Dell OptiPlex gets multimedia upgrade 

The rattling sound of these old Western Digital Caviar drives brings me some really good memories...

Don't forget to enable DMA on the HDD and CD-ROM.

It's a good day when Retrospector78 uploads!

what a joy it is to see perfectly capable machines like these in action (and getting upgrades)

seeing this computer brought back some old memories, my school in like 1-4 grade was positively full of these lol

I agree, nothing like installing 95 or 98 on original hardware. Way more fun than new stuff.

Brings back so many good memories from back in the day

Installing Win95 from DOS 6.22 is absolutely fine. I often use a 6.22 disk as my generic “Das-boot” disk. I have had the same problem you were having, but I seem to remember it being a bad SCSI driver, or an issue with the Plug n Play config manager having trouble assigning resources. Something like that. I bet if you had stripped down the configs, and maybe removed any non-essential cards, it would’ve been fine. Might also have been a disk manager in the MBR. OH! No, I remember now - there’s a buggy version of emm386 that would have issues with ... something. I’m having trouble remembering what exactly triggered it, but there was a KB article that said you needed to upgrade to a later version. I think I ended up using one from MS Visual C++ 1.52 or something, as it was later than the ones bundled with DOS.

Very nice Win98 machines that have onboard ATI RAGE for early 3D games. Once thing to keep in mind is the custom ATX connector which prevents you from upgrading the PSU which is 145W stock. An adaptor exists that converts the ATX connector so a regular PSU can be used, otherwise you run the risk of damaging the motherboard.

Waiting for everything to happen truly is humbling.

very cool, you should apply this format (overview, base, maxed out upgrades) to more systems!

When I see a new RetroSpector video I know it will be a very good episode :D

That original animated Win95 bootscreen is still the best with the nice gradient and bright colours. And it allowed for some awesome animated 3rd party ones too...

Since 2009 I like to install those old OSes in Virtualbox. I have all Windows releases from 1.04 (1986) to 11 (2022) including the NT releases :) On the Linux side I have all Ubuntu LTS releases; the first release 4.10 and my first release 5.04 :) I have absolutely no space for 17 old PCs running Windows. However I installed my ancient VMs on the last 500GB of an 1TB HDD and of course they run with one CPU. I even have no space for my first two PCs; an own-build 486DX66 dual booting Windows for Workgroups 3.11 and OS2/Warp nor for my Philips P3105, an XT clone with MS-DOS 6.0. My 2 oldest still running VMs were installed and activated in April 2010 (Windows XP Home NL and Ubuntu 10.04 LTS). They survived 3 Desktop PCs and 4 CPUs (2003 HP d530 with a Pentium 4 HT; 2008 HP dc5850 with a Phenom X3 8600 upgraded to a Phenom II X4 B97 and my 2nd 2019 own-build with a Ryzen 3 2200G). Another reason I prefer VMs, they live forever, if backed up properly :) I still use that 2003 HP d530 SFF, I kept the parts and moved those to a Compaq Evo Tower with a Windows 98SE activation sticker. The PC has the Pentium 4 HT (1C2T; 3.0GHz); 1.5GB DDR (400MHz) and 4 HDDs in total 1.21TB (2x IDE; 2x SATA-1; 2x 3.5"; 2x 2.5"; 1x 250GB and 3x 320GB). The system is still used for ~1 hour/week as backup server. It runs the latest FreeBSD 13.1 with OpenZFS 2.1.4 with all storage lz4 compressed. The tower has 2 external cables 1 Gbps Ethernet and Power. Another fun project to use an outdated PC with the latest software for a still useful task. The transfer speed is 200Mbps due to a 95% load on one CPU thread :)

Great video. You sir are a proper nerd. I long for this era where technology was mostly used for productivity with none of the social media nonsense.

I have a couple of these (the GX1 variant) and I originally had them with windows FLP but after watching this video I simply had to load W98 SE

I love how the Quake audio is drowning him out as he drones on about resolutions back in the day. 😆

Great video! Really enjoy seeing your restoration/repair videos of these old PCs. The boxed software that you show with these PCs really adds to that throwback feeling. Who knew these PCs be so collectible over 25 years later? I have a "retro network" like this and hold regular LAN parties (three IBM Aptiva Pentium PCs, and a custom-built AT-class PC I built 23 years ago) for mostly IPX net games. Transferring large files via the network still makes retro gaming much easier with these older machines, even with bandwidth/speed limitations. I love that collection of old SoundBlaster cards...definitely keep those!

Nice video thanks. That sound cards box is just wow!

loved the upgrade format. keep up the good work

great job on turning this nice machine around......i like it alot! if i ever wanted a dos windows gaming rig..you are the guy to go to! wish that we lived closer!...good job!

The whole experience is so much about sound, smell and haptics to me. I am currently wrapping my head around how to set up and test some 20 SCSI harddrives that have piled up and it is absolutely tedious. but still, at every reboot the sounds of the floppy drive springing to life and loading MHDD makes me a little bit happy.

This is the first time I have watched a retro computer video about a computer that I used on a regular basis. Mine came from an office environment, so it didn't have a sound card installed when I got mine either. I later picked up a p2 era optiplex on eBay in the early 2000's that was my main computer for a while too. I really liked the style of those cases especially.

Opliplex, Dell, white. Good times!

Excellent video! I love the old Dell machines. Very well built.

Ooh! Same size/semi-look as the 'Tulip Impression compact 4/66' that came to a 14yo(C64 and Amiga 1200 owner before) 1994 house....and YES! Did go x86 from then...

Nice. Just a few days ago I installed Win98 on a Thinkpad 380Z. :)

I enjoy the process of installing OSs as well on my retro 90s-2000s Macintosh systems!

Here's a tip for beginners if you want to test the .mid and .wav files in Windows 95 when you install the sound drivers for any sound card, if you did a default installation you'll need to go in the Control Panel go to Add/Remove Programs click the Windows Setup tab go to Multimedia category and select Sample Sounds and Multimedia Sound Schemes if you want to get canyon.mid or passport.mid in the Media folder.

You missed one critically important part in your testing segment: CAN IT PLAY DOOM? (insert doom theme song here)

This might sound crazy but I'm 37. I've never installed MS-DOS! I've never used MS-DOS 6.22! All windows baby. I've done more with DOS BOX. It's interesting how it didn't work to install win95 over it. When I was a windows 95 and 98 user as a young kid I knew what dos mode games meant and what dos mode meant and how to use it...but that was it. Windows took care of it all. I think the first computer we had at home was a 286 with CGA color, I never reinstalled DOS but I could use DOS and MS-DOS shell.

I once worked a large company in Southern California and had to support 250 of them. There was a another model which had a 4 digit LED display showing the actual track info!

I couldn't agree more; using a Win 9x o/s on a period-correct machine is so satisfying. This one really turned out great, love it

The days of 'plug and pray'. I remember doing soooooooo many Windows 95 installs/reinstalls and going through the pain of trying to get various hardware to work properly.

Nice Upgrades Thanks for the Vidio

Nice work

That's a slick case design for a P1

I’ve always wondered why the Windows “Scanning for new hardware” detection dialog was slow. I guess in needs to built up some sort of database. It seems like Microsoft never choose to output what it is actually doing in that process. Contrast that with Linux that is always extremely verbose to the point where it seems like it is doing way more then it should overloading the users with senseless error messages that it can’t do this or it xyz failed to probe abc. I guess there’s no middle ground here between the just let the user wait and wonder vs printing a lot of extraneous information on the screen.

Lovely Compaq collection around. I always loved their designs, along with IBM Aptiva and Micron.

Love those old horizontal PC cases,Especially this one where the Dell badge is curved around with the case,Just little things like that you dont see anymore :( ,great setup :)

Of course back in the day it didn't feel like it took a long time to install Windows 95 because while waiting you'd be watching the latest episode of Friends or listening to your new Green Day album 😄

nice job as always with that build ;) i think i remember 2 of the soundcards in your box... i wonder where they came from... :) ... will there ever be a review or upgrade of the Siemens C5 PC like this one? :3

I enjoyed the video...have a nice vacation 😎

Nice restoration video! The Mitsumi you're having here was my first CD-Writer. I think it was 2x2x6 speed. The DELL's from this era, shared quite a lot with Compaq as building ways. Except the plastic used by Dell was a bit more bulky. (for example the Diskette drive eject button)

Needs a Voodoo. Oh wait, that’s been done. 😁 Great video mate.

Great channel.

I totally forgot that with windows 95 you have to install TCP/IP separately when you install a network card! But it makes sense when you consider that these machines are so low-powered and have such little memory, you don't want to install a bunch of network protocols if you don't have to. Just let the user install the one they're planning on using.

For an OG Pentium, I think that the Trio 64V+ is pretty much ideal. It's bullet proof. Excellent compatibility, pretty decent image quality, good GUI acceleration and even basic video playback acceleration. No 3D of course, but this isn't really the generation of PC for hardware 3D in the first place.

Always lovely to hear those hard drives chunking away especially when you have to do manual hardware detection. Recently swapped out an AWE64 for an SB16 and how easily I forget that these cards don't just willy nilly get detected by Windows 9x/2000, I thought it wasn't working initially. Good that you found answers on the caddy not working, I now wonder if you just lost/never had the keys😛

I have a few retro PCs but I have had to use a modern case and flat panel screen. It’s not the same

i have this very machine in my basement love to old dell OptiPlex's

If I remember correctly, the chipset and the 800M HDD can use DMA mode intead of PIO4 that is activated by default in Win95. That way the HDD and the computer overall will be faster. Also you may want to activate audio over IDE for CDROM that way ou will not need the CD audio cable.

Would choose for the lower cost soundcard for this optiplex.. Because market value of the SB16 is a lot higher.

old pc = gold I see

My GS is a Ms-Dos machine. It's a wonder that the 1gb drive still works, for now.

I remember being at work, one day back in the 90's and they wanted Windows 95 on there computer. That was fine and all, but, they didn't have a computer with a CD-Rom drive so I had to install it using floppies! So, if you think, the CD-Rom is slow, try installing Windows 95 with floppies. All 13 disks of it!

Nice. :) If you want the "correct" sound card for this system, you want a Vibra 16 installed into it. That's what Dell would've sold you if you wanted a sound card.

I am currently resurecting an Acer aspire 5315 laptop that I had about 12 years ago and I have it and now I got it back after it has been abised and not taken care of. I disassembled it completely and had to improvize the DC in jack which was missing. Also the power adapter has got bad capacitors and there is no store for me to buy two of those. In the meanwhile I am using other laptop's adapter, which is 19.5 V instead of 19 V (whichnos about the same). And after reassembling it I realized the backlight of the LCD display did not work. I need to check it if it is onlu from the connector not being properly arranged or the lamp itself is gone. Maybe a lamp from a Sony Vaio could fit in there and work, if need be. Obviously GNU Linux will make it rin lightning fast (preferably Antix).

Nice machine and setup! This Dell has a sticker "made in Europe", I wonder where?

Talking about hard drive sounds... I used to always feel sorry for my drive during the hardware recognition phase of Windows 95 setup, because it made all kinds of strange noises that I imagined to be quite stressful for the drive.

other than my laptop that i use daily all i have are 8 bit computers, but i have been thinking of putting together a win 98 machine for some games that i have. i used to use them on win xp but i think 98 would be better.

I think there's a revision A04 bios still available on Dell's website.

was my work pc in 2000

what would you say if old doom engine (wolf3d engine) would do better than a new raster engine with all their tricks

Yey Mitsumi, my first CD-ROM was a MISTUMI 2x

Can you link to an image of the Windows 95 boot floppy please?

ASP chip... does it install the ASP support by default. I also vaguely remember "text assist", a very early speech recognition Also worth checking out, the Jamie O'Connell FMsynth driver, a lot better on midi than the default

Every DOS game ever made, huh? I'd like to FTP into a NAS like that 🙂

I want to start getting into MS-DOS basic programming what would be a great cheap desktop/laptop would you suggest?

@RetroSpector78 Where have you gone? I hope you're okay and just taking a break!

I think you may need the windows 95 upgrade to do that 1s time around, Also i think it maybe the version of windows 95 that can be funny with CD rom driver support too, I think the earlier version 95 A is quite stripped down compared to the version B. The service pack i think turns 95A into 95B shame you put windows 95 on though, it would have made a killer windows 3.11 machine with the CD Rom and sound card, I have networked windows 95 as part of the NT4 domain, and used the server to deploy windows 95, using the network boot disk, which is a fun little project!

HIMEM.SYS is required duh, and you should have the MS-DOS CDROM driver on the config.sys as well for Windows 95, 98 and ME not so much though even those may need it for some older drives with proprietary controllers (not ATA or SCSI drives)

DMA mode on the dc rom drive enabled? please put something in between the cards for them not to get damaged, otherwise you'll be asking necroware to fix it.

What's the game you've been playing to demonstrate the sound?

BTW, about 13:15. Just an odd/weird but at the same time a funny idea. Probably you could search for and buy/grab for free somewhere locally a used old analog office PBX station and try to reproduce a dial-up networking model: This (of other Pentium based) machine with a modem at one side and then > PBX > "ISP modem" > local LAN (plays a WAN role here). So typical reconstruction of dial-up networking could be made. Apache httpd 1.0 with some Web 1.0 web site would be a nice addition while locating at the local LAN segment.

try windows me that might work great or windows 200 pro with nt technology

(Childish moan) I want to have a whole crate full of soundcards too!

Where are you RetroSpector78!?? hopw you are doing fine.

Камрад - За такое и лайкос не жалко!

please archive those dos games

I do miss the sound of the hard drives.. I wish you could add them on emulation, the same way you can do with floppy drive sounds in UAE

like how quake said " yeah... whatever you where talking about , you're done ... Its quake time now!! ... RAAARW !! BLAM!! " Quake don't care.

Stupid question... I see alot of mods for games out there... Quake would have run on that machine There are quake mods... Would they run on that retro hardware? I do not know if its possible but... Could you run slayers testiment on this...its a quake mod...that is basically doom eternal. Gman lives shows this on his channel 🤣😊

Please max out the memory & hard drive.

okay, toss a 3dfx at it! and a TB SSD! and uhm... LASERBEAMS! heh,

Network wise, if not used you should remove IPX/SPX otherwise you will be "trashing" your network is packets that will only exist to be discarded resulting in a performance penalty. So yeah, if you don't need it, remove it.

No exitement in retro PC-s at all. They are all too generic for my taste.