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Skybuck's advise for ms-dos retro-gaming.



 
 
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Old January 27th 20, 11:12 PM posted to alt.comp.hardware.pc-homebuilt
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Default Skybuck's advise for ms-dos retro-gaming.

Hello,

Here is my preliminary conclusion for ms-dos retro-gaming:

1. Stick with your best windows computer and use dosbox whenever possible.
2. Gaming on real/old hardware is not advised for following reasons:

2.1 Stinky old computers.
2.2 Dirty old computers.
2.3 Limited storage space old computers.
2.4 Soundcards/drivers not working or missing.

If you are going to try gaming on old/real computers then I would advise the following:

3. Use the oldest computer you can find, preferably a 80486.
4. Use floppy disk to boot into computer, especially if windows is already on it and no ms-dos.

5. Make a really good boot floppy

AND FINALLY the master piece of advise:

!!!

6. USE FILE SERVER/FILE SERVER NETWORKING/NETWORK FILE SYSTEM.

!!!

Anything that can be used to connect your old computer to your super duper truper computer and use it as a file/drive server.

This way old computers can run software directly from ethernet/file servers, a much better solution, then trying anything else, usb is not possible, too slow, can't boot no boot menu, etc.

Also I may try: NFS or NTFS servers.

I actually haven't tried Tip 6 yet, but looking into it.

This seems the most promising technique, probably with my advise of 5, make a boot floppy, so C: and D: drives can stay intact as they are.

I replaced all my ms-dos based computers with windows 95/windows 98 and thus almost no ms-dos available anymore, except on pentium 166 with system commander/multi boot.

But the SB Live Value ! soundcard totally sucks for dos gaming.

For now I find DOS-BOX to have the best sound quality cause it is connected to my super duper truper 7.1 receiver ! LOL.

Also most of the old windows games are not worth it really more, better play the new ones.

However I do enjoy the old ms-dos games, there are some really cool gems in there, even games I never heard about.

So I still want to and will continue to do some more ms-dos gaming but probably mostly with dos-box.

I don't think even tip 5 and 6 in combination with a 80486 is worth it, but I might try anyway just to see what it would be like.

But I am a bit skeptical.

It's almost sad to say, but *real* ms-dos and *real old soundblaster cards* are basically DEAD.

The sound quality is almost not there in ms-dos and old computer system and I enjoy my DreamPC from 2006 much more than the old computers mostly.

So my investigation for now:

Give up on old ms-dos computer, stick with dosbox, don't wast your time on it, unless you enjoy technical problems like crazy ! =D

For me it was kinda interesting anyway though.

I can't really throw away or dump these old systems, still some interesting files on the harddisk, and can always function as backups.

For now trying to use old computers was a big disappointed... and using ms-dos edit was super annoying and all the typing into folders also kinda annoying.

Using windows 95/95 was a bit better.

Using windows xp was still better.

But windows 7 just takes the cake for now.

Windows 7 for now the best and easiest to use operating system ! =D

Haven't really tried windows 10, but there is very little point for now in trying windows 10...

My pentium III 450 mhz cannot boot into USB stick I think.

I tried Sparky Linux on USB stick... but there simply is no boot menu.

Maybe there is a way to boot into usb stick via floppies and such... but mhoaw... not too interested in that... Might check it out maybe sometime...

Oh actually I used Athlon 2600 XP as well... boy is it smelly. Computer from parents... kinda interesting, nice backup on there as well...

But again not really worth it that much, though the sound is kinda great on the simply speakers, at least no popping and clicking as with the soundblaster 16 on pentium III 450.

So in short:

1. Pentium 166 dismissed because SB Live Value! is crap for ms-dos gaming.
2. PentiumIII 450 dismissed because Soundblaster 16 sound is crap/noisy/popping.
3. Athlon XP 2600+ dismissed cause it's a stinky mother****er.

That leaves

4. 80486 (untried) (kinda dismissed because windows 95 takes all space and no more space on drive) and just 128 MB drive, NFS NETWORK FILE SYSTEM might be tried though, but maybe this PC is noisy and stinky too, not sure

And ofcourse

5. DreamPC

and very maybe

6: Motorola set top box VIP 1963 with maybe linux on it if I can get it working haha.

All computers mostly have windows on em, so basically ms-dos has been annihilated by windows.

For now I am staying with my DreamPC 2006 and probably going to get ready to buy new Threadripper 3 system and/or try and get the settopbox motoral vip 1963 working =D

Still need to extract some files from Pentium 166, my source code.

For this a network file system would be best, so I have to look into that how to set one up without microsoft client/file system cause I hate that junk and absolutely don't want to use that, though it would probably be fastest to use that but I really don't like it.

Might try it later anyway if nothing else succeeds. Oh by the way NFS server might not work well for dos, no long filename support.

So maybe I will have to fall back to windows file system networking, folder/drive sharing and such to get this working/done.

So far my conclusion for now is ofcourse Windows is far superior to ms-dos in every possibly imaginable way ! LOL.

The only thing that attracts me to ms-dos is dedicated gaming, few CPU context switching.

But if that is the only thing than it might not be worth it seeing all the other troubles that it brings along !

Bye for now,
Skybuck.
 




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