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thanks for watching techwiki click the subscribe button then enable

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notifications with the bell icon so you won't miss any future videos so you

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finally built the gaming pc of your dreams and spent the last two months

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locked in your room playing all the latest aaa titles

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but nostalgia is a hell of a drug and you

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reach for one of your favorite games of years gone by thinking well surely with

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such a powerful machine mech warrior 4 will run better than ever right wrong

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after you dig out an external optical drive to install that christmas gift

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from 18 years ago you discover to your horror that it won't load

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you used Windows compatibility mode but

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nothing happened so what gives

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well it turns out that how much computing power your pc has is only part

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of the story i mean if you think about it the nintendo 64 has more than enough

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power to run the original super mario brothers but that doesn't mean that you

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can just plug an s cartridge into it so here's

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the deal one common reason older games won't play nicely with modern hardware

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is that many of them were written for 32-bit systems you can learn more about

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the differences between these and more modern 64-bit systems up here but for

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this episode the main thing that you need to know is that most modern pcs use

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64-bit cpus and operating systems giving

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them support for more than four gigs of memory and the ability to process more

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information at once but programs need to be coded to work

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with either a 32-bit or 64-bit system

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meaning that if you're running a modern 64-bit version of Windows your pc will

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actually emulate 32-bit mode for any

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programs written for a 32-bit computer

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this includes older games sometimes this emulation works without a

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hitch but other times games just won't

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cooperate for a number of reasons sometimes older games will try to load

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additional but incompatible code often in the form of dll files used by older

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32-bit versions of Windows a Windows update might break a dependency that a

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game relies on or they might not be able to properly

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interface with a 64-bit device driver

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other games might refuse to launch at all because maybe some of their code is

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written for even older 16-bit systems

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which 64-bit Windows editions can't emulate at all or due to draconian drm

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protections like safe disk that are completely incompatible with modern

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versions of Windows and as if that weren't enough you can

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also run into issues with the hardware itself particularly your fancy new

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quad-core multi-threaded CPU

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modern operating systems will usually try to split a given program's workload

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over multiple cores as nearly every consumer-grade pc out there i mean not

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to mention even phones has at least two

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cores in it now this results in tangible efficiency improvements in modern games

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that are written with multi-core cpus in mind but

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it can wreak havoc on games whose code

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just wasn't meant to be split up that way think of it kind of like taking

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apart a lego house versus one made of glued together popsicle sticks

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but Linus is there any way to get my old games

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running or am i up kb lake without a paddle

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well there isn't a foolproof way to play

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every older title on a modern system but

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there are certainly some workarounds 32-bit versions of modern editions of

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Windows are still widely available

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for some reason and it is certainly possible to dual boot your computer with

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both a 32 and a 64-bit os

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you can also use a virtual machine if you need to run a really old version of

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Windows or fire up dosbox if you've got something that's that old

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now if your issues are performance rather than compatibility related due to

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the multi-core CPU issues we mentioned before you can try adjusting the CPU

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affinity in Windows task manager or a third-party piece of software this will

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force your game to run on only one core

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and failing that you can actually try switching off all but one core in your

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BIOS or UEFI so that Windows will actually treat your CPU as a single core

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model furthermore it is amazing how

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resourceful the gaming community is by the way especially when it comes to

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their beloved retro titles depending on exactly which game you're trying to run

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some resourceful folks out there have created guides for dealing with

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antiquated drm schemes through registry hacks and even created fixer utilities

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that you can use to launch your older games with special instructions that

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will make them run more smoothly finally as a last resort actually i'd

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recommend you try this in the first place since it can save a lot of hassle

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there's a reasonable chance that you'll find a compatible version of that game

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that you loved on a reputable digital distributor like steam or more likely

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good old games and they usually cost just a few bucks

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so there you have it you may yet be able to enjoy your

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favorite games from yesteryear if you don't mind getting a little creative

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just don't get too creative and migrate your entire digital life to an old

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school beige box running Windows me

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and speaking of your digital life are you looking for a way to keep prying

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eyes away from your online activity then check out private internet access vpn

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not only does pia work on up to five devices at once by hiding your true ip

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address and allowing you to bypass geo restrictions and censorship making you

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appear as though you're connecting from somewhere else it also blocks unwanted

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connections to help prevent attacks it auto blocks all traffic if the vpn

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disconnects it keeps your data out of the hands of advertisers and other

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snoops who are tracking your activity it prevents dns leaks and even includes

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mace pia's built-in malware blocker pia

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supports multiple vpn protocols and encryption levels allowing you to dial

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in the exact level of protection you need and they've got apps for Windows

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mac Android iOS Linux and they've even

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got a chrome extension with support for more platforms coming soon they've got

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over 3000 servers in 28 countries so what are you waiting for check them out

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today at the link below so thanks for watching guys dislike like check out our

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other channels comment with a video suggestion or subscribe so you don't

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