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Latest Video Cards For Windows 95?


Bracamonte

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I remember having a "S3 Virge" graphic card that was pretty good for back then. Worked well under DOS and Windows 95, and I think Windows 3.1 too. You can probably find them pretty cheap now, and I'm sure there's drivers available somewhere. It beats the generic VGA cards that were common then.

If I were you, that's what I'd get, only because I'm familiar with it and that's all I used. I remember playing lots of Carmageddon back then and the S3 Virge was pretty good.

I don't know exactly what you need, but if you're looking for a decent video card that's better than VGA (256 colors 320x200; 16 colors 640x480), then I'd install a Cirrus Logic card. Make sure it's VESA compatible, and at least a Highcolor or Truecolor SVGA.

I guess those are my two recommendations. :)

Hope that helps. I haven't bought a video card in over ten years, mainly because computers now come with good enough graphics adapters and I'm not concerned with having the latest and greatest. But back then, just to view a Jpeg in more than 256 or 16 colors, you had to buy a graphic card. Times have changed though since the early nineties. Good luck.

Edited by ScrewUpgrading
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Using the 77.72 win9x Nvidia driver I was able to get an EVGA 6200 256mb PCI card and an Nvidia GeForce 6600 256mb AGP card to mostly work with Windows 95 OSR2. The 2-d drivers and 3D drivers work perfectly. The special Nvidia control panel, however, requires 98 and give a missing export error when it tries to start up. That is not really needed for basic operation though.

Surprisingly they still sell the EVGA 6200 cards at most computer stores. Probably because it is one of the few standard PCI cards available and is useful for adding additional monitors on newer boards that only have one PCIe16 video slot and several standard PCI slots. They work all the way up to Windows 7 too.

The GeForce 6xxx series was the last to have 95 drivers. Any earlier Nvidia card should also work well with 95.

BTW, some of the other threads - mainly about Windows 98 and Geforce 7xxx - mention issues with 512mb cards. Does that apply to 6xxx? Is that only an AGP issue?

Other good 9x cards: S3 Virge , Matrox Millennium II, 3DFX Voodoo 4/5. Plenty of ATI cards too but the drivers for those often had problems.

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I use ATi Radeon 8500 128MB's in my Windows 95 boxes. I have an original drivers disc for one from back when 95 was still supported.

Later ATi cards may work as well, but it's been a while since I tried experimenting with them. I think I had a 9200 working at one time, but I believe my 9800 XT's had some issues.

Note - there will be various errors about missing DLLs, exports, etc etc unless you be sure to install DX8 and several other updates before attempting to install any "newer" drivers. One DLL in particular that installers will complain about is MFC42.DLL. It is contained in the updates or it can be copied from a 98 machine.

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  • 1 year later...

I loaded Win 95 full version OEM cd onto my hard drive via a win95-98 boot disk and after I loaded the drivers for my Nvidia GeForce FX5200 256mb video card I got these errors. "The NVSVC.EXE file is linked to missing export USER32.DLL:EnumdisplayDevicesA." "Error loading C:\Windows\SYSTEM\NvCpl.dll. One of the library files needed to run this application cannot be found." What do I need to fix this and where can I find it?

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High Hoko!

I am using that very seme video card and have had the exact same problems you are describing. So I went into misconfig, and unchecked some of the Nvidia stuff that was starting when the PC boots up. This method got rid of those error boxes at startup, though a few features that are available for 98, 98se, and Me users are not there.

The card works otherwise though, so long as you do not fiddle a lot with precise settings etc.

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I loaded Win 95 full version OEM cd onto my hard drive via a win95-98 boot disk and after I loaded the drivers for my Nvidia GeForce FX5200 256mb video card I got these errors. "The NVSVC.EXE file is linked to missing export USER32.DLL:EnumdisplayDevicesA." "Error loading C:\Windows\SYSTEM\NvCpl.dll. One of the library files needed to run this application cannot be found." What do I need to fix this and where can I find it?

If the driver itself is working, you're in good shape. Try what SomeGuy and cyberformer suggested:

The special Nvidia control panel, however, requires 98 and give a missing export error when it tries to start up. That is not really needed for basic operation though.

High Hoko!

I am using that very seme video card and have had the exact same problems you are describing. So I went into misconfig, and unchecked some of the Nvidia stuff that was starting when the PC boots up. This method got rid of those error boxes at startup, though a few features that are available for 98, 98se, and Me users are not there.

The card works otherwise though, so long as you do not fiddle a lot with precise settings etc.

Remember though that MSCONFIG does not exist in 95 by default. You can copy it from a 98 machine or extract it from the Q239887 Hotifx which is named 4756US8.EXE. The Microsoft links at MDGx's are dead now... :(

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If I used a Rage 128mb video card on my 95 machine instead of the FX5200 256mb card would I still get the same errors? What is DX8 and where can i find it?

Edited by Hoko
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If I used a Rage 128mb video card on my 95 machine instead of the FX5200 256mb card would I still get the same errors? What is DX8 and where can i find it?

The Rage 128 should have complete 95 support. The errors you are seeing with the nVidia card MAY only be the "nVidia Control Panel" that runs in the System Tray. You do not NEED this in order for the driver to work properly. You may be able to simply disable it with MSCONFIG as suggested, and get rid of the error.

DX8 is DirectX 8. It is an update for Video/Audio "effects" under Windows. Usually required by games, etc. Version 8.0a is the last version that supports Windows 95. You should install it before attempting to use ANY "newer" video card such as your FX5200 because many of the newer cards require this to be updated.

Download and install these:

DCOM95 (required for DX8) and then DX8.

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  • 2 weeks later...

I use ATi Radeon 8500 128MB's in my Windows 95 boxes. I have an original drivers disc for one from back when 95 was still supported.

Later ATi cards may work as well, but it's been a while since I tried experimenting with them. I think I had a 9200 working at one time, but I believe my 9800 XT's had some issues.

Note - there will be various errors about missing DLLs, exports, etc etc unless you be sure to install DX8 and several other updates before attempting to install any "newer" drivers. One DLL in particular that installers will complain about is MFC42.DLL. It is contained in the updates or it can be copied from a 98 machine.

LC - What are those several other updates? When I installed the Nvidia GeForce FX5200 card with only DX8 installed, it still created all the missing DLL error messages. :huh:

Also, if I can't get away from these errors, how do you get MSConfig from Win98 and install it in 95?

Edited by Hoko
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LC - What are those several other updates? When I installed the Nvidia GeForce FX5200 card with only DX8 installed, it still created all the missing DLL error messages. :huh:

Also, if I can't get away from these errors, how do you get MSConfig from Win98 and install it in 95?

I only have 2 nVidia cards in all of my computer parts stockpile... I always used 3dfx (long ago :lol: ) and ATi cards, so I am not very familiar with nVidia... :}

I believe later versions of the nVidia Control Panel do not work on 95 at all. I seem to remember something about the 77.xx (??) release of ForceWare being the last version that works 100% under 95, but I can't remember where I got that information. :unsure: The later drivers may work, but the Control Panel itself does not.

Many of these may be unrelated, but besides DCOM95, and DirectX8, I always install the Winsock2 update, the Windows 95 Y2K update, Dial-Up Networking 1.4, Internet Explorer 5.5 SP2, and Windows Media Player 7 (or unofficial 7.1).

Should be able to get MSCONFIG from here...

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LC - What are those several other updates? When I installed the Nvidia GeForce FX5200 card with only DX8 installed, it still created all the missing DLL error messages. :huh:

Also, if I can't get away from these errors, how do you get MSConfig from Win98 and install it in 95?

I only have 2 nVidia cards in all of my computer parts stockpile... I always used 3dfx (long ago :lol: ) and ATi cards, so I am not very familiar with nVidia... :}

I believe later versions of the nVidia Control Panel do not work on 95 at all. I seem to remember something about the 77.xx (??) release of ForceWare being the last version that works 100% under 95, but I can't remember where I got that information. :unsure: The later drivers may work, but the Control Panel itself does not.

Many of these may be unrelated, but besides DCOM95, and DirectX8, I always install the Winsock2 update, the Windows 95 Y2K update, Dial-Up Networking 1.4, Internet Explorer 5.5 SP2, and Windows Media Player 7 (or unofficial 7.1).

Should be able to get MSCONFIG from here...

Many searches said I could download DCOM95 at this site but which link is the right one? http://www.microsoft.com/com/default.mspx

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Many searches said I could download DCOM95 at this site but which link is the right one? http://www.microsoft.com/com/default.mspx

:rolleyes:

Links already given. :lol:

I doubt you would be able to "easily" find it on Microsoft's site these days...

Download and install these:

DCOM95 (required for DX8) and then DX8.

Ah, ok :) I have already downloaded both of those and installed them. I forgot the first one was DCOM95

Edited by Hoko
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