Now that i've dual booted my pc with Win98 and XP so that i can play some of my older games that don't use XP, i am faced with a new problem - CPU speed. Some of the games just run too fast.

I've downloaded a couple of evaluation versions of programs (Mo'slo and CPUkiller).
Mo'slo had no effect on game speed even when i try to run the game at 1% of the original speed, and CPUkiller didn't effect the gamespeed as such, it just made it run jerky (inbetween the jerks, the game still ran at high speed, if that makes sense. And the game was probably more unplayable than before).

Anyone know of any other programs that slow down old games? If you've tried them and know they work, then that's even better.

Thanks

BTW, i'm assuming this is okay for the boards, as the programs i found were AbandonWare.

Mo'slo works fine provided you use it right... Last time I used it it was a DOS app, but it slowed down every single game that needed slowing down. Which game are you using it on?

Cheers Tal. Trying to use it on Populous:The Beginning (software mode, not hardware, coz graphics in hardware aren't too good). It is the DOS version of mo'slo that you mention.

I followed the instructions, ran DOS-prompt, went to the mo'slo directory, then typed:
moslo /n c:\gamedirectory\game.exe
(obviously arbitrary folder names used here)

It started up the game for me, but no change in speed.

Any help appreciated. Cheers.

Now that i've dual booted my pc with Win98 and XP so that i can play some of my older games that don't use XP Why would you want win 98 and XP? If programmes (such as games) don't run well with XP, but they do with a previous Windows version, you can select a different compatibility mode. That way, you can let a game run with win98, without actually having win98. It's like all previous Window's have been integrated into XP. I have never tried this myself, but I heard others they were very pleased with this feature.

In my experience. that compatability feature is utter rubbish, IMHO. Different modes let the game's startup sequence get to slightly different points before deciding that they really don't want to play.
There are some games that just dont work in XP. Carmageddon2 for example (although there are some that claim it does), and Populous The Beginning (unless you install a nocd crack, bizzarly. But then, it still ran too quickly).

I'm having a similar problem with old game being too fast and have yet to find an answer. Commando is impossible :)

As to the compatability mode, I had high hopes for this too. Unfortunatley it has yet to help me run a game that doesn't like XP. Some of them I've managed to find a work around (like deleting a file in YDKJ) but many others just refuse to run no matter what operating system you tell XP to try to be compatible with (Hidden and Dangerous being the most annoying example of this though the Delux version now works). So, all in all, a dual operating system is probably the least hassle means of getting older games to at least run (even though they are too fast) especially in these days of huge hard-drives.

There's three programs I've used over the years.

Atslow, Moslo, and CPU killer.

Atslow has had several different flavors. The older ones can't slow down a 1.4ghz Tbird anywhere near enough. But I think the version 5.xx (I'm guessing; the last version I used was like 4.12) probably can come close.

Moslo slows down by a percentage. But the two or three times I remember trying it (years ago), it wasn't smooth. The action would speed up really fast, and stop, then fast, and stop, then fast, and stop. Basically, unplayable to me.

CPU killer, however, worked on Win2k. I've not tried it on XP, but I suspect it works too. However, it does slow down all of windows, and when you exit out to a full screen command prompt, it speeds things up a little.

There is, of course, disabling the l1/l2 cache, enabling ECC l2 checking, memory timings, and all other thing BIOS.

WineX tends to work quite well, too. Especially for older games.

You can specify the percentage slowdown you want with Mo'slo when you run it... Try using that.

I've tried specifying 1% and 99%, as well as others (to make sure i knew which way it worked - whether typing 99 meant slow down by 99%, so very slow, OR 99 meant slow down to 99% of actual cpu speed). But, none of the values made any effect.

Do you actually have to type %? So:
moslo /10% c:\gamedirectory\game.exe
OR
moslo /10 c:\gamedirectory\game.exe

I've been doing the later, without typing %.
I'd try it right now, but i'm at work, don't have it on this pc.

I really don't remember, but if you just run moslo.exe it should give you detailed instructions on how to do it.

And why are you running moslo outside the game's directory? Just copy it in the game's dir and you won't need to type out the whole path to the executable every time.

I'll keep persevering. Cheers for your help.

It doesn't really matter where you put moslo. If i put in the game directory, you still have to change directory to the game directory in DOS-prompt before starting the command. So either way, the game directory has to be typed somewhere down the line.

Also, there are pretty good emulators around for getting w95/98 "compatible" games running in w2k for example. I've not used any of these either but I've heard they do an excellent job. Having used every system for a good time since dos 4.something with the exception of wxp, I can say with a fairly good conscience that w2k is the best. Its stability is incredible, and saying that some of the games don't work on it is clearly overexaggarating. Only problem there is are a few w95 games and the dos games in general. Which can be fixed with a few "simple" (or not) programs.

Well, if it's not slowing the game down you might be doing something wrong, and running it with a full path instead of just the executable is one of the things not normally done. So try running it like I suggested.

And if all else fails, the Mo'Slo site has a Feedback section where you can post your problem.