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PC Videocards - how times have changed....

iv-tecman

iv-tecman

iv-tecman

Soldato
Joined
12 May 2005
Posts
8,384
I think a lot of the members in this section really do not realise just how far 3D GPU acceleration really has come along…

I stumbled upon an article and it was a fantastic blast from the past, and reminds me that 3D video cards for your PC really are now pretty much at their highest…

http://www.pcpro.co.uk/reviews/components/864/videologic-apocalypse-3dx

The videologic 3Dx, it was a rather unique add on card for 2D graphics cards, and instead of the 3Dfx solution it competed with, it didn’t need a pass out cable and sent the data across the bus..

I did own one until I finally got a 3Dfx card, however as I’m now using my 5870 vapor-x that is the size of a PS3 – just kidding…. But back in the day video cards were nothing like what we have today.

Today, when we look at our systems performance, and we want higher screen resolutions, higher FPS more detail and better filtering and graphics we don’t look at our CPU or memory first…

We look at our GPU solution.. Today, a person with a E6600 or a Q6600 for example with 4GB of memory and a Nvidia 8800GTS wanting higher performances in say Dirt2, need not upgrade the CPU, in fact its not the CPU but the GPU you’ll replace.

Place an ATI 5850 into the system, and the PC will go from playing the game at 1024 x 768 with some AA at 60fps to playing the game in HD 1920 x 1080 with 4 x AA at 60fps by changing just one component..

I find it amazing back in the day to get a 3Dfx voodoo 2 to work correctly with my existing PC (at that time) I needed to upgrade memory, 2D card and maybe even my motherboard and CPU.

Today, even a 2 – 3 year old CPU can handle a really expensive and powerful GPU that’ll see you running a lot of top titles at some rather ridiculous screen res and FPS.

Its almost like buying a GPU is like buying the heart of a gaming machine, and how times have changed….
 
Very Very true! those were defo the days

I remember my DX2 66mhz with a 4mb S3 Virge 3d extreme and then the original 4mb Voodoo piggy back 3Dfx card :)

Ultimate Race Pro was....WOW!
 
And besides, 200MHz machines are rapidly becoming the standard for games players anyway.
Click to expand...
Times HAVE changed :D

I was never really around in the mid 90s to see this boom of 3D, bit too young. I was still playing my side scrolling 2d games :D
 
you do still look at cpu, as it will limit better cards. But its not nearly as important anymore, up the res on said system and youll get back to being gpu limited :)

RAM is largely a non issue, since you go "beats 4gb (or now 6gb)" and dont think about until you buy your next cpu/system, unless you want more of an oc or something. Hell, even 2gb isnt too bad for most games, if your still running xp, although that it 10 years old, and as such 2gb does now limit you quite a bit on newer OS's, but along the same lines, I had 2gb ten years ago (ok maybe not quite that long ago, but it was fsking ages ago).
 
Heh yeah. Putting a Voodoo in and seeing TRANSPARENT WATER in Quake II, just gobsmacking!

I had a Videologic Kyro II for a while too, some weird tile based rendering thing. Don't think they could get it to scale though.
 
I still remember adding a 3dfx voodoo 1 4mb into my machine and firing up GL Quake. NOTHING has ever impressed me so much since. The difference going from blocky crappy, 320x240 10fps or someting, to smooth, filtered, 640x480 30fps oh man, couldn't beleive it.
 
Mr Fujisawa said:
I still remember adding a 3dfx voodoo 1 4mb into my machine and firing up GL Quake. NOTHING has ever impressed me so much since. The difference going from blocky crappy, 320x240 10fps or someting, to smooth, filtered, 640x480 30fps oh man, couldn't beleive it.
Click to expand...

I share your memory, I used to just sit and marvel at the difference
 
Ultimate Race Pro, I remember that. Was a tech demo bundled with the first Power VR 3D card, then NEC revised the board and chipsets and I think, Videologic as well, introduced Bilinear Filtering, and then Ultimate Race Pro looked amazing…

I think Quake in GL mode at 640 x 480 at 30fps was when I was amazed at how good PC gaming was becoming… It was the work of the devil at times to patch a DOS game to run with a Voodoo 3Dfx card… lol

I also remember Tomb Raider. 3Dfx was the only reason I never turned to console gaming forever..!! Tomb Raider with the 3Dfx patches was just out of this world. Amazing graphics – if you had the hardware.

200MMX CPU with 16MB of memory and 8MB voodoo 2 board, and games were just amazing…

Games are equally amazing today.. I just never seem to get that same – wow factor I first got when I got my first 3D accelerator. I guess we’re now at the point where £350 GPU cards are running at such high res I just don’t get to max them out…

I mean, I’ve got a 5870 vapor-x, and I can run pretty much most games at 1920 x 1080 60fps, but then I still think games running at 1024 x 768 look awesome…. At 1920 x 1080 its just getting into silly resolutions… and my 42” plasma or 24” LCD can’t go past this anyhow… Plus I’m locked at 60fps due to refresh rates… I hate screen tearing… Never play a game without v sync enabled.

If anyone remembers playing Doom at 320 x 240 with chunky blocks of crude looking textures, then I guess 1024 x 768 with smooth filtered graphics will look pretty good.!! Lol

Some PC gamers just don’t know what it used to be like – back in the day.!! lol
 
Up until 2 months ago I had a fully boxed Videologic power VR card in my PC room.
I chucked it out, along with an Orchid Righteous Voodoo 2:p

How I used to love playing games with those cards, the difference completely blew me away at the time.

I do agree with you, in that I don't think that I have been as impressed since those days:(
 
I find it funny how reviews always used to include the size of the card into the score. Recently cards have gotten HUGE, but there is little mention of the size and it certainly doesnt hurt the score anymore. Shame Voodoo cards stopped production - the designs were way ahead of Nvidia.
 
CaptainRAVE said:
I find it funny how reviews always used to include the size of the card into the score. Recently cards have gotten HUGE, but there is little mention of the size and it certainly doesnt hurt the score anymore. Shame Voodoo cards stopped production - the designs were way ahead of Nvidia.
Click to expand...

You realise Nvidia bought 3dfx, hence them gaining SLI tech and stuffs?
 
3Dfx was a company that, at the time, had a great product but forgot about marketing correctly. They were more interested in producing state of the art products and forgot that not everyone could afford to shell out the sort of money they were charging for high end PC kit….

I mean, the Voodoo 2 12 MB edition, in SLI mode was hugely expensive… But they didn’t really offer anything other at the time, I mean your choices were either 1 or 2 x 8MB Voodoo 2 or 1 or 2 x 12MB voodoo 2, SLI modes and they had no entry level cards.. They soon phased out the voodoo 1 in favour of new tech, and this left many consumers who couldn’t afford the prices of voodoo 2 buying Nvidia or ATI products that offered 2D and 3D on one card.. Much cheaper, and this, I’m afraid might have been why 3Dfx, with all the power their cards offered in the end failed… Its all well and good having the best product, but if its priced too highly for all but wealthy PC enthusiasts its not going to be long before order books are empty..

Nvidia did buy 3Dfx and made a fortune out of top end GPU cards using 3Dfx IP and also slowly used the top end GPU when it was replaced by newer tech as entry level GPU meaning their target audience for GPU was both budget and power consumers..

It really was a shame with 3Dfx, excellent top end products… They were just too far ahead of their time, and I also heard they weren’t very good with their accounts, and hence went bust..!!

I do find it hard to believe that ATI at the moment have the best all round video card solutions…. ATI in 1995 were horrible products… The Rage 3D was a truly horrific POS..!! It certainly is – how times have changed..
 
Don't have the heart to throw my Voodoo 2 out, have always fondly remembered the awesomeness of it tearing up Q2 CTF - as opposed to the 'meh' software mode!

Just dug it out the cupboard, pulled off plate and lobbed in the scanner :D

600dpi clicky
 
3DFX lived off the same core architecture for years and just kept repackaging it in a newer faster version, then adding dual GPU boards, then adding sli just to keep up with nVidia.........strangly a marketing tool that nVidia seem very familiar with ;)

If I remember correctly, 3DFX itself wasn't bought by nVidia, instead it was a lot of the IP and a lot of the staff then followed.

What really killed off 3DFX was their failure to integrate transform & lighting (t&l) into their boards and failure to introduce 32bit colour (something even the TNT2 had).

What I find strange with nVidia nowadays is their desire to integrate proprietory API's into their gfx solutions - originally with the TNT they marketed as the company that had no API, but lauded the use of DX.
 
3dfx died because they lost the oem markets to nvidia and ati. thats where the money was and still is. they decided to manufacture their own cards and went down...

bad management is what killed 3dfx, i am pretty sure they had the talent to compete but lakced strategic focus.
 
hi

ive still got my voodoo 2 12 meg , matrox mysique 2 meg and my kyro 2 . kyro 2 was awsome , almost matched a geforce 3 if i remember right

cheers
 
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