Virtual PC 2004 SP1 Windows NT 3.51 Virtual Hardware Drivers

Windows NT 3.51 is like taking a trip back in time to the most scary place you ever read about in history class at school. It is like experiencing deja vu, and is welcome relief when you finally get out of there. However it can be quite fun to sit and tinker, and see what you can get it to do with modern code.

 

Service Pack Requirements :

Unless you have a Service Pack 4 or above Integrated version of NT 3.51, you will encounter problems during the installation.

Installation of SP5 should be performed as soon as the installation has been completed.

Downloads:

Windows NT 3.51 was release in 1995, well before the full hardware set in Virtual PC had been created. In order to find basic functionality, you will need to install a few drivers to make the most from the system.

 

S3 Trio64v+ (765)

Under Windows NT 3.51, the S3 Trio64v is catered for in the driver database as “s3 compatible display adapter”. The maximum supported resolution is 1280×1024 at 64K colour, or 1024×768 at 16.7 million colours.

 

DEC DC21x4

Under Windows NT 3.51, the DEC DC21x4 is catered for in the driver database as “DEC PCI Fast Ethernet DECchip 21140”. All resource configuration is automatic.

 

Creative Sound Blaster

There are no drivers under the Windows NT 3.51 driver database which can provide sound support for the Virtualised Sound Blaster 16 ISA. It too me quite some time to ascertain that there was once a driver release by creative for the adapter, and even longer still to find any further references to the release.

I was eventually successful in locating the driver files, and have created a Virtual PC 2004 Virtual Floppy Disk of the driver files, for download below. File © belongs to Creative Labs, VFD creation by C:Amie.

The driver includes support for wave form playback as well as MIDI wave tables.

Driver Downloads

SB16-ISA-NT3.51.zip 17/04/1996 1.4MB

To install the sound card using the Creative Drivers.

  1. Open the Control Panel
  2. Double Click Drivers
  3. Click Add…
  4. Select Unlisted or Updated Driver
  5. Mount the VFD image using the Virtual PC toolbar
  6. Click OK to accept A:\
  7. Select Creative Tech. Sound Blaster 16 if prompted
  8. After the driver file copy configure the hardware resources as:
    Port: 220
    Interrupt: 5
    DMA Channel: 1
    DMA Channel (16-bit): 5
  9. MPU401 I/O Address: Disable
  10. Click OK and restart the Virtual PC

Soundblaster Configuration Image