[♪ Music Intro and Keyboard Typing noises ♪]
[♪]
Greetings, and welcome to an LGR thing and today,
I would like to answer a very broad topic.
It's a question or set of questions that I get asked
*all* the time, ever since I've started LGR, and that is
"What classic computer should I buy?" Like I wanna get into playing old computer games,
How do I do it? What's the best way for me?
And you know what, that's just such a deep topic that goes all over the place that it's really hard to answer.
I attempted to do this seven or eight years ago with a video titled "What DOS PC Should You Buy?"
And while there are several things that I mentioned there that are still going to be brought up here,
'cause they're still relevant,
there are several of the items that I would like to talk about that have gotten more expensive or harder to find
and beyond that, I don't want you to just take my word for it, so I have asked *nine* other YouTubers
to be a part of this video and give their input on the topic.
These are not only all channels that I totally recommend and watch all the time,
but I know that they're active in coming up with solutions to the kind of problems that we're gonna be discussing today.
So the questions I asked each of them was what is your *go-to solution* for playing old PC games,
whether it be earlier Windows games
or DOS games, pretty much anything from 1981 to 2001 or so.
Yeah, there are just a lot of topics to cover and a variety of issues, so let's get right to it!
So for this video, we'll be assuming that your goal is retro gaming,
and for that, you'll really want to ask the question, "What do YOU want to do with an old PC?"
or whatever solution that you happen to come up with because different games are gonna require different things.
And in regards to this, the most frequent questions that I get about this are:
Should I stick to pre-made computers from back in the day?
Classic hardware from Compaq or Hewlett Packard or Dell or whoever.
Or should I customize a slightly later machine with more modern components,
and then install stuff as needed for compatibility with older games?
Or should I build my own classic computer from scratch using spare parts?
Or should I maybe just skip all of that altogether and stick to emulation and virtual machines or buying games off of GOG?
Before we get to that, my personal go-to pick for an old computer that I like to play old games on
is the LGR Woodgrain 486.
I mean, that's why I built it here on the channel after all.
It serves my goal of imitating my first PC that I had as a kid, but
it also has all the bells and whistles that I lusted after back in the day.
And it's also covered in woodgrain! *Chuckles*
Which, granted, you know, I customized that and made that happen myself, but uh, you know, I like that.
And it also serves as a base for playing with early to mid '90s upgrades, because I just don't like to leave it static.
I like to swap parts out and see what can be done in terms of appropriate hardware and software from the mid '90s.
As it's configured right now though, it is a 66 megahertz AMD 486, a DX2 CPU,
has 16 megabytes of RAM,
a 1 megabyte Diamond Speedstar Pro VLB video card,
a Creative Sound Blaster Pro 2.0 sound card,
1.2 meg 5¼ floppy drive and 1.44 meg 3½ disk drive,
a 4x CD-ROM drive,
and it also has a flash card interface for convenient file transfers.
You can do this either by CompactFlash or SD cards or any number of other solutions.
And all of this is connected to an AOpen VI15G Socket 3 motherboard,
with 256K of L2 cache installed and a standard CR2032 button battery.
And that's actually one big reason I chose this board is because many batteries
on a lot of these older computers are gonna have something that's gonna leak.
Look for one with a modern battery that is less prone to leaking.
And something else that is absolutely not required but I happen to like it on these older machines,
is this green display here, which shows the current speed of the computer in megahertz.
This paired with a turbo button is extremely useful,
because a lot of games in the early '90s and late '80s looked for a slower CPU,
and the turbo button, you enable that, and it's going to slow down your computer.
What it does exactly is gonna vary depending on the computer you have, but generally, it slows things down.
I've done an entire video about this in the past, so if you're curious, you can check that out.
As for the operating system, this thing runs MS-DOS 6.22,
but I also have another CompactFlash card that I swap out with Windows 3.11 on there.
But the thing is though, it doesn't stop there! This computer is great for a lot of things, but
there are games earlier and later and even around the same time that are way more picky and...
this is just not going to work with it, or at least it won't be ideal.
I keep several early IBM PC compatibles hooked up for older games,
like original IBM PCs with a 4.77 megahertz 8088 and some with a
8 megahertz, 286 CPU.
These can be very valuable for early '80s games, throughout around 1987 or so,
and as far as sound, *Chuckles* there's not much.
These just come with a PC speaker, or in the case of my IBM AT, an AdLib card.
Yes, just the original AdLib, which gives you that twangy FM synthesis sound.
And it's also worth noting that if you get many, many later cards that are compatible with the Sound Blaster standard,
they're gonna give you that AdLib FM synth sound, either in OPL2 or in OPL3 or something emulating it.
A slight step up from these are the 386 machines that I keep around, such as
these computers that are around 16 to 25 megahertz, a 386 SX or DX.
These are amazing for games that run too fast on even a mid-range 486, but are too slow on a 286 or 8088.
Perfect for earlier VGA games and later EGA games,
and I usually pair these kind of things with a Sound Blaster 2.0 or equivalent.
I also keep several machines set up with Windows 3.1 and 95 on there all the time.
And these have anything from a 100 megahertz 486DX4 CPU,
all the way up to a 233 megahertz Pentium MMX.
Usually with SVGA, a Sound Blaster 16, or one of those clones from the time period.
And finally for later '90s Windows gaming, I largely stick to Windows 98 Second Edition and Windows XP machines.
something with around an 800 megahertz Pentium III,
on up to a 2.4 gigahertz Pentium 4, depending on what I need.
Voodoo graphics are what I stick to for these for the most part,
since the supplied 3DFX Glide mode, which is an incredibly popular thing,
is different than Direct3D and OpenGL, so that's worth keeping in mind.
And some of the later ones I'll stick a NVIDIA GeForce 2 or an 8800 Ultra in there.
And as far as displays, uh, I typically recommend going with a CRT if at all possible.
It takes up a lot of space, but the result is fantastic
in terms of reproduction of what the games are originally supposed to look like.
And while I do still use certain older LCDs every so often,
it's only if they're the right aspect ratio and don't do weird things with the scaling
because sometimes you can end up with stuff that looks blurred or the pixels aren't the correct size.
You don't always have square pixels in these older games.
And typically, as far as sound cards go,
you do want something a little better than Sound Blaster 16
for Windows 98 Second Edition or Windows XP.
Something like the Aureal Vortex 2, which provides A3D, a fantastic early 3D standard.
I use that in a couple of my machines.
And yes, Windows 98 is still built on top of MS-DOS, so things run quite well in DOS mode for the most part,
but you do wanna watch out for compatibility issues in terms of graphics, sound, and CPU speed.
And I'm not really gonna talk about Windows XP, since it doesn't really have a proper DOS mode,
and that's getting into DOSBox territory, and you can start moving onto emulation and virtual machines anyway.
With all that being said, though, there are so many other points of view on these kinds of topics.
So, without further ado, let's get to our guests in no particular order,
and we're gonna start with Nostalgia Nerd.
NN: Hello, my name is Nostalgia Nerd, and when it comes to DOS gaming,
*this* is all I need.
This thing being a Compaq Presario 4100.
As the name suggests, under the hood is an Intel DX4,
a clock tripled 486, and really, the crème de la crème of Intel 486 processors.
I've slotted a Sound Blaster 16 and CD-ROM drive in mine, as well as upgrading to a whopping
32 megabytes of RAM and two gigabyte hard drive to create a machine
that would have blown the minds and swollen tear ducts in 1994.
This machine is from the era of gaming I love the most.
I could always use a Pentium, but there's something about pushing the 486 to its limits that I find pleasing.
DOOM runs smooth as silk, and while it might struggle with some later games, I actually quite like that.
It also has a snazzy BIOS menu,
and I find the pairing of MS-DOS 6.22 and Windows 3.11 to be the peak of civilization.
Not to mention it's very aesthetically pleasing to look at,
even with a 17 inch CRT plonked on top.
All of these things combined make this my go-to machine for DOS gaming.
LGR: Well, as you might imagine, this is very much a viewpoint that I can get behind.
Sometimes a good, decent 486 is really all you need.
It's not the fastest, but it doesn't need to be. A lot of times, those limitations can be fun
and admittedly, tweaking and getting games to work that maybe shouldn't on a slightly slower computer
is a lot of the appeal of running games on older hardware, at least for me.
And really, a 100 megahertz DX4 machine is *plenty*, um, in fact, I'm also very fond of these Compaq Presarios.
Presarios or-
S- s- sudios or whatever-
they're very cool machines, I love my model 425 right here.
It's an all in one box, it's kind of a great middle ground of
having a full size desktop, but also smaller space it's taking up
and it has a CRT and it's very capable with the components inside.
But anyway, uh, let's move on to another point of view, and that is from Metal Jesus Rocks.
MJR: Hey guys, Metal Jesus here.
Now, in my retro gaming PC, I was looking for something
that perfectly encapsulated say, 1998 and 1999,
something that would run, say, Battle Bugs and also Septerra Core, and
all the rest of these games that I have behind me here.
Something that would run DOS and also Windows 98.
So what I ended up doing was starting with this Dell.
This is an XPS R400. It has a Intel Pentium II processor in there.
Then we maxed out the motherboard with 384 megabytes of RAM, I believe.
But as you guys know, it's the video card and the sound card
that determine how well all these games play.
So, for this machine,
we put a 3DFX Voodoo 3 in there, 3000 is the model number,
which works flawlessly both in DOS and in Windows.
For the sound card, I decided to not go with something exotic
because again, I'm looking for maximum compatibility both in DOS and Windows with every game I possibly can.
So I went with the standard.
I went with the Creative Labs Sound Blaster 16, and it works great.
The final must piece for my machine is the floppy drive because
so many of the games that I own are on either 3½ or 5¼ floppy.
The problem is is that my motherboard will only take one at a time, so,
right now I have a 3½ in there, but I do have a 5¼ that I can swap out if needed.
I'm very happy with it.
LGR: Alright, some very good points are brought up here because sometimes you wanna push it a little bit further than say a 486,
and go with something that can also do Windows 98, but
when you get into that era, or really, any era, sometimes you're gonna just have to compromise.
Like, in his case, where he was only able to run one type of floppy disk at the same time.
Sometimes, that can be due to the controller or the BIOS being used on the computer,
other times, you just don't have things working how it should, and it's weird.
I dunno, I've had that happen on several of my computers in that sort of late '90s, early 2000s era.
And then, the other thing to mention there is that uh,
while there are external 3½ inch drives for you know, older computers and more modern ones as well over USB,
5¼ inch, you're kind of stuck with an internal one.
There are some adapters that let you use 5¼ inch drives on USB,
but it's only a read-only thing for the most part.
Eh, writing is odd if you wanted to get it working externally, so something to keep in mind.
Well anyway, next person on the list is going to be Ancient DOS Games.
ADG: So when it comes to DOS gaming, you might think I'd be the kind of person who prefer to use real hardware.
But quite frankly, I just like emulating it on my Windows 10 machine.
Here's the thing:
If you wanna use real hardware for playing DOS games,
Sure, it's a perfectly valid option, it's just you kinda need like three different machines to cover the whole gamut.
You need something for the '80s, you need something for the early '90s, and you need something for the mid to late '90s.
So, with DOSBox, which is a DOS emulator, you can just... emulate all of those settings.
You can set your machine speed, you can set the type of video support, you can set up different audio devices.
And, you know wat the best part is?
Let's say you wanna play a game with a joystick.
If you're using a real DOS machine, you're limited to a four button joystick.
But with DOSBox,
you have access to pretty much *any* kind of joystick.
And the best part is that because you're not limited to four buttons,
you can just assign any button to any keyboard key, or heck,
put joystick support into a DOS game that doesn't even have it.
LGR: Well, here we're starting to get into the DOSBox side of things, as you might imagine, if you've ever seen his show.
He's always talking about all these different configurations that you can use
for every single game that he covers, it's like this is the type of thing you'll want to do to tweak DOSBox,
especially when you get to things like joysticks, because there are an awful lot of extra options for DOSBox,
which is nice, because...
He's right, you really do need at least three computers to get the best situation of these different eras
for the '80s, early '90s, mid '90s, and in my case, a 4th era, the late '90s - early 2000s.
and that's why I have so many dozens of PC setups lying around.
But, if you don't wanna do that, DOSBox is great.
It's customizable, expandable even.
And there are extra builds other than just the base DOSBox build,
one that I'm quite fond of is DOSBox-SVN.
It allows for things like 3DFX support and all sorts of extra cool stuff like that,
and, I mean, there are just plenty of them out there. I recommend diving into that world of DOSBox spinoffs.
Speaking of which, let's move on to the next person, which is PushingUpRoses.
PUR: When I was young, I had a Tandy 1000 and a lot of great games for it.
but when I upgraded to my Windows machine, I found I could no longer play them.
Compatibility issues were way more prominent in the '90s to early 2000s,
and when I found DOSBox, I found a brand-new way to play my old games on my new machines.
I would say it's what got me back into gaming.
For a while, I just had all these disks sitting around collecting dust, because my new machines could not play them.
It's definitely the most accessible and affordable option, seeing as though it's free,
and for me, it's the most efficient way to capture footage for my video work.
I also really like ScummVM, which is compatible with a lot of games both for DOS and for Windows,
and it has an easy-to-use interface.
Not everyone can afford or is tech-savvy enough to build an older DOS or Windows machine,
so I'm so glad we have options like DOSBox and ScummVM.
That way, everyone has a chance to enjoy their childhood games,
or even games they've always wanted to play and just didn't have the means.
In adulthood, I did pick up a few machines that I use for both DOS and Windows games,
but in terms of what I use the most, it's definitely emulation.
LGR: Well, absolutely agreeing there too. I mean, more DOSBox is good DOSBox, because
as fun as real hardware can be, as much as a treat it is,
it kind of is a treat, you know? You really have to commit to it if you want to use it.
And, that is a big reason why a lot of people end up
just not even going for older hardware at all and just sticking to DOSBox and..
As you can see, it works for people just *fine*!
You know? You have that and you also have
other more specialized programs for
individual games, like ScummVM, for instance, runs a ton of LucasArts, Sierra, and all sorts of adventure games
right there and they're often much better results than what you'd get in DOSBox.
Furthermore, there's things like source ports. And those are often fan-made projects
where they take uh, an existing source or take the codebase or graphics or assets from the game
and then update them to work with a modern system with a dedicated set of software.
It's just so good now, there's not really much reason to not do that, unless you're trying to go for, you know,
"emutating"
or uh, experiencing what the machine would have been like back in the day.
But anyway, next person on the list here we have Brutalmoose!
BM: My name is Ian. I run the YouTube channel Brutalmoose,
and when I like to play retro PC games, I do it on my HP Vectra VL400.
It's a computer that I bought on eBay and then customized after I got it.
It has an Intel Celeron 800 megahertz CPU,
the GPU is an NVIDIA GeForce 4 Ti 4200,
it's got 512 megabytes of RAM,
and the sound card is a Sound Blaster AudioPCI 128,
and it's running Windows 98 Second Edition.
I'd love to put a faster processor in there, but I also kind of don't know what I'm doing.
Uh, so, it's kind of where it's at right now.
Aside from the upgrade limitations, which may really just be based around my limited knowledge,
it's been really great to run anything. It's a bit big and the horizontal shape is a little bit odd,
It'd be better if I had an actual CRT monitor to put on top of it,
uh, but I don't have the space for that right now,
so I just run it to my modern desktop monitor.
I like using it a lot more than software emulation, though that's just a personal preference.
And next up, I'm planning on building a Windows XP machine to kind of bridge the gap
between the Windows 98 games and the modern games.
I need an- I need an in-between right there.
Before I do that, though, I should probably learn more about how to build one of those.
Is that- is that all you wanted? I- I hope that's good, uh...
Yeee-
LGR: ...
Well, one more point here in the favor of pre-built computers, and I'm totally on board.
Getting something like this off of eBay or wherever is a great option, because usually
even if it's a little bit newer than the era you're wanting to play games on,
if it's not going beyond a certain point, it's still going to work for the vast majority of games
and in fact, the most common recommendation I give for people is just
get a Windows 98 computer,
stick some components in there that are gonna be compatible if you need them,
namely the sound card, so you can get some extra support.
However, like he also mentioned, upgrading is a bit of a concern.
And sometimes you're limited by the form factor, like
in the case of these Vectras, which, I really quite like. I have a lot of them myself, but...
sometimes you're limited by the space inside of there because it's all cramped
and it's just not as convenient to work on as a tower. These horizontal desktops, as nostalgic as I can get for them,
they can be a bit of an aggravation to work on internally.
That being said, let's go ahead and get Retro Man Cave's perspective.
RMC: My go-to classic hardware for playing older games?
For me, it starts with the 486 DX2-66.
It fits perfectly with the era of early '90s games that I like to play.
Powerful enough to tackle any game of that time,
while not being so fast that old games without speed limiting
don't run too quickly or can't easily be resolved.
I'm certainly not a purist when it comes to classic hardware. Nobody has fond memories of single speed CD-ROM drives.
I go for the fastest I can put in,
and an easily accessible CompactFlash drive replaces the hard disk.
making transferring games to it from a modern system an absolute breeze.
For audio, I'm a fan of the Audition 32, as advocated on Phil'sComputerLab.
It's fully Sound Blaster compatible, has great OPL3 sound, and most importantly,
has an MPU-401 output port for my favorite part of the whole setup:
the Roland SC-88 for sweet MIDI melodies.
With backward compatibility for MT-32 instrument tables but not custom patches,
it covers all of my music needs without breaking the bank on an MT-32.
My games never sounded nor played better.
LGR: Ahh, more 486 love. It makes my heart...
heartened.
You know, I dunno. I guess, it really is just because my first computer was a 486, but...
it's also just because a *ton* of games from the early to mid-'90s are going to run very well on there,
and you also have the ability to add a few convenient upgrades and...
that's all you need! You know, a CompactFlash setup and maybe a good sound card, an MPEG card or anything like that,
and you're ready to go! And of course, a good CD-ROM
and eh, I totally agree with him about not wanting to go with like a 1x or 2x,
they're just too slow to even be really nostalgically enjoyable,
unless you're trying to demonstrate how crappy things were *Chuckle* in these early iterations of hardware.
Uh, but yeah. That's just a great setup indeed, and in fact, also MIDI, he mentioned.
Uh, this Roland Sound Canvas, I absolutely recommend that as well if you can.
Uh, you may need a MIDI-compatible MPU-401 card installed,
or you can go for a sound card like the Audition that he mentioned right there.
I have one of those as well and it does work very nicely with MIDI.
You may need to use a program like SoftMPU
to get certain programs to work if they happen to require "intelligent mode," but
I've talked about that in previous videos.
Either way, awesome setup.
Uh, let's move on though to PhilsComputerLab!
PCL: Hey Clint, thank you for having me on your show!
Here's my custom-built 4-in-1 DOS and Windows 98 time machine.
It's based around a Super Socket 7 motherboard,
with the AMD K6-III+ processor,
which lets you toggle the caches and CPU multiplier, so you can slow it down
to a 386 and play those sensitive DOS games like Wing Commander,
but it also has enough power for early Windows 3D games like Unreal.
The video card I recommend is a 3DFX Voodoo 3.
Excellent DOS compatibility, sharp image, and it supports the Glide API.
The Sound Blaster AWE64 Gold and a MIDI interface card handle the sound.
I've also routed the CD audio signal to the back of the computer,
as everything goes into an external mixer.
And of course, a Roland MT-32 and a Sound Canvas.
I mix it up with some modern parts, so I'm using a modern ATX case,
power supply, a GoTek floppy emulator,
and an IDE to SATA adapter, with a drive bay for easy access.
So there you have it Clint, you should be able to play around ten years worth of retro games on this machine.
Thank you so much for having me on your show.
LGR: So this is a kind of setup that really intrigues me because I haven't exactly done it myself yet.
And that is a nice mixture of old and new components
working together to just make a streamlined, clean, uh very capable machine
without going too fast, without going too slow, it's kind of the best of both worlds of uh, modern tech
and older classic retro hardware and software.
I also like that he mentioned that you can disable the cache on there
and you don't have to worry about a turbo button or
sometimes a turbo button isn't enough. I have to disable the cache on my Woodgrain 486
when the turbo button isn't enough to get say, Wing Commander, working properly.
Games like that can be really tricky on faster hardware.
and it's also a thing where you may uh, want to run some software on top of that
and he didn't mention it, but I've used Mo'slow and Slowmo and
all sorts of other CPU limiting programs in DOS and Windows 95, with some decent success.
Uh, I've had less success with the Windows ones, but uh,
the DOS ones like Mo'Slo, yeah, sometimes that can do the trick.
Alright, well, let's move on to the next person here and that is The 8-Bit Guy.
8BG: So what's my favorite MS-DOS gaming machine?
Well, ideally I think a 386 or 486 is
probably about the right speed to use for a gaming machine for MS-DOS, but
I don't have a lot of space around my house, so...
I don't really have a room for the full desktop setup and the CRT monitor and
stuff like that, so I tend to like laptops, and um...
so this is what I use, this is a 486 laptop
and it has the TFT active matrix screen,
its resolution is 640x480, so it's perfect for MS-DOS games.
Now, granted, it doesn't have any kind of internal sound card, but...
there is a certain charm to listening to the um,
the different PC speaker sounds, which pretty much every MS-DOS game had as a fallback if you didn't have a sound card.
BUT, if I'm not the mood to listen to that, I do have two have two other options here I sometimes use uh, this is a uh...
Covox Sound Device, it plugs into the parallel port, it works with quite a few games, and
uh, this is a brand-new product that I just got, which gives you AdLib compatibility on the parallel port, so uh,
that's two ways I can help to give me a little bit more authentic gaming experience on this laptop, but um...
Yeah, so this is definitely my favorite MS-DOS machine.
Yeah, this is exactly the kind of thing that I was hoping that David would dive into his segment, and he did.
Uh, laptops and portables. I mean, they're a fantastic area for vintage computer exploration!
It's something that I've been getting into more myself in recent years, and
I just think it's really fascinating because even though you don't have as much as an upgradability path,
you know, it's not as versatile as a desktop.
It does take up a lot less space and there's something really
fascinating to me about having
all these capabilities in a nice little compact package.
Of course, there are obvious downsides like the sound devices being limited that he mentioned.
And then sort of the later ones that often have
very good sound chips built in, with AdLib and Sound Blaster and Wave Blaster compatibility
but is also paired with a really bad scaler.
So that means that you're running an older DOS game or an older Windows game that's a lower resolution
and it tries to scale it up on the screen, and it looks like garbage.
Sure, you can plug in an external monitor, but then you're kind of getting beyond the point of using a laptop in the first place.
when your concern is space, but
Anyway, that being said, uh, laptops are a great option if you're looking to get into a vintage computer setup,
but don't wanna commit to a whole lot of space taken up
and setup and things like that. And they're often pretty affordable, too, if you look around in the right places.
And to finish this out here, last but not least, we have Ross Scott of Ross's Game Dungeon and Accursed Farms.
AF: Hey, Clint!
So what do I do to play old games?
Well, for DOS, it's easy.
DOSBox handles almost everything.
I use the program D-Fend Reloaded as a frontend to make life easier for configuring everything.
Sometimes, I get pops in the sound.
*POP*
I hate that...
but I can usually fight that by tweaking the values.
If a game has MIDI music, sometimes I use custom soundfonts to make it sound better.
BUT, finding the perfect soundfont is the path to madness.
For Windows 95 and 98 games, I first try compatibility mode.
That *usually* doesn't work.
After that, I run VMWare with old Windows installed inside it.
For hardware, I don't use anything special because honestly, legacy parts make me feel trapped
because all parts eventually fail, and I like knowing I can always play an old game with just off-the-shelf parts.
I'm actually worried where we're heading for games from the past ten years or so.
Even on VMWare for 3D accelerated games,
I can't force features like anisotropic filtering or antialiasing like back when those games came out.
so they can look worse now than they used to,
I hope the industry finds an answer to this as time goes on.
HELP!
LGR: AAAHH!!!
Oh man, okay, so... *Chuckles* here's the thing:
Uh, a lot of his reasons for using virtualization, VMs and emulators and stuff,
are the same exact reasons I *don't* use them, and that is because some of the things that you want to do on there,
they just don't work very well. You get weird little bugs as far as video and sound glitches
you can't do uh... AA and things like that, enhancements you could on original hardware.
(At least not yet). And yet, I totally understand why he doesn't even want to bother with old hardware.
It is kind of restricting and...
there is a time limit on this stuff, I mean, these things are not going to last forever.
And sure, there's a lot of upgrades and uh repairs
and sort of refurbishments that you can do to older hardware to make it last
potentially for another couple of decades, but...
beyond that, I mean, I don't know. There's- There's a lot of components that *are* going to die.
And the future is genuinely concerning to me because the virtualization and emulation scene
is not quite up to snuff *at all* for things from around 1996 to 2002 or so
on the PC, a lot of those Windows games that are just...
completely messed up, especially those that are 3D accelerated
or rely on some sort of weird DirectX shenanigans and all sorts of other things.
It's a real pain, um,
I mean, and something else that he also didn't mention is running these games on WINE.
It's odd, a lot of Windows games, the best way to get them working nowadays is to run Linux. *Laughter*
Um, as annoying as VMs and emulators can be to use,
it's still less aggravating and time-consuming than original hardware.
I've got some confused comments over the years from people being like,
"I wanna get into original hardware because emulators, or virtual machines, are so uh, irksome to set up" and...
You know, man, if you think those are bothersome, uh... *Chuckles*
There- It's nothing compared to getting like a 386 or 486 and diving into a world of
IRQ conflicts and Config.sys problems and just memory constraints and
everything.
It takes dedication and a lot of time and resources to get into real hardware,
and I completely understand if you don't want to, which is why I'm glad there are so many more options these days.
Well, that's pretty much it for this episode of LGR and once again,
thank you to everyone who was a part of this.
Uh, all these awesome YouTubers are awesome, so I appreciate it.
And also, thank you, the viewers,
for sending me all these questions related to this stuff that
hopefully I've covered a good majority of it in this video, or at least,
touched on a lot of things. I know there's a lot more as well,
that's I just haven't even gotten to yet, that probably would make sense for another video entirely.
And there's also the subject of buying these things and finding old hardware and software and
components that we didn't even really get to!
So uh, yeah, leave your questions in the comments
and uh, maybe your own setups, and what's worked for you and what hasn't,
I would love to hear it and I'm sure you're gonna say it anyway, so bring it on!
This stuff is endlessly fascinating to me and I'm sure we'll be getting to more of it in the future.
And if you did enjoy this episode, then thank you very much!
Perhaps you would like to see one of my others that are linked to right here.
And also, be sure to check out the full list of everyone that was in the video, uh, besides me! *Chuckles*
They're all fantastic as far as I'm concerned, so check 'em out!
Some really good content there, if you're not familiar with 'em.
And as always, thank you very much for watching.