The G450 is a good Directx6 level chip which will be slower than the G400 but had the same good driver support, an even better vga output signal quality, more compact chip and heatsink, high PCB/components quality and should be considered it was an office oriented product which can be used for those games period imho. I can say much for 1997 games but I suppose they should be just as good as them running on the G400. Of course it will not result in the fastest rendering considering clocks, 64bit memory bus, etc..

In terms of speed, the Matrox G450 is comparable to an Nvidia TNT2, albeit a bit slower. It's also slower than the older G400 model. You can see some period correct benchmarks in this review. With regards to legacy features, the G450 does support table fog, but not paletted textures. On the plus side, it also has EMBM since Matrox pioneered that tech in the consumer market.

Image quality is where Matrox cards really shine. In that area, they were simply the best of the best. Even if you set your desktop to 1600x1200 the G4xx cards will still deliver a very sharp image. They don't have the performance for smooth gaming at that resolution of course, but they were superb for regular workstation use.

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2023-06-02, 07:27:

In terms of speed, the Matrox G450 is comparable to an Nvidia TNT2, albeit a bit slower. It's also slower than the older G400 model. You can see some period-correct benchmarks in this review. With regards to legacy features, the G450 does support table fog, but not paletted textures. On the plus side, it also has EMBM since Matrox pioneered that tech in the consumer market.

Image quality is where Matrox cards really shine. In that area, they were simply the best of the best. Even if you set your desktop to 1600x1200 the G4xx cards will still deliver a very sharp image. They don't have the performance for smooth gaming at that resolution of course, but they were superb for regular workstation use.

Thanks for the info and the links.

It is just as I thought then. The G450 could be decent card for my field of use but is far from the optimum. Good image quality and EMBM support is a big plus of course but I doubt that many games from the era I am into will support it. So it is a feature nice to have but necessary for the best gaming experience.

As plan C could also get the hp system and just swap the graphics card. It seems the hp system is equipped with socket 370 motherboard.

Which graphics card would be the optimum for socket 370 motherboard and a intel pentium 3 (not sure if is coppermine or Tualatin) 1GHZ cpu? Something in the geforce 2 or 3 range?

If that is the case then price advantage of the hp system compared to the from the scratch project a would vanish but I am still not completely against the idea.

After all having solid foundation like functional motherboard, cpu,cooler and power supply is too is good stuff for a beginner. It would makes things easier because I do not have to figure out for myself which parts are working and which parts are not working.

That's part of the fun when building retro machines but for a noob like myself it is better to keep stuff stupid and simple.

@386XS thanks for your detailed answer as well.

I use the stronger version (400) for my 98 pc, it's good for DX games of that period and it pairs really well with a voodoo 2 if you want glide support at the same time, all in all if you want to run games at their intended resolution and most of the times sub 60fps (just like we all did) it does its job.

predator_085 wrote on 2023-06-02, 08:34:

Thanks for the info and the links. […]
Show full quote

Joseph_Joestar wrote on 2023-06-02, 07:27:

In terms of speed, the Matrox G450 is comparable to an Nvidia TNT2, albeit a bit slower. It's also slower than the older G400 model. You can see some period-correct benchmarks in this review. With regards to legacy features, the G450 does support table fog, but not paletted textures. On the plus side, it also has EMBM since Matrox pioneered that tech in the consumer market.

Image quality is where Matrox cards really shine. In that area, they were simply the best of the best. Even if you set your desktop to 1600x1200 the G4xx cards will still deliver a very sharp image. They don't have the performance for smooth gaming at that resolution of course, but they were superb for regular workstation use.

Thanks for the info and the links.

It is just as I thought then. The G450 could be decent card for my field of use but is far from the optimum. Good image quality and EMBM support is a big plus of course but I doubt that many games from the era I am into will support it. So it is a feature nice to have but necessary for the best gaming experience.

As plan, I could also get the hp system and just swap the graphics card. It seems the hp system is equipped with socket 370 motherboard.

Which graphics card would be the optimum for socket 370 motherboard and a intel pentium 3 (not sure if is coppermine or Tualatin) 1GHZ cpu? Something in the geforce 2 or 3 range?

If that is the case then price advantage of the hp system compared to the from the scratch project a would vanish but I am still not completely against the idea.

After all having solid foundation like functional motherboard, cpu,cooler and power supply is too is good stuff for a beginner. It would makes things easier because I do not have to figure out for myself which parts are working and which parts are not working.

That's part of the fun when building retro machines but for a noob like myself it is better to keep stuff stupid and simple.

@386XS thanks for your detailed answer as well.

If vga output quality is not a priority I suppose most Geforce 2 MX's are good choices maybe with older drivers having lighter impact on the cpu. Cheap and fast GPU which support many features and was the best selling cheap product in its time. Usually on cheaper PCB brands image quality wasn't the best on the VGA output but speed at lower resolution and compatibility were really good.

Speaking from experience, i used for win98 gaming a Compaq deskproEN with PIII at 1 ghz and Matrox G450 - PCI version (no AGP slot), slower then the AGP version.
I played Diablo 2, Drakan, Unreal Gold, Starcraft, Red Alert, Thief I, Quake 3, Quake 2 and many others. It has good compatibiliy.
It has also a DVI conector. My monitor has vga and dvi. I use the vga port for my dos machine - 486 dx2 at 66mhz.
So 1 monitor for 2 pc saves me from switching cables.
I am happy with it. But I am not picky about graphics/resolutions. I am used to play games on ps2 and ps1, so on PC I play at 800x600 and I get decent frame rates.

b0by007 wrote on 2023-06-02, 10:34:

Speaking from experience, i used for win98 gaming a Compaq deskproEN with PIII at 1 ghz and Matrox G450 - PCI version (no AGP sl […]
Show full quote

Speaking from experience, i used for win98 gaming a Compaq deskproEN with PIII at 1 ghz and Matrox G450 - PCI version (no AGP slot), slower then the AGP version.
I played Diablo 2, Drakan, Unreal Gold, Starcraft, Red Alert, Thief I, Quake 3, Quake 2 and many others. It has good compatibiliy.
It has also a DVI conector. My monitor has vga and dvi. I use the vga port for my dos machine - 486 dx2 at 66mhz.
So 1 monitor for 2 pc saves me from switching cables.
I am happy with it. But I am not picky about graphics/resolutions. I am used to play games on ps2 and ps1, so on PC I play at 800x600 and I get decent frame rates.

I love this mentality, in a way i like the limitations when i use my old machines, it's the way those game looked and developers probably designed the visuals with those limitations in mind, lately i was thinking about it regarding alias, it was rarely feasible in 2000 and the same goes for high resolution with freshly released games, so they tested and played the game during development with that jagged look, i was thinking if some game on PC worked around that limitation and was designed to look a specific way to mitigate the problem.

@all Thanks for the further replies. I will also check out the Gf2 mx cards.

iraito wrote on 2023-06-02, 11:09:

b0by007 wrote on 2023-06-02, 10:34:

Speaking from experience, i used for win98 gaming a Compaq deskproEN with PIII at 1 ghz and Matrox G450 - PCI version (no AGP sl […]
Show full quote

Speaking from experience, i used for win98 gaming a Compaq deskproEN with PIII at 1 ghz and Matrox G450 - PCI version (no AGP slot), slower then the AGP version.
I played Diablo 2, Drakan, Unreal Gold, Starcraft, Red Alert, Thief I, Quake 3, Quake 2 and many others. It has good compatibiliy.
It has also a DVI conector. My monitor has vga and dvi. I use the vga port for my dos machine - 486 dx2 at 66mhz.
So 1 monitor for 2 pc saves me from switching cables.
I am happy with it. But I am not picky about graphics/resolutions. I am used to play games on ps2 and ps1, so on PC I play at 800x600 and I get decent frame rates.

I love this mentality, in a way i like the limitations when i use my old machines, it's the way those game looked and developers probably designed the visuals with those limitations in mind, lately i was thinking about it regarding alias, it was rarely feasible in 2000 and the same goes for high resolution with freshly released games, so they tested and played the game during development with that jagged look, i was thinking if some game on PC worked around that limitation and was designed to look a specific way to mitigate the problem.

Thanks for impressions boby007. I also just have console background when 90s gaming is concerned. My pc back then also had only limited gaming capabilities. So I think I also would glad to see the old games from back then in little better quality than just the ps1 would make rather happy.

@iraito It is indeed a good question how games were supposed to look according to the devs back then. Which graphics card and which rendering features where seen as the baseline is another really interesting question I think.

Cranking up the resolution to the max with the highest possible framerate can be nice as well but looking for a set up that has a more contemporary look can also be interesting.

predator_085 wrote on 2023-06-02, 11:27:

Cranking up the resolution to the max with the highest possible framerate can be nice as well but looking for a set up that has a more contemporary look can also be interesting.

So, Plan A is nice and Plan B is cheap ...
...just let us know once you get both at home 😜 .

G450 AGP can be overclocked to G400 MAX specs. So it can be like TNT2 Ultra, but with inferior OpenGL.

Thanks for making this thread. I was asking myself the same question. and got many valuable info. I just hope we are not after the same hp pc on ebay...

AngryByDefault wrote on 2023-06-02, 12:28:

predator_085 wrote on 2023-06-02, 11:27:

Cranking up the resolution to the max with the highest possible framerate can be nice as well but looking for a set up that has a more contemporary look can also be interesting.

So, Plan A is nice and Plan B is cheap ...
...just let us know once you get both at home 😜 .

Lol. Well it could really happen that end up with both variants eventually. Both versions are equally interesting and I would not mind having both.

@Serpent Rider Well overclocking might be an option to improve the performance of the g450 not sure though If I am competent enough as beginner to attempt such thing. But it is good to know that would be possible.

I’d say you should go with plan C. Spend less now so you can start experimenting. You might find you change your mind on what you want after you get your hands on something. I know I have done that myself.

Plus, an upgrade to a GF2 MX would be cheap and easy later on.

danieljm wrote on 2023-06-03, 21:24:

I’d say you should go with plan C. Spend less now so you can start experimenting. You might find you change your mind about what you want after you get your hands on something. I know I have done that myself.

Plus, an upgrade to a GF2 MX would be cheap and easy later on.

When thinking about it now you are probably right. With the hp system, I would have a solid foundation already for a good price. And then I can start experimenting with various video and sound cards.

I would have plenty of options from very cheap cards like the GeForce 2 MX and a bit more expensive other GF 2 line cards that still do not cost a fortune like GF 2 gtx line. The most expensive cards would be the Geforce 2 Ultra line. Sometimes Radeon 8500s are also quite cheap to have if I am into looking for an NVIDIA alternative.

@all Speaking of sound cards. As the system won't come with a sound card what sound cards would you consider worth having for the socket 370 system for Windows 98 gaming (97 to latte 2000 games)?

You can get Radeon 9100, which was budget renaming of 8500LE.

predator_085 wrote on 2023-06-04, 07:19:

@all Speaking of sound cards. As the system won't come with a sound card what sound cards would you consider worth having for the socket 370 system for Windows 98 gaming (97 to latte 2000 games)?

Everyone has their favorite and you will likely get several different suggestions...

If you go for "inexpensive and easy to find" SB Live!'s are probably a good choice. (AFAIK you mainboard is PCI only).

Drivers seem to be complicated in terms of finding which one works with each card model, but it should be a very good overall card. Being a PCI card, it's DOS support will not be as good as that of a legacy ISA card.

Cards with the "Aureal Vortex 2" are some of the most regarded around here, but not that easy to find for a good price.

Cards based on the ESS Solo-1 or Yamaha YMF chips are highly regarded too, and likely easier to find than Vortex 2.

Some say the cards with ALS4000+ chip are good and cheap, underrated cards that perform better than most people will give them credit for.

CMI8738 based cards are not recommended.

For several other chips I find mixed opinions, usually not recommending them, but then some (imho) knowledgable member shows up stating that card "X" works well in situation "Y". But this is probably not the way to get started if you're looking for a smoother kickstart.

BTW, I just stumbled with this thread:
HP Vectra VL/400 MT, Pentium-lll , 1ghz.

...look out for @ThermalWrong's post about and ISA expansion port on page 1:
Re: HP Vectra VL/400 MT, Pentium-lll , 1ghz.

Also check
Re: What's wrong with all these sound cards???

@AngyByDefault Thx for your detailed answer and the links. I will read everything very carefully. It makes a lot of sense that I might get many different suggestions on that matter. I am sure that there are many great options out there.

I just need to find a good option that is compatible with my mainboard and is priced in good way. Then I also have to consider the availability.

I am also going to check out all the games I wan to enjoy on my system and see which different sound cards these games support.