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Voodoo2 Cards / AGP Card - Graphics output questions

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First post, by Smack2k

Posted on 2020-01-24, 02:14

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Hey all,

I may be way off on my understanding of this, so wanted to ask those of you with much better video graphics knowledge.

I am throwing together a faster Win 98 machine (Pentium 4 3.4) and have 2 Voodoo2's in SLI along with an ATI X800 XL AGP card in it (why? cause that's what I went with!! ) The ATI Card I know is fairly decent (until I can get a 850 XT PE) and the Voodoo2 Cards are in there more for older Glide titles. Here's my question though:

With the Video coming out of one of the Voodoo cards to the monitor and the Voodoo obviously connected to the ATI card via Pass Through cable, would I be getting the best abilities of the ATI Card when its the primary card in use, which would be a good amount of the time? I dont know how things work going from the ATI through the Voodoo and out to the monitor in terms of loss / no loss in Graphics capabilities of the ATI Card.

I am sure there are better setups, I am sure X goes better with Y and no, I may not need the Voodoo cards at all, etc.., this is what I decided to try out....and I am just concerned with how things work between cards and what loss, if any there is for the much better AGP Card.

Appreciate any insight on this......thank you....

Reply 1 of 7, by Warlord

Posted on 2020-01-24, 03:01

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All the pass throuh cables function is to display video from the main graphics card when you are not using the 3dfx card.
If you have 2 monitors you don't even need the pass though cable. The 2nd monitor hooked up to the 3dfx card will work when the 3dfx card is running the game, and the main monitor will just go black.

The pass though cable is just there so you can use 1 monitor.

Reply 2 of 7, by RacoonRider

Posted on 2020-01-24, 03:35

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The video quality loss should be comparable to just using a longer cable.
Btw, if your x800 has DVI and your display has both VGA and DVI, you could just use two cables to hook up both cards to the same monitor. This should give you the best of both worlds.

I have not done this exact thing myself, but my Athlon build is permanently connected to VGA input of my main monitor, while my main PC is connected to it via HDMI. Very convenient, although I really miss a 19" 1280x1024 screen.

Reply 3 of 7, by kjliew

Posted on 2020-01-24, 03:54

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The generation of your ATI AGP card should support DVI, so you should use it to get the best display out of typical LCD panel. The Voodoo2 SLI can go for the VGA DSUB on the LCD panel. You do not have to use the pass-through VGA cable as long as you have a LCD panel with both VGA and DVI inputs.

Reply 4 of 7, by maxtherabbit

Posted on 2020-01-24, 14:20

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RacoonRider wrote on 2020-01-24, 03:35:

The video quality loss should be comparable to just using a longer cable.

it's worse - the switching stuff in the voodoo is bandwidth limited

Reply 5 of 7, by RacoonRider

Posted on 2020-01-24, 15:21

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maxtherabbit wrote on 2020-01-24, 14:20:

RacoonRider wrote on 2020-01-24, 03:35:

The video quality loss should be comparable to just using a longer cable.

it's worse - the switching stuff in the voodoo is bandwidth limited

Is it? Well, you learn something new every day!

Reply 6 of 7, by appiah4

Posted on 2020-01-24, 18:18

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If your monitor accepts multi input connect the X800 via DVI and the Voodoo 2 SLI setup through VGA, and skip the passthrough altogether.

Retronautics: A digital gallery of my retro computers, hardware and projects.

Reply 7 of 7, by Smack2k

Posted on 2020-01-25, 01:42

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Thanks for all the info......makes more sense now....I am hooking up the voodoo via VGA and the ATI via DVI to my Monitor......thanks for the tips....

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