Search found 150 matches

by tk421
Thu 24 Nov, 2022 6:27 pm
Forum: General
Topic: suitable machie to emulate Pentium II 500Mhz + Voodoo 3 3000
Replies: 10
Views: 4935

Re: suitable machie to emulate Pentium II 500Mhz + Voodoo 3 3000

My guess is that you would need a ~5.0 Ghz CPU to get a Pentium II 450 at 100% performance. One thing to keep in mind is that PCem performance does depend heavily on which program you are trying to run. On my Core i7 9750h-based laptop, I can get most programs working at 100% performance on a Pentiu...
by tk421
Mon 07 Nov, 2022 1:36 pm
Forum: General
Topic: PCem v18 News (Was v17 Notice)
Replies: 99
Views: 80061

Re: PCem v18 News (Was v17 Notice)

In my experience the "no ROMs present' error can be fixed by deleting the contents of your nvr subfolder within your PCem folder. If your ROMs are all in the right place then this should work. It did with PCem v17 on Windows 11.
by tk421
Thu 29 Sep, 2022 7:57 pm
Forum: Development
Topic: is it possbile to develop emulation-virtualization hybrid?
Replies: 5
Views: 3474

Re: is it possbile to develop emulation-virtualization hybrid?

I do not believe this can be done at present, but given the big differences between virtualization and emulation software, I would think there is no need for such a hybrid program to be developed. PCem is radically different from virtualization solutions like VMWare, VirtualBox, Microsoft Virtual PC...
by tk421
Mon 26 Sep, 2022 9:00 pm
Forum: General
Topic: DPI issue with Windows 98 on PCem
Replies: 16
Views: 2965

Re: DPI issue with Windows 98 on PCem

Thank you. I cannot fault PCem for the performance of the Ryzen 9 5900HX. It was worth a try, but clearly this CPU is not good enough to run PCem at full specs. By contrast, my i7 9750h-based laptop is almost as good as the 5900hx. I can run Bridge Commander, a 2002 era game, at 1024x768 resolution ...
by tk421
Thu 15 Sep, 2022 7:14 pm
Forum: General
Topic: DPI issue with Windows 98 on PCem
Replies: 16
Views: 2965

Re: DPI issue with Windows 98 on PCem

Thank you for your reply. It is good to know that the 12900K and 12900KF can handle more of the 3D-accelerated games. My tests with the 5900HX were a bit disappointing. Games like Star Trek Armada II ran at 80-90% performance. Others like Star Armada and NHL 2000 were well below that level of perfor...
by tk421
Wed 14 Sep, 2022 7:10 pm
Forum: General
Topic: DPI issue with Windows 98 on PCem
Replies: 16
Views: 2965

Re: DPI issue with Windows 98 on PCem

I recently tested PCem on a new Ryzen 9 5900hx-based laptop. Although some games worked great on an emulated P2 450, others did not even with the emulated CPU running at 350 Mhz. The same bug booting as a P2 333 shows up on my emulated PC too. I am not sure how that can be fixed. May I ask if the 12...
by tk421
Wed 07 Sep, 2022 7:22 pm
Forum: General
Topic: Outside of VMworkstation (which has disorted sound) we don't have a fully working XP emulation yet.
Replies: 11
Views: 2405

Re: Outside of VMworkstation (which has disorted sound) we don't have a fully working XP emulation yet.

Run Windows Media Player minimized on your XP VMWare VM to get rid of that annoying sound stuttering and video stuttering. On a modern PC, to use XP in VMWare with sound stuttering and even video stuttering being a near constant occurrence is an annoying thing to see after years of powerful, reliabl...
by tk421
Tue 30 Aug, 2022 1:15 am
Forum: General
Topic: No ROMs present! You must have at least one romset to use PCem.
Replies: 16
Views: 29183

Re: No ROMs present! You must have at least one romset to use PCem.

I had a problem like this with a new PC I bought to use with PCem. If I remember correctly the solution was to delete the contents of my old nvr folder with PCem, and it worked. I could use PCem again as if it was still on my old PC. I backed up my PCem folder before testing this out. I did not try ...
by tk421
Sat 27 Aug, 2022 6:45 pm
Forum: General
Topic: Reoccurring error message with Windows 2000: A debugger has been detected
Replies: 11
Views: 1656

Re: Reoccurring error message with Windows 2000: A debugger has been detected

Would using a program like Daemon Tools within a PCem VM help run the Sims off of a virtual CD of the game? Obviously the virtual CDs would have to be on the virtual hard drive for this to work. I do this for some games from 1999-2000 and they work fine, but not if I run the virtual CD directly thro...
by tk421
Mon 15 Aug, 2022 7:24 am
Forum: General
Topic: Game refuses to work - after 10 ISO softwares and running direct from CD
Replies: 11
Views: 2255

Re: Game refuses to work - after 10 ISO softwares and running direct from CD

If the problem is the same as I had with NHL 2000, namely the CD not read or not in the CD-ROM drive error, I would suggest using Daemon Tools within your PCem VM and place the virtual CD for your game on the emulated hard drive. You could make a virtual CD of your game CD using a program like Alcoh...
by tk421
Sat 30 Jul, 2022 10:09 pm
Forum: General
Topic: CD-Rom Player on PCem
Replies: 6
Views: 1869

Re: CD-Rom Player on PCem

I think virtual CDs are the best way to use CDs with PCem. You will get very fast performance and with the Voodoo 2/3 it will look better than most Pentium PCs back in the day. One option would be to place your CD ISO within a PCem virtual hard disk and run Daemon Tools from within a PCem VM. I do t...
by tk421
Sat 30 Jul, 2022 8:38 pm
Forum: Development
Topic: DVD Drive Support
Replies: 5
Views: 3798

Re: DVD Drive Support

One option would be to place your DVD ISO within a PCem virtual hard disk and run Daemon Tools from within a PCem VM. I do this for some of my games and it is the only way to run them with a virtual CD. I am sure DVD ISOs would work the same way. Daemon Tools will even work with a P166 MMX. At the v...
by tk421
Mon 11 Jul, 2022 7:33 pm
Forum: General
Topic: PCem v18 News (Was v17 Notice)
Replies: 99
Views: 80061

Re: PCem v18 News (Was v17 Notice)

V18 will be switching to Qt This may regress XP/Vista/7/8/8.1 support. Several emulators moving to QT (PCSX2, Dolphin) gave up 7 because they had no choice in the matter when that decision's from upstream and/or develop on Win10/linux unaware of the platform regression creep issues. OTOH it's great...
by tk421
Wed 08 Jun, 2022 1:01 am
Forum: General
Topic: Recommendation of laptops
Replies: 8
Views: 2112

Re: Recommendation of laptops

I think the CPU for your new laptop will do fine for most PCem tasks. I am sure you will enjoy the Voodoo 3 3000, which runs very well on my laptop thanks to PCem. I don't know if having 6 cores is better than 4, but I do know that having an all core turbo speed of 4.2 Ghz and top turbo speed of 4.5...
by tk421
Wed 25 May, 2022 5:27 pm
Forum: General
Topic: Recommendation of laptops
Replies: 8
Views: 2112

Re: Recommendation of laptops

The I5 10300h should be ok for Pentium MMX emulation. I am fond of the Pentium MMX emulation that comes with PCem, so I recommend it without question. You will still get good performance for the games you mentioned if you use the P166 MMX. You should get good performance for the older video cards th...
by tk421
Sat 07 May, 2022 3:00 am
Forum: Development
Topic: New hardware for PCem v18?
Replies: 6
Views: 7652

Re: New hardware for PCem v18?

PCem was the first emulator to come with 3Dfx Voodoo 2, Voodoo 3 and Voodoo Banshee support. Also, Soundblaster AWE64 isn't exactly a "newer" card. It was released in mid-to-late 1996 and was based on an old ISA bus. Since several years ago PCem emulates Sound Blaster 128 which is a PCI b...
by tk421
Mon 02 May, 2022 9:05 pm
Forum: General
Topic: Lag while playing a game (Mortyr)
Replies: 11
Views: 2208

Re: Lag while playing a game (Mortyr)

May I ask which screen resolution you are using in PCem? If you are using 1024x768 you might get better performance by reducing your win98 and PCem game resolution down to 640x480. This always works for me. Your game might work better with the Voodoo 3 instead of the Voodoo 2. leilei's advice here i...
by tk421
Mon 25 Apr, 2022 6:16 pm
Forum: General
Topic: PCem performance on AMD laptop APUs
Replies: 5
Views: 2007

Re: PCem performance on AMD laptop APUs

PCem depends very heavily on the single-threaded performance of your CPU. The number of cores is not really all that useful for a program like PCem. The key would be to have a CPU that has an all-core turbo speed of at least 4 Ghz, and a strong single-thread turbo speed of at least 4.5 Ghz. That way...
by tk421
Thu 07 Apr, 2022 9:05 pm
Forum: General
Topic: Diablo II in PCem Mini-Guide
Replies: 5
Views: 2250

Re: Diablo II in PCem Mini-Guide

I read your guide to Diablo II. I am glad to see people offering help to those trying to get their old games running on new PCs. PCem is the best way to run many of these games. Pentium 2 emulation is so good that I can run some games well past the Pentium MMX speeds. This is impressive given that m...
by tk421
Thu 07 Apr, 2022 8:56 pm
Forum: Development
Topic: Dynarec issues
Replies: 22
Views: 11565

Re: Dynarec issues

I have just tried Episode 1 Racer using the P2 333 in PCem on my i7 9750h. I admit that there were times when the emulation speed went below 100%, but not while I was playing the game. In-game performance was rock-solid at 100%. Performance only went below 100% when viewing in-game video cutscenes o...
by tk421
Sun 06 Mar, 2022 9:27 pm
Forum: General
Topic: Windows 2000 in PCem
Replies: 2
Views: 3585

Re: Windows 2000 in PCem

The above configuration is good for Windows 2000. I even have a socket 7 P300 MMX configuration running Windows 2000 and I use it for Star Wars Rebellion. It beats any other alternative for that game. Star Wars Rebellion crashes too often on Win95/98 to be useable, but on Win 2000 it is stable and r...
by tk421
Sun 06 Mar, 2022 9:18 pm
Forum: General
Topic: Emulating p3 with winxp?
Replies: 10
Views: 6972

Re: Emulating p3 with winxp?

PCem v17 is really good so if your game can run on a Pentium II I recommend it without hesitation. Pentium II emulation is top notch. I am not yet able to run all of my programs on the P2 450, but Jedi Knight and Episode 1 Racer run just fine in-game. Video cutscenes and in-game menus are a differen...
by tk421
Wed 23 Feb, 2022 8:26 pm
Forum: General
Topic: TIE Fighter CD DOS Version Works
Replies: 3
Views: 2538

TIE Fighter CD DOS Version Works

There has been some effort to get the TIE Fighter CD DOS version to work through DOS, and not Windows 95/98. While my efforts to get this game to work in DOS on a 486 PC were not successful, I did get this game to work using a socket 7 based Pentium 75 PC in PCem. This Pentium 75 was using DOS 6.22 ...
by tk421
Thu 30 Dec, 2021 10:13 pm
Forum: General
Topic: ANNOUNCEMENT: MichaelJManley taking over as PCem maintainer
Replies: 82
Views: 51549

Re: ANNOUNCEMENT: MichaelJManley taking over as PCem maintainer

Welcome MichaelJManley! Thank you Sarah for making PCem one of the best programs out there. My productivity with computers has improved immensely as a result of using PCem, a valuable tool not only for playing win95/98 games but also for any program compatibility task that uses software from 20-30 y...
by tk421
Wed 02 Jun, 2021 9:37 pm
Forum: General
Topic: How fast of a PCem CPU?
Replies: 10
Views: 5616

Re: How fast of a PCem CPU?

I agree with the comments made here. I will test out some of the suggestions for improving Pentium 2 performance in PCem. For me, the PII 233 is very fast and reliable. Pentium 2 emulation is very well implemented in v17, so it has become my de facto standard for most win98 tasks. The Voodoo3 is a h...
by tk421
Fri 07 May, 2021 9:24 pm
Forum: General
Topic: Will having more than 65 gb ram makes pcem faster?
Replies: 3
Views: 1852

Re: Will having more than 65 gb ram makes pcem faster?

PCem is almost completely dependent on your CPU. I am sure having a decent video card helps, but the CPU is by far the most important factor in PCem performance. RAM is not so much an issue as long as you have enough for your PC tasks. May I ask what speed you typically get from your 9900k CPU, espe...
by tk421
Tue 20 Apr, 2021 4:20 am
Forum: General
Topic: Cannot format blank floppy disk ?!
Replies: 11
Views: 4093

Re: Cannot format blank floppy disk ?!

For anyone trying to format a blank floppy disk, or in my case, a virtual floppy disk, I can confirm that this works well with WinImage, but it also works in PCem if you do it from Win 3.1. Your Windows formatted disk should work fine in DOS. I would still have to test it with WordPerfect 5.1 to mak...
by tk421
Wed 24 Mar, 2021 9:34 pm
Forum: General
Topic: AMD Ryzen 5000 series.
Replies: 11
Views: 7537

Re: AMD Ryzen 5000 series.

May I ask if you could get games like Jedi Outcast or Jedi Academy to work well with your emulated P2 400 and 450? The Ryzen is a big improvement in CPU performance if it can run those 2 games through PCem at 100% on those 2 emulated CPUs.
by tk421
Wed 17 Feb, 2021 8:13 pm
Forum: General
Topic: v17 released!
Replies: 33
Views: 33501

Re: v17 released!

v17 offers so much for people using modern computers that it is as close to perfection as anyone could hope to see on a PC. I have recently begun a new round of PCem testing. I am very impressed with the program's ability to run not only games, but other programs like Visual Studio 6.0. System crash...
by tk421
Sat 06 Feb, 2021 9:04 pm
Forum: General
Topic: Maximizing PCem performance
Replies: 15
Views: 15273

Re: Maximizing PCem performance

Check the number of rendering threads used in Voodoo 3 settings. If there are 4, set them to 2. This might help solve some of the performance issues you're having. Specifically, you need at least 5 cores to run the main CPU + Voodoo 3 with 4 rendering threads. Leaving aside the issue of not having ...