PII-300 - where will I run out of juice?

[AdamLotz]

Hey guys -

I have a PII-300 that I'm running DOSMame on.  I want to say it has 128 megs of ram but not positive.  

I built the cabinet as an alternative to buying the $2800 Ms. Pac / Galaga reunion.  Obviously it plays both of those games fine.  But even in the set of antiquted roms I had, there were a few games that seemed slow.

Where (or maybe what year of Rom) will this system end up being no good anymore?  I mean, what sorts of games can I expect to work fine, and which games will be unplayable?  And for Dos MAME, does RAM count as much as it apparently does under windows?

[Thenasty]

Use MAME 36 Final. You can run hundreds of games with this version with your P2-300.

[SirPoonga]

Yeah, part of using an old system for mame is using an old mame.  old mames ran better on old systems.

[1Spoon]

Interesting point.
I have mame 0.60 with a full set of ROMs.
If I were to run MAME 36 Final,  would I be able to use the ROMs I have ? Or do I need an older set??

[Geo]

Adam,

I'm running a PII-450 with AdvanceMame 62.2 and most of the stuff I run is fine. The majority of NeoGeo games run at near full FPS without skipping. Usuallt I am running under DOS, but going to Windows (98SE) doesn't hurt too bad.

On the plus side, when I'm ready I can just swap in an Athlon XP 2000+ CPU/MB upgrade for about $150 and be screaming. I do have some usable mempry hanging around otherwise add another $100 or so.

BTW,

Are you the same AdamLotz that visits JU? If so, you will find this hobby much less $$$$!

George (Jeepin' Geo)

[eightbit]

Adam I bet if you upgrade to win98 you'll see a performance boost. Dos doesn't get you the performance boost it used to. Most hardware has been optimized for Windows and mame is being developed in Windows now.

[Brax]

My buddy runs a PII 300. He's maxed out his ram. You'd be amazed what he can pull off. I think you'd notice quite a difference with a ram upgrade and you can play a great number of games. His wanted a coputer upgrade but now with the ram (384 megs) he's prepared to keep it for some time yet.