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/vr/ - Retro Games

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9984537 No.9984537 [Reply] [Original]

Lets talk about configurations, real and virtual.
Obviously you can run a DOS 6.22 machine with a high-end VGA card and SB and Voodoo and use programs to disable the CPU's cache and slow it down to run the majority of DOS games without issue. I would much rather setup a range of DOS virtual machines in 86box/PCem and throw games/programs at those specific setups. So far I have three machines setup for playing old PC games.
(pic related)First is an Intel XT with a 4.77 8088 with 256KB of RAM using a Monochrome Display Adapter doing the old green and black look. Has two 360KB floppy drives and a 33MB HDD through an XTide adapter. Works great for all text-based DOS games and pre-CGA stuff. Runs DOS 3.30 due to larger HDD and floppy sizes being recognized.
Second is a late 80's/early 90's oriented DOS6.22 iDX4 at 100Mhz with 16MB of RAM and 2GB HDD. Graphics is a Trident TGUI 9440 VESA card, and sound is a SB Pro v1 with Roland MT-32 MIDI. Runs any pre-3D VGA DOS game with ease.
Last VM was put together just to see how well it would function. A copy of the second machine, but geared for Windows 3.11 for Workgroups, with a TCP/IP stack installed and the last browser ever released for Win3.11, Opera 3.62. Managed to browse textfiles dot com without crashing, but little else. Might be good if I can ever find someone interested in playing Win3.1 Metal Marines or CivNet against another human in this day and age, otherwise worthless.
Was thinking about rolling up a 286 CGA machine and a 386 EGA machine, and maybe a Pentium 2 Voodoo machine down the line. Been thinking about rolling up a Tandy/PCjr machine as well, given there was a short period prior to EGA where the Tandy/PCjr was superior to CGA.
Anyone have any specific configs/setups they wanna share?

>> No.9984924

>>9984537
>Second is a late 80's/early 90's oriented DOS6.22 iDX4 at 100Mhz with 16MB of RAM and 2GB HDD. Graphics is a Trident TGUI 9440 VESA card, and sound is a SB Pro v1 with Roland MT-32 MIDI. Runs any pre-3D VGA DOS game with ease.
This is pretty close to the last actual DOS machine I had (had GUS, not SB or MT-32). At the time, I never had trouble running any earlier games. So I don't know why you would bother with an XT... I never tried emulating it, but the slowness of the actual hardware I used once is burned into my brain. I could see the text getting drawn onto the screen, one character at a time. As I recall, compatibility problems were only really a problem with later games, mostly having the right SVGA card, the right sound card, and unloading TSRs to get enough conventional memory. Sometimes problems with extended versus expanded memory or the odd game that didn't work with EMM386 loaded.

>> No.9985708

>>9984537
RIght now I'm in the middle of trying to build a 486 dos gaming PC. This is a first time experience for me so I have no idea what I'm doing but I'm learning a lot of new stuff along the way. I have only picked out the motherboard and CPU I'm using. its an AMD 486 100 Mhz, and some motherboard that uses a SiS 496 with headers for IDE, Parallel and serial. For my video card, I think I'm going to try an ATI mach 64, or some s3 card. As for the sound card, I have no idea on what I'm gonna use. Most of the options that I would want are too expensive for my budget. I am eyeing the Orpheus 2 LT, and then buying a wavetable synth daughter board, but I'm open to suggestions for good cheap dos sound cards.

>> No.9985848

>>9984924
Because I'd much rather play text-based games on a monogreen MDA screen than the standard SVGA black and white. It can be a bit slow to load up the GWbasic games of the era, but it's still faster to load than a C64. I did copy over qbasic and edit from a more recent version of DOS though, since edlin is ass.

Just rolled up a 286 CGA machine and played around with Temple of Apshai. For anyone else who ever wanted to play it, Abdual is the password to get past the copyright protection.

>>9985708
I see a CT4170, which is basically a budget model SB16, on sale on ebay for $35 for a fully working and tested unit. That's pretty high-end for DOS, and it's ISA. Only way to do better would be to get one of the AWE32 or 64's in ISA.

>> No.9985858

Has anyone had success running interstate 76 in this? The physics are tied to the CPU timing and it’s hell trying to get it work on modern windows

>> No.9986791

>>9985858
I'll give it a go. Back with results in an hour or two.

>> No.9986947
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9986947

>>9984537
I would love to enjoy those halcyon fays I had in what I call the VGA times again. The two biggest hurdles I encountered are finding people willing/able to repair CRT monitors and confusion with power sources. Working on CRT monitors is life-threatening so the price for such dangerous work I imagine would be astronomical if I could even find someone with the knowledge moving towards extinction. Powering the old devices is also a minefield of confusion for me, since there's something like -5V or something that is needed which is no longer produced that these old parts may need; it's all really complicated and difficult for me to process in my old age. Even something more modern like the J-Win98SE build that I am closer to completion ran into the issue with power sources are designed to be mounted on the bottom of a case with a top-facing intake fan, when the ones I had back in the day were mounted on the top-rear of the case with bottom facing exhaust fans. There's so much difficulty that stalls these setups.

>> No.9987402

>>9986791
Trying to run it under 98 with 32MBs of RAM and a 133Mhz Pentium lead to a framerate of about 10-15. Using a Pentium Overdrive at 166Mhz and 64MBs of RAM gave a smoothish 24FPS. This is all under software, the D3D mode is even slower. Gonna download the Gold Edition of the game to try out the Glide renderer and see if that's any better.

>> No.9987675

>>9986947
Anyone still willing to work on a CRT would know the basics of discharging it, which isn't particularly difficult or dangerous.

>> No.9989559

Bump

>> No.9989594

>>9987402
Based, I think 24fps is actually the designed frame rate, so if it was giving you that I think that means it's working like a dream. Thanks for the update, I honestly forgot to come back to this thread and check until today.

>> No.9991354

>>9989594
Got silky smooth and playable 24FPS using a Pentium Overdrive MMX 200Mhz.