Obviously plain DOS will run very quickly on these machines, but what runs the best as far as more complex OSes go on this sort of hardware?
I'd imagine that for earlier Pentiums, i.e., 60-166Mhz, 95 is faster, and that for 200-300Mhz boxen, 98SE is actually faster due to optimizations and such and the capability to better use the memory that a faster system usually comes with.
I have no experience with OS/2 on any box, or Linux on a Pentium box. I've seen that older versions of Linux run well, and obviously someone wouldn't wanna throw Ubuntu 10 on there - would it even handle that?
What do you all use on your Pentium boxen and why?
I'll start:
I use 98SE on my later Pentium boxes, because it provides a combination of DOS compatibility, modern compatibility (i.e., can run fairly recent software and communicate with modern boxes easily), and speed. I've been questioning this lately, however.
I use DOS on my older Pentium boxes, usually 7.10, and it runs quite well and of course does all the things one is accustomed to from DOS. The nice thing about DOS on a Pentium is that the hardware is overkill, so you never need to worry about slowdowns, and it can run every game ever made for DOS, so you don't have to worry about system specs.
I'd imagine that for earlier Pentiums, i.e., 60-166Mhz, 95 is faster, and that for 200-300Mhz boxen, 98SE is actually faster due to optimizations and such and the capability to better use the memory that a faster system usually comes with.
I have no experience with OS/2 on any box, or Linux on a Pentium box. I've seen that older versions of Linux run well, and obviously someone wouldn't wanna throw Ubuntu 10 on there - would it even handle that?
What do you all use on your Pentium boxen and why?
I'll start:
I use 98SE on my later Pentium boxes, because it provides a combination of DOS compatibility, modern compatibility (i.e., can run fairly recent software and communicate with modern boxes easily), and speed. I've been questioning this lately, however.
I use DOS on my older Pentium boxes, usually 7.10, and it runs quite well and of course does all the things one is accustomed to from DOS. The nice thing about DOS on a Pentium is that the hardware is overkill, so you never need to worry about slowdowns, and it can run every game ever made for DOS, so you don't have to worry about system specs.