard infection and some even died from the infection. I never had the chance to feel this boredom because life was as always (except for wearing masks, some social distancing and doing tests) and I always had to go to work. Most people were upset about the situation and I always thought "Why? I would be happy, if I had have this amount of free time w/o going to work!" (and I wouldn't call itboredom).

kind regards
soggi

Hi Soggi, this might be the first time we share same opinion! 🥳
The Corona pandemic was a serious matter and the former East Germans that are friends of our family were highly critical about the whole situation.
They were angry about how things went, about restrictions.
But still took vaccinations, probably because of their GDR past (vaccinations were seen as a must).
One guy even now denies everything and says that Corona never was real, calls it propaganda.
Which is odd to hear, because a CB radio friend of mine had lost 50٪ lung capacity during pandemic. He was a Corona denier, too until he was infected.

Personally, I had been infected myself in 2022 (?) so I know better.
I got all the symptoms on one weeked, the whole program, intensively. Headache, shivering fit, fever. When I felt a bit better, I've visited a test center down the street (in the open, it was sort of a construction trailer, I didn't infect others) and got a positive result via e-mail.
I recovered quickly, but in the following months I was constantly tired and was out of breath. Long Covid?
And that wasn't the last time I had been infected, I suppose.
The pandemic might be over, but new Corona virus variants are still all around.
It's just that our immune system has awaken and nolonger is out of practice.

Personally, I'm just glad I had survived. But I also feel sorry for those who didn't.
I wonder how many people lost their beloved ones for no apparent reason.
Imagine you had a son or daughter and he/she simply died next day because of vaccine. It makes no sense.
I heard stories of various people in my city who hadn't made it.
Some young people died because they couldn't handle the vaccine.
There was that young girl working at the hospital who had died a few hours after getting her vaccine, I had been told.
Really sad. Especially because young people, teenagers, have an fresh immune system that in principle could handle things all alone.

Really, it's a serious thing. I had been at a vaccination center (sports hall?) once to get my vaccine and after that happened, I then was sitting there waiting 15 mins for any allergic reactions to occur (this was recommended).
I sat there, like my fellow citizens and I felt fine.
Suddenly, though, one person collapsed and a medical team came to help.
That person was a southerner, apparently. I couldn't see much from the far.
I only noticed that he got some water and some injections, then he stabilized.

PS: I think jakethompson1 meant by "boredom" that you couldn't do much during pandemic.
You were being forced to live in isolation, were restricted to the house/home.
Personally, I was watching older DVDs then or did read online comics.
For example, the whole series of "Omaha" the Cat Dancer.
It helped against the depressions back then. The TV programme had nothing but Corona to offer back then.

dormcat wrote on 2024-09-30, 08:13:

Have you noticed that I didn't use Macintosh but Apple, haven't you? 😉 Both The 8-Bit Guy and the movie Pirates of Silicon Valley mentioned how Steve Jobs intentionally hindered and/or interfered Apple II sales and developments in order to promote Macintosh, which he considered as his pet project.

You know, when people used to ask me what the difference was between me and Steve jobs, I would say “Steve was the Big Picture guy and I liked the solid workbench”. When people ask me what the difference is now, I say “Steve’s an asshole”.

I absolutely love that scene from the Steve Jobs movie, which also clearly showed Steve's resentment towards the Apple II. I know Steve Wozniak went on record to say that the argument in this scene never took place, but it so perfectly captures the stark difference in both philosophies and personalities between the two Steves at Apple.

I kinda liked COVID-19 era, except for the part you were treated like criminal in some places if you weren't vaccinated and self-testing. From what I picked up there was some really angry security guy at the local petrol station then, avoided him by paying with a smartphone app. I come from some tourist infested shithole, remember the first lockdown and OMG!, it was so peaceful and quiet outside, ghost town basically, no cars, clean air, one of a kind experience.

Somehow got delta in 2022 or whatever the heck that variant was called then, was free from work whole week and a half, which was nice, I usually don't take more than week of leave at once in an attempt to spread the few available days throughout the year.

Since I don't have any social life, COVID-19 restrictions didn't seem to make much impact personally, though it seems to me the virus changed people and they're even more toxic since than they were before.

RetroGamer4Ever wrote on 2024-09-28, 18:17:

Yes, and there are a few immutable factors contributing to that.... […]
Show full quote

Yes, and there are a few immutable factors contributing to that....

1. Old PC hardware availability (CPU/mobo/complete vintage systems/whatever)has decreased significantly, while old PC software remains easily available or grows steadily. What's around may be functional to some degree or going bad/gone bad. This isn't going to change and it's just the way things go. Unless someone starts pooping out retro x86 PC CPUs/board combos to use with retro software or older hardware gets refurbed by one or more players, there's going to be a collapse of the old PC hardware market.

2. The game industry has gotten the message about retro gaming and is remastering/source porting everything it can to modern hardware, making old hardware less necessary and attractive.

3. The emulator scene remains as horny as it as ever been, so again, the shift to modern hardware is moving along at a solid pace.

winuser3162 wrote on 2024-11-10, 13:38:

i hate emulation i think its so stupid. completely ruins the experience. i dont care that you are too lazy/too broke to experience the game on original and intended hardware. in my opinion and this is only an opinion, games should only be enjoyed on period correct hardware.

as an owner of much "original and intended" hardware, having completed period games on period hardware during their "original and intended" periods, and a past contributor to two emulators, involving my prior experience of those periods to have them emulate better....

fuck this hobbyist gatekeeping shit.

leileilol wrote on 2024-11-10, 14:00:

winuser3162 wrote on 2024-11-10, 13:38:

i hate emulation i think its so stupid. completely ruins the experience. i dont care that you are too lazy/too broke to experience the game on original and intended hardware. in my opinion and this is only an opinion, games should only be enjoyed on period correct hardware.

as an owner of much "original and intended" hardware, having completed period games on period hardware during their "original and intended" periods, and a past contributor to two emulators, involving my prior experience of those periods to have them emulate better....

fuck this hobbyist gatekeeping shit.

i guess emulation is important for the preservation of certain softwares. it doesn't feel the same for me when i play a game on a different system though, thats just me.

Emulators are great.

And most depends on what are you interested on.
If you are only interested in the games itself, go for an emulator. The game still the same, and you don't have to deal with all the problems of the old crap.

Who instead, is more interested on deal with real stuff, most of the time the games even go in second place. Most of us, owners of old stuff, pass more time fixing, cleaning, reconfiguring than really using our stuff to play something.

Even the retro feeling, is something complicated. Most of us are just nostalgic. But, even play with our old systems don't give back the feelings of the old era. Because, time pass, there is no way to stop it. There is no way to feel the same sensations of 30 years ago. No matter how accurate the system that are you using is. It's different, we are different now. So, stop with this bullshit, there is no retro feelings. There are only old nostalgic people, who try desperately to keep a little piece of their youth alive. Without much success.

With emulators, I spend a lot of time playing, I finished a lot of games on emulators, more than on real systems. Because they are quick, easy, always ready to go.
And I do have good memories for them. The times i was waiting for the new version to check if now the game i wanted now work.

I also finished some games in both, emulators and real hardware, and let me say, the feelings are the same. If the game is good, is good. No matter where are you playing it.

As always, it's an hobby, don't be crazy for it, enjoy it.

Personally, I've always felt that emulators are legit development tools, just like compilers, assemblers, disassemblers, debuggers, hex editors, disk editors etc.
Decades ago, EPROM emulators had been common, for example.

There are only old nostalgic people, who try desperately to keep a little piece of their youth alive. Without much success.

Sometimes, when I'm having problems of concentration I do play the NES.
Mostly SMB1, but also Rad Racer and SMB 2 and 3 if it takes longer.

It's not so much about nostalgia, maybe, I guess, but about relaxiation.
Those games remind me of simpler, saner days. They help me to find my way back to reality in these crazy times.

That being said, I do favor the real physical hardware here, with the old NES controller.
Doesn't need to be an original NES, it also can be a clone. Just not an emulator box, please.
If I do have to use emulation, then I prefer a full-fledged emulator.

majinga wrote on 2024-11-10, 15:14:

But, even play with our old systems don't give back the feelings of the old era. Because, time pass, there is no way to stop it. There is no way to feel the same sensations of 30 years ago. No matter how accurate the system that are you using is. It's different, we are different now. So, stop with this bullshit, there is no retro feelings. There are only old nostalgic people, who try desperately to keep a little piece of their youth alive. Without much success.

Some people lose their youth and some trade it away. It's not time that does it.

leileilol wrote on 2024-11-10, 14:00:

winuser3162 wrote on 2024-11-10, 13:38:

i hate emulation i think its so stupid. completely ruins the experience. i dont care that you are too lazy/too broke to experience the game on original and intended hardware. in my opinion and this is only an opinion, games should only be enjoyed on period correct hardware.

as an owner of much "original and intended" hardware, having completed period games on period hardware during their "original and intended" periods, and a past contributor to two emulators, involving my prior experience of those periods to have them emulate better....

fuck this hobbyist gatekeeping shit.

The way that people in their early 20s today who are interested in this hardware got into it was largely through emulation first

majinga wrote on 2024-11-10, 15:14:

Emulators are great. […]
Show full quote

Emulators are great.

And most depends on what are you interested on.
If you are only interested in the games itself, go for an emulator. The game still the same, and you don't have to deal with all the problems of the old crap.

Who instead, is more interested on deal with real stuff, most of the time the games even go in second place. Most of us, owners of old stuff, pass more time fixing, cleaning, reconfiguring than really using our stuff to play something.

Even the retro feeling, is something complicated. Most of us are just nostalgic. But, even play with our old systems don't give back the feelings of the old era. Because, time pass, there is no way to stop it. There is no way to feel the same sensations of 30 years ago. No matter how accurate the system that are you using is. It's different, we are different now. So, stop with this bullshit, there is no retro feelings. There are only old nostalgic people, who try desperately to keep a little piece of their youth alive. Without much success.

With emulators, I spend a lot of time playing, I finished a lot of games on emulators, more than on real systems. Because they are quick, easy, always ready to go.
And I do have good memories for them. The times i was waiting for the new version to check if now the game i wanted now work.

I also finished some games in both, emulators and real hardware, and let me say, the feelings are the same. If the game is good, is good. No matter where are you playing it.

As always, it's an hobby, don't be crazy for it, enjoy it.

Maybe it’s just me but when I play a childhood game of mine on the original console it feels better than an emulation on a later device

Real hardware is more fun, until it isn't.
Plenty of times I've fired up the old 486 for the first time in months because I'm in the mood for a game only for something to have gone wrong and have to spend the time troubleshooting instead.
Also old games that didn't allow save games are a pain. Dosbox save states make these games much more enjoyable.

and even on real hardware I'm playing on PC's much more powerful then original spec, not sure how "authentic" that really is.
but yes, 9 times out of 10 I'm playing on a real PC, it just feels more enjoyable.

chinny22 wrote on 2024-11-11, 00:34:

Real hardware is more fun, until it isn't. Plenty of times I've fired up the old 486 for the first time in months because I'm in […]
Show full quote

Real hardware is more fun, until it isn't.
Plenty of times I've fired up the old 486 for the first time in months because I'm in the mood for a game only for something to have gone wrong and have to spend the time troubleshooting instead.
Also old games that didn't allow save games are a pain. Dosbox save states make these games much more enjoyable.

and even on real hardware I'm playing on PC's much more powerful then original spec, not sure how "authentic" that really is.
but yes, 9 times out of 10 I'm playing on a real PC, it just feels more enjoyable.

Ah, yes! That reminds me of a specific DOS game, Telekommando 1.
It was being shared on a 3,5 floppy disk originally and assumed to save its progress on A:\ drive (or B:\ maybe, as well).

So when being shipped on shareware CDs, the users ran it from C:\ drive and the game failed to save correctly.
So in order to use save game feature, the game would have to be started from A:\ just as as originally intended.

In emulation, an A:\ would be needed then. Either by using drive mounting feature or by using a floppy disk image.
So DOSBox save state feature would be a workaround here.
Alternatively, the Amiga version could be used, too, of course. It's a self-booting floppy. 😉

winuser3162 wrote on 2024-11-10, 13:38:

RetroGamer4Ever wrote on 2024-09-28, 18:17:

Yes, and there are a few immutable factors contributing to that.... […]
Show full quote

Yes, and there are a few immutable factors contributing to that....

1. Old PC hardware availability (CPU/mobo/complete vintage systems/whatever)has decreased significantly, while old PC software remains easily available or grows steadily. What's around may be functional to some degree or going bad/gone bad. This isn't going to change and it's just the way things go. Unless someone starts pooping out retro x86 PC CPUs/board combos to use with retro software or older hardware gets refurbed by one or more players, there's going to be a collapse of the old PC hardware market.

2. The game industry has gotten the message about retro gaming and is remastering/source porting everything it can to modern hardware, making old hardware less necessary and attractive.

3. The emulator scene remains as horny as it as ever been, so again, the shift to modern hardware is moving along at a solid pace.

i hate emulation i think its so stupid. completely ruins the experience. i dont care that you are too lazy/too broke to experience the game on original and intended hardware. in my opinion and this is only an opinion, games should only be enjoyed on period correct hardware.

Sounds as "stupid" or "intelligent" as building a 8800GTX SLI setup to get a subpar experience playing Crysis 1 compared to... every single card released during the last 10 years?

winuser3162 wrote on 2024-11-10, 13:38:

RetroGamer4Ever wrote on 2024-09-28, 18:17:

Yes, and there are a few immutable factors contributing to that.... […]
Show full quote

Yes, and there are a few immutable factors contributing to that....

1. Old PC hardware availability (CPU/mobo/complete vintage systems/whatever)has decreased significantly, while old PC software remains easily available or grows steadily. What's around may be functional to some degree or going bad/gone bad. This isn't going to change and it's just the way things go. Unless someone starts pooping out retro x86 PC CPUs/board combos to use with retro software or older hardware gets refurbed by one or more players, there's going to be a collapse of the old PC hardware market.

2. The game industry has gotten the message about retro gaming and is remastering/source porting everything it can to modern hardware, making old hardware less necessary and attractive.

3. The emulator scene remains as horny as it as ever been, so again, the shift to modern hardware is moving along at a solid pace.

i hate emulation i think its so stupid. completely ruins the experience. i dont care that you are too lazy/too broke to experience the game on original and intended hardware. in my opinion and this is only an opinion, games should only be enjoyed on period correct hardware.

You do you. I respect that .

Here is my opinion on the subject, quoted from two threads (MODs, I have done this previously and was not reprimanded, I hope that it is still OK)

darry wrote on 2020-07-01, 12:20:

Period correctness is a concept that came about after the fact when people wanted to have a machine be representative of a certa […]
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Period correctness is a concept that came about after the fact when people wanted to have a machine be representative of a certain time period .

In real life, except when buying a complete new machine, hardly anything ever was or stayed "period correct". People often re-used older monitors and peripherals when upgrading to a new machine . Even after buying a completely new machine they often upgraded parts like RAM, video cards CPUs, etc over the months/years . Additionally, at the time of a game's launch, the hardware available did not necessarily allow the said game to run at it's full potential; using later hardware could be beneficial .

Period correctness is a concept that is nice if all you want is a machine that is a snapshot of a given moment in time, museum style .

In practice, if you actually want to run software/games that span a few years, the approach is sub-optimal, unless you actually can manage to have a period correct machine for each year of the time span that you are addressing. IMHO, a much better and practical approach, from a usability point of view, is to base your hardware build decisions on the software you want to run and choose your components so that they allow comfortably running the more demanding/newer applications/games that you have in mind while still working properly with less demanding/older ones . Obviously, you can't cover all time in one build, but planning that build based on what it is able to do, rather than a specific year, makes more practical sense, IMHO .

darry wrote on 2021-03-11, 17:27:

IMHO, the primary point of having any computer, old or new, is using it to run software . Emulation is not perfect, though gett […]
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IMHO, the primary point of having any computer, old or new, is using it to run software .
Emulation is not perfect, though getting closer all the time . FPGA re-implementation is another approach that will help bring us even closer.
If there ever comes a time when objectively perfect (indistinguishable from the real thing) re-creations of software/hardware environments can be experienced in a "Matrix"-like virtual reality environment, I believe that owning actual retro hardware will lose a lot of its appeal, except to die-hard collectors .

In the mean time, we have real physical old hardware to enjoy when possible and emulation/FPGA to augment/complement and sometimes replace it, depending on one's tolerance to emulation's current limits .
I also agree that playing with old hardware is a lot of the fun, but it still does not need to be period correct .

At the end of the day, if I play Doom 1 on my "period incorrect" Pentium 3 1400 and a real Sound Canvas or Gravis Ultrasound and/or Orpheus and/or AWE64 off of an SSD , is my retro experience any more or less valid than that of someone who scrupulously builds a setup where all parts are 1993 vintage because he wants to experience a "moment in time" ?

TLDR, IMHO :
- Period correctness is as important as you want it to be, if you even care at all. It can also be as loose or restrictive as you want to be , timeframe wise . It is an entirely subjective choice from a usage/enjoyment point of view .
- Real hardware can be used for period incorrect (hot-rodded) builds without resorting to emulation and still be part of the retro experience . The only limit is compatibility (part of the fun is stretching that) between older/newer software and hardware
- Emulation can be part of the retro experience and is a valid personal choice
- Period correctness to any degree, for any reason in a personal build, is a subjective personal choice, but the concept does matter for historical preservation and museum exhibits (depending on scope, purpose and practical constraints) which should strive to be as historically accurate as possible .

That being said, according to your take on "period correctness", since Doom came out in 1993, does the only "period correct" software/hardware to run it consist of what was available leading up to its launch day (December 10, 1993) ? If not, what is the acceptable cutoff point according to you and why ?

To be clear, I am not trying to mock you, disrespect you, or paint you into a corner. I just want to better understand what people consider to be "period correct" and why.

I suppose the good and bad sides of both emulators and real hardware are unique to each one so they are both needed. While I was really interested in accurate emulators back in the 2000-2010 period, I ended up to real hardware with the help of modern hardware designed for them. But after all at this age it's more about having saved those old hardware both console and games than really playing its titles.