retro games 100 wrote:

Hello everyone. […]
Show full quote

Hello everyone.

Someone is very kindly going to give me a 486dx2/66 computer, but it has no PCI slots.

I would like to buy a Vesa Local Bus graphics card for it.

Please can someone recommend the names of some good VLB graphics cards to look out for on ebay.

Thank you very much.

Best regards, Robert.

Imho any Tseng,Ark or S3 based card is good for the system but if you plan to put on a faster socket 3 CPU you might want to get a "hotter" model of the above

My experience: Tseng ET4000 W32, S3 928, Cirrus Logic 5428; all 3 good boards and a lot faster than ISA. They even compare favorably with PCI cards I tested.

fillosaurus wrote:

My experience: Tseng ET4000 W32, S3 928, Cirrus Logic 5428

I second that recommendation, in that order too.

Thanks guys. 😀

I had a Diamond Stealth S3 Trio64 VLB once. That would probably be quite excellent for DOS. Somewhat better than ET4000 W32/p for Windows too.

ET4000 can be annoying with resolutions and refresh rates. My Diamond Stealth 32 required TSRs to set that stuff, even in Windows 95.

I also had a #9 Motion 771 once, which is a S3 968 with VRAM. It was faster in Windows than the W32p, but slower for most games.

You will be mostly CPU limited for performance with a VLB system anyway, because it will probably be a 486 of some sort. So anything that's not dog slow should be adequate. Stay FAR away from Trident cards.

Cool. 😎

*bump*

Where'd one put the Mach32 and Mach64 along the cards already named?

1) S3 Trio64
2) Tseng ET4000 W32
3) S3 928
4) Cirrus Logic 5426
5) Cirrus Logic 5428

Also feel free to extend the list, as I'm currently looking for a decent card for my DX2 ... I've got to admit my overlook on gfx card for the VLB is quite limited. I've had a CL5426 in my DX2 til recently, since the picture was getting wobbly/noisy. Replaced it with a 2MB 5428 now, which doesn't have that problem, but scores ~40 points slower in doombench.

I also have a Spea/V7-Vega which scores the same, but is limited to 1MB. I've also had a Trio32 which scored roughly 300 points faster than the card I'm currently using, but that one drew half of the screen white as one of the pins got ripped off it's pad (might have been fixable, but not for me, even tho I tried my best ... ended up in the trash for now).

Last but not least ... could the wobbly picture on my Cirrus Logic 5426 possibly be caused by these capacitors apparently going bad?

If you go the Tseng route, I would avoid W32 and go for either W32i or even W32p. To the best of my knowledge, W32 does not to memory interleaving when 2mb is installed, and is therefore slower. Also, I believe W32 was buggier when running accelerated graphics in windows.

I normally use Grand Theft Auto in 320x200 and 640x480, as well as Magic Carpet 2 to test out the speed of my graphics adapters in DOS. I don't know how good these games represent overall performance, but I have found ET4000W32p to be quite a bit faster than any of the other cards I tested.

In theory ARK1000 should be slightly faster than Tseng when 0WS is enabled, but I have not been able to get it working in that configuration on my current motherboard. I tried 3 different ARK1000 cards with the same result. I found in the 1WS setting it performed similarly to my other cards.

I do not recall that there was a major difference in speed between S3 764, S3 968, Mach64 VRAM and Mach64 DRAM in DOS. Though it's been a while, and maybe I should run some more benchmarks.

I have not yet had much of a chance to try cirrus logic based VLB cards. I have heard that 5429, 5434/36 are all fairly averager performers.

The slowest card I have tested so far is probably the Trident 9440.

While I haven't found S3 to be the absolute fastest for VLB cards, it is said that they have better compatibility. That might be worth something to you.

shock__ wrote:

*bump*

shock__ wrote:

Last but not least ... could the wobbly picture on my Cirrus Logic 5426 possibly be caused by these capacitors apparently going bad?

Hehe. Looks like one of my really early posts. I would really like to know the answer to this. I have several cards that produce a wobbly image, and if I knew it was fixable by replacing capacitrors, I would invest the effort needed in to getting and learning to use my first soldering iron equipment.

Should do it anyway, its a handy skill to have especially when dealing with this old equipment.

I've actually got a S478 motherboard with dodgy caps that I'm going to be replacing sometime in the next week or two (when I get the time), I can post up a how to if you want 😀

I dare say that replacing those caps will fix the issue. If not its certainly worth a try, its really not that difficult.

DonutKing wrote:

Should do it anyway, its a handy skill to have especially when dealing with this old equipment.

I've actually got a S478 motherboard with dodgy caps that I'm going to be replacing sometime in the next week or two (when I get the time), I can post up a how to if you want 😀

Yeah!! 😁 If you could it in the quality style of your "build projects", that would be awesome!!

Ok! I'll try to get something sorted out for you in the next week.

Performance is done when FPS matches refresh rate. Check out vidspeed that measures bandwidth, which also includes results for several cards. 20.5MB/s is needed for 8 bit SVGA 640x480@70hz, 4.27MB/s for mode 13h.

Noone mentioned the (usually overpriced) ATI Mach64 yet. Btw, whats so good about the ARK2000 thingy?
They are a big mistery to me 🤣

I had a VLB ET4000 in my first 486 (and only) 486 build!

It was a AM 486DX4-100 and the mainboard had this AMI mouse BIOS. That machine was epic for Doom and Descent. That time a lot of fan made WAD CDs where sold and many levels where quite demanding. The DX4-100 + VLB ET4000 ate them for late night snack before morning 😜

shock__ wrote:

*bump* […]
Show full quote

*bump*

Where'd one put the Mach32 and Mach64 along the cards already named?

1) S3 Trio64
2) Tseng ET4000 W32
3) S3 928
4) Cirrus Logic 5426
5) Cirrus Logic 5428

Also feel free to extend the list, as I'm currently looking for a decent card for my DX2 ... I've got to admit my overlook on gfx card for the VLB is quite limited. I've had a CL5426 in my DX2 til recently, since the picture was getting wobbly/noisy. Replaced it with a 2MB 5428 now, which doesn't have that problem, but scores ~40 points slower in doombench.

I also have a Spea/V7-Vega which scores the same, but is limited to 1MB. I've also had a Trio32 which scored roughly 300 points faster than the card I'm currently using, but that one drew half of the screen white as one of the pins got ripped off it's pad (might have been fixable, but not for me, even tho I tried my best ... ended up in the trash for now).

Last but not least ... could the wobbly picture on my Cirrus Logic 5426 possibly be caused by these capacitors apparently going bad?

I'd like to find a Mach64 VL-Bus card myself. I've seen a Mach32 once in a while at outrageous prices but never saw a Mach64 VL-Bus card ever.

sliderider wrote:

shock__ wrote:

*bump* […]
Show full quote

*bump*

Where'd one put the Mach32 and Mach64 along the cards already named?

1) S3 Trio64
2) Tseng ET4000 W32
3) S3 928
4) Cirrus Logic 5426
5) Cirrus Logic 5428

Also feel free to extend the list, as I'm currently looking for a decent card for my DX2 ... I've got to admit my overlook on gfx card for the VLB is quite limited. I've had a CL5426 in my DX2 til recently, since the picture was getting wobbly/noisy. Replaced it with a 2MB 5428 now, which doesn't have that problem, but scores ~40 points slower in doombench.

I also have a Spea/V7-Vega which scores the same, but is limited to 1MB. I've also had a Trio32 which scored roughly 300 points faster than the card I'm currently using, but that one drew half of the screen white as one of the pins got ripped off it's pad (might have been fixable, but not for me, even tho I tried my best ... ended up in the trash for now).

Last but not least ... could the wobbly picture on my Cirrus Logic 5426 possibly be caused by these capacitors apparently going bad?

I'd like to find a Mach64 VL-Bus card myself. I've seen a Mach32 once in a while at outrageous prices but never saw a Mach64 VL-Bus card ever.

The Mach64 is a nice card, speedy in DOS too even though it has VRAM and some models can have the 2mb upgrade so the card has a total of 4mb VRAM!
But my experience with these cards is that they have some glitches in certain motherboards

sliderider wrote:

I'd like to find a Mach64 VL-Bus card myself. I've seen a Mach32 once in a while at outrageous prices but never saw a Mach64 VL-Bus card ever.

There are Mach32 VLB cards being sold on eBay Israel (!) for 6€ per piece and recently one was sold on German eBay for 7€ (actually came in second in that auction).

Anonymous Coward wrote:

If you go the Tseng route, I would avoid W32 and go for either W32i or even W32p. To the best of my knowledge, W32 does not to m […]
Show full quote

If you go the Tseng route, I would avoid W32 and go for either W32i or even W32p. To the best of my knowledge, W32 does not to memory interleaving when 2mb is installed, and is therefore slower. Also, I believe W32 was buggier when running accelerated graphics in windows.

I normally use Grand Theft Auto in 320x200 and 640x480, as well as Magic Carpet 2 to test out the speed of my graphics adapters in DOS. I don't know how good these games represent overall performance, but I have found ET4000W32p to be quite a bit faster than any of the other cards I tested.

In theory ARK1000 should be slightly faster than Tseng when 0WS is enabled, but I have not been able to get it working in that configuration on my current motherboard. I tried 3 different ARK1000 cards with the same result. I found in the 1WS setting it performed similarly to my other cards.

I do not recall that there was a major difference in speed between S3 764, S3 968, Mach64 VRAM and Mach64 DRAM in DOS. Though it's been a while, and maybe I should run some more benchmarks.

I have not yet had much of a chance to try cirrus logic based VLB cards. I have heard that 5429, 5434/36 are all fairly averager performers.

The slowest card I have tested so far is probably the Trident 9440.

While I haven't found S3 to be the absolute fastest for VLB cards, it is said that they have better compatibility. That might be worth something to you.

Arent the W32i and W32p have ISA and PCI interfaces respectively? ...and this fellow is looking for a VLB card.

Im just a newbie, but that is my understanding.