Tommaso72 wrote on 2016-05-22, 07:09:
I have a Matrox M3D accelerator in my Aptiva with a 133 Cyrix.
Like others said thats beginners mistake with PowerVR cards. They generally required a beefy FPU (even Kyro cards), while non-Intel collector CPUs like 6x86 and K6 were notable for having underpowered math coprocessing.
I would even add that a decent Intel chipset, that has decent IO speed and PCI implementation also comes in handy.
So to play around with PCX cards and still have a playable framerate get a Pentium II / Celeron with an Intel chipset motherboard.
Ive been doodling around with i440FX(yep FPM/EDO RAM!) Slot 1 machines and memory speed doesnt seem all that important compared to processor/FPU speed (from Pentium MMX to Pentium II) , and even i440FX seems to be doing better than SiS620/Via 693 with same 66MHz FSB processor.
Tommaso72 wrote on 2016-05-22, 07:09:
From what I read it is only good for a few games and even then needs the PowerVR version of the game@ So does this mean even with the drivers that come with this card installed the card does nothing at all unless you have a proper version of the game and the game was specifically written for it@ A regular graphics card only needs the drivers and it works, is it different with this card@
Nah. So PCX2 like other very early 3D chipsets of its time acts like a general 3D accelerator. Will work with most things you throw at it with some bugs and caveats (and sometimes lots ,or games that flat out wont work), and will excel in the handful of titles specifically written for it, and has a few techdemos and screensavers that will only run on this card. Its more powerful than a 3dlabs Permedia 2, and possibly on par with Veríté V2200, Rage Pro, and Voodoo Rush, but the Voodoo 1 and Riva128 high end will beat it badly.
As said PCX will need a better processor to start with, but will scale better than a Voodoo 1 or others in its generation. Again the 1024x and 24 bit shenanigans others mentioned.
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