Dual booting ME and XP

Hey all :wave

I recently set up a dual boot with ME and XP
so that i could play Mechwarrior 2 and the expansions as well as a few other older games

Clean installed ME (FAT32) and then XP (NTFS)

No problems with XP


Installed the last NVIDIA forceware (81.98) suitable for ME

it instals fine, but cannot be accessed and does not appear to register

I cannot get the display above basic settings - 640x480 + 16 colours
Just wont restart, have to go through safe mode which defaults the display back to minimum, and then it lets me restart normally.
I need to get it to 800x600 + 256 colours at least

My graphics card is a 7600GS which is not listed in the .INF
trying to set it up as a 6600 or 6800 does not appear to work either.

Found out that ME can have this problem when more than 512MB of RAM is installed. (I have 1.5GB)
Followed the instructions from microsoft to limit the RAM
but still no-go

Anybody got a clue (because I obviously havent )

Thankyou

 

Most of the newer NVidia cards (and video cards in general) are not compatible with older versions of Windows like '98 or ME. The cards are designed for use with Win2000, XP, and Vista. So, even tho' you do have an ME compatible driver, that doesn't necessarily mean that the card will run properly under Windows ME. I know, this isn't alot of help and not very encouraging either.... you could try the NVidia help/tech support pages (maybe they have user forums?) and see if there's a fix for you. Or maybe you can scrap WinME, and replace it with Win2000 and that should definitely help if it doesn't completely fix the problem.... good luck!

hd2k

 

Thanks for the reply
was hoping i could modify the .inf for the Win ME driver, (copy & paste) but they are written differently.

wish I had known that before i bought the card, would have gone for a high-end 6800.
May have to have a look around for windows 2000, never had to look for an outdated OS before.
Have quite a few older games that I havent even tried on XP yet. Even though the graphics dont stack-up compared to the latest games, its all about the gameplay to me.

 

Try this out:

http://www.majorgeeks.com/DOSBox_d4381.html

 

Most older games will OK on WinXP if you run 'em in what's called "compatibility mode". Right click on the shortcut for the game, and you should get a 'Compatibility' tab (among others) where you can choose Windows 95 or Windows 98/ME.....

 

have tried that, didnt work.
will try it again, i have 2 different versions of the game (one enhanced for the 3dfx voodoo), so i will have to make sure i try both of them.
that is obviously the prefered method.

Birdbath - i have installed dosbox with varied results, will keep trying.
Its proving to not be simple (unlike myself)

the original version of the game installed and got up to where you select your clan - then it crashed.
the 'enhanced' version wont run in dos.

I'll keep plugging away, but boredom does set in fairly quickly, I'm not a geek, I prefer things to work - not to challenge me

thanks guys