Not sure what "problems" with Via chipsets you are referring to. 90% of problems people have it that because Win98SE has drivers built in for Intel chipsets, they don't realize installing motherboard chipset drivers is a thing. Most of the other 10% is a specific interop issue with the Sound Blaster Live series of cards and the Via 686B southbridge. You don't have an SBLive, so not relevant. Windows 95 helpfully lacks built-in motherboard chipset drivers for Intel chipsets too, so you'll need to install drivers for Win95 regardless.

Aside from that, if you want DOS, an ISA sound card and so a motherboard with ISA slots makes life a lot easier. This ES137x card has DOS support, but like most PCI cards under DOS, needs a TSR program to work that eats a bit of memory and limits compatibility. The parts you list look great for a Windows 95 system that will run very quickly (motherboard and CPU are from Win98SE era), but I'd suggest something else for DOS, purely for the ISA slot.

That motherboard has an ISA slot, I would recommend using it for an ISA sound card; you will get much better compatibility with DOS if you do.

Something like an ESS 1868 based card should be easy to find and fairly cheap, with good Soundblaster Pro compatibility and no need to load drivers.

If you have slot 1 board it would be perfect fit for win95 , any pentium II cpu do the job .

by default, the p3 is not a good fit for win95 due to lack of proper SSE support under that OS.

In Windows 95, a Pentium III will work like an overclocked Pentium II, which is fine. I have a late-90s Compaq Deskpro that had Windows 95C (also known as Windows 95 OSR2.5) factory-installed, and its 550 MHz Slot 1 Pentium III works fine as a fast Pentium II. Windows 95-era software doesn't even try to use SSE because SSE processors weren't available until 1999, so the lack of SSE support in Windows 95C is not a problem for what you want to do. Just make sure that the version of Windows 95 that you install is an OSR 2.x version (either 95B or 95C); see the Windows 95 page on Wikipedia for details if you're interested.

Side note: There are still Windows 95B PCs in use at my workplace!

Thanks for all the feedback. Good to know that the build will work. Honestly, I know little about what hardware was in vogue during the Win 95 era(I grew up in the glory days of XP).

I chose the 370 socket as I got a fairly good deal on ebay(compared to other motherboards of the era). The other parts were also affordable. If I go for another build I will look into socket 1 and other sockets of the era. Generally I prefer to go for easily accessible, inexpensive parts I can bargain for on ebay.

dionb wrote on 2025-03-29, 07:43:

Not sure what "problems" with Via chipsets you are referring to. 90% of problems people have it that because Win98SE has drivers built in for Intel chipsets, they don't realize installing motherboard chipset drivers is a thing. Most of the other 10% is a specific interop issue with the Sound Blaster Live series of cards and the Via 686B southbridge. You don't have an SBLive, so not relevant. Windows 95 helpfully lacks built-in motherboard chipset drivers for Intel chipsets too, so you'll need to install drivers for Win95 regardless.

Aside from that, if you want DOS, an ISA sound card and so a motherboard with ISA slots makes life a lot easier. This ES137x card has DOS support, but like most PCI cards under DOS, needs a TSR program to work that eats a bit of memory and limits compatibility. The parts you list look great for a Windows 95 system that will run very quickly (motherboard and CPU are from Win98SE era), but I'd suggest something else for DOS, purely for the ISA slot.

I am glad that the Via chipset won`t be a problem. I read somewhere on the forum that Via chipsets were to be avoided due to the issues and someone even suggested some patches like memory interleave enabler. I never used any motherboards of the era so I assumed it might become an issue later on.

As for the ISA sound card I did read about it here but I could not find any decently priced ones while I was searching for a sound card on ebay. The ones I tend to prefer range from 10 - 20 $ or sometimes even less than that. This is the first time I am ever having an ISA slot motherboard so I was also unsure about the compatibility.

For DOS I will probably go for another build later. From the looks of it there is a steep rise in prices of DOS era hardware(atleast for motherboards) compared to XP/Win 9x systems.

megatron-uk wrote on 2025-03-29, 09:08:

That motherboard has an ISA slot, I would recommend using it for an ISA sound card; you will get much better compatibility with DOS if you do.

Something like an ESS 1868 based card should be easy to find and fairly cheap, with good Soundblaster Pro compatibility and no need to load drivers.

I will probably try to get this card if I build a DOS exclusive system down the line. It seems to be a decently priced ISA sound card though it is still more expensive than the PCI ones up on ebay.

Hans Tork wrote on 2025-03-29, 17:44:

[...]

As for the ISA sound card I did read about it here but I could not find any decently priced ones while I was searching for a sound card on ebay. The ones I tend to prefer range from 10 - 20 $ or sometimes even less than that. This is the first time I am ever having an ISA slot motherboard so I was also unsure about the compatibility.

For DOS I will probably go for another build later. From the looks of it there is a steep rise in prices of DOS era hardware(atleast for motherboards) compared to XP/Win 9x systems.

The thing about eBay and prices is that at any given time, the prices you will see are precisely those that no one was prepared to pay. Better deals pop up all the time, but are snapped up just as quickly. That said, if I check eBay for "ISA sound card" and set the max to EUR 20 I find 69 hits, including a couple of pretty nice ones (based on Aztech AZT2316R, AZT2320, Crystal CS4237, ESS ES1869 and OPTi 82C929 chipsets) - and some Vibra cards for Creative fanboys too.

As for "DOS era" hardware - anything with ISA is DOS era, and there's enough out there still for a good price, so long as you are creative in your search terms and not tied to a shortlist of very popular brands (sometimes deserved, sometimes less so).

As for "DOS era" hardware - anything with ISA is DOS era

As a rule of thumb, I think same.

On other hand, after the 486 processor the PC platform nolonger targeted DOS.
All the standards that followed were made with Windows (95) in mind, rather.
We noticed it on the switch from APM to ACPI or introduction of USB.

auron wrote on 2025-03-29, 14:51:

by default, the p3 is not a good fit for win95 due to lack of proper SSE support under that OS.

I suppose the Core 2 Extreme I use for Windows 95 is complete inappropriate 😉!

dionb wrote on 2025-03-29, 22:02:

Hans Tork wrote on 2025-03-29, 17:44:

[...]

As for the ISA sound card I did read about it here but I could not find any decently priced ones while I was searching for a sound card on ebay. The ones I tend to prefer range from 10 - 20 $ or sometimes even less than that. This is the first time I am ever having an ISA slot motherboard so I was also unsure about the compatibility.

For DOS I will probably go for another build later. From the looks of it there is a steep rise in prices of DOS era hardware(atleast for motherboards) compared to XP/Win 9x systems.

The thing about eBay and prices is that at any given time, the prices you will see are precisely those that no one was prepared to pay. Better deals pop up all the time, but are snapped up just as quickly. That said, if I check eBay for "ISA sound card" and set the max to EUR 20 I find 69 hits, including a couple of pretty nice ones (based on Aztech AZT2316R, AZT2320, Crystal CS4237, ESS ES1869 and OPTi 82C929 chipsets) - and some Vibra cards for Creative fanboys too.

As for "DOS era" hardware - anything with ISA is DOS era, and there's enough out there still for a good price, so long as you are creative in your search terms and not tied to a shortlist of very popular brands (sometimes deserved, sometimes less so).

Thanks for the recommendations. I too am getting them under 20 dollars here. I will probably pick up one when I get ready for my DOS build.

fosterwj03 wrote on 2025-03-30, 00:12:

auron wrote on 2025-03-29, 14:51:

by default, the p3 is not a good fit for win95 due to lack of proper SSE support under that OS.

I suppose the Core 2 Extreme I use for Windows 95 is complete inappropriate 😉!

Even though it sounds a bit "extreme" but how is the compatibility like. Do you get any crashes? Can you play games on the system reliably with sound and decent graphics?

My experience with Win 98se has been that it is much more fragile than Win Xp and also very, and I mean it very prone to random BSODs. I have learnt by reading the forum posts that Win 95 is even more unstable than Win 98se. I would hate to be the guy who has to do a fresh install of the OS every other day because some software or hardware broke the system. This was the case with Win 98se before I realized exactly what and how to get it working in a stable fashion. My current Win 98se build is pretty stable and a lot of it is having the correct drivers and also making minimal installations. Personally I have never used a Win 95 system(any version), so I do not know much about it`s stability.

Jo22 wrote on 2025-03-29, 22:14:

As a rule of thumb, I think same. […]
Show full quote

As for "DOS era" hardware - anything with ISA is DOS era

As a rule of thumb, I think same.

On other hand, after the 486 processor the PC platform nolonger targeted DOS.
All the standards that followed were made with Windows (95) in mind, rather.
We noticed it on the switch from APM to ACPI or introduction of USB.

I would probably draw the line at systems meeting the Microsoft PC97 and other specs, when their dictated Windows compatibility switched from minimum specs to things you aren't allowed to have.
Such as: text mode POST screen, non-ISAPnP ISA cards in the system (eventually no ISA slots allowed at all), etc.

jakethompson1 wrote on 2025-03-30, 00:30:

I would probably draw the line at systems meeting the Microsoft PC97 and other specs, when their dictated Windows compatibility switched from minimum specs to things you aren't allowed to have.
Such as: text mode POST screen, non-ISAPnP ISA cards in the system (eventually no ISA slots allowed at all), etc.

That was the final nail in the coffin, right.

What I meant was more of change of direction, rather that a hard shift.

A 586 PC with a 586 motherboard still was quite DOS compatible, but DOS nolonger was the leading platform.
The extensions were made with Windows (95) in mind, rather.

When 486 PCs were at their height, the 486 motherboards were normally just industry standard PC/AT compatibles. With ISA or VLB bus.
No PCI, no Plug&Play, except for ISA Plug&Play (arrived late).
Edit: VIP boards came late. Opti Local bus was like VLB in its functionality.

Things like floppy controller, IDE and serial/parallel ports were on dedicated multi-i/o cards.
The chips were discreet, dedicated industry standard chips.
Something like an 16450 or 16550AFN FiFo and an UM82C11 parallel port IC.

With the Pentium motherboards, things like Super I/O chips and LPC bus became more dominant.
There was a shift from 5v to 3.3v, also, which got even harder with ATX specification.

In 486 days, the processors were still general purpose processors also.
You had ethernet routers based on 486SXL running some Unix style OS, for example.

All in all, the classic PC/AT architecture was built with 286/386/486 processors.
The 586 itself wasn't so much the deviation, but what came with it at the time (586 motherboards, BIOS extensions, USB, AGP etc).

A 586 combined with a classic AT style mainboard (without PCI) is very compatible and not worse than a 486DX4-100 in terms of compatibility.
Rather contrary, things like VME and enhanced x87 FPU can even enhance everything and make things run smoother.

So again, I don’t blame the Pentium (586) CPU at all. It's fine for DOS.
It's just the changes that ATX motherboards brought with them.

(I know that ATX is mainly a form factor, but it also introduced other things like power connector, the concept of the back panel etc.)

Edit: If I was being accurate, then I should have said that the 386 platform in the 80s already was meant for a "next gen OS".

But the "super DOS" that eventually became OS/2 was delayed and still very dependent on standard hardware - like good old DOS was.
Early Windows NT 3.x was similar, I think. It needed industry standard hardware to run well.

With the advent of Pentium PCs and Windows 95, the standards got watered down.
Strict compatibility at hardware level nolonger was as much of a requirement as it used to be.
Instead, multimedia and Plug&Play and Windows 95 was important.

Early Linux users got to experience this soon.:
There was a saying that Linux needs "good hardware", which more than often was pre-USB era hardware.
Or "scrapyard hardware" as we non-Linux users used to joke. 😉

PCs with SCSI controllers and solid graphics cards with VBE support were considered good.
ACPI was an issue often, so that -noacpi switches got more common.

Hans Tork wrote on 2025-03-30, 00:19:

fosterwj03 wrote on 2025-03-30, 00:12:

auron wrote on 2025-03-29, 14:51:

by default, the p3 is not a good fit for win95 due to lack of proper SSE support under that OS.

I suppose the Core 2 Extreme I use for Windows 95 is complete inappropriate 😉!

Even though it sounds a bit "extreme" but how is the compatibility like. Do you get any crashes? Can you play games on the system reliably with sound and decent graphics?

My experience with Win 98se has been that it is much more fragile than Win Xp and also very, and I mean it very prone to random BSODs. I have learnt by reading the forum posts that Win 95 is even more unstable than Win 98se. I would hate to be the guy who has to do a fresh install of the OS every other day because some software or hardware broke the system. This was the case with Win 98se before I realized exactly what and how to get it working in a stable fashion. My current Win 98se build is pretty stable and a lot of it is having the correct drivers and also making minimal installations. Personally I have never used a Win 95 system(any version), so I do not know much about it`s stability.

Rock solid, as a matter of fact. I just upgraded the system to a Radeon 9800 XL, so I'd say it can handle some games. I've got a Sound Blaster Live! for sound im the computer.

Re: ATI Radeon 9200 AGP card in Windows 95?

In all seriousness, I used Windows 95 on a 486 DX2-50, a Sound Blaster compatible, and a Cirrus Logic VLB video card back in the day (August 1995), so I've run Windows 95 on the gamet of hardware.

Your setup sounds like a good way to experience Windows 95 when it first came out. Your processor and motherboard are supported, and your motherboard looks like it will give you plenty of flexibility.

Have fun with it!

fosterwj03 wrote on 2025-03-30, 01:23:

Rock solid, as a matter of fact. I just upgraded the system to a Radeon 9800 XL, so I'd say it can handle some games. I've got a […]
Show full quote

Hans Tork wrote on 2025-03-30, 00:19:

fosterwj03 wrote on 2025-03-30, 00:12:

I suppose the Core 2 Extreme I use for Windows 95 is complete inappropriate 😉!

Even though it sounds a bit "extreme" but how is the compatibility like. Do you get any crashes? Can you play games on the system reliably with sound and decent graphics?

My experience with Win 98se has been that it is much more fragile than Win Xp and also very, and I mean it very prone to random BSODs. I have learnt by reading the forum posts that Win 95 is even more unstable than Win 98se. I would hate to be the guy who has to do a fresh install of the OS every other day because some software or hardware broke the system. This was the case with Win 98se before I realized exactly what and how to get it working in a stable fashion. My current Win 98se build is pretty stable and a lot of it is having the correct drivers and also making minimal installations. Personally I have never used a Win 95 system(any version), so I do not know much about it`s stability.

Rock solid, as a matter of fact. I just upgraded the system to a Radeon 9800 XL, so I'd say it can handle some games. I've got a Sound Blaster Live! for sound im the computer.

Re: ATI Radeon 9200 AGP card in Windows 95?

In all seriousness, I used Windows 95 on a 486 DX2-50, a Sound Blaster compatible, and a Cirrus Logic VLB video card back in the day (August 1995), so I've run Windows 95 on the gamet of hardware.

Your setup sounds like a good way to experience Windows 95 when it first came out. Your processor and motherboard are supported, and your motherboard looks like it will give you plenty of flexibility.

Have fun with it!

Thanks, for the tips. I do hope I can enjoy the Win 95 era and a few DOS games on the system.

I did not know radeon 9x cards could work on Win 95 reliably. Coming to think of it, what stops someone from putting a Radeon 9x card and a S3 virge card on one motherboard for a crazy Win 95 build. I do not know if multiple gpus are supported on the OS though.

Hans Tork wrote on 2025-03-30, 01:28:

fosterwj03 wrote on 2025-03-30, 01:23:

Rock solid, as a matter of fact. I just upgraded the system to a Radeon 9800 XL, so I'd say it can handle some games. I've got a […]
Show full quote

Hans Tork wrote on 2025-03-30, 00:19:

Even though it sounds a bit "extreme" but how is the compatibility like. Do you get any crashes? Can you play games on the system reliably with sound and decent graphics?

My experience with Win 98se has been that it is much more fragile than Win Xp and also very, and I mean it very prone to random BSODs. I have learnt by reading the forum posts that Win 95 is even more unstable than Win 98se. I would hate to be the guy who has to do a fresh install of the OS every other day because some software or hardware broke the system. This was the case with Win 98se before I realized exactly what and how to get it working in a stable fashion. My current Win 98se build is pretty stable and a lot of it is having the correct drivers and also making minimal installations. Personally I have never used a Win 95 system(any version), so I do not know much about it`s stability.

Rock solid, as a matter of fact. I just upgraded the system to a Radeon 9800 XL, so I'd say it can handle some games. I've got a Sound Blaster Live! for sound im the computer.

Re: ATI Radeon 9200 AGP card in Windows 95?

In all seriousness, I used Windows 95 on a 486 DX2-50, a Sound Blaster compatible, and a Cirrus Logic VLB video card back in the day (August 1995), so I've run Windows 95 on the gamet of hardware.

Your setup sounds like a good way to experience Windows 95 when it first came out. Your processor and motherboard are supported, and your motherboard looks like it will give you plenty of flexibility.

Have fun with it!

Thanks, for the tips. I do hope I can enjoy the Win 95 era and a few DOS games on the system.

I did not know radeon 9x cards could work on Win 95 reliably. Coming to think of it, what stops someone from putting a Radeon 9x card and a S3 virge card on one motherboard for a crazy Win 95 build. I do not know if multiple gpus are supported on the OS though.

I don't think Windows 95 can handle multiple video cards, per se. I think some cards with multiple GPU cores can support multiple monitors (Dual and Quad Matrox cards, for instance) in Windows 95, but not VGA cards in different slots.

Yes, I've experimented over the last couple years with early 2000s video cards in Windows 95. The Radeon 9000-series is about the fastest possible in Windows 95. But, I don't recommend messing around with unsupported hardware unless you have a lot of patience and a willingness to spend money on things that may not work.

fosterwj03 wrote on 2025-03-30, 01:40:

Hans Tork wrote on 2025-03-30, 01:28:

fosterwj03 wrote on 2025-03-30, 01:23:

Rock solid, as a matter of fact. I just upgraded the system to a Radeon 9800 XL, so I'd say it can handle some games. I've got a […]
Show full quote

Rock solid, as a matter of fact. I just upgraded the system to a Radeon 9800 XL, so I'd say it can handle some games. I've got a Sound Blaster Live! for sound im the computer.

Re: ATI Radeon 9200 AGP card in Windows 95?

In all seriousness, I used Windows 95 on a 486 DX2-50, a Sound Blaster compatible, and a Cirrus Logic VLB video card back in the day (August 1995), so I've run Windows 95 on the gamet of hardware.

Your setup sounds like a good way to experience Windows 95 when it first came out. Your processor and motherboard are supported, and your motherboard looks like it will give you plenty of flexibility.

Have fun with it!

Thanks, for the tips. I do hope I can enjoy the Win 95 era and a few DOS games on the system.

I did not know radeon 9x cards could work on Win 95 reliably. Coming to think of it, what stops someone from putting a Radeon 9x card and a S3 virge card on one motherboard for a crazy Win 95 build. I do not know if multiple gpus are supported on the OS though.

I don't think Windows 95 can handle multiple video cards, per se. I think some cards with multiple GPU cores can support multiple monitors (Dual and Quad Matrox cards, for instance) in Windows 95, but not VGA cards in different slots.

Yes, I've experimented over the last couple years with early 2000s video cards in Windows 95. The Radeon 9000-series is about the fastest possible in Windows 95. But, I don't recommend messing around with unsupported hardware unless you have a lot of patience and a willingness to spend money on things that may not work.

So it is one gpu then. Also I do not like tinkering with unsupported hardware and that too on pre-XP OS`s. I had quite an experience with my Win 98se build.