Running older Windows 98 games

86 5.0L

86 5.0L

Supreme [H]ardness
Joined
Nov 13, 2006
Messages
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Hey guys looking to run some older PC games, namely Janes USAF, I tried VMware but found out the 'driver' wasnt able to run 3D games, now im thinking of picking up parts to build the ultimate Windows 98 machine, any other ways out there?
 
building an old gaming computer is the definately the most fun way of doing it.. Especially if you want to play any old Glide games..

a pair of voodoo2's can be had for pretty cheap (Put a WTB in the FS/T forum usually works)..

my old gaming PC is

FX5900
AMD 3400+
Voodoo2 SLI (12Mb BlackMagics)
Win98SE
Audigy1 (sound blaster for the old dos games)
768Mb of DDR
 
86 5.0L said:
Hey guys looking to run some older PC games, namely Janes USAF, I tried VMware but found out the 'driver' wasnt able to run 3D games, now im thinking of picking up parts to build the ultimate Windows 98 machine, any other ways out there?
Click to expand...
You have to specifically enable 3D acceleration in VMWare, I believe it can emulate up to DirectX7 fairly well.

For anything above that there's SwiftShader, which is a software Direct X 9 renderer that I've used to successfully run Half Life 2 (in DX9 mode) inside of VMWare.

Side note: It appears Janes USAF works naively on Vista if run in Windows 98/ME compatibility mode.
 
Unknown-One said:
You have to specifically enable 3D acceleration in VMWare, I believe it can emulate up to DirectX7 fairly well.

For anything above that there's SwiftShader, which is a software Direct X 9 renderer that I've used to successfully run Half Life 2 (in DX9 mode) inside of VMWare.

Side note: It appears Janes USAF works naively on Vista if run in Windows 98/ME compatibility mode.
Click to expand...

I managed to run almost all my Win98 games under XP64, the biggest hurdle were the installers, more so the 16bit ones. Some games I could modify the installer so it worked on XP64, but others I had to install the games on a VM and make a new installer (back then there was no 3d acceleration in vmware).

Games like rogue squadron and moto racer were some of my first "conversions"

Now that VMware supports 3d acceleration I think its a better alternative.
 
H-street said:
building an old gaming computer is the definately the most fun way of doing it.. Especially if you want to play any old Glide games..

a pair of voodoo2's can be had for pretty cheap (Put a WTB in the FS/T forum usually works)..

my old gaming PC is

FX5900
AMD 3400+
Voodoo2 SLI (12Mb BlackMagics)
Win98SE
Audigy1 (sound blaster for the old dos games)
768Mb of DDR
Click to expand...

Out of curiousity, are those the V2's I sold you? :p

Also...has anybody ever got Glover to work on any 98+ system? (Game got bad reviews....but I liked it)
 
86 5.0L said:
Hey guys looking to run some older PC games, namely Janes USAF, I tried VMware but found out the 'driver' wasnt able to run 3D games, now im thinking of picking up parts to build the ultimate Windows 98 machine, any other ways out there?
Click to expand...

That's what I did. Pentium 3 733, 256MB RAM, ATI Xpert 128 16MB, Windows 98SE. Runs all my old games just fine.
 
Tried Wine on Linux?

I built a "legacy" system running Windows 98SE with a P3 800MHz S370 CPU, 512MB RAM, TNT2 + Voodoo2 SLI, SB16-compatible sound card, MPU-401 compatible MIDI-interface, 5¼" floppy drive, ZIP100 drive and a 3Com 3C905B. That's my only system that runs Grim Fandango properly. A Radeon 9000-series with DX9 would be better though. What do I use it for? A few old games, and some DOS software for my MIDI synthesizers, I have a bootable ZIP with DOS 6 and the apps on it. There are many drivers to load from config.sys and autoexec.bat that would otherwise be lengthening the Windows boot time.
 
++ on building a dedicated retro system. I got mine mostly for free with a Rage Pro Turbo and a dying hard drive. $45 of ebay and amazon parts got me a TNT2 Pro, V2 12MB SLI and a 40GB HD.

I was getting frustrated trying to run really old stuff under Vista.
 
Another vote for a retro build, I built mine about 1.5 years ago, haven't had the time i'd like to play on it though.

Rig in sig.
 
I'm waiting for a glide,dx5,6,7-->dx10 wrapper or something that emulates all the features thru shaders.

I would have my x1650 gt iceq in my machine, but nothing will even let me uninstall/install drivers back and forth with my 8800 gt in there, so I'm just waiting till the day someone makes a wrapper.

I'm definitely going to make donations when it's started.

it's just killing me that a voodoo5 is still the very best way, imo, to play old games.
 
I have a P3 850 I'm thinking of turning into a retro machine.
Right now it's running XP sp3 with a GF4 Ti4200 and 512mb ram serving as the wife's email, web surfer.
When I give her my P4 when I go to a new rig will my old copy of Windows 98, non SE version be allright for the retro box?
I have a brand new Voodoo 3 2000, TNT2 ultra,Sound Blasters etc.
I'm just concerned about the Win98 os not being the "SE" version and if that will complicate matters.
 
can I get away with a more updated system, say a P4, Nvidia FX5500(or so)
 
Windows 98 non-SE doesn't work with CPUs over 1.2GHz. Otherwise, as long as your boot HDD controller can be loaded with the standard IDE drivers, you stay at a max of 512MB RAM and use a GPU supported by 98, any system would work.
 
Stoly said:
Now that VMware supports 3d acceleration I think its a better alternative.
Click to expand...
Unknown-One said:
You have to specifically enable 3D acceleration in VMWare, I believe it can emulate up to DirectX7 fairly well.
Click to expand...
heelix said:
Update to VMWare 6.5 - they added support for DX9 now.
Click to expand...

Whoa, whoa, whoa! Hold on a minute!

VMWare may support certain aspects of 3D acceleration, but this support is limited to only Windows 2000 and above. As for Windows 98, you're pretty much obligated to build a dedicated machine for gaming. (Shouldn't be a problem. Really, really cheap!)

Or dual-boot, if your main computer's old enough. (Think ~2004 or earlier)
 
Janes USAF?

All I care about from Windows 95/98 are really the big hits.. I do have starcraft, diablo, diablo 2, doom/quake, rainbow six (some of the series), a few others.

Most of the big hits can easily be played on a new machine. But ya, if you wanna some of the not so big hits, you need a retro pc.

Esp. when your talking Janes. I had fun with that in the past, but IMO a flight sim or any type of combat aircraft sim should have good graphics.

Their the types of games that you really notice everything.

But hey, your playing Janes, which was a classic, and not trying to play a Sega Master System combat game with 5 fps (cough Top Gun)
 
86 5.0L said:
Hey guys looking to run some older PC games, namely Janes USAF, I tried VMware but found out the 'driver' wasnt able to run 3D games, now im thinking of picking up parts to build the ultimate Windows 98 machine, any other ways out there?
Click to expand...

It's sad, virtually none of the emulators out there (Virtual PC, or VMWare) can run 3D games. Hell, not even 2D games. Since the older Command & Conquer games (made in the mid ninties, DirectX 3) would have random crashes on my Windows XP and Win 2000 system I thought "Oh yeah I will run C&C Red Alert in an emulator in Windos 98 and all will work well!" (My 8800GTX does not have Windows 98 drivers available so I can't actually install it).

Well Virtual PC had horrible issues with the sound (making it unplayable) and VMWare would not let the game launch due to an error about a video buffer.

PC emulators suck. They are pretty much useless unless you are using desktop applications... it's quite sad. :mad:

GushpinBob said:
Whoa, whoa, whoa! Hold on a minute!

VMWare may support certain aspects of 3D acceleration, but this support is limited to only Windows 2000 and above. As for Windows 98, you're pretty much obligated to build a dedicated machine for gaming. (Shouldn't be a problem. Really, really cheap!)
Click to expand...

See, that's the problem. Usually if you're using an EMULATOR it's because you are running OLD SOFTWARE. Yet they only implement 3D support in VMWare for Windows 2000 and above? How exactly does that make sense to them? There's no reason one should have to build a dedicated Windows 98 gaming machine. Emulators should just work.
 
450 said:
Out of curiousity, are those the V2's I sold you? :p

Also...has anybody ever got Glover to work on any 98+ system? (Game got bad reviews....but I liked it)
Click to expand...

yea its that same pair.. i have another machine i am building with a pair of Diamond Monster 12Mbs and a Geforce 1 but that is just more to build for fun. it won't be played much..

i've got quite a few of the 3dfx line..

My original Purchased Orchid Righteous voodoo1 (The Click!!!)
3 sets of Voodoo2 SLIs (including my original Voodoo2 8mb SLi set)
Voodoo Banshee
Voodoo3 2k pci
Voodoo3 3k agp
Voodoo3 3500
Voodoo4 4500
Voodoo5 5500
Voodoo5 5500 PCI w/DVI flashed to work on a PC. (The dvi model was a mac version)

a couple that i'd love to get my hands an are the Obsidian Quantum X24 (24Mb Voodoo2 built in SLI), and maybe a Voodoo Rush (The failed 2d +3d offering), and ofcourse a Voodoo5 6k (probably would never be able to afford one)..

i'm almost finished with my play through on System Shock 2 and the old game library is getting bigger each month (i love it, 5$ games woot!)


If you build a retro machine make sure to get an audigy or some creative card, they work best with the old dos games (the sound setup). there is a Dos Setup on the audigy CD that gets the Dos games working great.
 
Zellio2009 said:
Janes USAF?

All I care about from Windows 95/98 are really the big hits.. I do have starcraft, diablo, diablo 2, doom/quake, rainbow six (some of the series), a few others.

Most of the big hits can easily be played on a new machine. But ya, if you wanna some of the not so big hits, you need a retro pc.

Esp. when your talking Janes. I had fun with that in the past, but IMO a flight sim or any type of combat aircraft sim should have good graphics.

Their the types of games that you really notice everything.

But hey, your playing Janes, which was a classic, and not trying to play a Sega Master System combat game with 5 fps (cough Top Gun)
Click to expand...

haha its one of the few Win98 games I have left, I might try finding the hit games I never got to play since my OS upgrade path consisted mainly of Win ME
 
While on the topic of retro builds, Mine has built-in audio and a few dos games won't run on the built-in trying all settings. I can disable the onboard sound, just aquired a few SoundBlaster Live PCI cards around, will these work ok or should I just get a ISA Soundblaster 16 off ebay?!? Dang Redneck rampage / shadow warriow / duke nukem for being too good not to keep!
 
There is a dos driver that comes with most of the soundblaster cards, works great for dos games.
 
H-street said:
yea its that same pair.. i have another machine i am building with a pair of Diamond Monster 12Mbs and a Geforce 1 but that is just more to build for fun. it won't be played much..

i've got quite a few of the 3dfx line..

My original Purchased Orchid Righteous voodoo1 (The Click!!!)
3 sets of Voodoo2 SLIs (including my original Voodoo2 8mb SLi set)
Voodoo Banshee
Voodoo3 2k pci
Voodoo3 3k agp
Voodoo3 3500
Voodoo4 4500
Voodoo5 5500
Voodoo5 5500 PCI w/DVI flashed to work on a PC. (The dvi model was a mac version)

a couple that i'd love to get my hands an are the Obsidian Quantum X24 (24Mb Voodoo2 built in SLI), and maybe a Voodoo Rush (The failed 2d +3d offering), and ofcourse a Voodoo5 6k (probably would never be able to afford one)..

i'm almost finished with my play through on System Shock 2 and the old game library is getting bigger each month (i love it, 5$ games woot!)


If you build a retro machine make sure to get an audigy or some creative card, they work best with the old dos games (the sound setup). there is a Dos Setup on the audigy CD that gets the Dos games working great.
Click to expand...
Does your voodoo 5 dvi do centering, or do you have to rely on your monitor to scale?
 
so lets sat I pick a system similar to the one posted

FX5900
AMD 3400+
Voodoo2 SLI (12Mb BlackMagics)
Win98SE
Audigy1 (sound blaster for the old dos games)
768Mb of DDR

what can I change/add to make it a better Win98SE machine? 1GB of RAM? better GPUs?
 
Cornflake said:
See, that's the problem. Usually if you're using an EMULATOR it's because you are running OLD SOFTWARE. Yet they only implement 3D support in VMWare for Windows 2000 and above? How exactly does that make sense to them? There's no reason one should have to build a dedicated Windows 98 gaming machine. Emulators should just work.
Click to expand...

Virtual machines aren't usually emulators. The difference between a VM and an emulator is that a VM emulates some hardware with combination of real hardware from the host whereas an emulator, well, emulates all of the hardware for a guest. I guess Qemu would be an exception, though.

Anyway, it does suck that VMWare made the decision to not include 3D acceleration support with their Windows 9x video drivers. At the very least, I wish they would make some kind of product, in collaboration with Microsoft, that would virtulize a Win95-98 environment geared towards all games created between 1995-2002, with full DirectX 8/OpenGL/Glide support (DirectX 9 was released in the midst of XP's lifetime, so why include it). Think of it as a DOSBox for Windows games.
 
Well, the original Command & Conquer 95 works on Wine ;-)

what can I change/add to make it a better Win98SE machine? 1GB of RAM? better GPUs?
Click to expand...
Normally, Win98SE can't let you use more than 512MB without crashing, and it's 256MB for Win98.

This tells you how to use 1GB max:
http://aumha.org/win4/a/memmgmt.htm

There are possibly other fixes by copying WinME files to 98, but I haven't looked.

By the way, 98 uses half the RAM compared to NT OSes. A lot of memory isn't necessary.
 
DragonMaster said:
By the way, 98 uses half the RAM compared to NT OSes. A lot of memory isn't necessary.
Click to expand...

Why is that? Is it because the OS still has many 16-bit components?

Also I remember Windows 98 being fairly snappy on 64-128MB. I'm amazed I have 4096MB in my current box.
 
I guess, the memory requirements are always half of NT in spec sheets. I think a 64-bit OSes take twice the amount of RAM a 32-bit OS uses as well.
 
anything DX8.1 or more.. at minimum you want DX8.1 since that'll cover pretty much any old game..

Personally if i could i'd put an old ATI 97/800 Pro AGP in the system with a pair of Voodoo2 12Mbs. I just happen to have an FX5900 laying around.. the 9800 is the last card they actually support under Win98.


if you do run into problems with too much memory in the system win98 has a setting you can limit it to whatever you want.. but at 768Mb i haven't run into any compatability problems with games or the system.
 
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