soviet conscript wrote:

I see them on eBay for under $10 pretty often. actually I just bought one for $6 shipped. the 450mhz was released a month or 2 past my self imposed deadline but...what the heck.

I only buy hardware from my country to keep the costs low,and they hard to find,prolly back then very few ppl could afford a p 2 450,p3 450 are common,i got 1 off those too and altough except the sse instructions,there is no other difference between the 2,it bothered me that the post screen said p3 instead of p2 so i choosed this option for now.

I'm not sure if you already decided on the video card.
The i740 would do nicer filtering than the Riva 128 so you'd get better image quality. It is less common though so you might run into more compatibility problems than with the Riva 128 which was the fastest Direct3D card for a while so it was tested quite thoroughly in that period. If you don't already have an i740 it might be somewhat hard to get.
Regarding the performance: Vintage3D (Putas' site) doesn't really contradict old reviews about i740. Most reviews are from when the chip came out so possibly immature drivers where used. Additionally the chip relied on AGP texturing so it will slow down a slower system even more.

About the G200: I think that would be a good choice: Excellent image quality/sharpness in general, good filtering for 3D, 16MB RAM option, good performance, low power consumption, drivers available for other operating systems (Win31, NT 3.5/4.0, W2k, XP).

Just had a look at http://www.vgamuseum.info/index.php/history-tree for other options:
Rendition Verité V2200 (proprietary API, slower, 1997, possible hard to get)
S3 Savage3D (proprietary API, mainly for Unreal though)
Banshee and TNT were already mentioned.

idspispopd wrote:

I'm not sure if you already decided on the video card. The i740 would do nicer filtering than the Riva 128 so you'd get better i […]
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I'm not sure if you already decided on the video card.
The i740 would do nicer filtering than the Riva 128 so you'd get better image quality. It is less common though so you might run into more compatibility problems than with the Riva 128 which was the fastest Direct3D card for a while so it was tested quite thoroughly in that period. If you don't already have an i740 it might be somewhat hard to get.
Regarding the performance: Vintage3D (Putas' site) doesn't really contradict old reviews about i740. Most reviews are from when the chip came out so possibly immature drivers where used. Additionally the chip relied on AGP texturing so it will slow down a slower system even more.

About the G200: I think that would be a good choice: Excellent image quality/sharpness in general, good filtering for 3D, 16MB RAM option, good performance, low power consumption, drivers available for other operating systems (Win31, NT 3.5/4.0, W2k, XP).

Just had a look at http://www.vgamuseum.info/index.php/history-tree for other options:
Rendition Verité V2200 (proprietary API, slower, 1997, possible hard to get)
S3 Savage3D (proprietary API, mainly for Unreal though)
Banshee and TNT were already mentioned.

thanks for the recommendations. I did end up going with the Matrox G200 w/ RAM expansion to 16mb RAM. The card seemed to fit fine with my timeline. I probably would of gone with a different card if I didn't have a Voodoo to team it up with and maybe if I didn't already have several dedicated DOS machines since I've read it has some issues with DOS. here Its seems choosing a card for the Mid 90's is a little more tricky then other eras since it has a lot more to do with what you specifically want to do with the machine.

I did find a reference on the net that if your using the OEM overclocked g250 that adding the 8mb RAM expansion returns the card to the original clock speed of the g200. can anyone verify this? or can anyone recommend a program that gives you your video cards clock speed since I own both types of cards.

Is there a list/chart that details voodoo 2 compatibility issues with windows voodoo 1 games? I know of the DOS compatibility chart.

As far as I know all Windows Glide games should run on the Voodoo2

vetz wrote:

As far as I know all Windows Glide games should run on the Voodoo2

if that's the case maybe I should go for a voodoo 2 setup seeing as I already have a 200mhz Pentium DOS PC with a voodoo 1 installed. I was making my decision on the bases that there were early windows glide games that needed the voodoo 1 but if its just a DOS issue.....

only sacrifice i'll have to make if I want an SLI setup then is removing the mem module on the AWE64 to make room. unless I go with a Banshee but then I lose out on sli...so its a matter of what i'll take advantage of more and honestly i don't I'll play to much with soundfonts so...

thanks for all the feedback guys, looks like ive decided to pursue windows 95 PC 4.0

I'm going to go the voodoo II SLI route but at the same time I don't want to give anything up so I either need to invest in a obsidian2 voodoo II sli card or find another slot 1 motherboard with 1 more extra PCI slot. obviously the motherboard is going to be cheaper and easier to do.