Playing Win9x games on Win7

[jujigatame]

Apparently Windows 7 Professional Edition has something called "Windows XP Mode" which allows you to run software in some sort of WinXP emulation. Has anyone tried this on games? The Microsoft website really only touts it for business applications, but I'd be curious as to how it works for stuff like QFG5, Grim Fandango, Longest Journey, Sanitarium, and so on.

[Collector]

XP Mode is what MS has done with Virtual PC. If you have Pro or Ultimate you can download and install XP Mode. It includes a disk image of a preinstalled XP. It doesn't work quite as smoothly as the old Mac OS "Classic Mode" to help its users transition over to OSX. It's not as seamless and can take awhile to launch, even though the default is to hibernate when closed. Integration is not as good as the plain old Virtual PC. You cannot drag and drop between host and guest machines. You can, however, copy and paste, but even this is a bit glitchy.

As far as for gaming purposes, Direct3D is missing, which makes it only useful for a few games. Since the guest machine is XP, it won't help with the Win9x games that don't work right in XP.

That said, if you have 64-bit Windows it is invaluable. With TrackWinstall I have been able to track all of the changes made by a 16-bit installer to aid me in manually installing those programs that will run in 64-bit Windows, but shipped with a 16-bit installer so that it cannot be installed with its own installer. I have also been able to install my old USB scanner in XP Mode, even though they never made 64-bit drivers for it.

There are better virtualizers for gaming. VMware and others allow you to install Windows 98, which is a better choice for a gaming machine for old Windows games. VMware will give you DirectDraw, if not Direct3D.

[jujigatame]

Almost seems like it would be more cost effective to save the $100 on Win7 Pro and buy 10 year old Win98 laptop off eBay.

[Collector]

Almost seems like it would be more cost effective to save the $100 on Win7 Pro and buy 10 year old Win98 laptop off eBay.

If all you want to do is play 9x games something along might be worth considering.