A Geforce something before 6. Older cards (i.e. before FX) may yield better legacy driver support.

Radeons don't do Table fog so they're nil in the legacy DX usage scenario.

A Geforce 4 Ti would be a great DX7 and 8 card I believe. The 4200 was very popular and shouldn't be hard to find. The FX series should also be fine.

Holy shit, you guys ninja'd in as I was editing my first post...😀

Were there any other makers still around

Nope it was all Nvidia and ATI.

The 4200 was quite legendary, so I would go with that card.

why do you recommend a budget card? they are all budget now

Ok, let me add a secondary question to this. How about the best DX6 card? That pushes the timeline back a bit to where the other makers were still around. I was reading up and it seems the voodoo1 can only handle directx 5 features natively? I think? Wiki shows it only being a DX3 card...who can trust wiki though right?

What would be the suggested DX6 card? Has to be fully DX6 compliant, so I guess anything before Geforce 256? Has to have fog table and palleted textures, etc.

voodoo 3/4/5 for dx6

wildcat vp cards do dx8.1, excellent 2d quality and of course good opengl support as they are 3dlabs cards. drivers for 98. professional 3d cards but with lots of game settings in the driver. i never check the compatibility to the nth degree, but they will play wc3, ut2004, fire warrior. avoid vp990 - no 98 support, 2000 only with sp1 [dunno if it has any xp restrictions].

parhelia maybe

I agree on later Voodoo cards for DX6.
For DX7/8 I can't really recommend anything else except ATI and nVidia, other chips (and their drivers) are just not as mature, slower, not tested as much by game developers, ...

One argument for a Radeon 8500 might be TruForm support, that is if you are interested in that.

DirectX 6:
The choice should be between a Voodoo4 or 5 (not Voodoo3), Kyro II, TNT2 Ultra and Rage 128 Pro.
I would go with the Voodoo4 4500 simply for greater compatibility (if you ever want to play a Glide game)

DirectX 7/8:
I'm guessing a GeForce 4 Ti 4600. Other DX 7/8 cards are Radeon 8500, Matrox Parhelia and SiS Xabre.
SiS Xabre is a no-no, it does vertex shading in software (incompatibilities) and Parhelia isn't that good either.
3DLabs Wildcat is an option too but I don't know enough about their performance to make a statement.

leileilol wrote:

A Geforce something before 6. Older cards (i.e. before FX) may yield better legacy driver support.

Radeons don't do Table fog so they're nil in the legacy DX usage scenario.

So, which games specifically require table fog? I haven't had too many issues running legacy DX games on Radeon cards, so that's why I would like to know.

I can't find a definitive answer on this. How far up the DX chain can the Voodoo1 handle with full feature compliance? I want to build the box for it to showcase the voodoo card, but for the primary video I've been thinking of just keeping it simple with an S3 or maybe a Millenium. I could always use it as an excuse to double up on 3d options by sticking a virge or mystique in there, but if I go that route, may as well go full on Riva 128 and keep it all complemantary without reaching too far past the voodoo's capabilities with say a TNT2 or something.

I'm guessing this would put me at max for DX5 or so. To amend the original topic, if I add in DX6, would my choice for a GF4 Ti change at all, or will that cover that extended range as well just fine?

Don't forget to explore the route of Cirrus Laguna 3D for special hyperrealistic effects in games. Also throw Alliance AT3D in there for good multiplayer performance; it only displays the most essential things, giving you an edge over your opponent.

mr_bigmouth_502 wrote:

So, which games specifically require table fog? I haven't had too many issues running legacy DX games on Radeon cards, so that's why I would like to know.

Centipede.
Rainbow Six: Rogue Spear.
Test Drive 5 (patch 1.1).
Thief II: the Metal Age.
Etc.
Seriously, table fog is very common in Dx6-Dx7 games.

I don't think table fog is in any D3D7 games. It was too poorly supported by that time. Radeon never officially supported it.

If ONLY DX7 and 8, you can use a modern card without issue. Otherwise Geforce FX. But feel free to go at this discussion yet again.

d1stortion wrote:

Don't forget to explore the route of Cirrus Laguna 3D for special hyperrealistic effects in games. Also throw Alliance AT3D in there for good multiplayer performance; it only displays the most essential things, giving you an edge over your opponent.

I like your attitude 😀

d1stortion wrote:

Don't forget to explore the route of Cirrus Laguna 3D for special hyperrealistic effects in games.

Dat texture warping 😮

swaaye wrote:

If ONLY DX7 and 8, you can use a modern card without issue. Otherwise Geforce FX. But feel free to go at this discussion yet again.

I couldn't find anything specific about this at the wiki.

That reminds me, I was going to post it in the eBay links thread but forgot... the other day I ran across a listing for some nice Asus Ti4600s for dirt cheap. Maybe relevant to your interests.

senrew wrote:

I couldn't find anything specific about this at the wiki.

That's because D3D 7 and later are well supported in even modern drivers. So really the best card is a modern card. Though some D3D 7 games might be troublesome on Win Vista/7/8.

swaaye wrote:

That's because D3D 7 and later are well supported in even modern drivers.

Don't make me laugh, please. Dx9 only and with some errors. Dx7 - Dx8 games have a good chance to be a graphical garbage.