Running NT 4.0 on recent hardware

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Polikarp - 14 Feb 2006 18:03 GMT

Hi all,

I have found very limited first-hand information on the net about
installing/running NT 4.0 on the relatively new system. I can report some
success and I hope, the information isn't redundant.

My old configuration was:

MB: ABIT BH6, Pentium II 300 @450
Radeon 7500 with DVI
3 x HDDs, 1 x DVD-R
SB PCI sound card and cNet PCI network card.

New configuration:

Asus V8V-MX motherboard with on-board sound and network chip
AMD Athlon 64 3200+

Before starting anything, I have uninstalled network and sound drivers
(although it turns out to be an unnecessary step). After assembling my new
MB, adding old components (HDDs, DVD-R and graphic card) I pressed the ON
button - NT 4.0 (SP6) started as nothing has happened. USB was working
great as before (after reducing USB 2.0 to Full-speed in BIOS), drivers
for Net and sound were present on the supplied CD and installed without a
problem. I didn't use Microsoft supplied driver (atapi.sys) on my old NT
instalation, but open source uniata.sys (http://alter.org.ua - thanks
Alter !). However, I have analysed behaviour of three different drivers on
new hardware afterwards:

Uniata.sys: worked well but I couldn't enable UDMA mode on any drive. I
could write a DVD, but at lower speeds.

Atapi.sys (MS): worked well, UDMA was enabled on all drives but its
BSOD-ed on attempt to write a DVD regardless of program used.

VIAide.sys (from drivers CD): Works perfectly.

Isn't that REAL Plug and Play ?

Polikarp

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nt4-ever - 15 Feb 2006 23:46 GMT

wow Great Post
thanks much

Beware the GotCha's:

"16-Bit Programs May Not Update the Screen on
Processors Faster Than 2.0 GHz"
http://support.microsoft.com/?id=320694
Notice the Lack of mention of NT4;
the re-writing of History has begun
ala "1984"/"Brave New World"
But the Way-Back machine has preserved
the truth:
http://web.archive.org/web/20040415205506/http://support.microsoft.com/?id=320694
and even Google's cache is so old,
it mentions NT4:
http://72.14.207.104/search?q=cache:USkggWAHXsIJ:support.microsoft.com/kb/320694
+4.0.1381.7151++414,480++Ntvdm.exe&hl=en&gl=us&ct=clnk&cd=1

Setup-More-Than-1.792GB-Memory
http://support.microsoft.com/?id=177652

CPUID-Check-Athlon-Write-Combining
http://support.microsoft.com/?id=231949

2049MB-RAM
http://support.microsoft.com/?id=192669

There were so many issues re size
(eg QKB-177652)
Not resolved until SP6a imho a Virgin
Install of NT4 Not Possible on
new machine But one must import
a previously working NT4 disk ???

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Polikarp - 16 Feb 2006 17:36 GMT

Hi nt4-ever !

> wow Great Post
> thanks much

You're wellcome !

> Beware the GotCha's:
> "16-Bit Programs May Not Update the Screen on Processors Faster Than 2.0
> GHz" http://support.microsoft.com/?id=320694
> Notice the Lack of mention of NT4;
> the re-writing of History has begun ala "1984"/"Brave New World"
> But the Way-Back machine has preserved the truth:

As Athlon 64 3200+ runs at 2.0 GHz, I have not encountered any of the
glitches mentioned in the article.

It is a kind of amusing to see how MS recreates history. But erasing any
traces of a product, which was the only decent OS they have done (=bought)
? Sad.

> There were so many issues re size (eg QKB-177652)
> Not resolved until SP6a
> imho a Virgin Install of NT4 Not Possible on new machine
> But one must import a previously working NT4 disk ???

I really hope so.

I dual boot between two NT4 partitions, both with SP6. One is my working
OS, cleaned from any unnecessary file, service etc., never installed IE,
never encounter virus, spyware .... Second instalation is used for the
testing purposes and emergency. It was never cleaned. After hardware
upgrade, there were no problems with neither of them. I suppose that any
fresh SP6, installed on older system, could work O.K. by just attaching
HDD to the new MB (although I wonder about Dual Core processors). I have
done that before, but the leap was not so big - from Intel Atlanta (LX) MB
to Abit BH6 (BX). IDE driver at a time was from Intel.

I was never forced to reinstall NT4. Both OS-es are healty for (too) many
years, and I have used/checked etc. hundreds of programs. But my great BH6
MB was showing signs of ageing (it even survived lightning with just 3/5
PCI slots fried) and I was forced to upgrade. I was looking for MB with
AGP and as many drivers for onboard chips as possible (I'm afraid there
will be less and less such hardware). And hoped for the best - and now I'm
happy. Even flashed the BIOS (from DOS - supplied Windows utillity from
Asus doesn't support NT4 !). Athlon runs at 35'C - 40'C at high load, I
can burn DVDs at full speed ...

There is only one minor issue. My largest HDD is 160 GB. It was
partitioned to only 120 GB due to the 128 GB boundary. With uniata IDE
driver I could see unused space after 128 GB, but never dared to expand
the partitions to 160 GB. With the currently active VIA driver I can't see
this space anymore. But I could live with that - maybe the newer Uniata
drivers will resolve issue with UDMA on the VT8251 controller of A8V-MX
motherboard ?

Polikarp

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