Joining the un-ending list of devices that can run Doom is a slightly more conventional, but still vintage, find of an early 2000s desk PC running a locked Windows 2000 install. YouTuberctrl-alt-reesreplaced the drive for DOS and Doom goodness.
The retro desk PC was sourced from a (soon or now-demolished) community center on eBay, sold for £30 according to the original video title alongside its accessories. The community center had sourced the desk from British PC manufacturer Time, who were reportedly defunct by 2005. Besides the desk PC itself, the setup also came with an extra CRT monitor (unused for the video), fax machine, and a similarly ancient printer.
The main desk PC construct has two front-mounted disc drives under the desk, alongside typical USB I/O. A CTX LCD monitor is attached to the top of the desk PC as well, flanked by Time speakers that also run their cords inside the desk. A membrane keyboard and ball mouse are also included among the peripherals secured atop the desk PC.
Time Icedesk Specs
Once ctrl-alt-rees finally got DOS running, he wound up using it to upgrade to Windows 98 to make playingUltimate Doomwithaudiopossible on this hardware. He used Windows' MIDI driver as well, which made it sound suitably chunky for the era. Before closing the original video, he also discusses plans for small drive upgrades to the desk PC to make it more useful as a go-to hub for his retro hardware.
Of the endless list of outrageous Doom-playing devices, a good-ol' fashioned retro PC is definitely the most tame of the ones we’ve covered recently. Of course, it’s a retro PC from a defunct UK manufacturer, but still. Compared tolawnmowers,air hockeytables, and even more inexplicably,Notepad, this is probably the most typical thing Doom has been run on in a while. Well,Ultimate Doom, anyway.
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Christopher Harper has been a successful freelance tech writer specializing in PC hardware and gaming since 2015, and ghostwrote for various B2B clients in High School before that. Outside of work, Christopher is best known to friends and rivals as an active competitive player in various eSports (particularly fighting games and arena shooters) and a purveyor of music ranging from Jimi Hendrix to Killer Mike to the Sonic Adventure 2 soundtrack.
