How high a resolution can you get with 8 MB RAM?

1600x1200 desktop.
We talked about those month or two ago. Most probably they dig-up thousands of trays of chips and made new PCI cards with them, which is good timing. On the other hand it is 32-bit memory configuration, not the best.

They're probably taking the chips off old servers sent for recycling.

I have 3 HP machines with this GPU built in: NetServer E800, Server tc3100, ProLiant ML350 G4p. (I also used to have the motherboard from an Acer Altos 1200.)

Yeah the "marketing" specifications aren't really promising from a realistic point of view like "...this ATI video card provides high quality 2D and 3D video performance for your games and applications!". Oh well maybe it should've been specified which period correct games they are talking about.. 😁
I don't think I've ever tested the XL solution.. maybe just the Rage IIC AGP and Rage Pro Turbo AGP and even a problematic Rage Mobility.. on AGP.

I picked one up to see if it would be a good solution in my low profile Aptiva 2196. It wasn't, but at least it worked (an older Socket 7 system here wouldn't even POST with the card installed).

Did some quick & dirty benchmarks. Here are screencaps from when I posted them on OCAU:

3dmark99

DOS

I understand that the 3D Rage Pro, Rage Pro Turbo, and Rage XL are all just different revisions of the same GPU.

The point that it'd not post on a Socket7 board is interesting, who knows what changed from the native solutions. While I never tested the XL variant I think with quite some limits, the Rage Pro Turbo wasn't a bad solution on a compatibility point of view and a time correct prospective. It wasn't a monster card but still well built and compatible with the common games I think to remember tested on. Maybe similar to the Voodoo1 speed almost?

I almost forgot the SiS300 card.. in the middle of those times newspaper almost didn't even talk about it.. after I was unhappy for the unusable Trio3D card and took the wrong choice of the Voodoo3 expensive one, I wish I had bought any other cards even these low end ones considering I was playing on a 14" inch monitor @ 640x480 most accelerated games even with the Voodoo3.
There were so many solutions to take and obviously most went for the high end while any middle low end often would have been enough.

Errius wrote on 2021-09-03, 10:55:

I understand that the 3D Rage Pro, Rage Pro Turbo, and Rage XL are all just different revisions of the same GPU.

Turbo probably isn't even a revision, but XL is an improvement.

The 32-bit memory on these cards makes them useless for 3D..

386SX wrote on 2021-09-03, 11:12:

The point that it'd not post on a Socket7 board is interesting, who knows what changed from the native solutions.

I read in this thread that the card requires 3.3V PCI slots, which I guess my other system didn't support. But I never actually looked into it further. ATI Rage XL 8MB on 486 PCI

386SX wrote on 2021-09-03, 11:12:

I almost forgot the SiS300 card.. in the middle of those times newspaper almost didn't even talk about it.. after I was unhappy for the unusable Trio3D card and took the wrong choice of the Voodoo3 expensive one, I wish I had bought any other cards even these low end ones considering I was playing on a 14" inch monitor @ 640x480 most accelerated games even with the Voodoo3. There were so many solutions to take and obviously most went for the high end while any middle low end often would have been enough.

In this particular Aptiva, the SiS300 is integrated into the SiS540 SoC. I had no luck finding a video card that would better it (low profile, PCI only is a tough set of limitations to work with). Thankfully it's actually pretty decent.

Pierre32 wrote on 2021-09-03, 12:55:

I read in this thread that the card requires 3.3V PCI slots, which I guess my other system didn't support. But I never actually […]
Show full quote

386SX wrote on 2021-09-03, 11:12:

The point that it'd not post on a Socket7 board is interesting, who knows what changed from the native solutions.

I read in this thread that the card requires 3.3V PCI slots, which I guess my other system didn't support. But I never actually looked into it further. ATI Rage XL 8MB on 486 PCI

386SX wrote on 2021-09-03, 11:12:

I almost forgot the SiS300 card.. in the middle of those times newspaper almost didn't even talk about it.. after I was unhappy for the unusable Trio3D card and took the wrong choice of the Voodoo3 expensive one, I wish I had bought any other cards even these low end ones considering I was playing on a 14" inch monitor @ 640x480 most accelerated games even with the Voodoo3. There were so many solutions to take and obviously most went for the high end while any middle low end often would have been enough.

In this particular Aptiva, the SiS300 is integrated into the SiS540 SoC. I had no luck finding a video card that would better it (low profile, PCI only is a tough set of limitations to work with). Thankfully it's actually pretty decent.

I've seen there were also some dedicated video card with that chip I think, but I never researched info about their features. Lately I see from a different point of view how many low end, limited but still working solutions might have been easily more than enough on those times. And the number of chip designer was already a great thing to search for a cheaper alternative to the common high end expensive cards.

There's a lot of "Would have been seen as good if released 6 months to a year or so earlier" type cards. Like the XL/XC and SiS 6326 would have been good in 97, the SiS300 series would have given the early TNT2 a run for it's money, the SiS Xabres would have mixed it up well with the early GF2s. So you can use them to make a "good for '97" etc system now instead of paying $$$ for the exact top end card that performed the same in 1997. I have "original" XL and XC cards, even managed to get OpenGL stuff working, they weren't high framerate cards, but I didn't have major compatibility problems with them on 99 and prior stuff.

Sure that's why for example even S3 Graphic, often remembered for the Virge (like it was the only solution they designed, many forgot probably the high end ISA models?) in a time where others didn't have much better solutions anyway, in the last years I reconsidered it for their last solutions. Even the Savage3D I never had but I think beside some problems it had, it wasn't that bad too. Or as said the SIS6326 compatibility or driver support. Even Trident as lately asked wasn't "that bad" with the Blaze3D considering how low end previous 2D solution usually are known for nowdays. Maybe there was too much talking about the few ones that had of course fast solutions but at which price and not always that good.

I have two or three of them. I think mine are slightly older as they came from retired servers of the Netburst/Core2 era.
They work just fine as a display adapter, that is about it. But I know at least one of mine worked just fine in my Asus 486 motherboard, so they are moderately compatible.