This is in response to several ongoing projects here on the forum: I am by no means an expert on NT, but here's what I did in an effort to get things up and going. Early this morning I was finally able to install Window NT 4.0 NTFS on a 486. The following is a list of hardware, software, and a blow by blow account of the procedure:
1. The Hardware: Motherboard is a FIC 486-PVT-IO (1996) with an AMD Am5x-133 overclocked slightly to 150 MHz. The video card is a Diamond Speedstar PRO VLB, and the RAM is 32 x 2 72-pin SIMM. The HD is a Maxtor 30 GB ATA-133 IDE with the primary partition set at 2 GB via an overlay. The BIOS sees it as 16383 cycs 16 hds 63 sects. The setup includes a 3.5" floppy as well as an optical drive. The motherboard includes an onboard dual HD controller and a floppy drive controller.
2. The Software: Microsoft Windows NT Workstation version 4.0. As per the CD, the requirements are as follows (verbatim): "1-2 processor edition. Disc contains code to run on a Windows NT compatible 486, Pentium, MIPS R4x00, Alpha, PowerPC, and Pentium Pro systems. © 1985-1998 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved. 0198 Part No. X03-58463". Note: this is an OEM CD which includes SP1.
3. The Installation: The CD is bootable but the present BIOS does not support that function on this motherboard. Assuming you do not have the required 3 NT setup floppies, the following applies: Format three 1.44 floppies using DOS. Do not use a USB floppy drive and do not format using XP or W10, as the host (NT setup) will reject the floppies if you do. NT requires at least 400 MB for the system setup and a primary partition no larger than 7.8 GB.
If possible, boot the system with a WIN98SE startup diskette and select the CDROM option. It is not necessary to FDISK or FORMAT at this point as NT setup will handle all of that later on. Insert the NT CD and change DIR to I386. Enter WINNT (not WINNT32). Now follow the on-screen instructions. NT will ask you to insert and mark the floppies 1-2-3 and then commence to make the setup disks for you.
If you are familiar with the XP install routine, then this part of the procedure will seem very familiar to you. The key thing to observe is that NT setup will ask you to choose a NTFS system and then ask if you to want to convert. Select "yes" and proceed. Also, if you are dealing with a SCSI HD you will need the drivers for the SCSI controller on a floppy. The setup routine will prompt you to insert the the floppies as required. Barring any hardware or software problems, you are now on autopilot throughout the rest of the install.
The NT system runs very well on this old 486 motherboard. Caveat: I did not take the time to install a mouse or sound card. Also, I did not install the server portion of the system. I have the Microsoft SP3 CD but would need to install SP2 first, which I have not done. IIRC, NT SP's need to be installed sequentially. Windows NT 4.0 can in theory support partitions of up to 16 exabytes in size using the NTFS file system. The maximum size of the system partition is limited to 7.8 gigabytes (GB). If you decide to use the system as a server or storage option, you will want to install NT SP4 in order to circumvent the Microsoft ATAPI.SYS problems when attempting to access space beyond 8GB. Theoretically, support of partitions of up to 16 exabytes in size is available using the NTFS file system.
1. The Hardware: Motherboard is a FIC 486-PVT-IO (1996) with an AMD Am5x-133 overclocked slightly to 150 MHz. The video card is a Diamond Speedstar PRO VLB, and the RAM is 32 x 2 72-pin SIMM. The HD is a Maxtor 30 GB ATA-133 IDE with the primary partition set at 2 GB via an overlay. The BIOS sees it as 16383 cycs 16 hds 63 sects. The setup includes a 3.5" floppy as well as an optical drive. The motherboard includes an onboard dual HD controller and a floppy drive controller.
2. The Software: Microsoft Windows NT Workstation version 4.0. As per the CD, the requirements are as follows (verbatim): "1-2 processor edition. Disc contains code to run on a Windows NT compatible 486, Pentium, MIPS R4x00, Alpha, PowerPC, and Pentium Pro systems. © 1985-1998 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved. 0198 Part No. X03-58463". Note: this is an OEM CD which includes SP1.
3. The Installation: The CD is bootable but the present BIOS does not support that function on this motherboard. Assuming you do not have the required 3 NT setup floppies, the following applies: Format three 1.44 floppies using DOS. Do not use a USB floppy drive and do not format using XP or W10, as the host (NT setup) will reject the floppies if you do. NT requires at least 400 MB for the system setup and a primary partition no larger than 7.8 GB.
If possible, boot the system with a WIN98SE startup diskette and select the CDROM option. It is not necessary to FDISK or FORMAT at this point as NT setup will handle all of that later on. Insert the NT CD and change DIR to I386. Enter WINNT (not WINNT32). Now follow the on-screen instructions. NT will ask you to insert and mark the floppies 1-2-3 and then commence to make the setup disks for you.
If you are familiar with the XP install routine, then this part of the procedure will seem very familiar to you. The key thing to observe is that NT setup will ask you to choose a NTFS system and then ask if you to want to convert. Select "yes" and proceed. Also, if you are dealing with a SCSI HD you will need the drivers for the SCSI controller on a floppy. The setup routine will prompt you to insert the the floppies as required. Barring any hardware or software problems, you are now on autopilot throughout the rest of the install.
The NT system runs very well on this old 486 motherboard. Caveat: I did not take the time to install a mouse or sound card. Also, I did not install the server portion of the system. I have the Microsoft SP3 CD but would need to install SP2 first, which I have not done. IIRC, NT SP's need to be installed sequentially. Windows NT 4.0 can in theory support partitions of up to 16 exabytes in size using the NTFS file system. The maximum size of the system partition is limited to 7.8 gigabytes (GB). If you decide to use the system as a server or storage option, you will want to install NT SP4 in order to circumvent the Microsoft ATAPI.SYS problems when attempting to access space beyond 8GB. Theoretically, support of partitions of up to 16 exabytes in size is available using the NTFS file system.