Jump to content

Need help choosing the right 9x OS


Peffse

Recommended Posts

Well I'm scrapping together a machine here, and I want to experiment on it. So far, I have close to 4 machines. My main machine, currently an XP machine, a Gateway workhorse with a vanilla 98SE on it, a "work in progress" with Vista, and a Generic somethingoranother with no OS (450MHz AMD K6-II).

Anyhow, I'm putting together another computer... and was planning on having a 9x OS on it and modifying it with all the cool projects this forum has. I have valid keys for 95 OSR2, 98FE, 98SE, and ME... but honestly, there is so much going on here, I can't figure out what would be the best one to install. To make things worse (or better) I have so much hardware that I could possibly build two machines, so I don't know which pieces would be best for a 9x machine.

Parts:

Either an Athlon XP 1.4GHz, or Pentium 4 1.7GHz

Either two 128MB DDR PC2100, or one 512MB PC2700

Either an AGP Geforce 2 MX200, or PCI Geforce MX4000

Either an IDE 80GB WD, or an IDE 13GB Seagate

Like I said, I have the product keys to any 9x install. I'm leaning towards 98SE, since it looks like it can be updated with ME files, has more service packs and can be changed visually with RP7. But that might be pointless if ME has more features built into itself (I've never used ME) and supports RP7 or something. Or maybe it's 95 that's the most fun to modify, considering how old and simple it is.

As an afterthought... I wonder how hard drivers would be to come by. All 9x machines I've used were built for 9x (which is part of the reason I'm doing this).

Link to comment
Share on other sites


Its a personal choice.

I like Win98SE. Very mature product in the Win9x lineup. Basically Win98 with a major service pack! For that reason it is still well supported by a dedicated online community.

WinMe had many new features that never really got a good shake down. Microsoft moved on before it had time to do so.

Win95 is the way to go if you want the a no fuss Win9x OS especially if you dread Internet Explorer.

I install:

Win98SE + Maximum Decim Cumulative Update

IE6 SP1 + Maximus Decim Cumulative Update

DirectX 9.0c December 2006

Windows Media Player 9

I use Firefox 2 as my browser, Thunderbird for my Email and I couldn't be happier!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Well, basically I'm looking for the version with the most projects. Which looks like Win98SE right now.

Assuming that I install Win98SE, which hardware set would be the best then? Would both work equally as well?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

98 has plenty of AGP support :) That is only limited by your mainboard. Out of the setups the setup I would recommend as the main one would be:

Parts:

Athlon XP 1.4GHz [i'm an AMD nut]

512MB PC2700

PCI Geforce MX4000

IDE 80GB WD

I recommend the PCI GF4 of the two because the AGP GF2 you have will be overall slower than the PCI GF4 (correct me if I'm wrong). Also, I've discovered the GeForce 4000 to be VERY overclockable by up to 50% stable as long as you screw on a small fan to it's passive heatsink.

Edited by Chozo4
Link to comment
Share on other sites

98 has plenty of AGP support :) That is only limited by your mainboard. Out of the setups the setup I would recommend as the main one would be:

Parts:

Athlon XP 1.4GHz [i'm an AMD nut]

512MB PC2700

PCI Geforce MX4000

IDE 80GB WD

I recommend the PCI GF4 of the two because the AGP GF2 you have will be overall slower than the PCI GF4 (correct me if I'm wrong). Also, I've discovered the GeForce 4000 to be VERY overclockable by up to 50% stable as long as you screw on a small fan to it's passive heatsink.

I would go with the AGP video card. PCI has a bandwidth of about 100 MB/s. AGP 4X has a bandwidth of 1 GB/s. BIG difference. The machine I am posting this on is also a "home brew" machine. I built it originally as a 1.6 GHz PIV with a PCI based nVidia 5200 card. On web sites with a lot of heavy Flash animation, the machine chugged a little, so I decided to try out an AGP card. I bought a low end nVidia 6200 based card and was astonished at the performance improvement when I put it in. Just amazing. The 6200 is pretty low end chip (stripped down 6800), but it ran rings around my 5200 card. I am assuming that AGP (4x in this case) was the major contributor.

So, I would go AGP. It also frees up a PCI slot for other use.

A while later, I upgraded my CPU to a 2.66 GHz PIV, and bumped my RAM up to 768 MB. It is a pretty zippy box at this point. However, the mobo will take up to a 3.06 GHz PIV HT. I just got one on eBay and it will be fun to see if there is any noticeable improvement. I am not expecting much; just doing it for the fun.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 1 month later...

go for 98SE.

It has best flexibility for dos-stuff and it supports most of hardware, beginning from 98Se you can also use flash storage devices (they need drivers while ME usually dont).

About hardware support in w98SE: My system still runs 98SE in amd athlon xp3200, 1g mem, agp GF6800GT,SB live, 5*120Gt ata disk, dvd,some external usb HDs /camera,and NIC to 8mb adls.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

- Either an Athlon XP 1.4GHz, or Pentium 4 1.7GHz : Intel preferable if you do process mediafiles, video/mp3.

- Either two 128MB DDR PC2100, or one 512MB PC2700 : up to 1g all ok, just remember to add the systen ini: [vcache]/MaxFileCache=

setting if yuo have at lest 512 mem, you find info about that in this forum.

- Either an AGP Geforce 2 MX200, or PCI Geforce MX4000 : for games/video, go for agp. With those cpu's, graphics card is the major bottleneck, you could run even gf6600.

- Either an IDE 80GB WD, or an IDE 13GB Seagate : the more, the better? i saw someone did break 120G barrier somewhere in this forum too. And ms fdisk needs to be updated if you use that for partitioning disk over 64Gb, see ms Q263044.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Parts:

Either an Athlon XP 1.4GHz, or Pentium 4 1.7GHz

Either two 128MB DDR PC2100, or one 512MB PC2700

Either an AGP Geforce 2 MX200, or PCI Geforce MX4000

Either an IDE 80GB WD, or an IDE 13GB Seagate

1. If you can, get a Sempron instead of an Athlon XP. A 1.4GHz Sempron (2200+) should beat both a 1.4GHz Athlon XP (1600+) and a 1.7GHz Pentium 4. If you cannot, I'd go Athlon XP.

2. 512 MB

3. Probably the GF2 MX because it's AGP, but I'd really try to get an AGP-based MX4000 (or a 6200, if you are willing to pay a little more, though even a GF4 Ti 4200 should be better than both of your options).

4. 80GB WD

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...