Rewrote topic to match forum standards

I'm running Windows in 640x480

Which version of Windows are you running?
Is this a fresh install of Windows?
Can you try running Quake 3 and let us know how that runs? You've picked two games that tend to give people problems. Quake 3 is the Macintosh of 1999 gaming--it just work.

Would the free demo work? Sorry I don't have Quake 3

Latest driver isn't always the best.

From here looks like 2.08 is a good choice for Win98
TNT2 driver performance

and yes Quake 3 Demo is fine for testing

chinny22 wrote on 2024-09-15, 23:57:

Latest driver isn't always the best. […]
Show full quote

Latest driver isn't always the best.

From here looks like 2.08 is a good choice for Win98
TNT2 driver performance

and yes Quake 3 Demo is fine for testing

Awesome. Thanks man, I'll try it tomorrow

Be aware that 2.08 is from July 1999 which was way before DirectX7, Quake3, and a lot of benchmarking judgment on driver speed had been on old games on older APIs. I'd personally go with 12.41 at the latest (the mid-late 2001 driver)

OK in Quake 3 here's the driver info. Is anything wrong?

How does Quake 3 run?

Pretty well, some pauses, a little texture jank maybe, slow fps sometimes.

Sounds about right. For 1999 hardware, Q3's brutal to texture cache and bandwidth at picmip 0, it'll even strain the "good opengl" cards and this is worse for PCI hardware. q3dm11's portal right at the start is a good place to make forsaken number lovers cry.

Oh I got an agp card though. And Deus Ex pauses, lags, and has frame rate drops

OK well what's a good cheap agp upgrade from the m64 agp? I can probably play most games as it is but... pretty mid performance

Cursed Derp wrote on 2024-09-17, 17:41:

OK well what's a good cheap agp upgrade from the m64 agp? I can probably play most games as it is but... pretty mid performance

if you want a gpu that supports table fog and 8bit palleted textures for thief II and you want cheap then an nvidia fx series, the fx5200 is the bottom card and the cheapest, it has good compatibility just dont expect high performance, tho for the games you're playing it will be enough, and better than a m64

this is the one i use in my 98/xp pc, there are cheaper ones, depends where you are in the world
https://www.ebay.co.uk/p/59284865?iid=175688942480
most people think these are shite, i posted the 3dmark99 score here for this card, and i think its a very respectable score of 11712.
Re: 3dmark99 MegaThread

if you want high end then an fx5900, which will cost a bit more, this is the cheapest on ebay at the moment at £79, the next one is twice the price at £140
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/176566669571?_skw= … ivn5LAZA&edge=1

DudeFace wrote on 2024-09-17, 18:34:

if you want a gpu that supports table fog and 8bit palleted textures for thief II and you want cheap then an nvidia fx series, t […]
Show full quote

Cursed Derp wrote on 2024-09-17, 17:41:

OK well what's a good cheap agp upgrade from the m64 agp? I can probably play most games as it is but... pretty mid performance

if you want a gpu that supports table fog and 8bit palleted textures for thief II and you want cheap then an nvidia fx series, the fx5200 is the bottom card and the cheapest, it has good compatibility just dont expect high performance, tho for the games you're playing it will be enough, and better than a m64

this is the one i use in my 98/xp pc, there are cheaper ones, depends where you are in the world
https://www.ebay.co.uk/p/59284865?iid=175688942480
most people think these are shite, i posted the 3dmark99 score here for this card, and i think its a very respectable score of 11712.
Re: 3dmark99 MegaThread

if you want high end then an fx5900, which will cost a bit more, this is the cheapest on ebay at the moment at £79, the next one is twice the price at £140
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/176566669571?_skw= … ivn5LAZA&edge=1

Thanks, DudeFace, I'll definitely check these out. You have a username after my own heart

An m64 is quite a slow card, performing about the same in agp or the fairly rare pci versions. Even when new these were they were "budget" cards owing to the 64bit memory.

A geforce 2 mx is a much faster budget card that can be had for cheap, or personally I like geforce 2 / 3 cards for high end of that era(however 3s are getting impossible to find).

The FX cards mentioned are also an alright option, however I think geforce 3 was the last to have a VESA 3.0 bios so if perfect DOS compatibility is of concern that's where I draw the line

bertrammatrix wrote on 2024-09-18, 23:24:

An m64 is quite a slow card, performing about the same in agp or the fairly rare pci versions. Even when new these were they were "budget" cards owing to the 64bit memory.

A geforce 2 mx is a much faster budget card that can be had for cheap, or personally I like geforce 2 / 3 cards for high end of that era(however 3s are getting impossible to find).

The FX cards mentioned are also an alright option, however I think geforce 3 was the last to have a VESA 3.0 bios so if perfect DOS compatibility is of concern that's where I draw the line

Cool, I'll look into those cards. Thanks to everyone for all the help, insight, and reccomendations!