/vr/ - Retro Games

>>1808583
The only real reason to own an older retro system is for DOS games that don't run well in DOSbox or some win95 games without using a VM.
You don't really need a faster processor. All the mid and late 90s games are generally better off being played on fairly modern machines anyway where you can jack up the AA, use better hardware, with the exception of finding the right balance for audio - finding a wrapper for A3D or EAX for those that support it. You also want HRTF if you use headphones at all, period even on older systems. You want a processor that you won't need to slomo for the earlier 90's to mid 90's games. About the only games I can really think off the top of my head are Blood and KQ8 with glide. Glide DOS games are really the best thing you can get out of it since it's fairly junk for dosbox. There aren't many though. Otherwise any late DOS games that can't be run well in DOSbox is your next priority, software mode Blood kind of fits in that at higher resolution.
Finding sourceports for other games is best for modern systems like Eduke3D and some of the Quake 1 sourceports, though Q2 and just about anything win98 runs pretty much fine native anyway if you want, but you need to watch out for 16 bit installers, once you get the game extracted and the reg data if any you can generally just copy those over.

>>1808583
>Should I try reconnecting it?
If the card works right now then no.
>Do you recommend an upgrade to the Duron processor? I can probably try to open up the extra cache to see what that does, but would I be better off just buying a different Athlon?
If none of the games you want to play requires a better CPU then there is no reason to upgrade.
>What card would be good to stick in the AGP slot for use with retro PC games?
If you want to play DOS and windows 2D games only then the savage is more than enough. If you have many games which support 3dfx then get one of those, but remember that they are overpriced as fuck.
If you want to play games made after 2001 then a nvidia 4 Ti or 5500/5900 FX would probably be the best option.
If you want to play DOS games you'll probably also need a compatible sound card. Picture related: one of my retro rigs.

>>1809607
>ever recommending an Nvidia FX card

>>1809737
OPs CPU would not even fully use it.

What exactly defines a 'retro PC'? I find it amazing that every few years, the performance increase was substantial. Was the Pentium 4 the beginning of the 'new' PC? Pentium 4s, despite being old, can handle many tasks rather well, much better than the P3. The P4 was also clocked rather high, with a lot of PCs having 2.8 GHz CPUs.

>>1809607
>NSA CONFIDENTIAL USB Device

>>1809157
This.

The only reason to go through the hassle of building and setting up a retro PC is for pure nostalgia sake. If all you want is playing old games, DOSBox, virtualization and sourceports are probably enough and a lot more convenient.

Also, a Duron 1.8 GHz with 1 GB ram and AGP card is a bit too advanced for a DOS machine and it will give you more compatibility problems than DOSBox.

>>1810031
I'd say "modern" PCs begin with 64-bit CPUs and motherboards with integrated SATA and USB 2.0 support, plus a GPU with DirectX 9 support (even if it's a shitty integrated GPU).

So yeah, it begins with late Prescott P4s that had 64 bit support (by then pretty much all of them had the other features mentioned).

>>1811050
I also reckon those Dell Dimensions with the P4s to still be useful for general purposes for years to come. I have an Optiplex (from 2002 I believe) with a 1.13GHz P3, and it can't do anything. The 2004 Dimension with 2.8 GHz P4s can do most everything, even without Lubuntu.

That said, is it possible to upgrade the AGP in the Optiplex so that it can at least display video reliably? That is, if a GPU would actually help with rendering video and is not depended on CPU power.

>>1811823
True, a 10-year old 2 GHz+ 64-bit P4 or Athlon64 with 2 GB ram can run Windows 8 or any other current OS and still work well as a Facebook machine or for basic office work. I believe they're even able to run most current emulators well except for 6th+ gen systems.

A bit older (2002 or 2003) machine with 1.6 GHz Northwood P4 or Athlon XP with 1 GB DDR1 ram (non-expandable), on the other hand... well it can still work if you've got nothing else but it will be slow and you have to make lots of compromises (such as running Windows XP or a lightweight Linux distro).

As for upgrading your old Optiplex, an AGP graphics card might improve 2D video performance a bit (especially for web browsing on modern sites), but it will still be slow and I don't think it's worth it.

>>1808583
How much can I expect to put into a Win 95 rig strong enough to play older 3D games like Mechwarrior 2: Mercs?

I haven't played that game in literally a decade because it doesn't want to run on Win 7/Win XP.

>>1811050
It's hard to draw this line with 64bit. Early Core mobile laptops (released at the beginning of 2006) did not support 64bit, but were actual real dual core processors.

>>1812213
Speaking of modern OSes, I have two Dell Dimensions with 2 GB of RAM and a 2.8GHz P4. Should I install XP since it is lighterweight, or could I install 7 on it?

>>1812440

It'll run on a 100+ MHz Pentium, so anything from there up that's still compatible will work.

Recommended setup for retro vidya:
440BX-based motherboard (comes with PIIX4E southbridge, which is very retro-friendly)
Slot-1 Pentium III or Celeron-A
Geforce 4 Ti (use Glide wrappers for 3dfx games)
Soundblaster Live (Has SB16 emulation for DOS but this requires a compatible chipset like the 440BX)
No more than 512MB of RAM. Win9x will shit itself running more and no Win9x games or apps even need that much.
Win98SE is the best Win9x edition while retaining the ability to use DOS.

Something like this would be worth it for those Windows 95/98 games that are too new for Dosbox but too old to be run natively on a 64 bit OS. Install Windows 98 on it.

>>1812615
>Pentium III
Yeah, no. A lot of games just break when running on a cpu over 500mhz.
I'd say get a Katmai running at 450 or lower.
>Geforce 4 Ti
Rage 128 + Voodoo 2 SLI is an infinitely better combination.
Voodoo 1 + S3 Trio if you want to play some of those DOS-only 3DFX games.
Geforce 2 is the latest NVidia you ought to run with Win9k for gaming. GF4 didn't have the greatest drivers or compatibility with older games.
>use Glide wrappers for 3dfx games
Glide wrappers tend to run like absolute shit on older machines.
>Soundblaster Live
Yamaha sound cards have higher audio quality and, actual full OPL3 compatibility.
Just make sure to get a motherboard with SBLink or PCPCI or whatever the fuck it's called by your mobo manufacturer.

>>1812639
>Yamaha sound cards

They can only give you SB Pro 2 emulation though, because of legal BS.

>PCPCI or whatever the fuck it's called

You need two southbridge features: Non-maskable interrupts (NMI) and distributed DMA (DDMA). If you're missing either you can't do full ISA sound emulation.

>>1812650
>If you're missing either you can't do full ISA sound emulation
You also need the PCPCI/SBLink connector.
Fairly safe to assume every motherboard with the connector is compatible with it.

>>1812615
>No more than 512MB of RAM

There's a commercial patch to enable up to 4GB in win9x without issue that costs iirc $20
Kind of steep for a simple patch but I guess it's a very niche market.

>>1812639
>A lot of games just break when running on a cpu over 500mhz.

You can deal with those using slowdown utilities. I'm partial to the 300MHz Celeron though since I ran one of those OC'd to 450 on air for years.

>>1812659
>You also need the PCPCI/SBLink connector.

You only need one or the other. SB Link is what allowed "modern" boards without proper southbridge support to manage DOS sound.

Running Win98 SE on an ICH9 Core2Duo setup here. It can't use the 2nd core but hell it was spare parts anyway. PCIe Geforce 7900 GT also works with modded drivers.

Sound looked like it was going to be an issue initially. ICH9 supports NMI with a TSR but not DDMA at all. As luck would have it, Aureal Vortex cards use a different method for DMA so they work fine for SB Pro2 emulation.

>>1812615
i'd say
>PII 266~300MHz
>32MB SDRAM (not more than 64MB)
>S3 ViRGE or ATI Rage 3D + 3Dfx voodoo1
>SoundBlaster Pro, or a motherboard with a 'SoundBlaster or 100% compatible' with SoundBlaster/Legacy audio mode

should play anything ever made for MS-DOS, and most Win9x games that might be too bitchy to run on modern hardware

>>1808583
>What card would be good to stick in the AGP slot for use with retro PC games?
3dfx cards and Geforce 256/2/3ti. Good 3d performance with great DOS games compatibility.

>>1808583
>1 GB DDR
>Not 512 mega fucking bytes of SDRAM

pleb/10

I still have my family's first Windows PC, A Dell Dimension XPS R400 from late 1998/early 1999:

>Intel Pentium II ("Deschutes") 400MHz Slot-1 CPU
>384MB PC-100 SDRAM (The most the motherboard can accept)
>STB nVidia TNT 16MB AGP 2x GPU
>Turtle Beach Montego A3D Sound card
>Netgear Ethernet Card
>IBM Deskstar 14GXP 12GB 7200 RPM HD (STILL WORKS!!)
>Sony 52x CD-ROM drive
>Iomega Zip100 Drive (Internal)
>Floppy Drive (Is that even worth mentioning?)

It currently has Windows XP installed, but because it's no longer supported (and runs slowly on the R400), I'll probably downgrade back to Windows 98 First edition (what the R400 originally came with) to play some retro PC vidya on it. What do guys think?

>>1812973
Other than the GPU, seems like a fine little machine Win9k gaming machine, not so much for DOS though.
Some games may not like the original TNT, so you may want to consider changing it for something else someday.
>Windows 98 First edition
Why not SE?

>>1812986
Because that's what it came with originally, and I don't have a copy of 98SE lying around, and I'm too lazy to pirate 98SE.

>>1812973
>Iomega Zip100 Drive (Internal)

Magnificent.

>Floppy Drive (Is that even worth mentioning?)

If it has a proper 2-channel FDC. They're hard to come by now.

This is a good thread to ask. What kind of hardware would a /vr/ "gaming PC" have? What would constitute such a thing? A PC made in 1999 with a GPU made in 1999, with the maximum amount of RAM that was common in 1999?

>>1816728
>A PC made in 1999 with a GPU made in 1999, with the maximum amount of RAM that was common in 1999?

doesn't work that way, you try to get the best hardware that is still compatible with a certain OS be it windows 9x or 98

>>1809737
>>1809737
>>1809737
>>1809737

The FX line is the best for a few old school glide wrappers due to its ability to emulate glide API perfectly

>>1816728

It wouldn't have specifically anything- you'd have to break them down year by year since technology was progressing so quickly that systems were often obsolete a year or two later.

>>1816775
you have a lot of fx gpus you're looking to unload I suppose

>>1816775
Yet it's no good for Direct3D or even OpenGL compared to other cards at the time.
It's designers have certainly left their mark on the cards.
RIP 3DFX

>>1816728
For Win9k gaming:
>Asus P2B-F
>Yamaha WaveForce 192XG
>ATI Rage 128 Pro + Voodoo 2 SLI
>384MB RAM
>USB 2.0 PCI Card based on the NEC chipset
>Win98 SE English, UK locale + Unofficial SP + USB Mass Storage drivers
Other parts don't really matter all too much.

>>1816826
>>1816828

No I just remember this guy- http://www.zeckensack.de/glide/

mentions that:
Support for the ARB_fragment_program extension (maybe better known as "DX9 pixel shaders 2.0"). This will eliminate all combiner approximations and offer the most feature complete emulation available.

Of course he mentions that Geforce 6 series and PCX series are also very good for this as well.

I don't think I ever owned an FX card.

I'll post my first PC configuration from back 2000 or so, maybe this will help somone

Celeron 500Mhz
128MB of Ram (no DDR)
Riva TNT M64 32MB →GF MX440
sum integrated sound

Everything worked fine. But no 60fps in Gothic thats for sure

>>1816880

Which leads to my next question- who the fuck owned a PCX card?

>>1816880
Do note that that page is nearly a decade out of date.
Even the Intel GMA950, widely known as one of the worst GPU to ever exist, supports ARB_fragment_program.

>>1816887
>Riva TNT M64 32MB
What a shitty card that was. Until GF4 mx line it was the biggest piece of silicon FUCK YOU.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/100-test-IMB200-REV-A2-RC-by-DHL-or-EMS-/251494778977?pt=Motherboards&hash=item3a8e41c861

why all cool mobos like these are so fucking expensive

>>1817248

That's an industrial motherboard meant for a small market that can easily justify the cost.

Also those ISA slots are just slave ports since industrial controllers don't typically use IRQs or DMA. They're useless for running something like an AWE64 card.

>>1814778
It still works, too! I remembered my dad specifying the Zip drive when we ordered it b/c he was using Zip disks extensively at work to store AutoCad LT drawings (they couldn't fit on a floppy).

Ironically, he ended up not using it much primarily because he rarely worked out of the house.
>Not that he would've been able to anyway; my mom and I would always fight over that PC until she got her own laptop a few years later b/c she was working out of the house at the time, which was a serious issue whenever I had homework that required the PC (or wanted to play some games). It got to the point where I ended up figuring out how to convert documents between that PC (with MS Office 97) and our old Macintosh LC II (with MS Works 3.x) just so I didn't have to wait to get my stuff done. LOL.

so i'm wondering if what i've got is too modern for DOS gaming.

asus a7v400-mx Socket A, via KM400a chipset, with athlon 1500mhz, 256mb of SDRAM currently installed

ATI radeon 9700 pro

no sound card, currently.

this thing was given to me, i bought the best AGP8x card i could find, but i'm wondering if that might not cause trouble.

TL;DR: free computer, can i use it for gaming?

>>1817594
i think IRQs would actually work on this board since it has ICH5

it's been reported to work with similar ICH5 boards

>>1818540

http://axiomtek.industrialpartner.com/industrial-pc/industrial-motherboard/imb200.htm

It lists support for ISA DMA via PCI bridge, but it says nothing about native ISA or NMI support. You'd need to ask the manufacturer or have someone test one to be sure.

Been building on this computer since easter now. It is supposed to be for games up until about 99/00. Right now it has a 933 MHz coppermine, 512 MB PC133 RAM, and a Riva TNT2 Pro. I ordered a Voodoo2 yesterday. Would like a Voodoo3 3000/3500, but I haven't been able to find a cheap one yet.

This is mostly for games that don't play nice with Windows 7.

It is a little too fast for some earlier Windows titles, so I'll probably resurrect the Pentium 166 MMX system that I have around here somewhere. I think it would be useful for MSDOS games too. Annoyed that I threw out all my old cases and power supplies 10 years ago.

>>1818051

Your biggest impediment to DOS gaming is going to be audio support. The DOS drivers for the VIA Vinyl audio chipset on your board specifically do not support the VT8237 southbridge, which probably means it's likely missing NMI or DDMA support. In which case SB emulation through PCI sound cards won't work either.

The CPU is too fast for some games though you can deal with that by underclocking, disabling CPU cache and/or using slowdown utilities.

>i bought the best AGP8x card i could find, but i'm wondering if that might not cause trouble.

Glide wrappers are available for 3DFX support on Radeon cards and a 9700 is sufficiently advanced to deal with the overhead.

>>1817248
and here I thought my S370 motherboard with a 1.4GHz Tualatin and 1.5GB of SDRAM would be the fastest computer config you could build still with an ISA slot

>>1822332
There's even Haswell motherboards with ISA slots.

>>1819525
>Would like a Voodoo3 3000/3500, but I haven't been able to find a cheap one yet.
Oh wow, I didn't know they priced up like that. Hilarious, I have one or two sitting in a box somewhere. I also have a bunch of nvidia and ATI cards as well, though those don't seem to be priced up. Likely because the whole proprietary glide bit has people snapping them up for systems just like you want.

>>1819525
There's an old utility called MOSLO that slows your CPU down just a bit, configurable.

>>1822376
but IMB200 is the fastest board with DMA
probably maybe

Question for all you DOSfags, how do you transfer your games from your main PC to your DOS machine?
I just got a system set up with FreeDOS to play old games on, but there's no USB support, so no flash drives The only thing I can think of is to waste all my CD-Rs, burning DOS games to them just so I can transfer the files to the hard drive.

>>1823831

Buy a USB floppy drive for your main PC and some floppies.

Done. Some games you will need to use CDs for, though. You could just buy a physical copy. The market in old DOS games isn't bad right now.

>>1823831
via network, if not directly from DOS then through another system, dual booted or launched off a live CD, a small linux distribution should do fine

>>1823831
You could get a network card and transfer the files that way.

Or something like the SanDisk FlashPath Floppy Disk Reader

Or an SD to 40 pin IDE PATA adapter.

Or buy a single CD-RW or a pack and transfer that way.

Or buy a PATA to USB/SATA adapter and connect to the old hard disk with the modern operating system and copy shit as needed.

Or do the opposite and get a USB/SATA drive with a PATA adapter.

>>1823901
Oh yeah, you could get a USB PCI card if it's new enough and install drivers and mount it.

Or also rig up a serial to serial or serial to USB transfer or something. Null modem - SLIP/ laplink - PLIP

>>1823918
Though I'd suggest using the SD/IDE adapters because the PLIP/SLIP shit is absurdly slow, on the order of 20KBps... so backing up large data, would suck.

>>1823932
Also, if you go for network cards though you do gain the benefit of playing across a network with DOSBOX, and potentially if you know anyone you could host the server on your LAN and have people connect with DOSBOX or their machines through IPX over internet. Still might be slower than just ganking the drive or swapping an alternative drive (rather than using the original drive so you don't risk losing the data) with an adapter though possibly.

>>1812615
That's pretty similar to my retro rig:

Shuttle HOT-637 440LX Mainboard
Intel Celeron-A 400
3dfx Voodoo 3
Aureal Vortex 1 Sound Card
160MB PC-100 SDRAM

You really can't go wrong with a Voodoo card; the later ones have damn near-perfect DOS compatibility, true Glide compatibility is great, and they are usually pretty cheap.

Check this to ensure your card of choice has good compatibility:
http://gona.mactar.hu/DOS_TESTS/#CRT

>>1823901
>PATA to USB/SATA adapter

I remember trying to use one of those to hook up an old LS-120 Superdisk drive to a Windows 7 machine. The BIOS recognized it but I guess that's not enough for W7 64bit because it couldn't even see that it was there.

>>1808583
>retro pc
>GHz

>>1824684

We had our rigs running at 1GHz by the end of 1998.

>>1824879
Whaa? How much would a rig like that even cost? I thought my mid-98 300MHz PII was hot shit :(

>>1824921

Liquid cooling, a Mendocino and a lot of balls.

>>1824026
>that Enlight case
I wish I could still find one, they were remarkable

>>1824921
The celeron 300A is what this guy is talking about.
>>1824937
Essentially the Celeron's with the L2 cache overclocked to the balls. They did 450 with a stock cooler and didn't lose a step.

The funny thing, Celeron 300A's were like 30 bucks. In today money that's 43 dollars. They were one of the cheapest chips you could get and they were amazing. They were marketed as the budget PII 300's. That's actually why the Celeron brand even survived as long as it did. The original Covington cores without the L2's were fairly junk and started them off on a bad note and people stayed away, but when the mendocino's with L2 dropped, with the price and stability they basically became renown and started selling in droves even up the chain to the ones that weren't really as overclockable. They got so popular that started pushing the fact that they were using Celerons, which was not something they were initially going to be. You don't normally push systems by blatantly telling people you're sticking cheap budget chips in them, but that's what they did because it branded up.

>>1824937
BALLS TO THE FUCKING WALL, man

I don't think it was common to overclock a 300a up to 1GHz. First retail 1 GHz CPUs from intel came out in 2000, and I guess a late 1999 Coppermine could reach 1 GHz through overclocking.

>>1827075
It needed water cooling to be done. So it wasn't exactly common, but it wasn't exactly difficult to do either.