VOGONS


First post, by Markj595

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Ok so ive got a number of classic computers ive been hanging onto since the early 2000's and ive been swapping, building, re-building since I can remember, mostly because I enjoy the project than the end result.
Recently ive been looking at my collection of voodoo cards and honestly the systems id like to include these cards in just dont "feel" right

So these 3 systems are the current configurations built

pentium 3 tualatin 1.4
QDI Motherboard (cant remember what one)
768mb Ram
AGP Graphics Slot

Pentium 2 350mhz
Tomato Baby AT Motherboard
192mb Memory
AGP Graphics Slot
PCI Slots x3 + x1 Shared PCI ISA Slot
ISA Slots x1 + x1 Shared ISA PCI Slot

Pentium Pro 200mhz
ATX format Board 440FX Chipset
96mb 72pin Memory
PCI Slots x3 + x1 PCI ISA Shared
ISA Slots x3 + x1 ISA PCI Shared

So the voodoo cards i own are..

2x 8mb Blackmagic Voodoo2 SLI
1x Voodoo Banshee AGP
1x Voodoo 3 3000 AGP

The voodoo2's in the Pentium pro, Voodoo banshee AGP in the Pentium 2 and the Voodoo 3 3000 AGP in the 1.4 p3

- I know the Pentium pro voodoo2 mix isn't right, Pentium pro released at 1995 voodoo 2 in 1998. so chronologically voodoo2 cards would benefit better a k6-2 500 or a Pentium 2 450.
- I think the voodoo 3 is in the right place being inside the 1,4ghz P3 so no issues there.
- The voodoo Banshee is currently in the Pentium 2 350mhz, This would probably pair better in a K6-2 500mhz or more but for the sake of having multiple K6-2 platforms perhaps a K7 Slot A Athlon 700mhz

Where would you put each card I guess is the question, Assume the hardware is available for the configuration, the only thing static in each configuration are the voodoo cards.
I've got quite a lot of gear kicking about the place, the idea here is to downsize the collection, build the best of these voodoo platforms and focus on them, then I can arrange other hardware for resale or storage subject to what it is.

Cheers in advance 😀

Reply 1 of 6, by The Serpent Rider

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- I know the Pentium pro voodoo2 mix isn't right,

And so what? Pentium Pro predates common desktop 3D acceleration solutions, including S3 Virge. Although Pentium Pro is anyway redundant with your options.

I must be some kind of standard: the anonymous gangbanger of the 21st century.

Reply 2 of 6, by bloodem

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I can give you my personal preference:
- Pentium 166 (with or without MMX) ==> Voodoo 1
- Pentium MMX 233 ==> Voodoo Banshee
- early Pentium 2 up to Pentium 3 Coppermine 1 GHz* ==> Voodoo 2 (*this one is more tricky, since I also like to use the Voodoo 2 as a secondary card, next to more powerful GPUs on faster platforms like Athlon XP).
- AMD K6-2/3+ 500 up to slower Athlon or Pentium 3 Coppermine ==> Voodoo 3

So, as an alternative approach, my suggestions for you would be:
- on the Pentium 3 Tualatin 1.4 you can use a fast nVIDIA card (such as a GeForce 3/Ti200/Ti500 or GeForce 4 Ti 4200/4400/4600) , and add a Voodoo 2 as a secondary card - this will allow you to play many good ol' Glide games in addition to newer, much more demanding games. IMO, a Voodoo 2 SLI is not really required in this scenario, so you get to keep the second card for another system.
- the Pentium 2 350 (with a bit of overclock) should go nicely with a Voodoo 3. I have two Pentium 2 350 CPUs - one of them works perfectly at 466 Mhz (133 MHz FSB), while the other works great at 434 MHz (124 MHz FSB). It's true that the Voodoo 3 will scale past a Pentium 2 (up to a Pentium 3 800 MHz or so), however, I think those CPUs are happier with a GeForce 2 GTS / Radeon as a main video card 😀
- the Pentium Pro should go nicely with a Banshee (it's a nice pair IMO: the slowest CPU with the slowest 3dfx card out of the three).

Last edited by bloodem on 2020-12-27, 16:37. Edited 1 time in total.

1 x PLCC-68 / 2 x PGA132 / 5 x Skt 3 / 9 x Skt 7 / 12 x SS7 / 1 x Skt 8 / 14 x Slot 1 / 5 x Slot A
5 x Skt 370 / 8 x Skt A / 2 x Skt 478 / 2 x Skt 754 / 3 x Skt 939 / 7 x LGA775 / 1 x LGA1155
Current PC: Ryzen 7 5800X3D
Backup PC: Core i7 7700k

Reply 3 of 6, by The Serpent Rider

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- the Pentium Pro should go nicely with a Banshee (it's a nice pair IMO: the slowest CPU with the slowest 3dfx card out of the three).

That would require AGP-to-PCI adapter.

I must be some kind of standard: the anonymous gangbanger of the 21st century.

Reply 4 of 6, by bloodem

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The Serpent Rider wrote on 2020-12-27, 16:35:

- the Pentium Pro should go nicely with a Banshee (it's a nice pair IMO: the slowest CPU with the slowest 3dfx card out of the three).

That would require AGP-to-PCI adapter.

Ugh, you're right. I totally ignored the "AGP" part, since I only care about PCI Banshee cards 😀
Anyway, in this case the second Voodoo 2 would also work fine with the Pentium Pro (paired with an S3 Virge or similar card for 2D). At lower resolutions the Voodoo 2 will be severely bottlenecked by this CPU, however, at 800 x 600, it should generally reach at least 80% if not more of its potential.
As for the AGP Banshee... I literally can't think of any use case for it. I never used it in any of my builds and never will. 😀

1 x PLCC-68 / 2 x PGA132 / 5 x Skt 3 / 9 x Skt 7 / 12 x SS7 / 1 x Skt 8 / 14 x Slot 1 / 5 x Slot A
5 x Skt 370 / 8 x Skt A / 2 x Skt 478 / 2 x Skt 754 / 3 x Skt 939 / 7 x LGA775 / 1 x LGA1155
Current PC: Ryzen 7 5800X3D
Backup PC: Core i7 7700k

Reply 5 of 6, by Markj595

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bloodem wrote on 2020-12-27, 16:32:
I can give you my personal preference: - Pentium 166 (with or without MMX) ==> Voodoo 1 - Pentium MMX 233 ==> Voodoo Banshee - e […]
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I can give you my personal preference:
- Pentium 166 (with or without MMX) ==> Voodoo 1
- Pentium MMX 233 ==> Voodoo Banshee
- early Pentium 2 up to Pentium 3 Coppermine 1 GHz* ==> Voodoo 2 (*this one is more tricky, since I also like to use the Voodoo 2 as a secondary card, next to more powerful GPUs on faster platforms like Athlon XP).
- AMD K6-2/3+ 500 up to slower Athlon or Pentium 3 Coppermine ==> Voodoo 3

So, as an alternative approach, my suggestions for you would be:
- on the Pentium 3 Tualatin 1.4 you can use a fast nVIDIA card (such as a GeForce 3/Ti200/Ti500 or GeForce 4 Ti 4200/4400/4600) , and add a Voodoo 2 as a secondary card - this will allow you to play many good ol' Glide games in addition to newer, much more demanding games. IMO, a Voodoo 2 SLI is not really required in this scenario, so you get to keep the second card for another system.
- the Pentium 2 350 (with a bit of overclock) should go nicely with a Voodoo 3. I have two Pentium 2 350 CPUs - one of them works perfectly at 466 Mhz (133 MHz FSB), while the other works great at 434 MHz (124 MHz FSB). It's true that the Voodoo 3 will scale past a Pentium 2 (up to a Pentium 3 800 MHz or so), however, I think those CPUs are happier with a GeForce 2 GTS / Radeon as a main video card 😀
- the Pentium Pro should go nicely with a Banshee (it's a nice pair IMO: the slowest CPU with the slowest 3dfx card out of the three).

Cheers for that, Given the downsize I like the idea of the 1.4 to do the majority of the workload, I do have a Leadtek Winfast 4600ti 128mb thats unused at the moment, That would go well with the voodoos.
I think for the pentium pro its going to get stripped out and put in the parts for ebay sales to be fair, ive tried to give it a few good uses only to find better options with more ability/options, I think that banshee is going to go the same way too off to ebay!
Ive got a few pentium 2 processors and boards im sure ive got an ATX Pentium 3 500 version paired up somewhere, Pentium 3 ATX with the voodoo 3 would give the more pure 3dfx experience, I did also today find a pentium 4 QDI Synatix 4 with RD-Ram, I think that's a 1.4ghz though. I need to bench test it on 98 to confirm its ok for sale or use.
Ill post some pictures of hardware over the next week as things make better progress.

Reply 6 of 6, by chinny22

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Banshee suits DOS/9x builds really well. Something your P2 also does so think that's its best fit. (even if you do sell the PPro)
It's VESA compatibility is excellent for dos and glide support for 9x games is fine until you get into more demanding titles when you'll typically want a faster CPU as well.

V2 SLI is sexy and like bloodem said if paired with a powerful D3D card makes for a really good Win9x allrounder.

V3 I tend to put in PC's I build dedicated to glide games.

I agree the V3 and P3 500 combination is good, majority of glide games will be happy with 500Mhz
That means the P3 1.4 could get a fast D3D card with tends to demand faster CPU's but you have glide covered with the V2's (assuming this does have PCI slots?)

PPro I'd treat more as a Dos PC, which really wants a Voodoo1 for glide, it is a good platform to mess around with some of the other 3D API's though
3D Accelerated Games List (Proprietary APIs - No 3DFX/Direct3D)