Need suggestions: Best Win98 guest that can run DX9

[sphyrch]

Hi all! I recently discovered PCem as an awesome alternative to VMware and VirtualBox, and found it to be better in almost all respects. The issue is that I'm a total beginner when it comes to hardware, driver compatibility, etc., so I could use some help.

I'm trying to configure a guest that can run Win98 SE that can play 3D games like Half-Life or Max Payne. I went to the PCem github page and just picked the components that seem the most high-end to me:
Gigabyte GA-686BX machine, 3DFX Voodoo 3 3000, SoundBlaster AWE32

However, when I run dxdiag, it informs me that Direct3D is not supported. Are there any particular settings (in the machine configuration window) that I need to set up for each of these individual components? Are there external drivers that I need to install for these?

My aim is to be able to run 3dMark 2001 (or even 2003) smoothly.

EDIT: I'm trying to build a sort of max performance Windows 98 machine (up to the hardware allowed by/included in PCem). So in my naive view - HL and Max Payne were advanced 3d games for that time, hence I quoted those games. It could very well be a possibility that the hardware allowed by PCem as of now won't be able to run either or both games. Even in that case, I'd still like to build as good a Win98 machine (from a gaming/3D graphics perspective) as I can. I hope that makes sense.

[leilei]

Voodoo2/3 drivers new enough (>Nov1999) require a minimum of DirectX 7 installed to work.

[sphyrch]

Voodoo2/3 drivers new enough (>Nov1999) require a minimum of DirectX 7 installed to work.

I've installed DX9.0c though. Still, it's not detected. I'm not sure that the components I listed in the OC are the best ones in terms of gaming, or even whether they're mutually compatible.

[szadycbr]

You still probably have not installed dx7 libs, install DX7 alone.

[leilei]

I'd also like to point this out

My aim is to be able to run 3dMark 2001 (or even 2003) smoothly.

The generation of hardware PCem emulates have never run either of those smoothly in the real world (even with HWT&L capable hardware like a Geforce4), so you're setting your expectations (from even the maximum Celeron 533+V3 3000 build) far too high

3dmark2003 i've only ever seen just that plane test work only on a Geforce2, and that's DX7 class 3d hardware (which none of the voodoos are anywhere near of being as capable). The rest of the tests relied exclusively on at least pixel shaders for shadows, bloom, etc.

You're new to hardware, so to put it broadly, PCem covers 1981-1999. 3DMark2001-2003 were targeting, well... 2001-2003 hardware. That means Pentium 4's, Athlon Tbirds & XPs, Geforces and Radeons, Parhelias and Xabres, 1GHz common, etc... and they're all magnitudes faster than the current selections of guest hardware (the best of which are still struggled to be emulated at a low level with today's hardware).

Half-Life's definitely completeable in PCem though. Max Payne probably is,but that has texture size issues with Voodoo hardware (affecting graphic novel readability) and the game's a big CPU hog even if you throw a geforce2 at it.

[sphyrch]

I'd also like to point this out

My aim is to be able to run 3dMark 2001 (or even 2003) smoothly.

The generation of hardware PCem emulates have never run either of those smoothly in the real world (even with HWT&L capable hardware like a Geforce4), so you're setting your expectations (from even the maximum Celeron 533+V3 3000 build) far too high

3dmark2003 i've only ever seen just that plane test work only on a Geforce2, and that's DX7 class 3d hardware (which none of the voodoos are anywhere near of being as capable). The rest of the tests relied exclusively on at least pixel shaders for shadows, bloom, etc.

You're new to hardware, so to put it broadly, PCem covers 1981-1999. 3DMark2001-2003 were targeting, well... 2001-2003 hardware. That means Pentium 4's, Athlon Tbirds & XPs, Geforces and Radeons, Parhelias and Xabres, 1GHz common, etc... and they're all magnitudes faster than the current selections of guest hardware (the best of which are still struggled to be emulated at a low level with today's hardware).

Half-Life's definitely completeable in PCem though. Max Payne probably is,but that has texture size issues with Voodoo hardware (affecting graphic novel readability) and the game's a big CPU hog even if you throw a geforce2 at it.

Thanks for the detailed reply! So if I've understood you correctly - even though Win98 supports DX9, the hardware available on PCem as of now properly supports up to DX7, which is good for 90's 3d games (maybe even Max Payne).

One question if you don't mind: what system and graphics card combo, and their relevant parameters, should I use to be able to run 90s 3d games at their max (or close to max) settings?

[leilei]

3d games in 99 were targeting Voodoos as they were a major part of the market and they were very compatible with problematic Super7 motherboards (a major budget enthusiast part). The only thing you're really missing out on are the very few games that have 24/32-bit textures, very few games that have compressed textures (was only mainly S3-locked poorly aged novelty maps addons) or color depth support (16bpp was generally the default standard, very few games allowed to go 32bpp even if there's hardware support).

CPUs are a trial and error, especially when cache bottlenecks aren't emulated. My general performance experience from that time is roughly equivalent to PCem's K6 233.

AWE32 isn't the max sound card either, You'll probably want Sound Blaster PCI 128 if you want to experience some of the A3D and EAX support in the 3d games of this time (only early A3D and EAX only however), though you'll lose out on some DOS game support (emulated as intended)

[UPerschke]

I would not recommend to use PCem for either at all. I would use VMWare Player instead.

Max Payne: Officially supports Win2k and is known to run under WinXP, although unsupported under latter.

Half-Life: Although the release version requires Win9x, it does run on WinXP with the latest offline patch, 1.1.1.0.

There are 3D guest drivers available in VMWare Player for Win2k & WinXP, and games benefit from hardware virtualization if available on your host CPU.

[sphyrch]

I would not recommend to use PCem for either at all. I would use VMWare Player instead.

Max Payne: Officially supports Win2k and is known to run under WinXP, although unsupported under latter.

Half-Life: Although the release version requires Win9x, it does run on WinXP with the latest offline patch, 1.1.1.0.

There are 3D guest drivers available in VMWare Player for Win2k & WinXP, and games benefit from hardware virtualization if available on your host CPU.

My bad I should have been clearer. So I'm trying to build a sort of max performance Windows 98 machine (up to the hardware allowed by/included in PCem). So in my naive view - HL and Max Payne were advanced 3d games for that time, hence I quoted those games. It could very well be a possibility that the hardware allowed by PCem as of now won't be able to run either or both games. Even in that case, I'd still like to build as good a Win98 machine (from a gaming/3D graphics perspective) as I can.

VMware and VirtualBox are good from WinXP onwards, but have pretty awful support for OS before that. Sorry, maybe I should've clarified all this in the original post. I'll edit it if I can.

[UPerschke]

Understood.
FIC VA-503+
K6-III as fast as your host CPU can do without noticable drops
3DFX Voodoo 3 3000
Sound Blaster PCI128
128 or 256 MB RAM
Win98SE
That's quite comparable with real hardware, e.g. in this thread: https://www.vogons.org/viewtopic.php?t=36407

[leilei]

See this thread too
http://pcem-emulator.co.uk/phpBB3/viewt ... f=2&t=3499

Satisfying DX9 games often requires at least DX7-baseline level hardware (if the game's generous enough to have safe pixelshader-less paths) and the gamut of that falls outside the realistic hobby-attainable scope regarding low level emulation of contemporary GPUs, and the performance of today's CPUs. It's luck that Voodoo3's drivers can run some of the DX7/8 games beyond 3dfx's closure, as they've never opened their D3D HAL part of the driver.

(any pass-through/virtualization evangelism would be massively missing the point and often introduce variables of stability and bloat that won't hold in the long term)

[sphyrch]

Understood.
FIC VA-503+
K6-III as fast as your host CPU can do without noticable drops
3DFX Voodoo 3 3000
Sound Blaster PCI128
128 or 256 MB RAM
Win98SE
That's quite comparable with real hardware, e.g. in this thread: https://www.vogons.org/viewtopic.php?t=36407

Thank you! As for Voodoo 3 3000, what could be recommended settings? There's something called Voodoo type (Voodoo Graphics, Obsidian SB50 + Amethyst (2 TMUs) or Voodoo 2). Then there's framebuffer memory, texture memory, render threads, bilinear filtering, screen filter, SLI, recompiler, etc. A bit confused on what the max settings would be. Also, there's the "Speed" setting of the video device

[UPerschke]

Thank you! As for Voodoo 3 3000, what could be recommended settings? There's something called Voodoo type (Voodoo Graphics, Obsidian SB50 + Amethyst (2 TMUs) or Voodoo 2). Then there's framebuffer memory, texture memory, render threads, bilinear filtering, screen filter, SLI, recompiler, etc. A bit confused on what the max settings would be. Also, there's the "Speed" setting of the video device

These options all relate to secondary Voodoo/Voodoo2 addon cards, which are obsolete if you choose a V3 3000 as primary graphics device.
For the V3 3000 to show up you'll need to copy 3k12sd.rom into the voodoo3_3000 folder.
Your host needs to provide 6 threads in total to crank the V3 to 4 render threads:
http://pcem-emulator.co.uk/phpBB3/viewt ... a9d#p15101