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Most stable and compatible win9x configuration

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Reply 140 of 163, by BitWrangler

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That's only in the virtualised address space, when it's TLB translated to physical it uses bottom up. Otherwise, since the 32bit address space is 4GB, you'd need cache for a whole 4GB of RAM

Unicorn herding operations are proceeding, but all the totes of hens teeth and barrels of rocking horse poop give them plenty of hiding spots.

Reply 141 of 163, by zapbuzz

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dormcat wrote on 2021-07-17, 14:20:
IMHO there are some contradictories: […]
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Intel486dx33 wrote on 2021-07-17, 08:16:
For a good reliable DOS gaming computer that can run WIn95.Win98se/WinME go for this build. Motherboard - Intel 430vx or Intel 4 […]
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For a good reliable DOS gaming computer that can run WIn95.Win98se/WinME go for this build.
Motherboard - Intel 430vx or Intel 430tx or Intel bx440 with AGP
RAM - 128mb or 256mb.
Video - S3 trio64

IMHO there are some contradictories:

430VX or 430TX chipsets cannot cache more than 64MB RAM; installing more would only slow down the system. Few games that could be enjoyable on a Socket 7-based build require bigger RAM anyway, and S3 Trio64 is a nice video card, if not THE standard 2D video card of the era. The build can run Win9x but I wouldn't suggest playing most Win9x games other than pure 2D games like Civ2.

On the other hand, a 440BX build would definitely benefit from an AGP video card with 3D acceleration; why do you need a 440BX build if you only plan to use a Trio64?

I have an Abit VP6 with 2gb ram and with it being the maximum it actually lags on post about it so i wonder how much is actually cached 🤣

Reply 142 of 163, by dormcat

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zapbuzz wrote on 2021-07-19, 13:01:

I have an Abit VP6 with 2gb ram and with it being the maximum it actually lags on post about it so i wonder how much is actually cached 🤣

IIRC a Socket 370 MB needs not worry about that. 😉

Reply 143 of 163, by zapbuzz

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dormcat wrote on 2021-07-19, 16:05:
zapbuzz wrote on 2021-07-19, 13:01:

I have an Abit VP6 with 2gb ram and with it being the maximum it actually lags on post about it so i wonder how much is actually cached 🤣

IIRC a Socket 370 MB needs not worry about that. 😉

Thanks man I can forget my old T2 Chipset Pentium mobo. Good for 98se on dialup but bad for xp on ISDN.(the good old days)
It had cahe limit I was thinking of that when I noticed the VP6 lag.

Last edited by zapbuzz on 2021-07-25, 15:31. Edited 1 time in total.

Reply 144 of 163, by Dhigan

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Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2021-07-07, 02:39:
DirextX 7.0a came out in late 1999 and is generally considered to be the most compatible for Win9x gaming. ... IMO, for the lea […]
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DirextX 7.0a came out in late 1999 and is generally considered to be the most compatible for Win9x gaming.
...
IMO, for the least problematic and most compatible PC retro gaming experience, you need three systems: one for DOS, a second one for Win9x and a third one for WinXP.
...
And while it's possible to have DOS + Win9x + early WinXP on a single system, that requires a very specific hardware combination paired with slowdown utilities, and yet it still necessitates some compromises.

DirectX 7.0a was released in December 1999 and windows XP in October 2001.
Wouldn't you agree with the idea that DX7 games should be played with XP ?
Would you know any DX7 game(s) not compatible with windows XP ?
This would help in trying to define the "right" windows 9X config ... and make it a bit more "high end DOS game friendly"
This is my low encumbrance retro-gaming toolset :
Compaq Armada e500 SPP2060 with w98SE is also quite DOS gaming compatible
Compaq Presario CQ61-315SF with Radeon HD 4200 and winXP64
Both are low power consumption and without display panel, so that I can plug any computer monitor needed.

Win 3.1 : HP Omnibook 425 + Toshiba T2130CT
Win 9x : Dell Latitude Cpx H500GT + Dell GX1
Win XP64 : Asus P5B Xeon

Reply 145 of 163, by Joseph_Joestar

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Dhigan wrote on 2021-07-20, 13:38:

DirectX 7.0a was released in December 1999 and windows XP in October 2001. Wouldn't you agree with the idea that DX7 games should be played with XP ?

How did you came to this conclusion based on those two dates? At the time DX7 was released, Windows 98 (and even Win95 OSR2.5) was still the main PC gaming platform. Windows 2000 was brand new and previous NT-based operating systems were not designed with gaming in mind.

Games that came out in the year 2000 shipped with DX7 on the disc and were likely optimized for it. Around that time, many GPU manufacturers started coding their Win9x drivers with DX7 in mind. For example, the latest Voodoo3 reference driver v1.07.00 needs DX7 in order to run correctly.

Would you know any DX7 game(s) not compatible with windows XP ?

Not sure why you're asking this? I never claimed that DX7 games can't run on WinXP. Just that DX7 is generally considered the best DirectX version for gaming on Win9x systems.

PC#1: Pentium MMX 166 / Soyo SY-5BT / S3 Trio64V+ / Voodoo1 / YMF719 / AWE64 Gold / SC-155
PC#2: AthlonXP 2100+ / ECS K7VTA3 / Voodoo3 / Audigy2 / Vortex2
PC#3: Athlon64 3400+ / Asus K8V-MX / 5900XT / Audigy2
PC#4: i5-3570K / MSI Z77A-G43 / GTX 970 / X-Fi

Reply 146 of 163, by bloodem

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Me and most of my friends stayed with Windows 98SE to the (bitter?) end. 😁 I remember trying Windows XP when it first came out, and it was running noticeably slower than Win98SE with a Thunderbird 1.33 GHz and 256 MB RAM. I clearly remember that one of the first games I tested (if not the first) was Return to Castle Wolfenstein, which ran fine on Win98 but on XP... ugh, it ran like crap (d'oh, 256 MB of RAM!).
I had also tried Windows ME and Windows 2000 multiple times in the past, but always ended up having performance/functionality issues that forced me to go back to Windows 98.

I finally made the jump to Windows XP at the end of 2002, when I upgraded to my trusty Thoroughbred Athlon XP 2200+ & 512MB RAM (which I still have in perfect working order on the same Biostar M7VIT Pro motherboard). At the time, Windows XP SP1 was already available, which had made XP finally usable, although I still had some games that refused to work properly on it - like Nocturne 1999, Need For Speed 5 Porsche and others. By that point, I didn't care too much about older games, because I was more interested in the latest and greatest games that ran great on XP (especially after I upgraded to 768 MB RAM).

Anyway, as Joseph_Joestar said, DirectX 7.0 is without question Windows 98 territory. Nowadays, you can run most Direct X 7.0 games on XP just fine, since there are many patches available (in fact, you can run most of those games on Windows 10 too 😁 ), but that's neither here nor there...

1 x PLCC-68 / 2 x PGA132 / 5 x Skt 3 / 9 x Skt 7 / 12 x SS7 / 1 x Skt 8 / 14 x Slot 1 / 5 x Slot A
5 x Skt 370 / 8 x Skt A / 2 x Skt 478 / 2 x Skt 754 / 3 x Skt 939 / 7 x LGA775 / 1 x LGA1155
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Reply 147 of 163, by BitWrangler

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Yah in my experience, Win98 was seen as superior for maturity and speed for gaming until into Dx9 era. There was a faction, who'd been having a rough time gaming on Win2k who took to XP immediately and thought it was the best thing for gaming since pong, but it took a lot of convincing for the ppl who had everything they liked running perfect on 9x.

Unicorn herding operations are proceeding, but all the totes of hens teeth and barrels of rocking horse poop give them plenty of hiding spots.

Reply 148 of 163, by mothergoose729

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bloodem wrote on 2021-07-20, 14:29:

Me and most of my friends stayed with Windows 98SE to the (bitter?) end. 😁 I remember trying Windows XP when it first came out, and it was running noticeably slower than Win98SE with a Thunderbird 1.33 GHz and 256 MB RAM. I clearly remember that one of the first games I tested (if not the first) was Return to Castle Wolfenstein, which ran fine on Win98 but on XP... ugh, it ran like crap (d'oh, 256 MB of RAM!).

My first family computer shipped out from Dell with 128mb of RAM... on XP SP2. It was terrible. Some how I surfed the internet and played games on it anyway.

Reply 149 of 163, by bloodem

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mothergoose729 wrote on 2021-07-20, 14:45:
bloodem wrote on 2021-07-20, 14:29:

Me and most of my friends stayed with Windows 98SE to the (bitter?) end. 😁 I remember trying Windows XP when it first came out, and it was running noticeably slower than Win98SE with a Thunderbird 1.33 GHz and 256 MB RAM. I clearly remember that one of the first games I tested (if not the first) was Return to Castle Wolfenstein, which ran fine on Win98 but on XP... ugh, it ran like crap (d'oh, 256 MB of RAM!).

My first family computer shipped out from Dell with 128mb of RAM... on XP SP2. It was terrible. Some how I surfed the internet and played games on it anyway.

Wow... 128 MB on Windows XP would've been truly painful! 😁

1 x PLCC-68 / 2 x PGA132 / 5 x Skt 3 / 9 x Skt 7 / 12 x SS7 / 1 x Skt 8 / 14 x Slot 1 / 5 x Slot A
5 x Skt 370 / 8 x Skt A / 2 x Skt 478 / 2 x Skt 754 / 3 x Skt 939 / 7 x LGA775 / 1 x LGA1155
Current PC: Ryzen 7 5800X3D
Backup PC: Core i7 7700k

Reply 150 of 163, by chinny22

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Looking at my games library I'd say DX8 seems like the cross over period. C&C Generals, GTA3, etc run just fine on 9x but it does start to feel like the game is more suited to XP.

Now if the question is it a good idea to install 9x on hardware from XP era then I think most would agree that's a perfectly good idea. Both P4 and Athlon XP based systems were recommended as well as graphics cards from the same era.

If your asking is it a good idea to play DX7 or earlier games on a more powerful PC with XP installed. As long as it doesn't have compatibility issues then sure nothing wrong with that either, but that wasn't the OP's original question and for some the the OS is part of the retro experience.

Reply 151 of 163, by BitWrangler

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bloodem wrote on 2021-07-20, 14:52:
mothergoose729 wrote on 2021-07-20, 14:45:
bloodem wrote on 2021-07-20, 14:29:

Me and most of my friends stayed with Windows 98SE to the (bitter?) end. 😁 I remember trying Windows XP when it first came out, and it was running noticeably slower than Win98SE with a Thunderbird 1.33 GHz and 256 MB RAM. I clearly remember that one of the first games I tested (if not the first) was Return to Castle Wolfenstein, which ran fine on Win98 but on XP... ugh, it ran like crap (d'oh, 256 MB of RAM!).

My first family computer shipped out from Dell with 128mb of RAM... on XP SP2. It was terrible. Some how I surfed the internet and played games on it anyway.

Wow... 128 MB on Windows XP would've been truly painful! 😁

Yah, it was questionable at XP release to stick poor suckers with only 128MB, but by SP2, OUCH!

Unicorn herding operations are proceeding, but all the totes of hens teeth and barrels of rocking horse poop give them plenty of hiding spots.

Reply 152 of 163, by BitWrangler

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bloodem wrote on 2021-07-20, 14:29:

although I still had some games that refused to work properly on it - like Nocturne 1999, Need For Speed 5 Porsche and others.

I'm wondering if that was a DX9 or later detonator issue, I was playing NFS Porsche on my athlon system with 98SE, then got some different games and was into those for a year, probably had driver and dx upgrades, and then went back to porsche and it was messed up, but didn't try sorting it out at the time. Nowadays I wander the house mournfully wondering where the hell I put my NFS porsche, Ford Racing, 4x4 evo, etc.... prolly a bottom layer box somewhere.

Unicorn herding operations are proceeding, but all the totes of hens teeth and barrels of rocking horse poop give them plenty of hiding spots.

Reply 153 of 163, by Dhigan

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Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2021-07-20, 14:08:

How did you came to this conclusion based on those two dates? At the time DX7 was released, Windows 98 (and even Win95 OSR2.5) was still the main PC gaming platform. Windows 2000 was brand new and previous NT-based operating systems were not designed with gaming in mind.

Thanks for answers. Well, my (strange ?) idea was that XP designers could not ignore DX7 ... DX8.1 was released in October 2001.
I do agree with all the comments that back in 2001 for most people, win98 was the way to play games ("superior for maturity and speed" compared to the money invested). I am now taking the 2021 point of view (which is the OP question I think). You can get a XP compatible (and powerful) machine for next to nothing . I would not try to play DX6 games with it, but DX7 games should not be a problem.

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2021-07-20, 14:08:

Not sure why you're asking this? I never claimed that DX7 games can't run on WinXP.

Sure ! To get back to the OP. My suggestion was that having a XP machine (capable of running DX7 games), you could have a less powerful w98 machine for DX6 games and below and design it a bit more "high end DOS game friendly".

A wise guy wrote :

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2021-07-07, 02:39:

Hardware progressed rapidly between the early '90s and the mid 2000s, especially 3D graphics cards. That's why it's so hard to fit everything on one rig. IMO, for the least problematic and most compatible PC retro gaming experience, you need three systems: one for DOS, a second one for Win9x and a third one for WinXP.
And while it's possible to have DOS + Win9x + early WinXP on a single system, that requires a very specific hardware combination paired with slowdown utilities, and yet it still necessitates some compromises.

Win 3.1 : HP Omnibook 425 + Toshiba T2130CT
Win 9x : Dell Latitude Cpx H500GT + Dell GX1
Win XP64 : Asus P5B Xeon

Reply 154 of 163, by Joseph_Joestar

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Dhigan wrote on 2021-07-21, 12:16:

My suggestion was that having a XP machine (capable of running DX7 games), you could have a less powerful w98 machine for DX6 games and below and design it a bit more "high end DOS game friendly".

DX7 graphics cards (e.g. GeForce2) are no less DOS compatible than DX6 graphics cards (e.g. TNT2).

Having good DOS compatibility depends mostly on the slowdown capabilities of the CPU and on the type of sound card used.

PC#1: Pentium MMX 166 / Soyo SY-5BT / S3 Trio64V+ / Voodoo1 / YMF719 / AWE64 Gold / SC-155
PC#2: AthlonXP 2100+ / ECS K7VTA3 / Voodoo3 / Audigy2 / Vortex2
PC#3: Athlon64 3400+ / Asus K8V-MX / 5900XT / Audigy2
PC#4: i5-3570K / MSI Z77A-G43 / GTX 970 / X-Fi

Reply 155 of 163, by Scoob

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Hello Dhigan, thanks for your suggestions. There can be only one. One PC for Windows 9x. And maybe, maybe another for ms-dos. Maximum two old computers in the house rule! I'm still looking for parts, but it will be a 440BX - 800MHz - Voodoo3 -awe64 or a i865 - 2GHz Northwood -GeForce 2 - Voodoo2/sli - Live!

A wise guy wrote :

By the way I found this funny. Do you know that calling someone a wise guy is not the same as saying the guy is wise? 😄 I'm sure it was not your intention.
Anyway, thanks! Bye.

Reply 158 of 163, by BitWrangler

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Scoob wrote on 2021-07-24, 16:46:

Is there any reason for a motherboard to work with a 700mhz slot 1 coppermine, but not with a 800mhz slot 1 coppermine, both rated at 100 fsb and 1.65v ??
DFI P2XBL REV C

Maybe, look up the S specs and see if your 800 is a D stepping.... CC0 Pentium III vs CD0 P3 ... CPUID 6-8-10... are there real differences???

Unicorn herding operations are proceeding, but all the totes of hens teeth and barrels of rocking horse poop give them plenty of hiding spots.

Reply 159 of 163, by AlexZ

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It may not be that simple. I have a PIII 700Mhz cB0 stepping that doesn't work and a PIII 733 cC0 stepping that works. Find your CPUs on https://www.cpu-world.com/sspec/Pentium%20III.html and compare. I will find out what's wrong as seller agreed with replacement.

Pentium III 900E, ECS P6BXT-A+, 384MB RAM, NVIDIA GeForce FX 5600 128MB, Voodoo 2 12MB, 80GB HDD, Yamaha SM718 ISA, 19" AOC 9GlrA
Athlon 64 3400+, MSI K8T Neo V, 1GB RAM, NVIDIA GeForce 7600GT 512MB, 250GB HDD, Sound Blaster Audigy 2 ZS