Playing games designed for windows 95/98

[Aikola]

Just wondered how you play these on modern computers, ive got a couple of games (about 3/4) and wanted to give them a blast.

[hydr0x]

There is no universal answer for this. Some have a DOS version their CD that actually works in DOSBox. Others work right out of the box, even on Win7, some with the help of compatibility mode. Some need more elaborate methods or are just not compatible with more modern Windows versions, requiring you to actually set up a retro PC. Some of those might work in a virtual machine like VirtualBox or VMWare.

[Cauterize]

Keep an eye out at the car boot sales for an old laptop sporting a Windows 98 sticker. These machines, usually cheap, make fantastic retro gaming solutions to playing the classic titles with ease.

[Aikola]

Cheers guys looks like ill have to whack em in and see if I need to find an older computer.

[shotblue]

Your best bet is to go around and find an old system unit with dos already installed, and find a torrent or cd with windows 95 to install in the dos.

That's your only way. If not partition your hard drive with windows Xp which should run on most 95-98 games. or install windows 95 through dosbox on any new windows.

[MRCL]

I actually built myself a retro PC just for this purpose. With legit 95 CD I have from back in the day lol. Even the hardware, down to the case, is from the mid 90s. Problem is, still not all games run, beats me why tough. I'm probably never able to play Redline Racer again

[totalgridlock]

DOSBox is a godsend for any game with a DOS mode and that's usually my first port of call. But for the tricky Win 95 era I use a small external HDD with Win 98 installed, running through the built-in Virtual PC feature in Win7. Works like a charm 99% of the time. You don't need an external HDD though, you can achieve the same using a small partition on your main HDD or even just jam a USB memory stick in and use that.

Nothing quite beats getting the original hardware and playing games as they were intended... in fact I used to keep a few old machines banging about in the garage, but space does become an issue!

[Farzlepot]

Some manner of virtual machine usually does the trick, as has been mentioned, but some old games are funny about that sort of thing and will still kick up a fuss.

And you can't install Windows 95 or 98 on a modern computer without virtualisation, as neither operating system will function properly with the hardware. Windows 98, for example, will not function properly if you install it directly on a computer (i.e. without using a virtual environment) with more than 512mb RAM.

So, as a few people have suggested, the ultimate solution is to keep a retro PC around. As somebody who has always been more fond of PC gaming than console gaming until the last few years, I have made a point to keep a PC for each sufficiently unique operating system, and that PC is always the highest possible spec that OS can support. So I have a cupboard with PCs for DOS 6 and Windows 3.1, Windows 98 and Windows XP (that is the PC I'm using to type this message actually).

For Windows 98, off the top of my head, you'd ideally need a Socket A AMD Athlon Thunderbird processor (1GHz will probably be enough), 512mb of SDRAM (was DDR RAM supported by 98, anybody? I can't remember the spec I've got on my 98 machine, but I think it's only SDRAM), a GeForce 3 Ti500 graphics card (I think the 4 series supported Windows 98 as well, but I'm not sure as that series came a year after Windows XP*) and an appropriate motherboard.

Don't forget that you'll also need a compatible power supply - I think 300w** would be enough. You may also need to secure a 3.5" floppy disk drive, particularly if the older games you're playing came on such a medium, but also because Windows 98 used floppy disks for some essential functions (remember boot disks?).

And even though people don't think about it very much, hard disk drive technology has changed considerably too - if I remember, Windows 98 had a maximum supported HDD size of either 64GB or 120GB*** depending on whether you had an updated version or not (early versions had a bug in FDisk I think). Also bear in mind that the BIOS chip on old motherboards may have a smaller HDD limit than even this, as low as 30GB on some older models from that era (but if you get a motherboard capable of supporting a later-edition Athlon Thunderbird I doubt this restriction will exist).

eBay often has old components for sale, but I've never tried buying any and can't vouch for how reliable that method would be.

Building an older computer isn't an easy undertaking, as finding compatible parts and matching them is even harder than it is when you're building a modern operating system, because they're not readily available. People have suggested buying an old PC from a car boot sale or something, but without knowing what spec the machine is some games may run poorly on it or not at all - it was very common for computers back then (and still, actually), particularly prebuilt machines, to lack 3D graphics cards. Some games could run in 'software' mode, but depending on the rest of the hardware in the computer, they may struggle badly. And the kind of people who are likely to be selling a PC that old are the kind of people who probably wouldn't have stuck an aftermarket graphics card in it.

These aren't consoles. PCs required frequent upgrades back then just as they do now - more frequent, perhaps, as things have slowed down a little. Processor power literally doubled every year for a while in that era, and just as now, games took advantage of these leaps in power. Which is why buying a random old PC might not suffice - you may end up with a PC barely capable of running the OS, let alone the games you want to play. If you're able to find the parts I listed earlier, however, you shouldn't have any problems with any games right up until the end of the Windows 98 era - assuming I remembered right, that should give you roughly the highest PC specification available to consumers prior to the emergence of Windows XP.

Windows 95 is a different story, though. I skipped that OS. From what I know, though, there's little to distinguish 95 from 98 under the hood, and from what I know moving from 95 up to 98 caused fewer compatibility issues than any other version of Windows before or since. Ideally, if you have a Windows 98 machine, you should be OK with Windows 95 software.

You should try virtualisation first. It'll probably work well enough, and it'll be a lot easier and cheaper. Unless you get lucky and find a high-spec Windows 98 machine for sale.



* And because the GeForce 4 series launched after Windows XP had been released, the only games that would need it would work on Windows XP anyway, negating the need for a retro machine. So stick with a 3 series.
** I'm guessing on this one, really, based on a vague memory. I seem to remember my Windows 98 machine having a 300w PSU, and it is a similar spec to the components I've listed, so it should be fine. If you actually decide to undertake building a retro PC, you should double check, but as I doubt you'll end up going to all this trouble I wouldn't worry about it!
*** Don't quote me on this, but I think it was Windows 98 First Edition that had the lower HDD restriction, and the issue was solved with Windows 98 Second Edition.

[hydr0x]

I wish I had the room to keep retro PCs. For anything that needs a Pentium (1) or less and runs on DOS, I think DOSBox is fine. But a Win98SE machine is a must to get all those pesky early 3D-accelerated games running. Although having said that, you'd need about 10 different machines to actually get all 3D games into 3D as in the very early days some only supported a specific chip/card like a S3 Virge (yuck, had one of those, Mechwarrior II at 7fps, here I come...) or some Matrox chip.

Why would you want to go with a Athlon though? I had one myself back then due to cost, but certainly a Pentium III (?) would be more compatible and slightly faster, no?

[Farzlepot]

I wish I had the room to keep retro PCs. For anything that needs a Pentium (1) or less and runs on DOS, I think DOSBox is fine. But a Win98SE machine is a must to get all those pesky early 3D-accelerated games running. Although having said that, you'd need about 10 different machines to actually get all 3D games into 3D as in the very early days some only supported a specific chip/card like a S3 Virge (yuck, had one of those, Mechwarrior II at 7fps, here I come...) or some Matrox chip.

Why would you want to go with a Athlon though? I had one myself back then due to cost, but certainly a Pentium III (?) would be more compatible and slightly faster, no?

AMD and Intel alternate between first and second place in the speed stakes quite regularly. At the moment Intel is beating them. Just before dual core came into common use, AMD were beating Intel with the AMD Athlon 64 FX series. Just before 64 bit processors happened, when AMD were pushing the ancient (at that time) Athlon XP line, Intel were soundly beating them with the P4. But in the era of the Athlon Thunderbird, AMD were beating Intel's P3. The Thunderbird was the first to break the 1GHz barrier, and it had a number of other advantages. And before the Thunderbird, Intel were beating AMD's original Athlon cartridge processors with their P3.

Anything earlier than the Thunderbird, be it AMD or Intel, and you risk the CPU being underpowered for later Windows 98 games. Anything later and you're overdoing it and risking compatibility issues. In my mind, the Thunderbird would be just right. Also, the Thunderbird was only available in socket A configuration, if memory serves, while the P3 had a number of variations, making it easier to source a compatible motherboard. I always used AMD chips from the K6-2 onwards back then, and I never found a compatibility issue with them. They were just x86 chips, after all.

[ELiam]

In the tightest of spaces (when the playing of the game is most important over the physical copy). Some sites like GOG.com have the original game with an installer designed to configure it for play on the newest hardware/software. They don't have everything, but if you lack the space to keep a large 95/98 machine lying around (and can't get it running otherwise) you'll at least be able to play the game that way.