The main PowerVR cards you'll come across are:

Videologic Apocalypse 3Dx (3D only)
Videologic Apocalypse 5D (2D+3D)
Videologic Apocalypse 5D Sonic (2D+3D+sound)
Matrox M3D (3D only)

There are some others, but rarer. I don't think there are any on eBay at the moment, you'd need to set up a watch. Although G1nx (on here) has an M3D for sale on amibay, but new users can't sign up to that at the moment.

PowerVR cards offer their own SGL 3D alongside another 2D (or 2D/3D) card. They are NOT good for Direct3D widely, with only a select number of games optimised for them. But there are a handful of games exclusive to them, such as a PowerVR version of Sega's Virtual On, Moon Racer, Revolte, Purevex and some early versions of Ultim@te Race.

I've just plonked for an ATi Radeon 9600 128mb card to go with the Matrox M3D, as it'll hopefully allow me to run a few other games that MUST run on Windows98 (like Johnny Herbert's Grand Prix World Championship), so that could be useful, as the only way I got that to work was via PCem with Windows98 installed... not fast!

You'll also come across PowerVR cards on Yahoo Japan Auctions (I saw one a few weeks ago when I was bidding/importing on an instruction manual for the Japanese version of Drakan) but be prepared to pay more... much more... and even more than that unless you can work around intermediary auction importers.

Plus a lot of the Japanese ones are the older PCX1 spec, lacking filtering on textures and some other goodies. More expensive and less capable than the PCX2 cards.

Shishkebarbarian wrote on 2022-02-15, 17:27:

What search terms do you recommend i use to find a matrox m3d? do you know where other than ebay i can buy/trade for one?

The card does have a visible MATROX printed on the PCB and lacks video output by design and does not have "MGA" on it, so there's a chance you might just find it listed as a random "matrox card". ( Note that the real Matrox cards of a similar vintage (Millennium, Mystique, G100/G200/G400 etc) are NOT PowerVR cards!)

If you're skimming past boxes, pay attention to the black/limeGreen box with a naked borg queen. The box is also orange/yellow at the side (similar shade to Creative).

Also don't worry about it if your boxed Matrox M3D doesn't contain Hexen II Continent of Blackmarsh. 😜

Oh yeah, most PowerVR cards have a chip with PowerVR enscribed upon it!

Right, I'm getting there. Got a Radeon 9600 installed, needed motherboard drivers to compete sorting that out. Anyway I now have 2 issues (prior to installing PowerVR card):

1. Radeon card crashes with black screen showing some of Windows icons when a game uses Direct3D. Tried both Johnny Herbert and Motorhead. Both work in software mode though. Using Catalyst latest drivers from Vogonsdrivers set.

2. CD drive (Samsung DVD burner) won't play audio CDs. I tried using VXD Audigy driver setting, and when you play music the Windows CD player just skips through each track playing nothing. I tried WDM method (with digital CD audio set) and it worked once, but games kept slowing down. Then today it too skipped tracks instead of playing them.

I've got the passthrough cable from the DVD drive to sound card, but it's not that it's playing silently, it doesn't even try to start playing tracks (though games install fine, and CD player can see all the audio tracks). Could it be jumper related? Anything I can check/try?

Anyone got any ideas on both/things to try? I'm trying to get the PC working before introducing PowerVR into the mix!

Additionally, the Radeon 9600 (using 6.2 Catalyst for Win98 from Vogondrivers) works fine unless you try Direct3D, even in DxDiag, when DxDiag just crashes back to desktop.

What version of DirectX do you have installed? The Audigy needs at least DirectX 8.0, but the Radeon needs at least DirectX 9.0, so at a minimum you need to be at 9.0. One of the install processes probably updated or notified you of the DirectX upgrade, so just checking.

Got DirectX 9.0a currently. Just sorted ATI by putting the 4.3 drivers on from Vogondrivers, not 6.2.

Still need to understand what's going on with Audigy 2ZS. In short:
Install VXD drivers = smooth sounds in games, CD Player sees CD tracks but skips through them swiftly when trying to play.
Install WDM drivers = once I had CD audio working, but then switching between types caused BSOD and needed a reboot to work. I read might be 16bit CD-ROM drivers clashing with 32bit, but no sign of 16bit installed on my PC.

Am I right in thinking that CD audio should play in VXD mode, even if cable not plugged in from soundcard to DVD drive, it'd just be silent?

Will double-check drive works in XP on same machine shortly...

If the audio cable is not plugged in, you will not here any audio from the CD if it is Red Book, CDDA. This is streamed off the disc. Games like Turok and Nightmare Creatures, for example, will play sound effects of off the HDD but music streams off of the disc. Check the "Sound" Control panel option. Is the digital sound tick box marked? If so, this means WDM driver is installed. VXD is analog only. Which type of audio cable between your CDROM and Audigy are you using? The 2-pin (digital) or the 3-pin (analog)?

If the CDROM were a SATA drive, then you don't need the audio cable (nor is there a place to plug one in).

Yeah, I know VXD mode needs audio cable, as can't do digital audio, but what I meant was, if the cable WASN'T plugged in, surely CD Player in Win98 would still "play" tracks, you just couldn't hear them? What happens currently is if I try playing CD audio (from a game or music disk), CD Player can see all the tracks/track lengths, but when I press play it skips instantly through 1,2,3 etc to the end of the disc, without the playback head moving at all on any track.

Yes, it would still play the tracks, but I wouldn't trust Windows CD player for use on Game disc music tracks. If you wanted to test whether the CDROM is playing audio properly, toss a Music CD in there. Games may not put the tracks in an order or format the Windows CD player is expecting.

Okay ultimately WinXP works with CD audio either digital or analogue (cable) but on Win98 using VxD or WDM without digital audio = CD audio skips through playing nothing.

Luckily I've found since sorting the ATI drivers out, gameplay with WDM audio is actually fine, so I'll run with that in Win98 for now.

Next up (tomorrow, as almost 3am UK time!)... PowerVR (at last, been waiting 25 years for another go at that!)

I got PowerVR working but have issues with Virtual On, Revolte and Moon Racer, see Re: Pentium 4, Voodoo 3 3000 + m3D (PowerVR PCX2) - Hybrid System

leileilol wrote on 2022-02-15, 21:04:

The card does have a visible MATROX printed on the PCB and lacks video output by design and does not have "MGA" on it, so there' […]
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Shishkebarbarian wrote on 2022-02-15, 17:27:

What search terms do you recommend i use to find a matrox m3d? do you know where other than ebay i can buy/trade for one?

The card does have a visible MATROX printed on the PCB and lacks video output by design and does not have "MGA" on it, so there's a chance you might just find it listed as a random "matrox card". ( Note that the real Matrox cards of a similar vintage (Millennium, Mystique, G100/G200/G400 etc) are NOT PowerVR cards!)

If you're skimming past boxes, pay attention to the black/limeGreen box with a naked borg queen. The box is also orange/yellow at the side (similar shade to Creative).

Also don't worry about it if your boxed Matrox M3D doesn't contain Hexen II Continent of Blackmarsh. 😜

thanks a lot. i'll keep an eye out for such a card! cards in boxes are usually way out of my price range though.