Hardware advice for retro gaming rig

[Munty]

Hi all, been toying with a few ideas recently and it's brought me back to a previous musing on building a pc to pay homage to one of my favourite all-time games. I made a Sketchup way back of what I might be able to do but I based it around the technology in my antique Win95 rig (because I already had it!)

I'm thinking now that it would probably be a much better idea to start from scratch as it would give me a more stable, more compact and much longer lasting result. But I've never tried to make an old rig before so I'm hoping for some help from those who know more than myself on such things!

I'm a hardcore XP fan and based on how utterly crap Vista and 7 seem to be I will continue building my current rigs with that. For a retro rig however I'd like to return to basics as it will be intended to run older games that aren't particularly compatible or stable with newer versions of Windows. I'm thinking it'll let me throw out or recycle a few of the computers I'm stuill hanging onto from the old days this way as well as save me downloading so many patches and emulators and such to get these games running!

So what I'd like to end up with is the ability to run 95,98 and 2000 on this comp, something I've never toyed with before so some advice on multiple OS's would be great as I've not got the first idea! I'll be wanting support for floppies and cd's due to the purpose of the rig and some form of more modern removable storage would be good too. USB would be great but I have no idea how possible that would be based on the dated OS's in question...

Of course games that are old enough to warrant installation on this system rather than my current XP one will almost certainly run at maximum efficiency on even the most basic on-board features of a semi-modern board but again please correct me if I'm wrong.

The final thought for this is that I'd like to use a fairly small LCD panel for a screen and incorporate it into the design so everything is complete (save keyboard and mouse) Based on age and maximum available resolutions for the kind of programs I'd be looking to run on this I'm thinking it wouldn't need to be very big at all but any thoughts on viable sizes would also be great.

Key to this making sense is to keep everything fairly small which I can't forsee being difficult due to the lack of anything much besides a motherboard, DDs and PSU but again please someone correct me if I'm wrong! I think I saw a CDD/HDD combo unit on here at some point, is there such a thing or am I making it up? Also a small low power PSU would suit my purposes fine and ideally could be used to power the screen as well so I can run everything from one plug. And while I think about it a few small built in speakers would be nice too, also powered internally.

That's my list done though! This is one of two builds I'm currently hoping to undertake since circumstance stopped my last one dead in it's tracks. This will be a quicker easier and cheaper ordeal though I believe so I'd really appreciate any feedback and advice. The other plan is for a future-proof (don't laugh just a few years will do!) gaming rig which I need mucho advice on so expect more questions to follow but I won't go on anymore for now!

Thanks for reading and in advance for any help!

[x88x]

I'm a hardcore XP fan and based on how utterly crap Vista and 7 seem to be I will continue building my current rigs with that.

Ah, we'll bring you around eventually. Don't judge 7 by Vista's mistakes. But, since that's neither here nor there as you won't be using anything newer than 2000 on this build, we'll leave that for now.


If you can find the appropriate drivers for it, one of the original miniITX boards would be great for this. 700MHz VIA CPU and 512MB of RAM should blow anything away. Otherwise, find an old 700MHz to 1GHz or so PIII, PII, or K6 with 64MB of RAM and it should handle anything wonderfully. ...unless you're looking at really old, CPU clock-cycle bound games...I remember a pacman knockoff that ran so insanely fast that it was over barely after you hit the 'start' button...and that was on my old Pentium 266!

For OS, I would recommend three partitions, with Windows 95 with USB support, Windows 98 SE, and Windows 2000 Pro, installed on different partitions, in that order. That will even give you addressable space for a fourth primary partition to store data on. I remember seeing somewhere an unofficial 'Windows 98 SE SP2' that someone put together that was just all the security patches for 98 SE up to when MS stopped putting them out, all bundled in a nice installer. ...actually, come to think of it, I think I might have that on my server at home..I'll try and remember to look for it tonight. That would make your 98 install much more secure if you ever want to expose it to the internet for an extended period of time.

Hmmm, actually...
If you're looking for something as small as possible, with a small screen, as long as you're not looking to do anything even remotely graphically intensive (2MB video cache), if you can find a decently priced Toshiba Libretto 100 or 110ct, that would do beautifully. I have a 110ct that served as my nettop before nettops were even a twinkle in anyone's eye, and specced out with 64MB of RAM it handled itself actually quite well. Ran Win 98 SE and Firefox beautifully, even managed to run Win 2000 Pro without overly many issues...personally I would keep it with 98 SE though..just a tad too sluggish in 2000. Actually though, any old laptop from that era would do just fine. You might even get one with a working battery.

[AmEv]

Hmmmm....

I have a few Slot 1 ATX boards, with a PIII 450 laying around, not getting any use.
Not sure on shipping tho....


With ATX size, you can have el-crapo parts, nice looking case.
Just throwing out ideas

[x88x]

I just checked, and I do have that unofficial service pack. They called it "Windows 98 SE SP2.1a". I can upload it somewhere if you like, once you get to that point.

[Munty]

Thanks guys, lots of great help already! I hadn't thought about using an old laptop but you're right it could work... I'm looking a little more into possible parts and have been ebaying the mini mobo+CPU bundles available. Seems to be a pretty cheap thing to get hold of and all of the ones I've seen are way over-qualified for what I'll be asking of them! The trick will be to get one in known working order complete with any necessary drivers but even so I don't think it'll be too much.

I'm looking at possibilites for other components now and I think my first job is to determine what size screen I'd like as that will determine whether or not a laptop will be of use. I'm leaning towards a mini pc build at the moment as I'm more familiar with it but I'm sure a lappy can't be too different, they all work the same way after all right?

I seem to remember my initial design for this rig using a 9" screen but I think it may as well go up to at least 10" as it's a more reasonable size I think even for old games. I'm guessing whichever way I go even an onboard graphics card will get a fairly decent resolution if I'm using modern technology so the only limit is the ability of the games to display large resolution images.

Just checked a bunch of my big-box games which is what this build is primarily intended for and none of them are asking more than 32MB RAM and I could probably install every single one of them in a few hundred MB of memory! Very few of them list optimal resolutions but I imagine they're mostly around 640x480 to an absolute maximum of 800x600 Just checked the resolution for the game this rig will pay homage to and it's a whopping 320x200! Didn't think it ever went that low haha

So realistically I think 9-10" will be more than enough for the kind of programs I'll be running and contrary to my knowledge that does permit use of a laptop. Found a 3 week old one on ebay that would be perfect but it has 6 days left so most likely won't sell for the £3 it's currently on!

I'm thinking about the keyboard now and this could be what decides it for me as I think it's pretty much surplus technology for 90% of the time this rig will be running. For that reason a standard kb is out of the question and a big bulky laptop one isn't much better. If I could disconnect the keyboard from the rest of the laptop and conceal it in the rest of the build however I could maybe do something interesting with it. Especially if I get a lappy with a small 9-10" screen to start with which would provide a fairly small keyboard.

Other options I'm looking at are small bluetooth keyboards intended for mobile phones, Xboxs etc, or my personal favourite to complement the rest of the rig, a laser projector keyboard! I've seen these before so I'm sure you guys have too but they connect via bluetooth and simply project a usable keyboard onto the desk you happen to be sitting at. The drawback with this is a massive pricetag however and for a rig that will seldom be used I just can't justify it unfortunately. For the cool factor it would bring to the build I WOULD be willing to pay for it but the cheapest I've found so far is £160 and that's half a processor for the new build I'm planning!

So currently I'm torn between desktop or laptop for a base unit. I think if I were to use desktop parts and build it from scratch I could make it fit my needs better but the cost in new parts would be much higher. Whereas if I were to use a laptop I'd have all the parts I needed right away and it would just be a case of sorting out the software. Probably be cheaper too if I can get a good deal to star me off...

What do you guys think? Should I scratch build or does it make more sense to rip apart a laptop?

I'm going to draw some doodles for each scenario and see what I prefer...

[Blibbax]

I think gaming on a phone keyboard could be quite hard. Starting with a laptop seems like a solid idea. You might not even need to rip it up much, depending on what you're trying to achieve.

[Munty]

Thanks Blibbax, I'm just thinking I won't really need to use the keyboard much so it seems silly to use an unmodded full-size one that will detract from the overall look of the project. I've been doodling and mocked up how I want the screen to look and although 10" looks easily big enough the measurements I've made it to seem VERY rectangular. It's based on stats of a 10.1" screen I found by googling which work out at 225x132 or just over 9" by almost 5 1/4".

That seems to be a ratio of about 1.7:1 and like I say it seems too long for it's height. Now this is based on a lappy screen but I don't have the name to hand as I long sicne closed the site I used to find it. I'm sure sizes will vary between models regardless but does this sound like an average ratio or might I be able to find something just a touch squarer out there?

So back to keyboard and desk/lap... I think either could easily work and I still see little that would differ between the 2 save the keyboard. As I said, the games I'll be playing are very mouse-heavy but mostly require little input in terms of typing. So as far as a small keyboard goes I think it would be ok given the small use this rig will inevitably get anyway and of course the motherboard (if I go desktop) will be able to attach a standard keyboard anyway...

As far as a laptop goes I still think it'll be cheaper and probably easier and quicker too as I'll start off with a complete system. Ebay has already turned up a few decent systems but none are quite right. There are a few 'spare or repair' items which may be worth getting and would be very cheap but they're mostly missing HDDs, batteries, chargers etc and I don't want to then spend a whole lot of time and money digging up obsolete replacement parts before I can even boot up.

The structure of the rig will be such that everything will be contained, be it a desktop or laptop base. In the event of using a desktop I imagine the whole thing could be kept very compact. The HDD, CDD, flppy, mini mobo and PSU can all be arrange to form a shallow rectangle (think keyboardish but bigger as necessary) This would form the base of the build and the monitor, probably a 10" LCD, will be attached to the base standing at the back, so it already closely resembles an open laptop really! The keyboard would then most likely be a small xbox, mobile phone item as mentioned and I'd try to house this inside the rig when not in use to keep it tidy. Same with the mouse which if I get on ok with this (ie. if it ever happens!) will be modified to form a part of the case itself. The case will then form part of a battlefield which will be immediately recognisable by anyone who has ever played this game! The monitor will be trimmed to represent an iconic in-game window too so the whole thing will tie in nicely.

If I use a lapto as a base little will change as the screen and hardware will still be located in the same way as above. The only difference will be housing the keyboard as I don't want it visible when the rig is not in use. Two solutions to this spring to mind, both using the lappy keyboard but trimmed down and slightly customised. The first is to simply hide the keyboard away inside the case when not in use which wouldn't be too hard but would necessitate a slightly larger area in front of the screen to accomodate it. The second is to contain the keyboard as an actual part of the case (in a fixed position) and simply conceal it when the rig is not in use. That could mean putting a building, field, soldiers etc. or maybe just grass on top of it, or it could be more complicated like decorating the underside of the keyboard to blend in with the rig and having it flip over when it's needed. That would probably take the most work and again it would require a larger area to the front of the case but it would palmost certainly be the most rewarding and impressive solution.

As I'm writing the ideas are becoming slightly clearer and much as I'd like to stick to what I know and go with a desktop build I think the components will make it too expensive and may be larger than lappy equivalents too making the build unnecessarily larger than it needs to be.

If anyone happens to know of donor laptops or a good source thereof I'm looking for anything at all but it must be in working order when I receive it. It'll be wiped of all memory and I'll start from scratch but I'd like it to be working initially so I know hardware is good! I'll also need any drivers providing as I'm not planning on connecting this computer to the internet. I want USB, CDD and FDD but RAM and CPU are not important really. Anything about 32MB RAM and a 0.7 processor will blow the target games out of the water!

That's it so keep an eye on friends neighbours and ebay for me And remember (As I don't know where this site is really located) I'm in the UK!

[Munty]

Well I guess we're underway as I just got myself a laptop for the project

Was an ebay do and cost me £35 which is more than I was hoping as I thought I was going to get it for just £20 but it's still not bad and it's well above specs. Unfortunately the screen is bigger than I wanted but it's more rectangular than the one I based my mockup on so will just have to make do!

Here is a link to the auction while it lasts and following that is a list of specs for when the link expires (or those who can't be bothered navigating away from TBCS )

Link:
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.d...#ht_500wt_1156

Spec:
Time 2000 laptop
AMD K6/2 500 Processor
12" Screen
128MB Memory
12GB Hard Drive
3½" Floppy Disk Drive
CD Rom Drive
LAN
2 x PCMCIA
2 x USB Ports
56K Modem
VGA
Parallel
Serial
PS 2 Port
Microsoft Windows 98 Recovery Disks

Presumably the fact it comes with a Windows 98 recovery disk means that's the OS it currently runs and as the image in the auction shows it in Windows AND the item is listed as seller refurbished I'm fairly confident the hardware will be good. To my knowledge I've never had a PCMCIA slot but I can't say it bothers me either way. Most important is that I've got myself a CDD, FDD and 2xUSB ports.

It states that the battery is duff but it has the charger and runs off that so I'm happy enough that way. Anyone who knows me can tell you that no battery can last as long as I do once I'm gaming anyway so it's not an issue! So that and the fact that the screen is 2" larger than I was hoping for seem to be the only drawbacks. Hell if the touchpad works I may even be able to tie that in with the overall design of the mod!

I'm going to move onto sourcing some of the bits I'm going to need for the rest of the build now as once I'm done with the lappy itself it will have absolutely none of it's original case left! Need craft items and miniatures for the actual case itself too as everything will have to be scratch built I think. Still at least I have the expensive part done! I'll try to sort out the software I want once it arrives and get these partitions and OS's installed. Once I know it's all going to work how I want it to I'll get on with the rest of the project!

[x88x]

Looks good. FYI, PCMCIA slots are just expansion interfaces, say, if you wanted to add a NIC or more USB ports or something. The standard isn't used on many new laptops anymore, but cards are still readily available.

[Munty]

Thanks for that, did a quick google after the auction finished and thought it looked like a kind of removable media slot. Either way I really don't need it so it's of little consequence! The important thig is that it DOES have everything that I DO need!

Can anyone tell me anything about laptop internals? The only major requirements for this to work out the way I want it to is that the keyboard and screen need to be separated from the remaining hardware by some distance. Presumably each item is only connected to the other by one or two cables/ribbons/whatever, but are they long enough to give me a bit of free reign in relocating them or are they only as long as they need to be? If it's the latter, can I extend them?