Crysis runs smooth (no actual framerate measured) with everything high at 1280x1024 and 8xfaa. "very high" requires DX10 ergo something beyond XP.

I don't know if the game is using EAX, the menu doesn't mention it. It all sounded impressive and environmentally immersive. Edit: apparently that's software mode, I need to make a system.cfg with:

con_restricted = 0
s_reverbtype = 1
r_displayinfo = 1
r_VSync = 1
d3d9_TripleBuffering = 1

(I've added some extra fun stuff)

I'll try that.

This seems to be turning into the low budget xp rocket I was hoping (minus the omniflop thingy), and I still have a pile of stuff I can try to sell. Which will be a challenge.

I was looking for am3 or am3+ motherboards with floppy controller and 2 available pci slots when using gpu. Very rare, it seems. So the floppy problem is at this point only solved by keeping the Dell pc around. In the attic...

Gigabyte GA-870A-UD3 (and the rest of the family https://www.gigabyte.com/us/Motherboard/AMD-- … Type-Socket-AM3
ASRock 980DE3/U3S3 R1

These are the only ones I know with am3 or 3+, ide, floppy, ddr3, and 2 available pci ports.

The Gigabyte would set me back about 70 euro, the Asrock similar. That's a lot just for floppy.