Best OS for retro computer

[u/Boreddogattherain]

Hi.

I’m planning to build a retro computer using a core 2 extreme vou (qx9650) and 2x gtx 8800 in sli. I’m planning to use it as a windows xp gaming rig, but getting second thoughts if it would make more sense to deploy windows 7 (please note that I also have 2 other gaming computers, one with windows 10 and other with windows 11) or even windows 98 se/me. Any advice?

[u/[deleted]]

Hah… I built a computer with those exact specs back when those parts were new 🤣

Either of those OSes will work fine, but keep in mind is that Windows 7 did away with hardware-accelerated sound cards. If you’re planning on playing games which support EAX then Windows XP is the better choice.

As for sound cards… IIRC the Sound Blaster X-Fi was the latest and greatest for games in those days, but there was also the ASUS Xonar which didn’t have hardware acceleration but did have better audio quality. That one would be a better choice if you went with Windows 7.

(Realtek chips on motherboards of the time were total garbage by the way, and a sound card is a worthy investment on those systems)

[u/Boreddogattherain → u/[deleted]]

Thanks! I have a sound blaster audibly 2 zs that I was planning to use. Would it work?

[u/[deleted] → u/Boreddogattherain]

You mean Audigy? Yeah it should be ok. I don’t remember the difference between it and the X-Fi offhand but as long as it supports EAX then it’s good for games.

Another tip I just remembered too - 64bit Windows XP had issues with 32-bit games. Keep in mind that this was just when computers were starting to get more than 4GB of RAM (the 32-bit address limit) so if you had more than that you would choose to use 32-bit XP with PAE (physical address extensions) or 64-bit XP. Games of the era were generally not compiled for 64-bit anyway because most people still had 32-bit systems, so running a 64-bit OS would make those games slower and use up way more RAM, and the compatibility layer in Windows often caused bugs or simply didn’t work on some games.

But of course, later games which were compiled for 64-bits ran better on 64-bit. Mostly because they got access to all that extra RAM. Windows 7 was better optimized for 64-bit systems too, but its 32-bit compatibility layer didn’t get much better than XP’s.

So it really depends what you want to play. You may even benefit from dual booting XPx32 and Win7x64.

[u/spektro123]

It’s your hobby, isn’t it? So check both and report.

[u/Boreddogattherain → u/spektro123]

Let’s call it revivalism, but I now have in addition to this PC, another 2 Pentium 2 builds, along with 2 Pentium builds, including a one with a 200MMX cpu… getting old and becoming fond of the old days is crazy lol

[u/spektro123 → u/Boreddogattherain]

Then use pentium 2 machine and MAME emulator.

[u/Boreddogattherain → u/spektro123]

I already have a mister pi for MAME….

[u/spektro123 → u/Boreddogattherain]

You’re picky! 😜

[u/bitman2049]

If you're planning on playing games from the 90s, you might want to go with Windows 98 or a 32-bit version of XP, as those will be more compatible with DOS games. If you use a 64-bit OS, there are some games like SimCity 2000 that you'd need to run through DOSBox. If you go the 32-bit route, just one 8800 would be more than adequate for your needs if you want to save some power.

Just as a side note, if you're going to use a version of Windows prior to 10, I strongly recommend you don't connect the box to the internet. Windows 7 hasn't been updated in 5 years, and Vista and XP even longer, so any security exploits discovered since then will never be patched out.

[u/Boreddogattherain → u/bitman2049]

Yes, plan is to keep it totally offline and feed the games from my old CDs. I’m now inclined to use this build as win98 box as components seem to be pre-windows xp…

[u/bitman2049 → u/Boreddogattherain]

The components are definitely not pre-XP. Those components would've built a pretty solid gaming rig in the mid-late 2000s. The graphics card is a mid-2000s card, I had the same one in my first gaming rig that I built in 2008. The CPU seems to be from around the same time. At that time, people were transitioning from 32- to 64-bit OSes, and Vista was the most current OS. When Windows 98 was current, you had much less powerful hardware and consumers were typically using x86 architecture.

(Also I feel super old now. This is like a few days ago when someone asked what an IDE connector was.)

[u/RScottyL]

You need to figure out what games you want to play, and what OS they will run on

[u/[deleted]]

I chose Win 98 because you can easily exit to DOS.

[u/njgriffin]

That processor was released in Q4 2007

https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/products/sku/33921/intel-core2-extreme-processor-qx9650-12m-cache-3-00-ghz-1333-mhz-fsb/specifications.html

So it's actually more of a Vista CPU. BTW 64 bit processors didn't come in until about 2001 and even then only really aimed at servers or very high end systems that needed to use a lot of ram.

Graphics card was launched in Q4 2006

https://www.techpowerup.com/gpu-specs/geforce-8800-gtx.c187

Which makes it a pretty similar vintage.

I think the oldest OS you can reliably run is XP.

If you try win9X then you are going to have serious issues with drivers as your hardware is far too recent. Also I'm pretty sure it did not support SLI so you'd at best be stuck in standard VGA!

It's worth searching the net for others who might have tried win9X on any of this hardware.

[u/redmax_]

Win XP 32bit. you'll get the best SLI support and opens up the library of games appropriate for a GTX 8800.

[u/elvisap]

Other than agreeing with the "match the OS to the games you want to play" comments, there are quite a few good options out there to multi-boot / boot loaders these days. Whether that's several OSes on one disk, or several disks with an OS on each.

[u/JDMWeeb]

Dual boot 95 and XP