Is This a Good Setup for My Needs?

Taylor7108 · Post by **Taylor7108** » Wed Jan 25, 2017 3:07 pm

Hi all!

This is my first post. I plan on building another PC specifically to play all the old DOS games I enjoyed as a kid. I have a box of 3.5" and 5.25" disks and I figured....why not. Anywho, here are the specs I was considering:

Intel 486DX2 66mhz - 256k
16mb RAM
Cirrus Logic CL-6D5428-80QC-A VLB VGA (1MB)
635MB HDD
Aztech Azt2316a (16bit) ISA Sound Card
CD-ROM Drive
3.5" (1.44mb) Floppy Drive
5.25" Floppy Drive
Network Adapter
DOS 6.22 w/ Windows 3.1

Here are examples of some games I plan on playing regularly:

Monkey Island Series
Leisure Suit Larry (and similar Sierra games from the time)
Pool of Radiance (and sequels)
Full Throttle
Ultima IV

Basically, games made from 1988-1994 with some CD games. Would this setup be good for my needs? Any suggestions to changes to the hardware?

Rwolf · Post by **Rwolf** » Wed Jan 25, 2017 7:42 pm

Seems nice...one thing about the CD rom - some old games use Red Book Audio standard, which can playing audio tracks off the CD, which both may need a Red Book capable drive and a (usually) CD specific cable from the drive to the sound card, connecte to an internal header. Unsure if such a header is available on the Aztech, but it seems to be a capable card, from what I read on the Vogons site. (I never owned one myself)

486 player · Post by **486 player** » Sun Jan 29, 2017 5:48 am

'bout thy sound card...
If it works in Sound Blaster (Pro) mode, or has OPL3 chip, plays sound.
Be ready for issues though.

Taylor7108 · Post by **Taylor7108** » Fri Feb 10, 2017 3:49 pm

So, I completed the build yesterday went through the MS-DOS install process, set up drivers, etc. Everything seems to be working great, but I did notice a couple of game specific issues.

Doom - Framey...maybe 20-30 fps. With the system specs, I kind of expected more performance. Sound is configured as a SB Pro using regular driver settings. Should I expect this game to run full speed at high detail and full sized window? **I did not install video drivers for the CL-6D5428. Is this necessary??

Secret of Monkey Island - Sound is loud, scrambled and crackly. From what I gather, this could be an Ad-Lib sound issue or resource conflict. Does this sound right?

Rwolf · Post by **Rwolf** » Fri Feb 10, 2017 7:58 pm

Doom - seems to be capped in the game:
http://doom.wikia.com/wiki/Uncapped_framerate

Monkey Island...I played that with Midi music, not FM synth.
There were some sound patches I think, maybe applicable.
http://www.vogons.org/viewtopic.php?t=697