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Is there any known software that won't run on the 6x86?
(back to Frequently Asked Questions) (back to Cyrix/IBM 6x86 FAQs) Is there any known software that won't run on the 6x86?
There are very few programs that are incapable of running on the 6x86. Running across one is very hard to do, and if it doesn't run it is because the program uses very sloppy, Intel specific code. You probably wouldn't want to run the program anyway.
There are a few programs that can run on the 6x86, but are in some way impaired. All Sierra programs that do a hardware test will crash a system using the 6x86. Always skip the hardware test on Sierra program installations.
The most commonly known incompatibility isn't an incompatibility at all. The software for running the additional 64 voices on the AWE 64 card from Creative Labs can run perfectly fine on the 6x86. The installation program for the software has been purposely rigged to not install on Cyrix processors. This follows a legal dispute between Creative and Cyrix over Cyrix's right to use Creative's SoundBlaster 16 drivers for the MediaGX integrated sound. Since Creative lost the legal dispute, they have not been favorable of Cyrix.
Another problem has been with the very slow speed that Quake runs at on the 6x86. The worse-than-usual performance is a result of id software optimizing Quake to take advantage of Pentium FPU registers. There is no remedy for this, however a 3D accelerator card can increase performance quite a bit.
If this does not answer your question, please refer to the "Support" section of the site.