windows emulator and X setup?

[Rob Crittenden]

Marty Landman wrote:
> I've got a 600MHz machine with 256 RAM and a 20GB SCSI hd on it. It's 
> running Win ME in DOS compatibility mode for all three partitions 
> although otherwise seems to be running properly. Windows device mgr 
> shows a PCI mass storage controller with yellow exclamation mark - 
> presumably the SCSI. Also has a CDROM/DVD player which is its only IDE 
> device currently.
> 
> This is a game machine for my kids in the family room and I'm debating 
> whether to install RH 9 on it which raises a few questions:
> 
> 1. is this adequate hardware for a full RH9 install including X?

You don't say which video card you have but sure, it should run fine.

> 2. will RH likely have a suitable driver for my SCSI?

It depends on the controller, not the disc, but it will likely work.

> 3. is it possible for me to get this machine running RH9 and able to run 
> windoz apps, especially games?

This is the tricky part. There are 4 flavors of windows emulators.

a. With vmware and win4lin you actually install Windows and run it as a 
virtual machine. As long as the games don't use DirectX they should 
work. This supports most Windows applications (except things like audio 
recorders, etc). Your CPU may not be beefy enough to run these very 
well, I'd check to see if there is a minimum recommended CPU.

b. wine. This is a general-purpose program that replaces Windows calls 
with native X/Linux calls. It can run some things perfectly, many things 
not bad and is a mixed bag for most.

c. Crossover. This is good for business applications such as MS Office 
but browser plugins such as QuickTime also work. And they've just added 
basic iTunes support. This is a fork of wine that submits most if not 
all of its changes back to wine.

d. Cedega. This is geared towards games. Some DirectX games will work. 
This is also a fork of wine but they only submit a fraction of changes 
back. If you don't have a GeForce series nVidia card I wouldn't bother. 
The ATi drivers don't work well and DRI is very slow with Cedega. For 
kids educational games this might not be a problem I suppose.

With b - d you need to do a lot of research to see whether your app or 
game will work. There is no reason (other than cost perhaps) you can't 
have all 3 installed at once. c & d cost money while b is free.

> 
> 4. re. #3, what kind of effort, heartache, & misery am I looking at?

Lots.

> FWIW I don't mind spending a day or two on this and then finding out 
> it's not going to work. My kids have gotten used to the inconvenience by 
> now. :)

I guess I'd probably leave it as is given the audience. Multi-user games 
may be handled differently in wine than in Windows which could be 
frustrating for your kids.