Radeon X300/X600 PCIe + PCIe-to-PCI adapter. Problem solved.

I have a P3 1Ghz 100FSB on a i810 mainboard with a PNY Geforce 6200 256mb pci. Pretty happy with the performance, as it runs up to NFS Underground 2 in low/medium at around 20-25 fps (to show an example of something 'demanding', as minimum requirement for this game is a 933mhz cpu! And these cpus use 133FSB which are better performing)

Anything below, which is my main usage,runs pretty well. Before this card I had a Geforce 2 MX installed at 220 core/ 200 memory that did the trick very well also. I replaced the card just to have digital output for my flat tv, but gained some more performance as well.

Geforce GF210 PCI? It's based on GF9, I vaguely remember.

The selection depends on the OS, I think.
Windows XP is no problem, but 98SE doesn't have drivers.

Personally, I would stay away from anything Geforce 5/6/7.
I had them in the 2000s, caused nothing but compatibility issues.

If retro games are important, a Geforce 2/3/4 is a better choice.
It will be compatible with older standards, like 8-Bit colour depth, fogging etc.

But that's just me, of course. I'm not so much of a 'gamer', I'm afraid. 😅

Not much choice for full retro-compatibility on Nvidia PCI - GeForce 2 MX or GeForce 4 MX (plus Quadro variants). Both are kinda appropriate for 800Mhz CPU, but suck at high resolution modes. Pick your poison.

Radeon 9200 PCI is probably all you need.

The Serpent Rider wrote on 2023-09-18, 08:06:

Radeon X300/X600 PCIe + PCIe-to-PCI adapter. Problem solved.

Why not some Radeon 9xx0 without PCI-PCIe-adapter?

If you can find Radeon 9200 PCI for affordable price - sure. With an adapter, you can have multiple options to choose, including PCIe versions of GeForce FX (GeForce PCX 5200/5750). Or go nuts and install Radeon X800/GeForce 7800.

The Serpent Rider wrote on 2023-09-18, 16:23:

If you can find Radeon 9200 PCI for affordable price - sure.

Wow, I didn't know that those R200/RV280 DX8.1 PCI videocards had become rare and expensive.

Now that you've mentioned it, yeah, there are currently few offerings on ebay for Radeon 9250 PCI, with 128-bit memory bus apparently. That will work out too.

MrCrocodile wrote on 2023-09-18, 07:15:

Hey everyone, […]
Show full quote

Hey everyone,

Recently I've got a nice P3 machine. It has one flaw, the motherboard is PCI only - no AGP slot. It has a nice case and the board is mATX, which makes swapping the board more difficult as there are not that many options. The CPU is 800MHz and possibly something I'll swap with a more powerful. It has a chipset (SIS630) with an onboard GPU.

Now the question, what would be a good GPU that could max it out? Well, a GPU that doesn't cost an arm and a leg 😉
Obviously Voodoo 5 would be great but they are insanely expensive, even Voodoo 3s are expensive.

I can see that FX 5500 PCI is readily available on Aliexpress, and not that expensive (~70 AUD). Are there any other reasonable options? 😀
Is FX 5500 a good match for P3? Won't the drivers be to taxing on the CPU?

I would swap the Board.
For example Biostar M6VBE.
https://theretroweb.com/motherboards/s/biostar-m6vbe
Usually it could be found for around 20 Bucks at least in Germany.

PCI has suboptimal Performance, i had FX5200, FX5500, Radeon 7000/9200 PCI and never was really happy.

That depends on chipset PCI implementation. Some chipsets, VIA in particular, had an ass performance with more modern PCI GPUs.

This is really interesting. First of all I didn't know that there was such a thing like PCIe to PCI adapter!
I guess I'll keep hunting for some of the cards mentioned, most notably for the PCI Radeons.

The board swap is an interesting idea, if I had to do it I would probably go with P4. But then the heat dissipation can become a problem, because the case is a hot box... So many factors to consider in a retro system 😀 But I guess this is what is about, isn't it? 😉