I have a windows 98 pc and someone could game with it blah blah blah. Would it be better than linux?
For my new build?
if that makes sense at all gaming linux is or is not better than win 98
elaborate
if you mean like DOS or pre-2000 windows games, yes
otherwise no
least with linux, you have steam (which dosent support pre xp OS's)... and wine which can play older games pretty well
oregon trail would be possible
If you want to run older games that do not work on newer operating systems then you could run windows 98 in a VM, that's how I play Simant
steam DOES work with windows 2000 that I can assure you, if anyone wants me to elaborate how I can
Linux would be better than windows 98. windows 98 has a core ghz limit of 2.8ghz. (also you can only use single core cpu's)you can do some massive hacking and change it to like 3.07ghz and you have a max ram usage of 1gb. the actual cap is 2gb but no one has been able to use more then 1.5 and with that it was super unstable. you only have dx9 support and you dont have very good opengl.
linux 32 bit you will have unlimited cpu ghz and you can use any amount of cores. your ram limit is 3.5 gb but if you put 4gb in you can use most of it. you dont have the stability issues. you have better software support chrome, firefox, you can run some windows programs. you can download dosbox and run all your dos games too.
was there something unfathomably wrong with windows post 2000, or are older os's just better for retro pc gaming?
Id recommend Linux if this PC can run it properly because DOSbox works on Linux which you can use to play DOS games but im not so sure about Wine and 3D games from pre-2000.
yes and no
the issue is that most pure dos games cannot be used on post 98 OSs including WiNE on linux
I think everyone is missing the most important thing here. On windows 98, you can actually play Legacy of Kain:Blood Omen. It doesn't work on anything past xp. Great game!
Ghost Recon works on 98. If I remember right they made it free to play a while back.