AlessandroB wrote on 2023-04-23, 16:05:

In the middle-end of the DOS era (1992-1996), using a PC with 486, P60 ora slow P55, the voodoo is the only 3D accelerator used by the software house? for what can i remember S3 or Matrox they haven't been used much. If i must choose one 3D accelerator voodoo is the first and only choice?

If you're using a Voodoo, you can have it all.

The choice would then be between a primary card of S3 or Matrox. In that case, for me, the choice is S3. But if you care more about utmost image quality and being able to fool around with MSI, then go with Matrox.

For dos only (not including win98), s3+voodoo 1/voodoo 2. I don't recommend matrox for ms-dos.

Before 1996, 3D acceleration wasn't really much of a thing in gaming. It was around late 1995 and into 1996 that early 3D accelerators with actual games support started to hit the market.

There were various chipsets and cards from different vendors available at that time: Rendition Verite, S3 Trio 64V+, Matrox Millennium/Mystique, 3dfx Voodoo, nVidia NV1, etc.

The main issue is there were no standards. Ever manufacturer had their own API. So depending on what 3D card you had, you needed games specifically written for it.

3dfx Voodoo became the most popular in part due to performance and visuals it offered at the time. Though there weren't a whole lot of DOS-only titles for it. To really take advantage of it, you want to be running some combination of DOS and Windows 95. GL Quake for example (one of the biggest reasons to own a 3D card) required Windows.

Generally if you want to experience early 3D acceleration from that era, a 3dfx Voodoo card is the safest bet. Anything else is going to be a bit more of a novelty.

3dfx Voodoo Graphics or Voodoo2 are the most practical options for 3D hardware acceleration in DOS. For 2D stuff: Any S3 PCI video card starting with the Trio64 or the Cirrus Logic GD5446 does the job, just make sure that it comes from a good manufacturer for decent image quality.

Sadly, it really more depends on which games you want to play, if you are talking about DOS titles of the early 3d era.

If you are looking for one option for everything, one option could be to just use a fast socket 7 mmx or k6 processor, and run the games in their software mode. Then you only really miss out on a few exclusive versions of titles, but many times software mode on the CPU that far exceeds minimum requirements works just as well as a 3d accelerator would have done. If you are looking for the most likely option to cover the widest range of titles on a 3d card, then it's basically a voodoo. And it doesn't really hurt anything since it is an add in card, so you can run software or 3dfx now.

S3 did have some minor success early on in 3d, but many of the same games ended up supporting 3dfx too, and I'd just go with the faster CPU & software mode over using S3. Many people did use S3 for 2d and Voodoo for 3d, like myself back then.

ok thanks confirmed what I imagined