What retro things have you done today?

Thats a nice comparison vid mate. Think I did see it before but wasnt really aware about the soundcard fun back then.

Your recordings are so clear. Even on my best cards with shielded cables you can still hear noise if I try and record on them :(

I did hear my go-to game soundtrack(Transport tycoon deluxe) on my awe32 for the first time a couple of nights ago and it is the best I have heard in person.

Also got the 3d acceleration to work on dungeon keeper and this is the best way to play it by far! The dosbox version is either too slow or too fast and the software version bogs down after a while even on more powerful PCs.

I have come to accept that I have no real need for anything lower than my p3 now. It runs the few DOS titles I am interested in just fine. Unless I find some decent dry storage somewhere soon I might have to cull some systems.
 
I’m not furloughed, but WFH means I can easily multitask ;)

I was rifling through the loft today (mainly trying to find another laptop IDE CD-ROM or DVD-ROM drive, and found...

Another Voodoo 3 2000 AGP, I was sure I’d given one away when I (stupidly) gave my Voodoo 2 12MB cards (two of them) away in the mid to late 2000s.
 
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LewisRaz said:
Your recordings are so clear. Even on my best cards with shielded cables you can still hear noise if I try and record on them :(
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I didn't do anything special; just made sure everything was "line out" rather than speaker and "line in" rather than microphone. Recorded in Audacity making sure none of the "spikes" went beyond the maximum vol or hz range of the recording device (not the technical way of explaining it) and then letting Audacity amplify it to that maximum without causing any spikes (also means a consistent volume when listening to multiple recordings). Just normal 3.5mm cheapo cables.

I have come to accept that I have no real need for anything lower than my p3 now. It runs the few DOS titles I am interested in just fine. Unless I find some decent dry storage somewhere soon I might have to cull some systems.
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Yes, same for me. A slow Pentium 3 is fast enough for every DOS game I've come across at 640 * 680 with the exception of software Quake. It has ATX PSU and mounting holes, mature AGP, PS/2 ports, excellent 440BX chipset. What's not to love!
 
almoststew1990 said:
Yes, same for me. A slow Pentium 3 is fast enough for every DOS game I've come across at 640 * 680 with the exception of software Quake. It has ATX PSU and mounting holes, mature AGP, PS/2 ports, excellent 440BX chipset. What's not to love!
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Slowly coming to the same conclusion, plus you typically still get an ISA slot or two. My dual-p3 machines are easily my most versatile, they’ll run anything from DOS 6.22 through to XP without real issue.

I definitely want to get hold of a “+” model K6-2 or K6-3 though, as then I can use setmul to slow down for even the oldest DOS titles.
 
I just disable caches on the P3 or run at 66MHz FSB which would also slow down... Other stuff.

TBH I've never seen the appeal in the Pentium Era. Slot 1 is where it's at.

I'm an advocate of only needing a Slot 1 500MHz PC (with a voodoo 3 and ISA sound) for the vast vast majority of W98 and DOS gaming. Anything that needs a faster system will run on XP and P3s can still be slowed right down.

Collecting other systems because it's fun and you want to is another matter!
 
LewisRaz said:
Work?!?! Whats that! :D

Furlough since march 23rd - No return date yet!
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Same for me, although my place of work have announced they're looking at redundancies so will have to see how that goes.

Much like you lot I've been messing with retro PC hardware most days, but in terms of actual game playing on it... not a huge amount yet! Not that I don't want to, it's just between other things I've been playing PS1 games on the CRT in the other room, currently going through Chrono Cross. I have a backlog of PS1 stuff that's been put off for years, and this has been the best opportunity to tackle it! PC will get used soon enough though, want to finally complete Half Life and try a couple point and clicks that I missed.
 
hohum said:
Same for me, although my place of work have announced they're looking at redundancies so will have to see how that goes.

Much like you lot I've been messing with retro PC hardware most days, but in terms of actual game playing on it... not a huge amount yet! Not that I don't want to, it's just between other things I've been playing PS1 games on the CRT in the other room, currently going through Chrono Cross. I have a backlog of PS1 stuff that's been put off for years, and this has been the best opportunity to tackle it! PC will get used soon enough though, want to finally complete Half Life and try a couple point and clicks that I missed.
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That sucks mate! Hope you end up alright!

I have played a fair bit on the retro pcs too! Nothing interesting really tho just a few including startopia, max payne. TTDLX..
 
I'm working from home and get easily distracted so I try to avoid 'multitasking'. Plus my room gets too hot if I have an old PC on too!

I've come up with a dumb mini-project...

I've got a Soundblaster Live which does Soundblaster effects nicely but bad FM Synthesis.
I've got a C-Media8738 based card that does surprisingly nice FM synthesis but no SB effects at all (despite being set up correctly).
What if I run them at the same time?

Because they're both PCI I can mess with the IO addresses etc quite a lot. I'm going to try setting the SBL's FM synth address from 388 to something... different. 398 or 3E8 appear to be options? I'm then going to set the 8738's FM syth to default 388 if not already and then give it atypical IRQ, DMA, IO address etc so games don't by default send SB soundsto the 8738....

not sure if it will work!
 
Are 8800GT cards sought after or something? I had an 8800GT and 9800GT in my watch list for this Athlon 64 X2 shuttle, the 9800GT ended first so that got my money, I was the only bidder at £16.

The 8800GT is coming to a close within the next hour. Bidding started at £15, and is now up to £31, with at least a handful of bidders having a pop.

Now I know the 8800GT was first, but from what I remember, the 9800GT is essentially the same card, but on a smaller micron process (and as such cooler/lower power draw/higher clocking).
 
paradigm said:
Are 8800GT cards sought after or something? I had an 8800GT and 9800GT in my watch list for this Athlon 64 X2 shuttle, the 9800GT ended first so that got my money, I was the only bidder at £16.

The 8800GT is coming to a close within the next hour. Bidding started at £15, and is now up to £31, with at least a handful of bidders having a pop.

Now I know the 8800GT was first, but from what I remember, the 9800GT is essentially the same card, but on a smaller micron process (and as such cooler/lower power draw/higher clocking).
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I would imagine they are, because of their fairly legendary status - even if they do apparently have reliability issues. Definitely one to keep an eye out for. I'd much rather have something like a AMD 6570 or 6670 - no external power and probably a slightly more powerful!
 
almoststew1990 said:
I would imagine they are, because of their fairly legendary status - even if they do apparently have reliability issues. Definitely one to keep an eye out for. I'd much rather have something like a AMD 6570 or 6670 - no external power and probably a slightly more powerful!
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The FirePro V4900 I’ve already got in the Shuttle is essentially an HD6670 in all but name.
 
LewisRaz said:
I have come to accept that I have no real need for anything lower than my p3 now. It runs the few DOS titles I am interested in just fine. Unless I find some decent dry storage somewhere soon I might have to cull some systems.
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I've come to the conclusion recently myself and that's why this afternoon I have been photographing hardware ready to sell on. I've got too much stuff and not enough space and i'm better off moving on stuff i don't need or find interesting and get some cash for it.

I will be keeping my K3+and pairing it with my P3 system i'm putting together and put the 486 and my Pentium into storage. I like the Pentium 233 MMX as its a nice build with a Riva128 and Original Orchid Righteous 3d. All my cases and un-needed hardware is going.

I will be keeping a few unique pieces of hardware and my Sound Cards will be staying as those are something i'm really interested in.

I moved the Pentium 3 from the ATCS into a more fitting case. The ATCS is going to a friend as he has been banging on about buying it from me for ages.

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Thought I’d list what systems I have at present, and then ask some opinions on which you’d keep, which you’d move on, and if you’d make any build changes to spec. Listed in order of oldest (technology age, not how long I’ve had it) to newest.

Olivetti PCS-11 - 386SX and 8MB of RAM, has a working Conner 30MB HDD, its got two available ISA 16-bit slots (video, IDE and Floppy controllers are all onboard). This is complete and original, including CRT, keyboard and mouse. Though it needs a PSU as it’s dead. I’ve got it running by making an ATX to proprietary harness for it, but I can’t use it like this as the PCS-11 is SFF and looks ungainly with wires hanging out of it, connected to an external PSU.

Olivetti Philos Pentium 75 Laptop. Hinges need work, but other than that it’s complete and working.

Pentium 233MMX - 64MB of RAM, CF2IDE, Two CD-ROM drives, AWE64 value, S3 Virge. All built into a rather nice, clean, and undamaged AT desktop case that doesn’t need any retrobriting or other work. Plenty of available expansion, but rarely gets switched on!

AMD K6-3 450@500, 256MB RAM, Voodoo 3 2000 AGP, AWE64 Gold, USB 2.0, 32GB CF2IDE, DVD-ROM. This is the one in the hideous (yet alluring) Fujitsu case, with matching 5:4 LCD (1280x1024). Have been using this one for most of my retro gaming (DOS/9x) recently. Tempted to re-build this into the Pentium’s case (and vice versa). Still got an available ISA and PCI slot in here.

Apple iMac blueberry. 350MHz G3 256MB RAM, Running OS 9.

Slot-1 PIII 650. Abit BX board (forget the model number, I’d have to dig it out of the loft to check). 128MB RAM, TNT2 Ultra, 20GB HDD, Sound Blaster Pro, CD-ROM drive. Currently in my ATCS-210.

Dual-P3 1GHZ. Tyan Apollo Pro 133a board. 2GB RAM, SB Live 1024, Geforce 4 Ti4200, 2x 80GB HDD in RAID0. Currently running Windows 2000, housed in the ATCS-201.

Dual-P3 1.13GHz Tualatin. Epox Apollo Pro 133a board pin-modded to take Tualatin CPUs, 4GB RAM, SB Live 1024, Geforce 7800GT AGP, 2x 80GB HDD in RAID0. Currently running Windows 2000, housed in the ATCS-111.

Apple PowerMac G4 Cube. Dual G4-500MHz CPUs, 768MB RAM, 80GB HDD, Geforce 2MX, airport card. Also have the 20” Cinema display, keyboard and mouse for this. Running OS X 10.4.

Shuttle SB51G, Socket 478 Pentium 4 2.8GHz @ 3.15GHz. 2GB RAM, Quadro FX1000 (Geforce FX5800), 40GB HDD. Running XP SP1a.

Apple PowerBook G4, 1.13GHz CPU, 1GB RAM, 64GB IDE SSD.

Sun Ultra 40 Workstation. Dual Socket 940 Opteron 280 (2.4GHz), 16GB DDR, SLI GTX 480, 4x 500GB HDD in RAID 5. Running Server 2008 (not R2, so Vista).

Shuttle SK22G2 V2. Socket AM2 Athlon 64 X2 6000+ (not yet arrived), Geforce 9800GT (not yet arrived), 4GB RAM, 80GB HDD. Running XP SP3.

As you can see, this is taking up a bit of space (not to mention the newer stuff I have as well). I’ve also got mountains of ISA, PCI and AGP cards, as well as RAM, other motherboards, parts that don’t work (like both my 486 boards), extra CPUs (loads of S370, S462, S478) and suchlike. I’ve got a matched pair of S604 P4 Netburst Xeons that I was going to do something with.
 
I'd keep the Olivetti 386, tweak the P3 650 to have 256Mb of RAM and put the GeForce 4 in there and perhaps a voodoo 2. keep the dual tualatin build because that sounds awesome, and the am2 shuttle. That covers pretty much any DOS, W98 and xp era game.

Thats of course if you're only interested in playing games and not the specifics of the hardware!

Have you tried running relatively modern games on the dual Tualatin build? Like Oblivion or COD2?
 
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