2D memory requirement is trivial math, IIRC.
multiply vertical by horizontal resolution, i.e. pixel count by color depth in bits.

There is also double buffering and other options who eat up video memory.
Its not only about Resolution and Color Depth.

We don`t talk about "Plain DOS 2D Applications.."

Double buffering (which depends of the resolution and color depth), textures and GUI acceleration does indeed eat video memory.

I wasn't talking about basic DOS applications at all, there are also 2D Windows games be it accelerated or not that sometimes tend to be overlooked.

this may be helpful

Pentium MMX 233 aiming for the stars!

personally, radeon 7500 and radeon 9200 pro are my top favs for this platform.

there is also of course the option of upgrading to a k6-3+ your motherboard probably supports up to 75x6 450mhz possibly even 83.3x6 500mhz. the k6-3+ would also allow you to install that 256mb of ram without much performance hit from the caching issue that 430tx chipsets have (is yours a 430tx?)
SUCCESSFUL K6-2+ to K6-3+ Full Cache Enable Mod

Simply go for a GPU that isn't too heavy on the CPU with drivers. Else you will have some serious performance loss in age appropriate games. Hence anything above or newer then a geforce mx will be a waste of time. Newer games that support T&L are held back severely by the CPU. Personally I would stick on a Voodoo 2 or a TNT2 m64, and if you have a SS7 mainboard with an AGP, maybe go for a GF2 card tops, but this one already slows down your CPU in gaming.

And if you have a SS7 board, put a K6-2 CPU on it and have a good performance increase to actually benefit from a 7500 or a 9200.

Oh Radeon is pretty slow, actually a older nvidia card is better for a K6-2 or Pentium MMX with older Drivers.

I would use Riva TNT2 and if that doesn't work then TNT1. Excellent DOS compatibility and 3D acceleration. With Riva TNT2 you may be able to play many Windows 3D games with reduced details up to year 1999.

matze79 wrote on 2022-04-15, 14:38:

Oh Radeon is pretty slow, actually a older nvidia card is better for a K6-2 or Pentium MMX with older Drivers.

We’ve seen great gf2 and gf3 results in 3dmark 2000 with older drivers on pmmx to k-3+. But I’m not sure those numbers actually translate to in game performance. I got worse performance on a ti500 than my 9800 pro on a k6-3+ In halo. (Which I actually played and at playable frame rates on the 9800 pro)

Not 100% sure what the best card for OP is, but I ro know that I’ve had so much trouble even getting cards to work at all on those socket 7 systems. And the radeon 7500 and 9200 seem to have really good success rates and good performance.

A TNT PCI can't be found anywhere... and on ebay, and price is ridiculous (180-200$)

I have found a S3 Savage 4 LT with 8MB

Can it connect with the Voodoo 2? As it's 2d/3d card already

idan182 wrote on 2022-04-17, 06:34:

A TNT PCI can't be found anywhere... and on ebay, and price is ridiculous (180-200$)

I have found a S3 Savage 4 LT with 8MB

Can it connect with the Voodoo 2? As it's 2d/3d card already

You should be able to connect any secondary card you want to the Voodoo 2. The V2 shoooullllddd only kick in when the PC detects the Glide API. You may have to mess with the drivers and disable other graphic APIs on the Voodoo or deal with some driver overlap issues though. I haven't ever tried a Voodoo with another full on 3D card, but i know its been done.

idan182 wrote on 2022-04-17, 06:34:

I have found a S3 Savage 4 LT with 8MB

Can it connect with the Voodoo 2? As it's 2d/3d card already

Certainly. There are lots of people using Voodoo2 with cards much newer than Savage4. Check this thread: Is a Voodoo 2 worth the cost

You can also use ISA/VLB Cards with 3Dfx. its fully independent from your primary card.

matze79 wrote on 2022-04-17, 19:39:

You can also use ISA/VLB Cards with 3Dfx. its fully independent from your primary card.

Yeah, but why use ISA or VLB video cards (other than tinkering and entertainment) when the OP's machine can use PCI ones which are a lot faster.

OK
So... I have the option to get:

-Savage 4 LT 8MB PCI
-Voodoo Banshee 16MB PCI

Currently I have S3 2MB + Voodoo 2 which is bad in DirectDraw 2D games (because of the 2MB?)
I prefer to have either one of these instead of getting a 4MB S3 + Voodoo2
Is it a good fit Savage4+Voodoo 2/ Banshee+Voodoo 2?
Maybe getting one of them, I would not have to use the voodoo..

which one will have better compatibility with keen, hexen, duke3d and those games?
I know it's an overkill for this PC but I can get them for very cheap.

If you already have a Voodoo2, you have an optimal setup. What DDraw games are causing you issues? You will not really see a performance boost with a card that is faster at 2D, plus 2MB should be enough for the games the rest of the system will be able to play.

Garrett W wrote on 2022-04-18, 06:57:

If you already have a Voodoo2, you have an optimal setup. What DDraw games are causing you issues? You will not really see a performance boost with a card that is faster at 2D, plus 2MB should be enough for the games the rest of the system will be able to play.

Heroes 3 moves a bit slow, I had Voodoo Rush and it ran faster.
I can't manage to run it on the voodoo 2 (this game is d3d? directdraw?) so it uses the S3 2MB right now.

As for Keen and Dangerous Dave 2 for example, the Diamond S3 2000 Flashes bad.
Keen is fixable with "svga compatibility option" but for dave, there is no such option. so I want to replace that 2D card anyway.

Voodoo Rush is in no way faster than your S3 Virge when it comes to 2D. The Alliance chip on the Rush was derided at the time, where as S3 had one of the most compatible and fast enough 2D cores. There's either something wrong with the drivers used or more likely you are witnessing a placebo effect 😀.

The reason HOMM3 is slow is your CPU. As stated before by me and other people in the thread, the MMX 233 is slow for this game. Or you know, it was more acceptable to wait for the AI to do its thing at the time. The game does not make use of Direct3D at all. Your Voodoo2 can not accelerate it in any way.

I'm not sure what issues you are encountering with those DOS games, but I'm sure they can be fixed. If you are dead set on replacing this card, my recommendation, as said earlier in the thread, is the Voodoo Banshee PCI. Do not get the S3 Savage4, it will not perform well on this CPU.
If you do get the Banshee, do not combo it with the Voodoo2, remove the V2 all-together and run the entire system with one video card. The Voodoo2 can be much faster than the Banshee, but a) it needs a lot of CPU grunt to flex its muscles, something you don't have and b) you will have far less to troubleshoot if you start stripping down to a more basic and reliable setup.

To summarize, I think you already have an optimal setup with the Virge + V2, but if you really have to replace it, get the Banshee.

Garrett W wrote on 2022-04-18, 07:51:

I think you already have an optimal setup with the Virge + V2

this

Garrett W wrote on 2022-04-18, 06:57:

If you already have a Voodoo2, you have an optimal setup. What DDraw games are causing you issues? You will not really see a performance boost with a card that is faster at 2D, plus 2MB should be enough for the games the rest of the system will be able to play.

Agreed.

I even said that when matze79 mentioned that for DirectDraw games it needed more than 2MB. There was misinformation around the S3 ViRGE where the poor 3D capabilities even extended to everything else which isn't the case. It has good GDI (GUI acceleration) performance and even some of these cards has VBE 2.0 implementation onboard (but it's DOS so and we aren't talking about that 😜).

Well there's one common thing S3 does suck at 2D and it's overlays. It's not Virge exclusive either, as many later Savages are pretty slow at that too. Fortunately, 2D games of the time didn't rely on overlays... this mainly became a problem for those who were on S3 and getting into console emulation 😀

If you want a Virge without 3D (which can be more desirable due to HAL-detection issues getting the Voodoo ignored in some games), you'd get a Trio64V+. There's probably a way to hack up the driver inf to drop the D3D hal on the Virge for a similar effect...