retep_110 wrote on 2023-06-14, 06:30:

Thanks for the advice. […]
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rasz_pl wrote on 2023-06-13, 18:12:

solid motherboard, throw $5 gf2mx400/gf4mx in there and its good to go.

Thanks for the advice.

Both cards are really cheap so we could pick either of them without any regrets.

Are both cards equaly good to max out a P2 400 mhz system or would it better to pick the weaker gf2 mx in order to avoid bottlenecking the cpu?

I am in a similar situation as your buddy. You can call me a upcoming p2 400 mhz user. The Asus mainboard is already purchased and on the way to me via mail.

I have no graphics card yet but I am bidding for geforce 2 gts. In case I win the bidding war on ebay then I will go with it. My alternative would be the mx 440.

While searching for a p2 machine in action I found some weird things. There are people that are playing around with p2 cpu and one of the graphics card from the geforce fx series.

A video that was showing the first Half Life looked quite good.

So you guys could also consider to think about higher specs gpu as well.

I am not sure if this would really make sense though. Maybe some people her with more experience can say more about it.

You could also take a look at the Radeon 7500 and 8500 cards a Nvidia alterative. They are not that expensive on ebay and might be useful as well.

The problems you may/will encounter if you take too recent video cards like the FX series are driver related. More often than not directX will crash, or OpenGL won't work and such fun things, and it's very difficult to diagnose. A common problem is the lack of SSE support by the CPUs, which at some point is silently required by modern drivers or DirectX versions. On this side a Pentium III is a good choice compared to a Pentium II.

gamefan_851 wrote on 2023-06-14, 07:26:

I am in a similar situation as your buddy. You can call me a upcoming p2 400 mhz user. The Asus mainboard is already purchase […]
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retep_110 wrote on 2023-06-14, 06:30:

Thanks for the advice. […]
Show full quote

rasz_pl wrote on 2023-06-13, 18:12:

solid motherboard, throw $5 gf2mx400/gf4mx in there and its good to go.

Thanks for the advice.

Both cards are really cheap so we could pick either of them without any regrets.

Are both cards equaly good to max out a P2 400 mhz system or would it better to pick the weaker gf2 mx in order to avoid bottlenecking the cpu?

I am in a similar situation as your buddy. You can call me a upcoming p2 400 mhz user. The Asus mainboard is already purchased and on the way to me via mail.

I have no graphics card yet but I am bidding for geforce 2 gts. In case I win the bidding war on ebay then I will go with it. My alternative would be the mx 440.

While searching for a p2 machine in action I found some weird things. There are people that are playing around with p2 cpu and one of the graphics card from the geforce fx series.

A video that was showing the first Half Life looked quite good.

So you guys could also consider to think about higher specs gpu as well.

I am not sure if this would really make sense though. Maybe some people her with more experience can say more about it.

You could also take a look at the Radeon 7500 and 8500 cards a Nvidia alterative. They are not that expensive on ebay and might be useful as well.

Thx for your reply. Well I think it would not hurt to expand the range of gpus that might be suitable for us. We will look into the cards mentioned. You were talking about a Half Life video with the P2 400mhz and the FX series. Youtube I presume?

I also wish you good luck for your planned purchase of the geforce 2 gts. It seems to be nice card according to the video review of phils computer lab on youtube.

Minutemanqvs wrote on 2023-06-14, 07:30:

The problems you may/will encounter if you take too recent video cards like the FX series are driver related. More often than not directX will crash, or OpenGL won't work and such fun things, and it's very difficult to diagnose. A common problem is the lack of SSE support by the CPUs, which at some point is silently required by modern drivers or DirectX versions. On this side a Pentium III is a good choice compared to a Pentium II.

Yes this makes sense that there might be driver related issues . Such things cannot be avoided when dealing with different hardware generations.

The only question is, if it would be really worth it to try to push p2 400mhz that far with such a "futuristic" card?

We certainly need to look for the videos @gamefan mentioned by ourselfs to see what is going on there.

A cpu swap in order to get more power would be possible. My buddy wants to use the vobis hight tower just as core system and does not mind to replace some components to make the system more powerful.

As other said, a GeForce 2-3 or MX 2-4 is probably your best bet compatibility wise.

@Retep_110 Yes sorry I was talking about youtube. I also mixed the specs of the p2 system up. The Half Life video was done on p2 333 mhz and not on a p2 400 mhz.

But here is the link

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q0Kn3FxHdqQ

the specs are mentioned by the uploader in the comments.

In general I'd say listen to more experienced guys her and just stick to geforce 2-3, or Mx2-4 to get the best chances for good compatibility.

As beginner myself i can understand the wish to try out many different configurations but if you get carried away to much with too many of options you will never get started.

Oh I see. Thanks a lot for the info. The video looks quite good.

Yes getting confused by the many configurations is indeed a realistic danger. I am luckily beyond that. I am already happy with my P3 800 MHZ of the shelf rig. Even the included apg graphics card, the riva tnt 2 impressed my more than I have anticpiated. It will leave the rig eventually for something more powerful but as of now I am happy retro user.

My buddy has also norrowed down his potential purchases down significantly. He will get the HIGHSCREEN VOBIS that was already mentioned or maybe a more powerful jetway complete pc with a athlon xp 2200+ and the included gf mx 440 video card.

So you see we are all.

For PS1 games i use my gf2 Willamette PC, it's around 99/2000 that you see a lot of PS1 games being ported and it's also near the end.

iraito wrote on 2023-06-15, 07:48:

For PS1 games i use my gf2 Willamette PC, it's around 99/2000 that you see a lot of PS1 games being ported and it's also near the end.

Yes this makes perfectly sense. I will advice him to take a look at the pentium 4 machines that are available out there as well and then compare it with jetway athlon pc. In order to get a stabel framerate is more inclined towards the higher power athlon anyway. So looking into the P4 class as well would be good thing.

the PSX game everyone loves its windows port of for GPU reasons is Final Fantasy VIII, which only hinges on paletted texture support and blending functions. Have both and you're golden. Geforce2-FX and 3dfx cards should cover this area well.

Also "cheap Dreamcast" costs will add up when your laser dies and you want to GDEMU it, DreamPi it, VMU upkeep, etc.. 😀 and there's a lot of myths about its percieved graphical quality as well as the emulation mandela effect not touching on the penalties and imperfections. The all holy 480p VGA out isn't compatible with all games either, and 640x480x16@60Hz w/ interference is a strain to see on a PC CRT... also those "backups" are pirate rips with significant quality loss to fit a CD-R.

I've been struggling with builds lately as well. I finally have my old P1 233 MMX up and running but it has a voodoo 3 2000 in it which is overkill so im considering puting in either my voodoo 2 12 meg or 8 meg card, or even sli when I upgrade the 8 meg to 12.

Runs Tomb raider and RE 2 and 3 very well.

I also play Unreal on it and it runs well but gets slowdown . So far its a good system but I think I need to set up my PS 2 and 3 for later games. I know Max payne needs a minimum 450 Mhz cpu. So P3 would be better.

retep_110 wrote on 2023-06-15, 08:20:

iraito wrote on 2023-06-15, 07:48:

For PS1 games i use my gf2 Willamette PC, it's around 99/2000 that you see a lot of PS1 games being ported and it's also near the end.

Yes this makes perfectly sense. I will advice him to take a look at the pentium 4 machines that are available out there as well and then compare it with jetway athlon pc. In order to get a stabel framerate is more inclined towards the higher power athlon anyway. So looking into the P4 class as well would be good thing.

If you choose a P4 and want to play something like RE 2, just remember you need a fat 32 formatted drive or you wont be able to save your game. NFTS wont save RE 2 save files.

Law212 wrote on 2023-06-15, 17:23:

retep_110 wrote on 2023-06-15, 08:20:

iraito wrote on 2023-06-15, 07:48:

For PS1 games i use my gf2 Willamette PC, it's around 99/2000 that you see a lot of PS1 games being ported and it's also near the end.

Yes this makes perfectly sense. I will advice him to take a look at the pentium 4 machines that are available out there as well and then compare it with jetway athlon pc. In order to get a stabel framerate is more inclined towards the higher power athlon anyway. So looking into the P4 class as well would be good thing.

If you choose a P4 and want to play something like RE 2, just remember you need a fat 32 formatted drive or you wont be able to save your game. NFTS wont save RE 2 save files.

Thats good to know for my buddy. Re 2 is one the games he wants to play for sure. We did not know that problems while saving can happen.

Law212 wrote on 2023-06-15, 17:20:

I've been struggling with builds lately as well. I finally have my old P1 233 MMX up and running but it has a voodoo 3 2000 in it which is overkill so im considering puting in either my voodoo 2 12 meg or 8 meg card, or even sli when I upgrade the 8 meg to 12.

Runs Tomb raider and RE 2 and 3 very well.

I also play Unreal on it and it runs well but gets slowdown . So far its a good system but I think I need to set up my PS 2 and 3 for later games. I know Max payne needs a minimum 450 Mhz cpu. So P3 would be better.

you are really lucky that you have a big arsenal of voodoo cards at your disposal. I also want to ad a voodoo 2 sli set to my hp pentium 3 800 rig but it will take some until I can get 2 of them.

Max Payne is a game I am personally very interested in to try it out. I am also courious how well it would run on my p3 with a Riva TNT 2 card.

But I am also thinking of turning our old pentium 4 rig, that is just resting at my parents into rig for 2000 and 2001 games.

The P3 800 mhz runs well so far but with late 99 games it starts to show it's age already. Especially in Quake 3. Also Deus Ex is not running as smooth as I was hopping for.

Half Life runs ok most of the time but there also some hick ups during scenes with many enemies on the Scene at once. I could not test Unreal on it. Need copy first.

But it still sounds impressive that Unreal runs quite well minus the slowdowns of course an P1 MMX

retep_110 wrote on 2023-06-15, 18:27:

Thats good to know for my buddy. Re 2 is one the games he wants to play for sure. We did not know that problems while saving ca […]
Show full quote

Law212 wrote on 2023-06-15, 17:23:

retep_110 wrote on 2023-06-15, 08:20:

Yes this makes perfectly sense. I will advice him to take a look at the pentium 4 machines that are available out there as well and then compare it with jetway athlon pc. In order to get a stabel framerate is more inclined towards the higher power athlon anyway. So looking into the P4 class as well would be good thing.

If you choose a P4 and want to play something like RE 2, just remember you need a fat 32 formatted drive or you wont be able to save your game. NFTS wont save RE 2 save files.

Thats good to know for my buddy. Re 2 is one the games he wants to play for sure. We did not know that problems while saving can happen.

Law212 wrote on 2023-06-15, 17:20:

I've been struggling with builds lately as well. I finally have my old P1 233 MMX up and running but it has a voodoo 3 2000 in it which is overkill so im considering puting in either my voodoo 2 12 meg or 8 meg card, or even sli when I upgrade the 8 meg to 12.

Runs Tomb raider and RE 2 and 3 very well.

I also play Unreal on it and it runs well but gets slowdown . So far its a good system but I think I need to set up my PS 2 and 3 for later games. I know Max payne needs a minimum 450 Mhz cpu. So P3 would be better.

you are really lucky that you have a big arsenal of voodoo cards at your disposal. I also want to ad a voodoo 2 sli set to my hp pentium 3 800 rig but it will take some until I can get 2 of them.

Max Payne is a game I am personally very interested in to try it out. I am also courious how well it would run on my p3 with a Riva TNT 2 card.

But I am also thinking of turning our old pentium 4 rig, that is just resting at my parents into rig for 2000 and 2001 games.

The P3 800 mhz runs well so far but with late 99 games it starts to show it's age already. Especially in Quake 3. Also Deus Ex is not running as smooth as I was hopping for.

Half Life runs ok most of the time but there also some hick ups during scenes with many enemies on the Scene at once. I could not test Unreal on it. Need copy first.

But it still sounds impressive that Unreal runs quite well minus the slowdowns of course an P1 MMX

On deus ex, i tried a lot of different CPUs and GPUs, it requires a P4 as a bare minimum to work at a decent speed and if you want to use detailed textures you need a gf2 minimum or a GPU capable of dealing with texture compression, it's the crysis of the year 2000 no doubt.

iraito wrote on 2023-06-15, 20:38:

retep_110 wrote on 2023-06-15, 18:27:

Thats good to know for my buddy. Re 2 is one the games he wants to play for sure. We did not know that problems while saving ca […]
Show full quote

Law212 wrote on 2023-06-15, 17:23:

If you choose a P4 and want to play something like RE 2, just remember you need a fat 32 formatted drive or you wont be able to save your game. NFTS wont save RE 2 save files.

Thats good to know for my buddy. Re 2 is one the games he wants to play for sure. We did not know that problems while saving can happen.

Law212 wrote on 2023-06-15, 17:20:

I've been struggling with builds lately as well. I finally have my old P1 233 MMX up and running but it has a voodoo 3 2000 in it which is overkill so im considering puting in either my voodoo 2 12 meg or 8 meg card, or even sli when I upgrade the 8 meg to 12.

Runs Tomb raider and RE 2 and 3 very well.

I also play Unreal on it and it runs well but gets slowdown . So far its a good system but I think I need to set up my PS 2 and 3 for later games. I know Max payne needs a minimum 450 Mhz cpu. So P3 would be better.

you are really lucky that you have a big arsenal of voodoo cards at your disposal. I also want to ad a voodoo 2 sli set to my hp pentium 3 800 rig but it will take some until I can get 2 of them.

Max Payne is a game I am personally very interested in to try it out. I am also courious how well it would run on my p3 with a Riva TNT 2 card.

But I am also thinking of turning our old pentium 4 rig, that is just resting at my parents into rig for 2000 and 2001 games.

The P3 800 mhz runs well so far but with late 99 games it starts to show it's age already. Especially in Quake 3. Also Deus Ex is not running as smooth as I was hopping for.

Half Life runs ok most of the time but there also some hick ups during scenes with many enemies on the Scene at once. I could not test Unreal on it. Need copy first.

But it still sounds impressive that Unreal runs quite well minus the slowdowns of course an P1 MMX

On deus ex, i tried a lot of different CPUs and GPUs, it requires a P4 as a bare minimum to work at a decent speed and if you want to use detailed textures you need a gf2 minimum or a GPU capable of dealing with texture compression, it's the crysis of the year 2000 no doubt.

Thanks for the info. That's very interesting and valuable leason not to the take the system requirements by the game companies at face value. My p3 800 mhz was over the recommended specs for Deus Ex so I expected it run well but I was wrong.

@leileilol Thanks for your answer as well. 3dfx cards are a nice recommendation for that area for sure but I do not know yet if my buddy is willing to pay a premium for a good voodoo card. A more ecomonical geforce could seems to be the better pick for him.

Also thanks a lot for further information about the Dreamcast. He found the DC not that bad he decided against it already. He wants a real PC. So DC is of the table anyway.

retep_110 wrote on 2023-06-15, 18:27:

you are really lucky that you have a big arsenal of voodoo cards at your disposal. I also want to ad a voodoo 2 sli set to my […]
Show full quote

you are really lucky that you have a big arsenal of voodoo cards at your disposal. I also want to ad a voodoo 2 sli set to my hp pentium 3 800 rig but it will take some until I can get 2 of them.

Max Payne is a game I am personally very interested in to try it out. I am also courious how well it would run on my p3 with a Riva TNT 2 card.

But I am also thinking of turning our old pentium 4 rig, that is just resting at my parents into rig for 2000 and 2001 games.

The P3 800 mhz runs well so far but with late 99 games it starts to show it's age already. Especially in Quake 3. Also Deus Ex is not running as smooth as I was hopping for.

Half Life runs ok most of the time but there also some hick ups during scenes with many enemies on the Scene at once. I could not test Unreal on it. Need copy first.

But it still sounds impressive that Unreal runs quite well minus the slowdowns of course an P1 MMX

So I installed a voodoo 2 12 MB card in this P1 233 MMX system and I think games run better than when I had the Voodoo 3 installed. V3 was probably bottlenecked like mad. I think this system is set and this is how I will keep it.

I am setting up a P3 as well. I have a 933 Mhz CPU for it, and I will most likely throw in the voodoo 3 2ooo agp card . I do have a riva tnt 2 card I want to try out that someone sent me recently . I have never used one before.

Law212 wrote on 2023-06-21, 05:10:

retep_110 wrote on 2023-06-15, 18:27:

you are really lucky that you have a big arsenal of voodoo cards at your disposal. I also want to ad a voodoo 2 sli set to my […]
Show full quote

you are really lucky that you have a big arsenal of voodoo cards at your disposal. I also want to ad a voodoo 2 sli set to my hp pentium 3 800 rig but it will take some until I can get 2 of them.

Max Payne is a game I am personally very interested in to try it out. I am also courious how well it would run on my p3 with a Riva TNT 2 card.

But I am also thinking of turning our old pentium 4 rig, that is just resting at my parents into rig for 2000 and 2001 games.

The P3 800 mhz runs well so far but with late 99 games it starts to show it's age already. Especially in Quake 3. Also Deus Ex is not running as smooth as I was hopping for.

Half Life runs ok most of the time but there also some hick ups during scenes with many enemies on the Scene at once. I could not test Unreal on it. Need copy first.

But it still sounds impressive that Unreal runs quite well minus the slowdowns of course an P1 MMX

So I installed a voodoo 2 12 MB card in this P1 233 MMX system and I think games run better than when I had the Voodoo 3 installed. V3 was probably bottlenecked like mad. I think this system is set and this is how I will keep it.

I am setting up a P3 as well. I have a 933 Mhz CPU for it, and I will most likely throw in the voodoo 3 2ooo agp card . I do have a riva tnt 2 card I want to try out that someone sent me recently . I have never used one before.

I wish you good luck with your P3 build. I would say that the TNT 2 card is a neat card worth trying out for sure. But I cannot compare it with other contempory cards. The card I had back then was ati all in wonder card. Never had the TNT 2 when it was new and I also never had Voodoo card.

So take my very good impression of the TNT 2 with a grain salt. Mabye my impression of the TNT 2 would be less positive if I had experience with other cards of the time.

It makes sense that the older Voodoo card works better with the MMX than the newer Voodoo. The newer V3 might bottleneck the old cpu a lot like you have already said.

Speaking of voodoo cards I might get a Voodoo Banshee soon to try it out on my p3 800 mhz. I found one for litte money and I am eager to try it out despite the fact that are much better Voodoo cards out there.

Sorry for bringing the thread back we have another question.

Besides the vobis pc my buddy has a chance to get 2 other more powerful of the shelf pc as well.

He can either get a socket 370 pc with a inthel 815 mainboard and copermine p3 1000 MHz with a geforce mx 400

or a Athlon xp 2400 pc (mainboard unkown but we can ask the seller of course) and gf force mx 440.

The price is smilar and we want to know know if any of these pcs is maxxing out the components ? Or are both pc rather bottle necked by the gpu?

retep_110 wrote on 2023-06-23, 06:39:

Sorry for bringing the thread back we have another question. […]
Show full quote

Sorry for bringing the thread back we have another question.

Besides the vobis pc my buddy has a chance to get 2 other more powerful of the shelf pc as well.

He can either get a socket 370 pc with a inthel 815 mainboard and copermine p3 1000 MHz with a geforce mx 400

or a Athlon xp 2400 pc (mainboard unkown but we can ask the seller of course) and gf force mx 440.

The price is smilar and we want to know know if any of these pcs is maxxing out the components ? Or are both pc rather bottle necked by the gpu?

An athlon XP 2K4 can push even a 9800 XT properly, so no problem with your cards, the PIII 933\1000 starts bottlenecking stuff like the geforce 3 but you should be good for any geforce 2 i guess.

iraito wrote on 2023-06-23, 07:43:

retep_110 wrote on 2023-06-23, 06:39:

Sorry for bringing the thread back we have another question. […]
Show full quote

Sorry for bringing the thread back we have another question.

Besides the vobis pc my buddy has a chance to get 2 other more powerful of the shelf pc as well.

He can either get a socket 370 pc with a inthel 815 mainboard and copermine p3 1000 MHz with a geforce mx 400

or a Athlon xp 2400 pc (mainboard unkown but we can ask the seller of course) and gf force mx 440.

The price is smilar and we want to know know if any of these pcs is maxxing out the components ? Or are both pc rather bottle necked by the gpu?

An athlon XP 2K4 can push even a 9800 XT properly, so no problem with your cards, the PIII 933\1000 starts bottlenecking stuff like the geforce 3 but you should be good for any geforce 2 i guess.

Thx for the info. Then I am going to advice him to go with the Athlon system With that configuration he also has some power reserves for much more powerful card in case he gets tired of the mx440.