Re: Is it just me or does DX11 suck?

Posted on 2010-08-24, 01:25

by

by swaaye

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I tend to skip a few generations. My desktop hardware is pretty old. I have a 8800GTX, a 3870 and a 4670 around. I really skirted an upgrade by switching from gaming on my 24" 1920x1200 monitor to my 1360x768 plasma TV. No complaints with that move at all and the 8800 laughs at almost all games at …

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Re: Is it just me or does DX11 suck?

Posted on 2010-08-24, 00:13

by

by swaaye

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Sliderider, your conclusions are strange. API advancement isn't the problem. - Buy cards that have a decent warranty. - Buy based on performance per price (usually midrange products). - Don't buy hardware in anticipation of future games. Buy when a game you want to play isn't playable. - Don't pay …

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Re: Defective VisionTek ti4600?

Posted on 2010-08-23, 18:44

by

by swaaye

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Don't bake cards that use aluminum electrolytic caps. Just a friendly warning. 😀 An oopsie that I've personally witnessed. Some GF4s use them. Some have all solid caps though.

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Re: At what point do you not need a hardware PhysX processor?

Posted on 2010-08-23, 18:42

by

by swaaye

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I haven't found Physx "effects" to be worth getting all caught up on honestly. Most of the time it is really gimmicky. NVIDIA keeps pushing it relentlessly but I think that a lot of gamers really don't care. It doesn't help that Physx tends to completely implode performance even with hardware …

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Re: Is it just me or does DX11 suck?

Posted on 2010-08-23, 18:16

by

by swaaye

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

D3D9 is also insanely slower and more demanding than D3D8. :) Half Life 2 on D3D8.1 mode is much faster than D3D9 mode and it is somewhat difficult to spot the differences. I think what's really going on is that the industry is pushing D3D9 as far as it can go because there is so much D3D9 hardware …

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Re: Farewell to 3DNOW!

Posted on 2010-08-23, 18:11

by

by swaaye

in Milliways

in Milliways

Just don't try AMD's 3DNow EXE for Quake 2 on your future Bulldozer-architecture AMD CPU. 😉

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Re: Windows 98 versus Windows 98SE? DOS compatibility differences?

Posted on 2010-08-22, 17:55

by

by swaaye

in Milliways

in Milliways

I think 9x's most prominent feature is Periodic Implosion.

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Re: Epox EP-8KTA3Pro - where to get latest BIOS?

Posted on 2010-08-21, 15:23

by

by swaaye

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Maybe you should open yourself up one of those blog sites? Wordpress gone retro? If I was motivated..... Driverguide is evil. They are too hard to access. The place is also jam packed with mysteriously-labeled file mess.

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Re: Best deal you ever got on a video card

Posted on 2010-08-21, 01:15

by

by swaaye

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

$130 for Radeon X800XT PE. Used it for a bit. Sold it for $200. :D Newegg had them on clearance and then some ebay dude wanted it bad. I also did that with a Quantum 3D Obsidian (voodoo1 edition) once. Ebay seller didn't know what he had and sold it for like $30. I bought it and played with it for a …

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Re: Epox 8KTA3+Pro mobo - broken IDE port?

Posted on 2010-08-21, 01:14

by

by swaaye

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

The Highpoint BIOS is usually part of the main mobo BIOS when the chip is on a mobo.

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Re: Epox EP-8KTA3Pro - where to get latest BIOS?

Posted on 2010-08-21, 01:10

by

by swaaye

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I love diggin up old downloads. It's a complete waste of time, but it is incredibly gratifying for some reason! http://www.itclinic.ru/download/brands/epox/ep-8kta3pro/ 😁 Thank our brothers over in mother Russia!

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Re: Epox 8KTA3+Pro mobo - broken IDE port?

Posted on 2010-08-20, 18:01

by

by swaaye

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

You can use the onboard IDE even with the limit. It just has a BIOS with the old LBA limitation. Do you really need more than 136GB? A bigger drive will still work but not all of it will be accessible. I have seen WinXP bypass this though and had setup show the full capacity. The RAID controllers do …

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Re: Thermaltake Silent Purepower 480W PSU - can you change the fans?

Posted on 2010-08-20, 17:55

by

by swaaye

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I've changed many PSU fans and yup most of the time they are soldered in. It's not a big deal. Snip the wires and solder your own fan in and put some heatshrink tubing over the solder points. Just don't fry yourself on the giant caps in there. We need your retro presence.

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Re: Best video card ever

Posted on 2010-08-20, 17:38

by

by swaaye

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Maybe Coppermine should be Pentium II Peformance Enhanced 2.0? P4 was the first really significant change to come along. Willamette could be P3. It's just the name game like you said. Not really worth arguing about what marketers do. To me, SSE was what defined the PIII. SSE can make for very nice …

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Re: Best video card ever

Posted on 2010-08-20, 17:23

by

by swaaye

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Coppermine is not much different than Katmai. The move to on-die cache is about it. The CPU itself is basically identical. There were some Pentium IIs with on-die cache. The Dixon mobile version had 256KB like Coppermine. And obviously the Mendocino Celeron could have been called a PII (it performs …

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Re: How to install Windows 95 and Windows 98 on dosbox?

Posted on 2010-08-20, 17:14

by

by swaaye

in Windows

in Windows

Most 9x games work fine on even 7 x64. The biggest issue I run into is typically old 16-bit installers. 3D 9x games won't work correctly in any emulator, not even the ones with the very basic 3D support. I'm not sure if Virtualbox will run 9x, but it will run XP and that wil cover almost every 9x 2D …

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Re: AMD Duron - super budget CPU

Posted on 2010-08-20, 00:34

by

by swaaye

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Yes that would qualify as gigantic 😀

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Re: Worst video card ever

Posted on 2010-08-19, 21:22

by

by swaaye

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

SiS 530 maybe? Yeah only useful for 2D.

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Re: Epox EP-8KTA3Pro - where to get latest BIOS?

Posted on 2010-08-19, 18:04

by

by swaaye

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Well, I'm speechless. That's quite the retro plan you have there. 😁

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Re: Best video card ever

Posted on 2010-08-19, 17:53

by

by swaaye

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Problem is: not all GLide games can run on Voodoo5. There are certain "Voodoo1-only" (or "Voodoo2-only") that cannot run on Banshee core or above. :depressed: Yeah but there aren't many. Some of those old games will work on a Voodoo5 too. I had Carmageddon 1 working and wow was it ever running …

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