Ultimate XP Machine

[Bmoney]

Ok I have gotten the retro pc bug and want to build the king machine for XP, 98SE, and DOS. Phil's computer lab is awesome and LGR this is all their fault  

From the XP build I have been researching motherboard, graphics cards, and other stats that have drivers and compatibility 

Mothboard : Asus Rampage IV Extreme Black

CPU: Intel I-7 4960x (Yes I know XP max is 2 cores but this is the fast chip for this board)

Graphics Cards: Duo 980TIs

Storage:4 120GB SSDs in Raid 0 Roughly 

Ram: HyperX DDR3 2666 32GBs (Yes I know way overkill which is kinda the point)

 

Thoughts? Because of the extra core and ram I was thinking maybe UNRAID and install a 32-bit v and 64-bit for the rare compatibility issues.

Any other suggestions on what to do with the extra cores?

Don't give me the Windows 7 speech either because I want xp and this will be on its own VLAN no direct internet access and my router is set up to block the subnet access to the WAN.

 

Suggestions for DOS and 98SE welcome also. Maybe a solid P4 build for 98SE or AMD and DOS P-II or III?

[Snipergod87]

You are mistaken about the processor limit.

XP Home is limited to one physical CPU unlimited cores

XP Pro is limited to 2 physical CPU's and unlimited cores

[it_dont_work]

Not sure you'll manage to find xp drivers for the board/cpu combo, at the very least remember to load some sata drivers into the xp install disc. 

 

Personally, The hardware is too new for an XP build, would see a lot of compatibility problems, and make 98 era software a nightmare and dos games would still need dos box. 

[Guest]

I think that the hardware you chose it way to modern. The highest I would go with an xp build is a C2D or C2Q and something like a 7800GTX or 8800GTX.

[Bmoney]

ASUS website has the drivers for the the hardware and the ACHI drivers. The all Nvidia GPUs have XP drivers up till to 900 series. 

[AskTJ]

Windows XP will work, but some games might not on the new hardware.

 

I would rather get a prebuilt, with a Core 2 Duo/Quad, and a 4th gen GPU. These can be found cheap and this will be the ultimate XP system.

[Snipergod87]

I would also advise against XP x64 due to driver hell and many things not being compatible with it.

 

If you are doing UnRAID make sure the KVM drivers are compatible with Windows XP.

If you are actually going to install Windows XP you are going to have a very very hard time finding XP compatible drivers for your X99 chipset

[Bmoney]

9 hours ago, Snipergod87 said:

I would also advise against XP x64 due to driver hell and many things not being compatible with it.

 

If you are doing UnRAID make sure the KVM drivers are compatible with Windows XP.

If you are actually going to install Windows XP you are going to have a very very hard time finding XP compatible drivers for your X99 chipset

That board is a x79