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Windows 95 on low specs

NeXT

NeXT

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Oct 22, 2008
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Kamloops, BC, Canada
I have finally secured an IBM PC110 Palmtop and im looking into installing Windows 95 OSR2 on it.
The thing is that I have never really run Windows 95 on something with specs this low before.
The PC110 has a 33mhz (I can jump it to 40mhz if that helps any) 486 SX and my particular PC110 will have 8mb of ram in it (though if you can find it, a 16mb module exists so you can max out with 20mb ram).
Windows 95 is apparently supported on the Pc110 but I need to know first hand from someone just how slowly Windows 95 will crawl with that slow of a processor and that small amount of ram. I would go Windows 3.1 but I don't have much 3.1 software and the pcmcia cd drive I use won't work with anything older than Windows 95.
 
My first windows 95 machine was less than that. 486sx/16 with 4mb of RAM. It was SLOOOW, but it was useable.
 
my thinkpad is running Win95 OSR2 (i think) on only 8MB of RAM. As long as you make the install as small as possible, you can get 95 to wrok on a 486 w./8MB RAM.
 
If I turn my head about 90 degrees, I can see Win95 OSR2 running on a 16MHz 386 with 13MB of memory. It takes forever (seemingly) to come up, but works passably well.
 
Hmm...from memory it will be slow. Mainly due to the 8MB memory. 33 Mhz and the 486 chip is adequate.

Tez
 
NeXT said:
The PC110 has a 33mhz (I can jump it to 40mhz if that helps any) 486 SX and my particular PC110 will have 8mb of ram in it (though if you can find it, a 16mb module exists so you can max out with 20mb ram).
Click to expand...

8MB or higher is enough to run W95 comfortably. 4MB runs, but is extremely starved (takes over 10 minutes to boot and is always swapping).
 
so pretty much the processor will be able to sustain the OS but the ram is right at the lower limit on what is acceptable. So should upgrading to 20mb help the system a lot?
Also, I plan on just stuffing something like a 2 or 4gb complact flash card in it to spare me both PCMCIA slots.
 
Trixter said:
Yes, 20MB RAM will run W95 quite comfortably.
Click to expand...

Thanks Trixter. It's a bloody same though they had to use a proprietary ram cartridge. :/

I was also looking around here and I'm assuming it's slightly dates as a lot of the storage relies on a PCMCIA drive and not the Compact Flash drive so hopefully I can still pop in a higher capacity Type I CF card and not have any issues. Also, his macro shots for the overclock page are terrible. They almost want to make me go with mine and redo them.
 
I had it running on a disczrded 486/sx 25 with 8MB of RAM in the 90's at work to run tests, it wasn't the fastest booting machine in the world but did run ok.
 
NeXT said:
I have finally secured an IBM PC110 Palmtop and im looking into installing Windows 95 OSR2 on it.
The thing is that I have never really run Windows 95 on something with specs this low before.
The PC110 has a 33mhz (I can jump it to 40mhz if that helps any) 486 SX and my particular PC110 will have 8mb of ram in it (though if you can find it, a 16mb module exists so you can max out with 20mb ram).
Windows 95 is apparently supported on the Pc110 but I need to know first hand from someone just how slowly Windows 95 will crawl with that slow of a processor and that small amount of ram. I would go Windows 3.1 but I don't have much 3.1 software and the pcmcia cd drive I use won't work with anything older than Windows 95.
Click to expand...

I run Windows 95 on my PC110 (my RAM is maxed out at 20Mb). It runs pretty good actually. With smaller amounts of RAM it would probably run worse, of course.
 
Can you post hi-res pics of the memory upgrade board?

If we can see the chips and the circuit board then maybe we can figure out if it can be upgraded by replacing chips or soldering additional ones to the board. ;)

RJ
 
channelmaniac said:
Can you post hi-res pics of the memory upgrade board?

If we can see the chips and the circuit board then maybe we can figure out if it can be upgraded by replacing chips or soldering additional ones to the board. ;)

RJ
Click to expand...

Second this.
Would be nice to max out my memory.
 
Old thread here but there is a PC110 group just started on Facebook, you’re welcome to join..
there are ram modifications to build larger ram modules but most instructions are in Japanese. I have links shared there in group.

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Mike
 
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