Why not use your G220 with a Voodoo 2 and get the best of both worlds? Matrox was the defacto for the highest quality 2D DACs so it will definitely give you the best picture quality over VGA.

If you're not planning on using Windows 3.1 then you could probably go up to a G450 and still have Win 95/98 support.

Windows 98 will work with anything up to a Geforce 8 series GPU using the unofficial drivers.

Kahenraz wrote:

Why not use your G220 with a Voodoo 2 and get the best of both worlds? Matrox was the defacto for the highest quality 2D DACs so it will definitely give you the best picture quality over VGA.

If you're not planning on using Windows 3.1 then you could probably go up to a G450 and still have Win 95/98 support.

Windows 98 will work with anything up to a Geforce 8 series GPU using the unofficial drivers.

I don't want to use anything too new because it will just be bottlenecked by the CPU and I don't really want to go the 2 video card route. I have a hunch it's going to be hard enough to keep this thing running stable without overloading it with too many expansion cards. One video card, one sound card and a network card is all I'm putting in it to start with. Once I have that running stable without any conflicts then I can consider adding more.

With a Voodoo/Matrox combination, only one is used at a time. The Matrox for 2D and the Voodoo for 3D. It wouldn't be a burden on your computer at all. In fact, the Matrox card is known to do more work on the CPU when processing 3D than other video cards at the time. So you'll actually be relieving your CPU by adding a more capable 3D accelerator.

If you don't want to use more than a single card and want good 2D and 3D performance, consider a Voodoo Banshee or a Voodoo 3.

There are a few things to consider when putting a PCI video card in a 486 class PC:
1. Matrox cards (and probably other newer PCI cards as well) don't like early PCI bus implementations. I encountered that on an ancient Pentium60 system with an OPTI chipset. It did not boot with a Matrox Millenium but a S3 Trio64 and a ATI Mach64 worked fine.
2. PCI performance on VIP (Vesa-ISA-PCI) systems can be abysmal. This is often the case because the PCI bus is hooked up to the VLB via a bridge chip. I do not know if this is the case with the UMC chipset which drives the M919 board. A VLB graphics card might be much faster in such a system.
3. 486 systems are absolutely hopeless with anything 3D and a Voodoo2 is overkill for such a system. I would put in a Voodoo1 board at the most.
4. If you plan to play DOS games: Better avoid Matrox cards and also ATI cards, they have compatibility problems with older games. Cards that should work fine are those with S3 chips (Virge cards are not that bad), early NVidia cards and some PCI Cirrus cards (5446 for example).

Just my random thoughts on PCI and 486 systems...

pyrogx wrote:

There are a few things to consider when putting a PCI video card in a 486 class PC: 1. Matrox cards (and probably other newer PC […]
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There are a few things to consider when putting a PCI video card in a 486 class PC:
1. Matrox cards (and probably other newer PCI cards as well) don't like early PCI bus implementations. I encountered that on an ancient Pentium60 system with an OPTI chipset. It did not boot with a Matrox Millenium but a S3 Trio64 and a ATI Mach64 worked fine.
2. PCI performance on VIP (Vesa-ISA-PCI) systems can be abysmal. This is often the case because the PCI bus is hooked up to the VLB via a bridge chip. I do not know if this is the case with the UMC chipset which drives the M919 board. A VLB graphics card might be much faster in such a system.
3. 486 systems are absolutely hopeless with anything 3D and a Voodoo2 is overkill for such a system. I would put in a Voodoo1 board at the most.
4. If you plan to play DOS games: Better avoid Matrox cards and also ATI cards, they have compatibility problems with older games. Cards that should work fine are those with S3 chips (Virge cards are not that bad), early NVidia cards and some PCI Cirrus cards (5446 for example).

Just my random thoughts on PCI and 486 systems...

So what would be a good card to use for crystal clear 2D if Matrox cards have problems? That's the primary thing I am aiming for.

I say the Mystique 220 is a good choice. Never had any issues with it and I like the excellent 2D output. Maybe some very early DOS games have issues, but I can't mention any I've encountered myself, and if you intend on playing the most popular ones you shouldn't have any problems.

Are you driving a CRT? I guess you are 😀

But if you are driving a LCD monitor, just go with DVI. I use DVI in my Super Socket 7 machine and the image is perfect!

Even if you don't. What about a DVI card + DVI>VGA dongle? I wouldn't worry about the video card being bottle necked. The newer, the better the image usually.

Mau1wurf1977 wrote:

Are you driving a CRT? I guess you are 😀

But if you are driving a LCD monitor, just go with DVI. I use DVI in my Super Socket 7 machine and the image is perfect!

Even if you don't. What about a DVI card + DVI>VGA dongle? I wouldn't worry about the video card being bottle necked. The newer, the better the image usually.

What video card has a DVI connector that would work in a motherboard that old? I haven't heard of anything newer than an original nVidia TNT (not TNT2) that works in a 486 motherboard and haven't seen one yet with a DVI connector.

Oh Cyrix 5x86, my bad 🙁

I would just try the Mystique220. If it works well, stick with it, Matrox cards are an excellent choice concerning analog output quality. If it has problems with your mainboard, a S3 968 card (VLB or PCI) could be a good alternative, for example a Miro Video 40SV PCI.
I remember a 486 upgrade chips test in some german pc magazine around 1996. They also used a UMC888x based mainboard for testing and they found that a Matrox Millenium had only half the bus transfer rate (14MB/s) of an ET4000 VLB card (33MB/s).

What video card has a DVI connector that would work in a motherboard that old?

The Matrox G450 has DVI and is a very good choice of card for the era. However, Windows 3.1 driver support ended with the G400 which is AGP-only.

There is a DVI adapter for the G200 but it is also AGP-only:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/124807-B21-Compaq-Gen … =item35c2a80f4c

As I don't have a Mystique I'm not 100% sure that the DVI adapter will work with it. However, I believe the Mystique is almost the same as a G200.. worth a try since it's so cheap. I would recommend buying the adapter anyways as they are normally very rare. I have no idea where this guy's stock came from. I bought one. 😀

There seems to be a lot of mis-information here. Sliderider, I suggest you read my post "Modern Graphics on a 486", found here,
Modern graphics on a 486


To reply to the other guys,

Sliderider is using an M919, which is based on the UMC 8881/888F chipset. The TNT1 will work with certain drivers, but for OpenGL, it seems the Creative-branded TNT1 is a no-go. There are reports that Diamond TNT has working OPenGL drivers for a 486.

While the Matrox G450 has a DVI connector, it will not even turn on when inserted in a UMC 486 board. It will turn on with a SiS board, but Windows drivers will not function (several versions tried). The GeForce2 will turn on with the UMC board, but drivers will not work (several early version drivers tried). I think your best bet is a Matrox Millennium G200. Use driver version 4.33c in Windows (no OpenGL though), or v5.07 in Windows NT for Open GL. The G200 has stunning 2D display out of the VGA port. It is still better than the VGA from a Quadro FX600, or GeForce 6200. I KVM between these setups all the time and still like the G200's VGA display. It is still not as good as a true DVI solution though, but it comes close, especially for its old age. That DVI adpater for the G200 has me intrigued. Anyone try this?

If you feel that the the Matrox G200 (from 1998) is too modern for your M919 (I still saw these sold NIB in late 1997), you could try the Mystique 220 or slow down your G200 with the tweak utilities.

The ATI Rage Pro 8 MB will also work on this UMC board and does have some degree of working OpenGL in Win98, but not near as fast and clear as the G200 w/NT4 setup.

A Banshee and Voodoo3 will not work on UMC 486 motherboards, only SiS.

S3 Trio3D 4 MB is another option. No OpenGL, but the display was pretty clear. Better than the Virge DX.

I am next going to try an ATI Rage 128 VR on a UMC 486 to see how it works out with the drivers. I'm hoping that it is just old enough to have working 486 drivers and address some of the OpenGL issues of the Rage Pro card. Updates would go to this thread, but I have no idea when I'm going to get to it, Modern graphics on a 486