sepultribe wrote:

as for what nforce4max said, i think sp2 is a good compromise between speed and stability. sp3 might be "safer", but with each update and service pack installed you certainly lose some speed, especially low spec machines.

But why, exactly? Was there something in particular that radically changed with SP3 that suddenly made XP start consuming more resources? (I might have thought the jump from SP1 to SP2, with its radically different security features, would have made more of an impact.)

F2bnp wrote:

Turns out none of them had an Intel chipset, all of them had SiS and Via chipsets... Had a Prescott 3.2 with 1GB RAM a couple of months ago with an 865PE chipset and it was extremely fast!

I'd have to wonder if you had the right drivers installed, particularly for the IDE controller.

Wow so many good helpful replies, thank you to everyone!!

Jorpho wrote:

Didn't we go through a lot of this in your other thread?

That was a different computer for a multi-purpose idea, there is no idea of "FSB scaling" and "slow down" involved here. Simply put, I'll limit the K6-2 for slower speed for dos, and run this system for everything else. I'm sure you're familiar with the two system compromise most people run into when trying to play retro games, etc...

Iris030380 wrote:

I mention drivers as you will want to install a detonator around the time of 2002. I seem to recall that System Shock II (and all games based on that engine) broke with a certain release of the detonator circa 2005. You can get the most of your Ti4400 with the 50 or 53 driver.

Not really true, had a lot of fun (or scare more appropriately) with System Shock 2 on the latest release drivers, 280.something. I was using a 6800gt though.

Jorpho wrote:

F2bnp wrote:

Turns out none of them had an Intel chipset, all of them had SiS and Via chipsets... Had a Prescott 3.2 with 1GB RAM a couple of months ago with an 865PE chipset and it was extremely fast!

I'd have to wonder if you had the right drivers installed, particularly for the IDE controller.

I did! I just hate these chipsets. Loaded on of those PCs again a few weeks ago and after using it for about a day it could never boot into Windows again. Go figure. 🙄

For the record, EVERY game that even mentions NT or 2000 will run fine in XP. I have about 30 games on my voodoo 5 rig that runs XP. None have any issues that was caused by the OS. I have had some 3D issues but that is not XP's fault. The MAIN games I play on this system are Quake 3 and unreal tournament and obviously any game that uses those engines. I would build the 3.2 pentium 4 rig, if presented the options you listed. Mostly because of how EASY it would be to build. I can see it now:

Asus p4c800e/dlx or abit IC7-max3

intel 3.4ghz EE processor http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_nkw=sl7ch&_sa … 58058&_from=R40

3gb ram (2x 512 & 2x 1gb) or 4x 512's

ATI 4670 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?It … N82E16814161337

Audigy 2

2x gigabyte I-ram in raid for boot drive (trust me on this) http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_nkw=iram+giga … 58058&_from=R40

That would give you a BITCHIN s478 setup. This would have been a "dream" setup in 03-04

Yeah well, other than the fact there was nothing near the power of a 4670 in 2004. 😜
The EE isn't worth it IMO, way too expensive. Just get a Northwood 3.4 and you'll be fine and cool, especially compared to a Prescott 3.4

F2bnp wrote:

Yeah well, other than the fact there was nothing near the power of a 4670 in 2004. 😜
The EE isn't worth it IMO, way too expensive. Just get a Northwood 3.4 and you'll be fine and cool, especially compared to a Prescott 3.4

I thought the same thing. Most people had 3.2 p4's. I was one of them, but EVERYONE I know drooled over the EE's. In all honesty, building a socket A system is better for this time period. I was looking at video card prices on ebay, and to get a "period" gaming card will run you almost as much as a new 4670.

Also, I was listing things that were regarded as "best in slot".

Not really. Socket A was a poster boy for craptastic chipsets. NForce 2 seems great, never tried it though. Also, the Athlon XP had already started to trail behind the Pentium 4 by this point. Athlon 64 is another story though, never tried one of them though, so I can't really say if it would be preferable to a Pentium 4.

n3xu5 wrote:

I'm considering building one of three possible machine configurations for 9x-Xp gaming. Either a P3 Tualatin 1.4, a dual P3 Tual […]
Show full quote

I'm considering building one of three possible machine configurations for 9x-Xp gaming. Either a P3 Tualatin 1.4, a dual P3 Tualatin 1.4, or a P4 3.2-800 Northwood.

-512mb-1gb memory depending on the cpu config.
-SB Live 5.1
-Windows Xp

If this is going to be a Win XP build then all of the above configurations suck- Especially the Tualatins, single or dual. (edit: ok, maybe the NW doesn't suck too hard- just remember to give it enough ram) Sorry but that's the hard truth. You'll be really limited by the motherboards/ ram. I ran XP on my 1.6ghz/ 512mb Tually system for a while doing benchmarks and stuff, but it was painfully slow by modern standards. For Win98 though it's a beastly system.

n3xu5 wrote:

1. Are there any incompatibilities of running 1996-2001 games with a faster processor?

Nope. Faster = better for games in that time frame.

n3xu5 wrote:

2. From the previously listed three, which cpu config would be better for gaming (no internet) on windows 96-2004 titles?

For XP? Northwood by a mile. A64 or Core 2 by 100 miles. Phenom/ Core i, probably 6 million miles.

n3xu5 wrote:

3. Most of the games (i'm interested in) around 2002-2004 recommend playing with a 800Mhz-1Ghz+ processor, how would the Tualatin fair up at stock speeds with games from that 2 year span?

Games from that era were notorious for understating their cpu requirements, primarily to enlarge their potential market base by duping non savvy consumers into thinking their P3 (which many people had at the time was capable of running the latest DX8/9 titles).

Have a look at this list of popular games from 2002-2004 with recommended CPU requirements per the developer's claims.

2002
Age of Mythology Athlon 1Ghz
Beach Life Pentium III 800Mhz
Dungeon Siege Pentium II 333Mhz
Grand Theft Auto III Pentium III 450Mhz
Heroes of Might and Magic IV Pentium II 300Mhz
Mafia: City of Lost Heaven Pentium III 700Mhz
Medal of Honour Allied Assault Pentium III 450Mhz
Medieval: Total War Pentium II 350Mhz
Need for Speed Hot Pursuit 2 Pentium III 800Mhz
Neverwinter Nights Pentium III 800Mhz
No One Lives Forever 2 Pentium III 1000Mhz
Star Wars II Jedi Outcast Pentium III 500Mhz
The Elder Scrolls 3 Morrowind Pentium III 800Mhz
Unreal Tournament 2003 Pentium III 1000Mhz
Warcraft III - Reign of Chaos Pentium III 600Mhz

2003
Age of Mythology - The Titans Athlon 1Ghz
Call of Duty Pentium III 600Mhz
Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Pentium III 800Mhz
Halo: Combat Evolved Pentium III 733Mhz
IL-2 Sturmovik: Forgotten Battles Pentium III 1000Mhz
Max Payne 2 Pentium 4 1.7Ghz
Need for Speed Underground Pentium III 700Mhz
Neverwinter Nights: Hordes of the Underdark Pentium III 800Mhz
Neverwinter Nights: Shadows of Undrentide Pentium III 800Mhz
Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time Pentium III 800Mhz
Rise of Nations Pentium III 500Mhz
Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic Pentium 4 1.6Ghz
Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell Pentium III 800Mhz
Warcraft III- Frozen Throne Pentium III 600Mhz
XIII Pentium III 700Mhz

2004
Call of Duty: United Offensive Pentium III 600Mhz
Far Cry Pentium 4 2.0Ghz
Half Life 2 Pentium 4 2.4Ghz
IL-2 Sturmovik: Ace Expansion Pack Pentium III 1000Mhz
IL-2 Sturmovik: Pacific Fighters Pentium III 1000Mhz
Lord of the Rings: The Battle for Middle Earth Pentium 4 2.0Ghz
Need for Speed Underground 2 Pentium III 933Mhz
Painkiller Pentium 4 2.4Ghz
Prince of Persia: Warrior Within Pentium III 1000Mhz
Sacred Pentium 4 1.5Ghz
Sid Meier's Pirates! Pentium 4 2.0Ghz
Vampire The Masquerade Bloodlines Athlon 1.2Ghz
Warhammer 40000: Dawn of War Pentium III 1000Mhz
World of Warcraft Pentium 4 1.3Ghz

Most run like arse and look like arse on a P3, Tualatin or no Tualatin (2003 titles start slowing down, 2004 titles definitely limited all round). The chip is moderately powerful, but motherboard, ram, slow bus, etc, issues really drag things down.

Far Cry, HL2 and Vampire The Masquerade can make even a well sorted A64/ Prescott/ Pentium D system sweat.

n3xu5 wrote:

4. I've been considering running a Geforce 4 ti4400 and possibly a pair of Voodoo 2's in SLI, will the ti4400 be a better performer in glide titles than V2 SLI?

Glide is 3dfx's proprietary API, so they're not directly comparable. Where Direct X is supported, the Ti is miles better in speed and quality. Example NFS: PU, V2 SLI only supports 800x600. It runs speedily enough with no hiccups, but at that low res, no AA, and 16 bit colour. The ti runs the same games with all the bells and whistles at 1280x1024 32 bit with AA.

Still fun to run it in Glide with the V2s though- but this is for nostalgia freaks only.

n3xu5 wrote:

5. Is Directx 8 backwards compatible with DX-5,6,7, etc?

Yup.

n3xu5 wrote:

6. I'm considering the ti4400 because I've read Nvidia is reported to have a higher success rate of backwards compatibility with older gaming. Would this be a good "end of period" card to max most games prior to 2003?

Good card, using one myself. But on a Win98 system because for XP you're really better off going for something more modern.

n3xu5 wrote:

...if you have any suggestions or would do something differently please feel free to share.

If you're serious about building, then you're really looking at two systems here. One Win98 system with a Ti and V2 SLI for 96-01 games. And one XP rig, fast as you can build for 2002-2004. Minimum, probably a highly clocked Northwood/ 1gb ram/ GF 6800.

Just my 2 cents.

I think the systems you're suggesting are a bit too powerful.
Sure, developers used to announce lower requirements than were really required, but it wasn't that bad. I had a lot of fun playing games with my Celeron 900 and Celeron 2.4. I still think you will, unless you want AA and insane resolutions.

Far Cry and Half Life 2 ran at about 60fps on my Prescott 3.2, 2GB Ram (1GB would have been sufficient) and a 6800LE unlocked to 6800GT levels at 1280x1024 (with no AA of course). The Northwood 3.4 would do a little better I suppose. Far Cry also was a lot of fun on a Northwood 2.4 and GeForce 6600gt that I had earlier on that system. I was playing at High settings (not Ultra) and I was getting 35ish maybe 40fps, with a bit of swapping though. Very playable though!

Morrowind was way too demanding back then. My brother played the game on a Pentium 3 733 with 256mb RAM and a GeForce 2 MX. It seemed nice at the time, but I could never imagine myself playing it today on that kind of machine. No need to run it on a retro PC either, I'd just play it on my current rig with the Morrowind Overhaul mod which looks superb! " I will listen outlander, but make it quick!" 😁

nforce4max wrote:

1: No post DoS era games have a frame cap so speed issues with faster cpus are not an issue.

This is not entirely true. They're rare, but there ARE win9x specific games that are speed-sensitive and require slow CPUs or a CPU slowdown utility to run on newer systems.
Off the top of my head, I believe Wipeout XL has this problem, some of the Sega PC games (including Sonic and Knuckles collection -albeit only in window mode), and Outcast. (there's definitely others too, and some may have patches while others don't -I believe Outcast has no options beyond CPU slowdown or genuine low clock speed)

Of course, there's a variety of other software compatibility issues with various games running under different OSs, some with patches, some not, and some having driver issues with specific video cards or motherboards (usually not with specific CPUs though -aside from the issues with missing P5 instructions on the Cyrix 6x86/MII)

These are all problems I'm trying to sort through for trying to set-up my own "ideal" win9x gaming box (ideally, DOS+Win9x under 98SE). In the end, I may end up resorting to building 2 separate systems, 1 for DOS and speed-sensitive 9x games, and another for late-gen 9x games in general (that don't work under vista/7 -including games patched for XP that break in vista/7).

F2bnp wrote:

I think the systems you're suggesting are a bit too powerful.
Sure, developers used to announce lower requirements than were really required, but it wasn't that bad. I had a lot of fun playing games with my Celeron 900 and Celeron 2.4. I still think you will, unless you want AA and insane resolutions.

Maybe, but unless you really want a machine for a particular nostalgic reason I don’t see why you should limit yourself to older hardware and the attendant lower game settings. For Win98 gaming maybe, because more modern hardware can sometimes be wonky on it, but for an XP system?

The OP's queries sound to me like he hasn't had first-hand experience with XP era gaming and systems, so why the requirement for a system built using period parts? My apologies in advance if that's not the case, but the questions asked make it look that way to me.

In any case I do have a couple of nostalgia rigs too- a Prescott @ 3.6ghz/ 6800GS and a A64@2.5ghz/ Radeon X1950Pro, both lurking around this forum somewhere – but they were specifically built so that I could transport myself back to 2004-06. 🤣

F2bnp wrote:

Far Cry and Half Life 2 ran at about 60fps on my Prescott 3.2, 2GB Ram (1GB would have been sufficient) and a 6800LE unlocked to 6800GT levels at 1280x1024 (with no AA of course). The Northwood 3.4 would do a little better I suppose. Far Cry also was a lot of fun on a Northwood 2.4 and GeForce 6600gt that I had earlier on that system. I was playing at High settings (not Ultra) and I was getting 35ish maybe 40fps, with a bit of swapping though. Very playable though!

I get around that in Far Cry on my Prescott- high 50s everything at high to be exact. Prescott scales pretty well past 3ghz, so shouldn’t be much if any difference between it and NW.

HL2 runs great too, but that scene in the first part where the train rushes past makes it jam up and stutter. A64 is powerful enough to not do that. Core 2/ Phenom goes through the game like its Tetris.

All the same, last time I played Far Cry end-to-end was on an A64 X2 2.7ghz + 8800GT system at 1680x1050 16AA/ 8AF Ultra HDR etc. And last round with HL2 was on a Phenom II + GTX460 also maxed out at 1680x1050. They looked crazy fabulous at those settings.

F2bnp wrote:

Morrowind was way too demanding back then. My brother played the game on a Pentium 3 733 with 256mb RAM and a GeForce 2 MX. It seemed nice at the time, but I could never imagine myself playing it today on that kind of machine. No need to run it on a retro PC either, I'd just play it on my current rig with the Morrowind Overhaul mod which looks superb! " I will listen outlander, but make it quick!" 😁

Yeah, with a more powerful system you can enjoy all those old games patched with widescreen and texture mods and max out everything and make them look awesome. I think quite a few of them from the 2002-2004 era have nice mods to bring them bang up to date.

I've found the tualatin chips on ebay without an issue, but most of the boards the support tutalatin 1.4/512/133 is another issue in itself. I've found maybe 14 boards that support the chip but only 2 of them show up on ebay and are vastly over priced.

I do have a older system laying around and I'm thinking about trying it out on older games, last time I ran it was 2007 I think.

Asus P4P800
P4c 3.2Ghz / 800FSB
2GB DDR Ram
Geforce 6800GT
SB Live! 5.1

I wanted a retro time accurate piece to play older games on but due to the inflation of older tech I may have to hold off.
:sadface:

I agree about Farcry. If you are picky about constant 60 FPS and want to play with HDR and at Full HD that game is quite demanding.

I would definitely go for at least Core 2 Duo with a powerful graphics card like a 8800GT or even faster.

n3xu5 wrote:

I've found the tualatin chips on ebay without an issue, but most of the boards the support tutalatin 1.4/512/133 is another issu […]
Show full quote

I've found the tualatin chips on ebay without an issue, but most of the boards the support tutalatin 1.4/512/133 is another issue in itself. I've found maybe 14 boards that support the chip but only 2 of them show up on ebay and are vastly over priced.

I do have a older system laying around and I'm thinking about trying it out on older games, last time I ran it was 2007 I think.

Asus P4P800
P4c 3.2Ghz / 800FSB
2GB DDR Ram
Geforce 6800GT
SB Live! 5.1

I wanted a retro time accurate piece to play older games on but due to the inflation of older tech I may have to hold off.
:sadface:

Which boards support Tualatin?

n3xu5 wrote:

I've found the tualatin chips on ebay without an issue, but most of the boards the support tutalatin 1.4/512/133 is another issu […]
Show full quote

I've found the tualatin chips on ebay without an issue, but most of the boards the support tutalatin 1.4/512/133 is another issue in itself. I've found maybe 14 boards that support the chip but only 2 of them show up on ebay and are vastly over priced.

I do have a older system laying around and I'm thinking about trying it out on older games, last time I ran it was 2007 I think.

Asus P4P800
P4c 3.2Ghz / 800FSB
2GB DDR Ram
Geforce 6800GT
SB Live! 5.1

I wanted a retro time accurate piece to play older games on but due to the inflation of older tech I may have to hold off.
:sadface:

Which boards support Tualatin?

F2bnp wrote:

Not really. Socket A was a poster boy for craptastic chipsets. NForce 2 seems great, never tried it though. Also, the Athlon XP had already started to trail behind the Pentium 4 by this point. Athlon 64 is another story though, never tried one of them though, so I can't really say if it would be preferable to a Pentium 4.

I keep my old Socket A for nostalgic purposes- rebuilt that machine 3-4 times. I lost an Asus A7N8X-X m/b to lightning, then replaced it with an A7N8X (Deluxe, with onboard LAN, sound, and the NForce 2 chipset.) It originally went from a GeForce 5200 FX, to a 7900 GTS. Sadly, that card died as well. I think I threw it in my closet in hopes of resurrecting it by oven one day. (Should that ever prove successful, I'll quote Caleb from Blood, "I liiiiive again!")

Now I've got a 5900 GTX in there sandwiched in a Thermaltake Giant III heatsink, plus twin Voodoo II's for that added 3dfx flair. It's been running the same 2800 Barton core CPU for all this time. That thing plays 90% of my old games from that particular era, it's just a good, reliable PC. Some people remember the first girl they ever kissed. I remember the first computer I ever built. I know, it's sad. 🤣

sliderider wrote:

n3xu5 wrote:

I've found the tualatin chips on ebay without an issue, but most of the boards the support tutalatin 1.4/512/133 is another issu […]
Show full quote

I've found the tualatin chips on ebay without an issue, but most of the boards the support tutalatin 1.4/512/133 is another issue in itself. I've found maybe 14 boards that support the chip but only 2 of them show up on ebay and are vastly over priced.

I do have a older system laying around and I'm thinking about trying it out on older games, last time I ran it was 2007 I think.

Asus P4P800
P4c 3.2Ghz / 800FSB
2GB DDR Ram
Geforce 6800GT
SB Live! 5.1

I wanted a retro time accurate piece to play older games on but due to the inflation of older tech I may have to hold off.
:sadface:

Which boards support Tualatin?

Usually boards that have the Intel 815E chipset usually support Tualatin without much fuss but for VIA boards all I can say is not many. I only got two Tualatin supported boards now and one I am not sure even runs any more.

nforce4max wrote:

sliderider wrote:

n3xu5 wrote:

I've found the tualatin chips on ebay without an issue, but most of the boards the support tutalatin 1.4/512/133 is another issu […]
Show full quote

I've found the tualatin chips on ebay without an issue, but most of the boards the support tutalatin 1.4/512/133 is another issue in itself. I've found maybe 14 boards that support the chip but only 2 of them show up on ebay and are vastly over priced.

I do have a older system laying around and I'm thinking about trying it out on older games, last time I ran it was 2007 I think.

Asus P4P800
P4c 3.2Ghz / 800FSB
2GB DDR Ram
Geforce 6800GT
SB Live! 5.1

I wanted a retro time accurate piece to play older games on but due to the inflation of older tech I may have to hold off.
:sadface:

Which boards support Tualatin?

Usually boards that have the Intel 815E chipset usually support Tualatin without much fuss but for VIA boards all I can say is not many. I only got two Tualatin supported boards now and one I am not sure even runs any more.

Both our old Shuttle and IWill VIA S370 board explicitly mention Tulatin support . . . whether that includes the 512k cache models, I'm not sure. (the Tulatin 256 Celeron 1.3 GHz we have works fine though)

I'll have to check again for the specific models of those boards and more details in the manual. (I know the IWill board lacks ISA, but has onboard RAID)

sliderider wrote:

Which boards support Tualatin?

Confirmed Boards are:
Soyo SY-TISU
ASUS TUSL2-C
Intel D815EEA2U
Tyan Tomcat i815T (S2080)
ECS P6S5AT
supermicro P3TDDE
supermicro p3tde6-G
Abit ST6

Unconfirmed (Most likely Bios Update, etc):
Asus TUA266
Abit VH6T
Gigabyte GA-60XET
Gigabyte GA-60XET-C
Epox 3-VSA-2
Epox EP-3PTA
Iwill DVD266u-RN
Iwill DVD266R-U
MSI ms9105rl

sliderider wrote:

Which boards support Tualatin?

Native Support - Tualatin 1.4Ghz / 512 / 133

Confirmed Boards are:
Soyo SY-TISU
ASUS TUSL2-C
Intel D815EEA2U
Tyan Tomcat i815T (S2080)
ECS P6S5AT
supermicro P3TDDE
supermicro p3tde6-G
Abit ST6
Abit ST6-Raid

Unconfirmed (Most likely Bios Update, etc):
Asus TUA266
Abit VH6T
Gigabyte GA-60XET
Gigabyte GA-60XET-C
Epox 3-VSA-2
Epox EP-3PTA
Iwill DVD266u-RN
Iwill DVD266R-U
MSI ms9105rl