Thinking of building a retro pc for emulation and old pc games, here's the parts I have.

[jordanbuilds1]

the reason im not posting this in new builds is because, well this isn't exactly new, its a pc with parts ive received over the years, so lets go down the list, shall we?
hp pavilion desktop case (had an i3 3100 in it)
intel xeon e3 1230 v2
Asus am3 motherboard
hp oem psu
2013 corsair cx750m psu
amd hd5450
Nvidia gtx 550ti 

what should I build with these parts. (am3 cpus are cheap, but so are lga 1155 motherboards)

[aisle9]

I'd do something like this:

• AM3 board
• Some kind of Phenom x4 (if Windows XP is the goal, a cheaper Athlon X2 will work fine)
• Corsair PSU, assuming it's not showing signs of age/imminent failure.
• GTX 550 Ti
• If you're going to play old-school games, you'll probably need an optical drive. Pretty good bet that the HP case has one that you can move over.

Pick up an el cheapo case from Craigslist, FB Marketplace, Kijiji, etc. If the AM3 board doesn't have RAM, you're in luck, because DDR3 is dirt cheap. Toss in a cheap SSD that you don't mind sentencing to a slightly early death due to the lack of TRIM support in XP (or a hard drive, if you hate life), and enjoy.

[jaslion]

Just build with what you have its technically supported in xp still

 

 

[Mark Kaine]

17 hours ago, aisle9 said:

I'd do something like this:

• AM3 board
• Some kind of Phenom x4 (if Windows XP is the goal, a cheaper Athlon X2 will work fine)
• Corsair PSU, assuming it's not showing signs of age/imminent failure.
• GTX 550 Ti
• If you're going to play old-school games, you'll probably need an optical drive. Pretty good bet that the HP case has one that you can move over.

Pick up an el cheapo case from Craigslist, FB Marketplace, Kijiji, etc. If the AM3 board doesn't have RAM, you're in luck, because DDR3 is dirt cheap. Toss in a cheap SSD that you don't mind sentencing to a slightly early death due to the lack of TRIM support in XP (or a hard drive, if you hate life), and enjoy.

so the Samsung "auto trim" is just marketing bs?

 

 

had one for like 10 yrs in my ps3 (no trim support) and its doing just fine btw.

 

 

 

14 hours ago, jaslion said:

Just build with what you have its technically supported in xp still

 

 

i mean true but im curious how the intel is going to do in the AM3 board! xD

 

btw i should do this also, have am3 board, athlons, phenoms, like 6 DDR3 kits a semi decent ATi card... and an old dell case, which is the problem as the mobo wont fit (i think) so I'd need to use my currently unused inwin 301, or buy some old HAF or whatever case, yikes! 

[demonix00]

3 hours ago, Mark Kaine said:

so the Samsung "auto trim" is just marketing bs?

No, because SSD's that have TRIM support will do the work themselves over time and don't need support in the OS for garbage collection.

 

Also, if you want to go the whole hog with a beige case, there's a company called evercase that still has new stock available (and they also have an ebay store)

[LAwLz]

Why not use your primary PC for this?

I don't really see a reason to build an entirely separate PC for these things.

[jordanbuilds1]

3 minutes ago, LAwLz said:

Why not use your primary PC for this?

I don't really see a reason to build an entirely separate PC for these things.

could, but I don't want to leave these parts aside, also if the system bricks due to emulation shenanigans, then im cooked if I use this on my main system

[LAwLz]

26 minutes ago, jordanbuilds1 said:

but I don't want to leave these parts aside

But they are really bad... It doesn't make sense spending money on the components you need to make a full system just to find a use for these parts. It's not like you can use all of them anyway. 

 

38 minutes ago, jordanbuilds1 said:

also if the system bricks due to emulation

Why do you think an emulator would brick your system?

[jordanbuilds1]

21 minutes ago, LAwLz said:

But they are really bad... It doesn't make sense spending money on the components you need to make a full system just to find a use for these parts. It's not like you can use all of them anyway. 

the point is for a "retro" pc, not a new pc to play rtx level games. its not really supposed to do anything more than play older games. also the remaining components cost 20-30 bucks

 

22 minutes ago, LAwLz said:

Why do you think an emulator would brick your system?

virus'

[Beerzerker]

On 11/4/2024 at 1:28 PM, jordanbuilds1 said:

the reason im not posting this in new builds is because, well this isn't exactly new, its a pc with parts ive received over the years, so lets go down the list, shall we?
hp pavilion desktop case (had an i3 3100 in it)
intel xeon e3 1230 v2
Asus am3 motherboard
hp oem psu
2013 corsair cx750m psu
amd hd5450
Nvidia gtx 550ti 

what should I build with these parts. (am3 cpus are cheap, but so are lga 1155 motherboards)

What model AM3 board?
I'm assuming it's one of the higher tier boards like a Crosshair IV or Crosshair V/Crosshair V-Z , maybe even a Sabertooth 1.0, 2.0 or 3.0 model since all those will run an AM3 chip.
However if not one of those, what is it exactly?

Best bet would be a Phenom II x4 960T for most boards regardless of model, good IMC and it's just the best 4 core AM3 overall, even when compared to a x4 Deneb.
Not that a x4 Deneb is bad mind you because it isn't - In fact if you already have one of those I'd just run it and not worry about getting a 960T chip.

Unless it's one of the higher tier boards it may or may not "Like" having a 6 core (Thuban) chip in it so much due to the differences in VRM setups between board models but any of the board models I named above will handle it.
If you do a Thuban based chip you'd probrably want to have a small fan blowing on the VRM area so that will be fine, even if it's a board I've named.

[jordanbuilds1]

4 minutes ago, Beerzerker said:

What model AM3 board?
I'm assuming it's one of the higher tier boards like a Crosshair IV or Crosshair V/Crosshair V-Z , maybe even a Sabertooth 1.0, 2.0 or 3.0 model since all those will run an AM3 chip.
However if not one of those, what is it exactly?

Best bet would be a Phenom II x4 960T for most boards regardless of model, good IMC and it's just the best 4 core AM3 overall, even when compared to a x4 Deneb.
Not that a x4 Deneb is bad mind you because it isn't - In fact if you already have one of those I'd just run it and not worry about getting a 960T chip.

Unless it's one of the higher tier boards it may or may not "Like" having a 6 core (Thuban) chip in it so much due to the differences in VRM setups between board models.
If you do a Thuban based chip you'd want to have a small fan on the VRM area so that will be fine.

its an Asus am3+ one so it should work

[Beerzerker]

Just now, jordanbuilds1 said:

its an Asus one so it should work

It's fine if you don't know the board model.

Nearly all AM3 boards will work with about any AM3 chip as you say, except for bottom tier (Office use) boards like an ASRock N68-GS-FX as an example.... Yes I have one of those too but do beware the thing about running a 6 core Thuban in a lesser board like that.

Although Asus didn't have all the problems others like MSI had running those chips, I'd want a fan on the VRM area anyway if possible and don't crank on it very hard if it's not one of the models I named or it could wind up with a fried VRM MOSFET.

 

[Kisai]

On 11/4/2024 at 11:28 AM, jordanbuilds1 said:

the reason im not posting this in new builds is because, well this isn't exactly new, its a pc with parts ive received over the years, so lets go down the list, shall we?
hp pavilion desktop case (had an i3 3100 in it)
intel xeon e3 1230 v2
Asus am3 motherboard
hp oem psu
2013 corsair cx750m psu
amd hd5450
Nvidia gtx 550ti 

what should I build with these parts. (am3 cpus are cheap, but so are lga 1155 motherboards)

Those parts are too new for any retro stuff (Retro tech being defined as literately anything not made or supported now, which would include 2 year old computers and smartphones.)  The definition I use for "retro" is basically "It needs an emulator to work on a current system" or "is not sufficiently emulated with a current system"

 

So things like the Super Nintendo and Xbox 360 are not sufficiently emulated on a current system (the SNES, Amiga 500/1200 and the M68000 Mac's all can't be emulated without some compromise,) but you can hit 'good enough'. DOS via DOSBOX is a mixed bag, as well as Arcade machines via MAME. Pretty much only 8-bit computers and consoles can be emulated 'perfectly' +/- some input latency on a current gen system, and 16-bit computers/consoles usually have to compromise by dropping render cycles. You don't realize what is missing unless you play on original hardware. Which is why like, you experience slowdowns on the Nintendo Switch when playing SNES games.

 

Pretty much anything written to use DirectX9 or before also is a crapshoot if it will run on Win10 or later due to depreciation, hiding, or removal of music, network and input API's these games were written against in favor of Xbox-era API's that were then also depreciated with Xbox One.

 

Which to go back to what you can do with that stuff. Most of that stuff is Vista/7 stuff, and is too new for XP but too old for Win 10. If you want to deal with getting Win XP on it, you might pull off playing some late Win98/ME era games up to early Vista-era games, but generally, and I'll say this every time someone asks. It is usually not worth the effort to build a retro system newer than a WinXP, because that's the cross-over point when the UI scaling no longer works. A game designed for HiDPI (eg anything higher than 720p) will work on Vista and later, but a game not designed for HiDPI will only work at native resolution on Windows XP. On Vista usually you have issues with UI scaling (Photoshop CS/CS2/CS3/CS4, which isn't a game is notorious for failing to work in HiDPI mode.) 

 

So if you want to go through the effort to get 32-bit XP on that hardware, sure, it can run XP-era software fine. But that's not XP-era hardware (XP era hardware ended in 2008, but was still getting updates as late as 2019, but that doesn't mean drivers (eg Intel INF that you need to enable USB and Chipset features) will work. You are most likely going to have to use whatever OS was released when the CPU was new and the vintage driver from that time. If you get that far the rest is usually easy.

 

[jordanbuilds1]

4 hours ago, Kisai said:

Those parts are too new for any retro stuff (Retro tech being defined as literately anything not made or supported now, which would include 2 year old computers and smartphones.)  The definition I use for "retro" is basically "It needs an emulator to work on a current system" or "is not sufficiently emulated with a current system"

 

So things like the Super Nintendo and Xbox 360 are not sufficiently emulated on a current system (the SNES, Amiga 500/1200 and the M68000 Mac's all can't be emulated without some compromise,) but you can hit 'good enough'. DOS via DOSBOX is a mixed bag, as well as Arcade machines via MAME. Pretty much only 8-bit computers and consoles can be emulated 'perfectly' +/- some input latency on a current gen system, and 16-bit computers/consoles usually have to compromise by dropping render cycles. You don't realize what is missing unless you play on original hardware. Which is why like, you experience slowdowns on the Nintendo Switch when playing SNES games.

 

Pretty much anything written to use DirectX9 or before also is a crapshoot if it will run on Win10 or later due to depreciation, hiding, or removal of music, network and input API's these games were written against in favor of Xbox-era API's that were then also depreciated with Xbox One.

 

Which to go back to what you can do with that stuff. Most of that stuff is Vista/7 stuff, and is too new for XP but too old for Win 10. If you want to deal with getting Win XP on it, you might pull off playing some late Win98/ME era games up to early Vista-era games, but generally, and I'll say this every time someone asks. It is usually not worth the effort to build a retro system newer than a WinXP, because that's the cross-over point when the UI scaling no longer works. A game designed for HiDPI (eg anything higher than 720p) will work on Vista and later, but a game not designed for HiDPI will only work at native resolution on Windows XP. On Vista usually you have issues with UI scaling (Photoshop CS/CS2/CS3/CS4, which isn't a game is notorious for failing to work in HiDPI mode.) 

 

So if you want to go through the effort to get 32-bit XP on that hardware, sure, it can run XP-era software fine. But that's not XP-era hardware (XP era hardware ended in 2008, but was still getting updates as late as 2019, but that doesn't mean drivers (eg Intel INF that you need to enable USB and Chipset features) will work. You are most likely going to have to use whatever OS was released when the CPU was new and the vintage driver from that time. If you get that far the rest is usually easy.

 

the main plan was to play nfs carbon era to gta v era games. I prob should have specified what I was doing, but I see what your saying.

[Beerzerker]

3 hours ago, jordanbuilds1 said:

the main plan was to play nfs carbon era to gta v era games. I prob should have specified what I was doing, but I see what your saying.

I don't believe you'd have much trouble out of it as long as what you do is within reason for the hardware/OS combo you'd be running.
It will run XP, Win7, Win 8, Vista and others fine, even does well enough with Win 10 TBH about it but the base requirements for that OS could make for some interesting stuff going on.
Win 11..... I woudn't try it with though.

However all of my AM3/AM3+ hardware has no problem if and when I run Win 10 on it.

For Linux it's fine and most distros run great on it, I know Mint and Peppermint distros have no problem with it at all.

So:
Do what makes you happy and game on and if there are problems, you know what to do about it.

 

 

 

 

 

[gravitywave]

Building retro systems is a rabbit hole...or a bunch of rabbit holes. I did it for a while, dealt with too many bad parts, unexpected hardware limitations. Even if you used to know things, you forget things and how things have changed. And when I finally decided to get rid of it all, selling it off to the curmudgeons who buy that kinda stuff wasn't a great experience either. I still have a 486 system under my bed because I didn't want to deal with the hassle of selling it.

 

So, that said...have fun?

[Mark Kaine]

On 11/5/2024 at 4:47 PM, demonix00 said:

No, because SSD's that have TRIM support will do the work themselves over time and don't need support in the OS for garbage collection.

 

Also, if you want to go the whole hog with a beige case, there's a company called evercase that still has new stock available (and they also have an ebay store)

oh ok good to know but I'd rather want something like this 

 

 

or

 

 

my old hp (i thought it was dell)

[demonix00]

On 11/5/2024 at 9:52 PM, LAwLz said:

Why not use your primary PC for this?

I don't really see a reason to build an entirely separate PC for these things.

Because modern windows operating systems block certain DRM systems that were in place on older games and I'm certain that the OP doesn't want to risk their main system with possibly dodgy executables that supposedly don't have the included DRM linked in them.

[jordanbuilds1]

1 minute ago, demonix00 said:

Because modern windows operating systems block certain DRM systems that were in place on older games and I'm certain that the OP doesn't want to risk their main system with possibly dodgy executables that supposedly don't have the included DRM linked in them.

this, and also because of the millions of loopholes ive had to go through to get ps1 bios before

[Mark Kaine]

3 minutes ago, demonix00 said:

Because modern windows operating systems block certain DRM systems that were in place on older games and I'm certain that the OP doesn't want to risk their main system with possibly dodgy executables that supposedly don't have the included DRM linked in them.

its also more fun, you could buy the bestest GPU at the time for a few bucks on the cheap also...

 

me I'd primarily use it as a Vista Station for music production and some older games, i doubt it would be great for emulation beyond PS1, something like RPCS3 would be completely out of the question i guess,  and original Xbox is kinda hard to emulate too, i got it working at 1440p/ 60fps,  but that's on a modern system with a 5800x3d.... and it definitely wasn't "plug and play".