VOGONS


First post, by Kyosho

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I've got a V3 3000 that appears to be a Gateway model based on the "G-WAY" 1.20 firmware sticker. I had tried this card in a P4 system that had a universal AGP slot (first making sure in the BIOS that it was set for 1x/2x mode) and had this same problem. I assumed it was the motherboard, because when I tried another AGP 1x/2x card in it (Rage IIc), it didn't work at all. Well, now I've got a Slot 1 motherboard that has an actual 1x/2x slot and still the same issue. Here's a video of it. Sorry about the background noise and the filthy monitor.

https://youtu.be/QvAt7j18fTM

There does not appear to be any physical damage to this card at all. I've looked over both sides of the board with a magnifying lens and have found nothing suspect. No broken legs on any chips, no cracks, nothing.The only thing I haven't done is remove the heatsink to inspect under it. However, I did use a flashlight to look under it and nothing seems amiss under there from what I can see.

Anyone seen this before and/or have any ideas? I know these cards are known for overheating. Does this seem like typical overheating damage?

I suppose I could do a full capacitor replacement on it, but none of them seem to be bulging or leaking in any way. I've recently been thinking of converting a toaster oven into a solder reflow oven, but that would really be the very last resort here. It's more likely I'd do more damage than good. Or perhaps I could try a heat gun and attempt to reflow just the main IC under the heatsink (after removing it). But again, that's something of a last resort.

Any ideas?

Reply 3 of 15, by Kyosho

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No S-Video, just VGA. I'll try and get some pictures up. I MIGHT have found the problem. I just went through and tried wiggling various components to see if anything needed some fresh solder or was loose. One of the capacitors broke off after barely touching it. Broke the leg clean off the cap. I've got one of the same value, though not the same package. Should work fine. It'll look a little out of place, is all. I'll update once I've put the new cap on and tested it. For some reason I have the feeling this won't fix it, but here's hoping.

Edit: Nope, the cap wasn't the problem. Though it changed the fuzzy white columns into solid white columns. Guessing the capacitor is for filtering. Will post again soon with proper pics of the card.

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Reply 4 of 15, by Kyosho

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Here's some pics. They're fairly high res so I think you can zoom in okay. If anyone wants a better pic of anything in particular, let me know. Also, I know my soldering job was kinda bad. Don't be hatin'. I'm in desperate need of a a new tip for my soldering iron. 😜

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Reply 6 of 15, by Kyosho

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Yes, I know. But I specifically bought the exact motherboard that PhilsComputerLab used in one of his big 3DFX card benchmarking projects a while back to be sure it properly supported the older cards' voltages. I used the onboard video to go into the BIOS and switch the settings to AGP 1X mode before I ever put a 1X card into it. And may or may not have had to change some jumpers on the motherboard as well. I forget. This was about a year ago, so I'm a little fuzzy on the details. Rest assured, I never put the V3 (or the Rage IIc for that matter) in when things were not setup properly. Also, the Rage IIc works fine on this Slot 1 motherboard. Not that it matters currently.

EDIT: The same motherboard Phil used here. Which is not the board I'm using now. I'm fairly certain that board was not the cause of this issue. But rather whoever owned this V3 prior to my owning it. It was sold as untested/asi-is when I bought it, which probably means they had the same problems I did but didn't want to mention them in the ebay auction so they could hopefully get more money. Typical ebay.

Last edited by Kyosho on 2017-06-15, 20:23. Edited 1 time in total.

Reply 9 of 15, by Arctic

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Kyosho wrote:

Yes, I know. But I specifically bought the exact motherboard that PhilsComputerLab used in one of his big 3DFX card benchmarking projects a while back to be sure it properly supported the older cards' voltages. I used the onboard video to go into the BIOS and switch the settings to AGP 1X mode before I ever put a 1X card into it. And may or may not have had to change some jumpers on the motherboard as well. I forget. This was about a year ago, so I'm a little fuzzy on the details. Rest assured, I never put the V3 (or the Rage IIc for that matter) in when things were not setup properly. Also, the Rage IIc works fine on this Slot 1 motherboard. Not that it matters currently.

EDIT: The same motherboard Phil used here. Which is not the board I'm using now. I'm fairly certain that board was not the cause of this issue. But rather whoever owned this V3 prior to my owning it. It was sold as untested/asi-is when I bought it, which probably means they had the same problems I did but didn't want to mention them in the ebay auction so they could hopefully get more money. Typical ebay.

What board have you been using and what board are you using now?
Why so mysterious? 🤣

Please post what Pentium 4 board you did use in combination with the Voodoo 3 AGP.
There are chipsets with no support for AGP@3.3v, yet many motherboards with these chipsets come equipped with "AGP universal".

Reply 10 of 15, by The Serpent Rider

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Kyosho wrote:

There's no superficial damage to any, at least.

Check temperature. One of them could be overheating, indicating failure.

I must be some kind of standard: the anonymous gangbanger of the 21st century.

Reply 11 of 15, by Kyosho

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Sorry, not trying to be mysterious, just linked the wrong page of Phil's. Had to use archive.org to find the one I meant. This one. Asus P4S533-VM.

The Slot 1 board I am using now, I cannot find the model online anywhere. It appears to be a Foxconn board but the model number on it I cannot find. Seems to be a pretty generic board. Here is the ebay auction. The closest I could fine online is this QS440BX. It works perfectly fine with the ATI Rage IIc. Unfortunately it's the only other AGP card I have at the moment.

As far as heat, I'm not feeling much on any of the memory chips. Don't have a thermal camera or IR thermometer to be certain, though.

Reply 12 of 15, by Jade Falcon

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That cap if I recall is a filter for the ram, the cards can run without the filter but will be unstable or have fuzzy video output .

If you can get into windows try under clocking the card.
As for replacing the cap, something tells me that the damage cap may have taken the ram with it.

Also I don't ever recall seeing many voodoo 3000 without a s-video port. Are you sure that's not a voidoo2000 with a 3000 heat sink? Could it have 3k bios on it? Maybe it's unstable at 166mhz?

Edit
Yes it's a voodoo2000
Looks at the clock oscillators placement. 3000 have it between the ce sticker and mosfet were the 2000 had it next to the bios chip.

Last edited by Jade Falcon on 2017-06-16, 16:43. Edited 2 times in total.

Reply 13 of 15, by Kyosho

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That... is a very interesting idea. It was sold to me as a 3000, but if it's not, but is running 3000 firmware, or something, that could be interesting to play with. I have not gotten Windows up and running on that system yet. However, with the previous system (the P4) I was able to get fully into Windows, but the jailbars/columns remained in place. I will look into this further tomorrow.

Reply 14 of 15, by havli

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Non-TV-OUT Voodoo3 3000 are not so common but they do exist. Most likely this is one of them. And even if it was a flashed 2000, it should still work just fine... I haven't heard of a single one V3 2000 that can't handle the 3000 clocks. This looks like damaged memory.

HW museum.cz - my collection of PC hardware

Reply 15 of 15, by Jade Falcon

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havli wrote:

Non-TV-OUT Voodoo3 3000 are not so common but they do exist. Most likely this is one of them.

True, but look at the layout of the card, nothing is the same as a voodoo3000, and the part number is for a S-video card. If I recall non S-video cards used a different part number.

havli wrote:

it should still work just fine... I haven't heard of a single one V3 2000 that can't handle the 3000 clocks. This looks like damaged memory

I had a lot of voodoo3 cards and out of the bunch only one could not do 3000 speeds but it was just unstable and did nothing like this card is doing. I'd be more willing to bet my money on the bad memory too.

Kyosho wrote:

That... is a very interesting idea. It was sold to me as a 3000, but if it's not, but is running 3000 firmware, or something, that could be interesting to play with. I have not gotten Windows up and running on that system yet. However, with the previous system (the P4) I was able to get fully into Windows, but the jailbars/columns remained in place. I will look into this further tomorrow.

Try koolsmokys v.control to play around with clock speeds and settings on the card. and check the mosfet voltage output. I seen them go bad before.
But only on PCI cards, still worth looking into.

But Id say the card has a bad ram chip. Sadly that's not a simple fix.