Should I build a Windows XP gaming PC? - "Use virtual machine!" /thread

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The good thing with XP is that it has a wide range of hardware compatibility, even up until around 2014 is when a lot of vendors dropped driver support for 32bit XP. Useful since actual hardware of the era will be subject to leaky capacitors, and unless you know how to recap, you're SOL.
64bit XP has a few compatibility issues with game IIRC, True Crime New York was one of them that failed to run.
 
Kind of yes, kind of no. Mostly no.

The machine is still right there. I still have to get a legacy GPU for it. I might have to find a DVD drive for it as well.

Like my VHS archiving problem, there's always bullshit that gets in the way.

The problem is something someone mentioned earlier in the thread where setting it up each time is a pain so I end up doing other things, and I just haven't got around to it. I'm also tempted to put linux on it for both certain games, and for certain utility uses. It might seem unrelated, but I want to find a way of labeling and organizing my SD cards and USB drives.
 
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Still no update, and unlikely to built for a while, if ever. Same problems as before. Other priorities, and problems sourcing an XP GPU.

However, I'm now considering options mentioned in this thread I dismissed before. Like what Dick Justice and @Aidan said on page 1 and 2.

Long version.
I ended up watching a bunch of YouTube and I saw some new videos about using old, cheap, mini PCs. I've wanted some of these for a while to build a retro emulation console, but could never get them despite their supposed abundance, and all the ones I saw were overpriced "refurbished" models being sold as Win 10/11 PCs with a bunch of shit in them. I didn't expect these to work as windows XP native machines due to having intergrated graphics, but they supposedly worked fine, with things like finding sound and network drivers being the problem. All that stuff about problems with modern CPUs not having the correct instructions seemed like a non-issue. Maybe they are Haswell era chips? The intergrated graphics also worked well, which surprised the hell out of me as I thought decent integrated graphics was a relatively recent thing.

However, these videos then go on to test games like Half-Life, Quake, and Duke Nukem. ie. Games that all have modern source ports, and are older than the DX9 vintage I'm after. You'd think they'd run games like Fear, Snowblind, UT, and Far Cry.

Another thing I saw a lot was using these machines with Linux. This avoids the driver issues, at the cost of tweaking and compatibility issues which I wanted to avoid in the first place. So far, sounds like another dud. The real benefit is using it. Having a 1 litre or even a console sized PC greatly reduces the space and set up commitment. I can keep it on top of my VCR (another project that refuses to go anywhere) and I could use it as such. I might even be able to mount it to my "TV" and use it through that. I might even be able to double it up with the retro console idea.

However, getting all of this squared away is unlikely. As mentioned, I was unable to source one of those mini-pcs for a reasonable price, and as a result the budget would spiral.
 
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Marissa Moira said:
If your interest is in old games it might be worth getting a raspberry pi and doing more with that or just getting an old laptop to run older games off of GOG.
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Seconding GOG but YMMV with Pis. First of all they're ARM devices and you can at least run DOSBox but Wine is no longer an option due to the complications involved in translating from one architecture to another. Also, you're probably best of with the most classic of retrogames on that platform. I have a Pi 400 (currently sitting in a cabinet because YouTube playback sucked and the SD card eventually shit itself), which is reasonably powerful for that series of computers but even Game Boy Advance games ran like dogshit using visualboyadvance-m.

EDIT: just realized I necro'd a 3+ year old post lul
 
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If you really want to repurpose your Haswell PC as a dedicated XP machine, I suggest buying a low-end Maxwell card and forget about mini PCs. A GTX 745 or a K620 will handle your DX9 gaming needs without any problems unless they need 8-bit paletted textures or table fog support. Fairly sure those two features went extinct in the DX9 era though.

If space is an issue, get an off-lease Lenovo ThinkCentre M72e/M92p Tiny. They're very common on eBay UK so you shouldn't have a problem getting one of these in working condition. The only catch is the shitty integrated GPU these things tend to come with, so that means shelling out extra dosh for a i7-3770T.

The M72e/M92p does NOT have a PCIe x16 slot so dedicated graphics cards are out of the question, aside from running a MiniPCIe to PCIe x16 riser plus board with a PSU jerry-rigged to it. It's not a very elegant solution I'd recommend, but it's still an option to consider if mini PCs like the Acer Veriton N2120G/N4630G with the optional I/O module (PCIe x16 box) or the HP t610/t620 Plus aren't available.
 
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Judge Dredd said:
The machine is still right there. I still have to get a legacy GPU for it. I might have to find a DVD drive for it as well.
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Is graphics card slot a PCI or AGP? I'll be cpt obvious and point to eBay. It has great selection. Nvidia with 4 digits are solid cards. I would recommend 7800 gt. As for drivers - Nvidia has a backlog of all drivers on their site, even XP ones.
 
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Today I put together an XP gaming system. Specs are overkill, but it's what I have at hand:
i7 2600
4 GB RAM
250 GB SSD
GTX 680

Method I used for installing XP and updates is a bit different from others in this thread:
Easy2Boot - Creates a bootable USB that allows booting of ISO files similar to Ventoy. I used an untouched XP SP3 ISO, and it slipstreamed the AHCI drivers live. The website is a bit overwhelming with information, but it wasn't too much trouble to figure out how to use. PhilsComputerLab has a video that covers using it to install XP: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-nZAhE0SetM
Legacy Update - Allows installing updates for XP, including the extended life updates.
Snappy Driver Installer - I manually installed my NIC and GPU drivers and used this tool to install the rest.

I grabbed some ISOs for American McGee's Alice from archive.org. Installing the game was a real blast from the past. I used DaemonTools to mount the ISOs and bypass the SafeDisc protection without needing a NoCD crack. Also, had to search for serial code to install it, and one of the first hits was a non-HTTPS site on a free web host. Had serials for a bunch of other games from that era, such as Starcraft and Diablo 2. This is making me feel 20 years younger!
 
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guiltyspark85 said:
Today I put together an XP gaming system. Specs are overkill, but it's what I have at hand:
i7 2600
4 GB RAM
250 GB SSD
GTX 680

Method I used for installing XP and updates is a bit different from others in this thread:
Easy2Boot - Creates a bootable USB that allows booting of ISO files similar to Ventoy. I used an untouched XP SP3 ISO, and it slipstreamed the AHCI drivers live. The website is a bit overwhelming with information, but it wasn't too much trouble to figure out how to use. PhilsComputerLab has a video that covers using it to install XP: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-nZAhE0SetM
Legacy Update - Allows installing updates for XP, including the extended life updates.
Snappy Driver Installer - I manually installed my NIC and GPU drivers and used this tool to install the rest.

I grabbed some ISOs for American McGee's Alice from archive.org. Installing the game was a real blast from the past. I used DaemonTools to mount the ISOs and bypass the SafeDisc protection without needing a NoCD crack. Also, had to search for serial code to install it, and one of the first hits was a non-HTTPS site on a free web host. Had serials for a bunch of other games from that era, such as Starcraft and Diablo 2. This is making me feel 20 years younger!
Click to expand...
This sounds like really fun and something i want to do. What else are you playing? You made some great choices with Alice, Starcraft and Diablo 2.
 
PotatoInMyAss said:
Do you also have a CRT? That’d be a must have for a legacy Windows box.
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No, I used to have a Sony 19" Trinitron, but unfortunately I gave it away 15 years ago. Think it went up to 1600 x 1200 with a refresh rate of 85 Hz. Was really nice! But I'm happy with just using an LCD for the moment.
 
I just heard about Windows XP Intergral. A fan made version of XP that adds a few things to make it work on modern hardware. I don't know if this is any good, or if it maintains compatibility with games. Thought I'd mention it, even as just a reminder to myself.
 
I'm tempted to do the same myself, the idea of having a fairly stable machine for Flight Simulator X and the old GTA III era games seems comfy.

I know I can just run all of this shit through WINE but some software is so goddamned particular (like FSX lol), legitimately... Flight Simulator X and some of my old box copy games just fucking refuse to play nice on anything newer than Windows 7.

Figure an i7 3770, 8GB of DDR3 and a GT7 something whatever the fuck OEM GPU ought to do the trick?

Come on OP, build the fucker and show it off!
 
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