Hm. I'm not sure if I can join this discussion here, since "performance" is subjective. but..

Our family PC in 2000 was a Pentium III 733 MHz running Windows 98SE.
It had a Nvidia GeForce 2 (I think, didn't care so much), 20 GB HDD, 128MB of RAM and an on-board sound that had an optional SB16 emulation.
Modem was an Elsa Microlink USB, monitor was a 17" CRT. RAM (SD-RAM) was expanded to 384 MB later on.

This PC was later upgraded to Windows XP. Windows SP1 was, I think.
However SP1 was not really useful, because it had no firewall and the Sasser worm constantly infected the system.
This was in the dial-up days, still.

Somewhen in 2004, SP2 was released. That's when Windows XP ran very well on that Pentium III first time.
Most applications were smoother than on Windows 98SE. Memory management was much better on NT line.

So was Windows XP SP0 or SP1 better in terms of performance ? Or Windows 2000?
- I don't know. And I don't care, to be honest! Windows XP as a whole was better on SP2 and that's what mattered to us.
With Windows XP and enough RAM, the Pentium III was a very fine system. ^^

Edit: I vaguely remember that the final memory expansion for that Pentium III was 768 MB..

GreenBook wrote on 2024-09-09, 06:20:

I want WindowsXP to run smoothly. I know that all games from the 90s will run on the highest details. I wonder how GTA3 and MaxPayne from 2001 work on this PC.

I would suggest you lower your expectations a bit, at least if you're talking higher resolutions. This was an era when software was shipped out the door on the assumption that next year's hardware would be so much better/cheaper. So... I would think many games in the late 1990s would have shipped on the assumption that the highest detail settings/highest resolutions would have been reachable with high-end hardware to-be-released a year or two later.

Also, people's expectations were a lot lower. You weren't exactly expecting 1280x1024 @ 60FPS out of your late 1990s game/system. In the CRT era you just lowered your resolution until the performance became passable.

Take, for example, the original Unreal Tournament. Shipped November 1999, one month after the release of the GeForce 256. Flagship processor would have been a 700MHz (or 733 if you could find a chipset) P3. Can you get 60+ FPS in Unreal Tournament at 1280x1024, 1600x1200, etc highest detail settings on a GeForce 256 and a PIII 700? I've never tried, but colour me skeptical.

And P3s were never overkill. I remember when XP was in the late beta cycle, a friend of mine with a 600MHz PIII and I with a 700MHz were both anxious, because the rumours were suggesting that those processors would be a realistic minimum for XP. And these were systems that were 18 months old at the time of XP's release. As it turns out, XP's actual final real-world CPU requirements were lower than those rumours, but that was the mindset back then. It wasn't a "oh I'm going to buy a PIII and this will run all software for the next 4 years at the highest performance levels"

@VivienM that is, games released during the era of Pentium 3 dominance did not run very smoothly on these computers.

I didn't think about it that way. It seemed to me that a powerful computer from 1999 could easily handle the games of the time.

Is that true in 2004, during the premiere of the FarCry game, no computer was able to run FarCry smoothly at maximum details?

GreenBook wrote on 2024-09-09, 06:20:

My main reason for being interested in Pentium 3 is a childhood dream. […]
Show full quote

chinny22 wrote on 2024-09-09, 06:01:

I'm surprised no one asked but what would be the most demanding game you want to play?
Some games that run on a P3 and Windows 98 may struggle on a P4.
Windows 2000 is very lightweight compared to XP, but you can always try XP and if some games are too slow downgrade to 2000

My main reason for being interested in Pentium 3 is a childhood dream.

I played on P2 450mhz and dreamed of a Pentium 3.

One of my friends had this PC: Pentium3 800 or 866mhz, GF2mx and 128 MB RAM.

I want WindowsXP to run smoothly. I know that all games from the 90s will run on the highest details. I wonder how GTA3 and MaxPayne from 2001 work on this PC.

By May 2000 his PIII had been released, by October 2001 XP was released. So the hardware was 18 months old when XP came out. And back then 18 months in the computer world was a long time 😀

GreenBook wrote on 2024-09-09, 06:20:

One of my friends had this PC: Pentium3 800 or 866mhz, GF2mx and 128 MB RAM.

I want WindowsXP to run smoothly. I know that all games from the 90s will run on the highest details. I wonder how GTA3 and MaxPayne from 2001 work on this PC.

not great, both those games are DX8 and require 16mb vram this will let you play on the lowest settings, a GF2mx is DX7 so without DX8 hardware it will be janky, i tried max payne a while back on my thinkpad R40 that had a radeon 7 with 16mb vram, it was playable but only on the lowest settings not great,

yesterday i benchmarked a few low end cards in 3dmark99 in winx XP SP3, and posted them in the 3dmark 99 megathread, a GF4 MX440 which is higher spec than a GF2 MX, a Radeon 9250 and an nvidia fx5200,

the GF4 MX400, 64mb 128bit AGPx4, DX7, scored highest
the FX5200, 128mb, 64bit AGPx8, DX9 came in second
the Radeon 9250 256mb,128bit,AGPx8,DX8.1 came third

i tried all three cards with hitman contracts in XP, and in terms of actual usability the FX5200 came out on top.
resolution was set at 800x600, graphic settings were mid-high, the GF4 had low frames aroound 20 and gameplay was very janky, hitman and NPC's were running at superspeed, not great!, since hitman requires DX8 according to pcgaming wiki, it clearly didnt support DX7 hardware on the GF4,

next i tried the radeon 9250 with the 256mb vram, 128 bit bus and DX8.1 this should have been perfect, except it wasn't, it was running 60fps but hitman and NPC's were running at superspeed, it was really janky not smooth, also shadows and lighting were not right and i couldn't see anything on screen.

next the MSI FX5200, the highest frames i saw were 50fps, but for the most part it was a stable 30fps, even at that it looked great and ran perfectly smooth, very playable/usable, the other two cards didnt even compare.

so if you're running XP and XP era games get a direct x 9 gpu, even if it is an FX5200 128mb 64bit, it will give the better experience, just make sure you dont get one with the lower 166mhz memory, it should be at least 200mhz.

DudeFace wrote on 2024-09-09, 13:31:

not great, both those games are DX8 and require 16mb vram this will let you play on the lowest settings, a GF2mx is DX7 so witho […]
Show full quote

GreenBook wrote on 2024-09-09, 06:20:

One of my friends had this PC: Pentium3 800 or 866mhz, GF2mx and 128 MB RAM.

I want WindowsXP to run smoothly. I know that all games from the 90s will run on the highest details. I wonder how GTA3 and MaxPayne from 2001 work on this PC.

not great, both those games are DX8 and require 16mb vram this will let you play on the lowest settings, a GF2mx is DX7 so without DX8 hardware it will be janky, i tried max payne a while back on my thinkpad R40 that had a radeon 7 with 16mb vram, it was playable but only on the lowest settings not great,

yesterday i benchmarked a few low end cards in 3dmark99 in winx XP SP3, and posted them in the 3dmark 99 megathread, a GF4 MX440 which is higher spec than a GF2 MX, a Radeon 9250 and an nvidia fx5200,

the GF4 MX400, 64mb 128bit AGPx4, DX7, scored highest
the FX5200, 128mb, 64bit AGPx8, DX9 came in second
the Radeon 9250 256mb,128bit,AGPx8,DX8.1 came third

i tried all three cards with hitman contracts in XP, and in terms of actual usability the FX5200 came out on top.
resolution was set at 800x600, graphic settings were mid-high, the GF4 had low frames aroound 20 and gameplay was very janky, hitman and NPC's were running at superspeed, not great!, since hitman requires DX8 according to pcgaming wiki, it clearly didnt support DX7 hardware on the GF4,

next i tried the radeon 9250 with the 256mb vram, 128 bit bus and DX8.1 this should have been perfect, except it wasn't, it was running 60fps but hitman and NPC's were running at superspeed, it was really janky not smooth, also shadows and lighting were not right and i couldn't see anything on screen.

next the MSI FX5200, the highest frames i saw were 50fps, but for the most part it was a stable 30fps, even at that it looked great and ran perfectly smooth, very playable/usable, the other two cards didnt even compare.

so if you're running XP and XP era games get a direct x 9 gpu, even if it is an FX5200 128mb 64bit, it will give the better experience, just make sure you dont get one with the lower 166mhz memory, it should be at least 200mhz.

Did I see someone suggest a FX5200 ....I own a 128bit version and even then its barely acceptable, Since this is a lower end Pentium 3 there isn't much point in aiming for a DX9 card as any game that can use DX9 features is going to want a much more powerful CPU and more Ram. A GF4 Ti card of any flavour with 128Mb of Vram would be a far better choice and far better at running DX8 games that a P3 should handle with ease, its also better than dropping cash on a FX5200.

I just want to say that anyone thinking of grabbing a FX5200 should avoid the 64bit version like the plague, if you are set on a budget FX card then grab a FX5500 which is a 5200 that isnt totally cut down into uselessness. The FX5200 seems like a nice card till you actually need it to do anything that it was designed for at which point it reveals its really Jared Letos Joker.

Trashbytes wrote on 2024-09-09, 13:42:

DudeFace wrote on 2024-09-09, 13:31:

not great, both those games are DX8 and require 16mb vram this will let you play on the lowest settings, a GF2mx is DX7 so witho […]
Show full quote

GreenBook wrote on 2024-09-09, 06:20:

One of my friends had this PC: Pentium3 800 or 866mhz, GF2mx and 128 MB RAM.

I want WindowsXP to run smoothly. I know that all games from the 90s will run on the highest details. I wonder how GTA3 and MaxPayne from 2001 work on this PC.

not great, both those games are DX8 and require 16mb vram this will let you play on the lowest settings, a GF2mx is DX7 so without DX8 hardware it will be janky, i tried max payne a while back on my thinkpad R40 that had a radeon 7 with 16mb vram, it was playable but only on the lowest settings not great,

yesterday i benchmarked a few low end cards in 3dmark99 in winx XP SP3, and posted them in the 3dmark 99 megathread, a GF4 MX440 which is higher spec than a GF2 MX, a Radeon 9250 and an nvidia fx5200,

the GF4 MX400, 64mb 128bit AGPx4, DX7, scored highest
the FX5200, 128mb, 64bit AGPx8, DX9 came in second
the Radeon 9250 256mb,128bit,AGPx8,DX8.1 came third

i tried all three cards with hitman contracts in XP, and in terms of actual usability the FX5200 came out on top.
resolution was set at 800x600, graphic settings were mid-high, the GF4 had low frames aroound 20 and gameplay was very janky, hitman and NPC's were running at superspeed, not great!, since hitman requires DX8 according to pcgaming wiki, it clearly didnt support DX7 hardware on the GF4,

next i tried the radeon 9250 with the 256mb vram, 128 bit bus and DX8.1 this should have been perfect, except it wasn't, it was running 60fps but hitman and NPC's were running at superspeed, it was really janky not smooth, also shadows and lighting were not right and i couldn't see anything on screen.

next the MSI FX5200, the highest frames i saw were 50fps, but for the most part it was a stable 30fps, even at that it looked great and ran perfectly smooth, very playable/usable, the other two cards didnt even compare.

so if you're running XP and XP era games get a direct x 9 gpu, even if it is an FX5200 128mb 64bit, it will give the better experience, just make sure you dont get one with the lower 166mhz memory, it should be at least 200mhz.

Did I see someone suggest a FX5200 ....I own a 128bit version and even then its barely acceptable, Since this is a lower end Pentium 3 there isn't much point in aiming for a DX9 card as any game that can use DX9 features is going to want a much more powerful CPU and more Ram. A GF4 Ti card of any flavour with 128Mb of Vram would be a far better choice and far better at running DX8 games that a P3 should handle with ease, its also better than dropping cash on a FX5200.

I just want to say that anyone thinking of grabbing a FX5200 should avoid the 64bit version like the plague, if you are set on a budget FX card then grab a FX5500 which is a 5200 that isnt totally cut down into uselessness. The FX5200 seems like a nice card till you actually need it to do anything that it was designed for at which point it reveals its really Jared Letos Joker.

How about using an FX5200 on some of the Windows 95 games like DooM 95, Resident Evil or Command and Conquer?

Trashbytes wrote on 2024-09-09, 13:42:

Did I see someone suggest a FX5200 ....I own a 128bit version and even then its barely acceptable, Since this is a lower end Pentium 3 there isn't much point in aiming for a DX9 card as any game that can use DX9 features is going to want a much more powerful CPU and more Ram. A GF4 Ti card of any flavour with 128Mb of Vram would be a far better choice and far better at running DX8 games that a P3 should handle with ease, its also better than dropping cash on a FX5200.

I just want to say that anyone thinking of grabbing a FX5200 should avoid the 64bit version like the plague, if you are set on a budget FX card then grab a FX5500 which is a 5200 that isnt totally cut down into uselessness. The FX5200 seems like a nice card till you actually need it to do anything that it was designed for at which point it reveals its really Jared Letos Joker.

yeah i did, its definitley an improvement over a GF2, even the 64bit version, but yeah personally i wouldnt bother with xp on a pentium 3, and for direct x9 games performance just wont be there, without a doubt a GF4 Ti would be the better option but also more costly, theres only 5 on ebay at the moment, cheapest is £46 the rest are £80-140, an FX5200 for a fraction of the price isn't a bad place to start.

ElectroSoldier wrote on 2024-09-09, 14:10:

How about using an FX5200 on some of the Windows 95 games like DooM 95, Resident Evil or Command and Conquer?

this is literally what i use it for. no joke. i also built my dad a 98/xp dual boot 478 P4, with an FX5200 128mb,64bit, and stuck all the command an conquer games on it, admittedly anything from generals and above see 30fps or less.

ElectroSoldier wrote on 2024-09-09, 04:16:

The dead dot com servers used PC133? I mean yeah maybe you might have been able to pick up second hand RAM in some places, like […]
Show full quote

rmay635703 wrote on 2024-09-09, 02:17:

I was getting $9.99 256mb pc133cl3 low density early 2k when sdram was getting dumped and overproduced from the .com bubble coll […]
Show full quote

ElectroSoldier wrote on 2024-09-09, 02:06:

Thats when it started to get cheaper, I wouldnt say it became extremely cheap for quite some years after that.

I was getting $9.99 256mb pc133cl3 low density early 2k when sdram was getting dumped and overproduced from the .com bubble collapse , back in the days that shipping was $50 for a stick of ram but it was $52 to ship 10x sticks

64mb EDO simms were like $15 in that period as well and you could occasionally pick up a 512mb stick of high density for $35 on pricewatch (good on newish socket a boards)
I bought a pallet of Ppro workstations in 2000 that made great 2k internet machines when you bumped the ram to 256 or 384 (6x 72 pin simms)

I wish I would have kept screenshots from pricewatch because the fallout from canned “technology “ company pull outs from broken leases kept hitting the market for near nothing almost 3 years. A lot of pallets 2 year old equipment went straight to the dump in that period because so many businesses went under they didn’t even bother marketing it.

Tons of bad 1 year old motherboards and power supplies but the ram always was good.

The dead dot com servers used PC133?
I mean yeah maybe you might have been able to pick up second hand RAM in some places, like you say you did, but that isnt a reflection of the entire market and certainly not of the new market.

The records from the day doesnt seem to back up what you say.

64 MB DIMM PC-100 @ $79.99 . TigerDirect.com . April 20 1999
128 MB DIMM PC-100 @ $89 . StarSurplus.com . May 9 2000
128 MB DIMM PC-133 @ $18.89 Crucial . October 30 2001
256 MB DIMM PC-133 @ $49.49 . Crucial . October 1 2002

Then from 2003 it starts to get cheap

512MB DIMM PC-133 @ $39 StarSurplus . April 22 2003

And PC133 RAM gets cheap because this appears on the markets
512MB DIMM DDR-3200 @ $89 . NewEgg.com . January 01 2004

If you want to talk about RAM prices I can tell you exactly how much they were on exactly what days and who was selling to who.

You being able to pick up the scraps from a dead dot com doesnt mean RAM prices are coming down.

Im not going to say youre wrong. A friend of mine made a good living for him doing exactly what you did. But I know what the markets were selling this stuff for

yeah im pretty sure by 1999 ram was still expensive thats prob why mine had either 32 or 64mb, and also because my dad was cheap.🤣
even by 2004-2005 most new pcs were being sold with between 512mb-1gb, only the real pricey high end systems exeeded that.

Does Pentium 3 with GF3 or GF4Ti or Radeon9500/9700 and 512mb ram, can run perfectly with games from late 90s (maximum setting and 30 stabile fps)?
What with early 2000 games like Gta3 and MaxPayne 2001? How do you think ?

GreenBook wrote on 2024-09-09, 18:08:

Does Pentium 3 with GF3 or GF4Ti or Radeon9500/9700 and 512mb ram, can run perfectly with games from late 90s (maximum setting and 30 stabile fps)?
What with early 2000 games like Gta3 and MaxPayne 2001? How do you think ?

I play Need for Speed: High Stakes and Descent 3 (both released in June 1999) with the following specs:

• MB: Gigabyte GA-6VXC7-4X-P
• CPU: Pentium 3 800EB
• RAM: 256 MB SDR SDRAM
• GPU: Gigabyte GV-R9000 PRO II (Radeon 9000 Pro) 128 MB DDR SDRAM @ 1600 x 1200 resolution
• HDD: Maxtor DiamondMax 60 GB @ 7200 rpm

I don't have any benchmarking software installed at this moment but as far as I can tell those games run smoothly. Radeon 9000 Pro is on par with GF3Ti but slower than all other GPU you've listed so I won't expect any speed problems under most situations. There are some particular scenarios with low frame rates though, such as Quake 3 Arena (December 1999) would become sluggish when rockets and their trailing smoke flying all over the battlefield.

This is an interesting video and I think it demonstrates how you need to carefully choose what games you play on your vintage system if you want to have a good time. This is newer hardware than the OP is talking about (especially the CPU) but the principal is the same.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p07Z_dXAv10

ElectroSoldier wrote on 2024-09-09, 04:16:

The dead dot com servers used PC133? […]
Show full quote

rmay635703 wrote on 2024-09-09, 02:17:

I was getting $9.99 256mb pc133cl3 low density early 2k when sdram was getting dumped and overproduced from the .com bubble coll […]
Show full quote

ElectroSoldier wrote on 2024-09-09, 02:06:

Thats when it started to get cheaper, I wouldnt say it became extremely cheap for quite some years after that.

I was getting $9.99 256mb pc133cl3 low density early 2k when sdram was getting dumped and overproduced from the .com bubble collapse , back in the days that shipping was $50 for a stick of ram but it was $52 to ship 10x sticks

64mb EDO simms were like $15 in that period as well and you could occasionally pick up a 512mb stick of high density for $35 on pricewatch (good on newish socket a boards)
I bought a pallet of Ppro workstations in 2000 that made great 2k internet machines when you bumped the ram to 256 or 384 (6x 72 pin simms)

I wish I would have kept screenshots from pricewatch because the fallout from canned “technology “ company pull outs from broken leases kept hitting the market for near nothing almost 3 years. A lot of pallets 2 year old equipment went straight to the dump in that period because so many businesses went under they didn’t even bother marketing it.

Tons of bad 1 year old motherboards and power supplies but the ram always was good.

The dead dot com servers used PC133?

The records from the day doesnt seem to back up what you say.

If you want to talk about RAM prices I can tell you exactly how much they were on exactly what days and who was selling to who.

You do realize that the .com bubble affected tons of rudimentary generic office buildings filled with random crap? About 6 major complexes in this very small area went empty and later leveled in that time, many were “support” functions where each minion had a pc and a phone and maybe a server for the building.

Our area started pushing for ewaste recycling about that time because our waste services couldn’t handle the volume of pc ewaste starting in 2000. This area all combined is about a 100k population and thousands of machines were piling up every month.

I have posted screenshots from pricewatch before albeit from early 2002 that show $9.99 256mb dimms.

If you want to prove anything by me generate a lowest price day to day map of 256mb dimms on pricewatch, when I’ve tried in the past it had very few snapshots on archive making it difficult because each capture of the memory page was months to years apart.

There were a couple years of places about once every month or so dumping pc133cl3 for pennies on the dollar on pricewatch, shipping was egregious but you just had to order 5+ to make it work.

For me starting about 2003-2004 is when the pc market became impossible to find any deals or discounts, stable predictable prices does not make for good home build and resale possibilities and honestly it continued to shrink and get worse from then on

GreenBook wrote on 2024-09-09, 12:51:

@VivienM that is, games released during the era of Pentium 3 dominance did not run very smoothly on these computers.

I didn't think about it that way. It seemed to me that a powerful computer from 1999 could easily handle the games of the time.

What are the 'games of the time'? If you wanted to play CivII, then yes, CivII would absolutely scream on a PIII. Same with Age of Empires and other non-3D-accelerated strategy games.

People had software libraries that evolved at different times. You got a new computer, you dug up your existing games, and by and large, they ran much better. Then over time you start acquiring more and more games that actually need your new hardware, and those perform worse and worse. Repeat with the new computer. No one would only run games released in the last 3-6 months on their brand new computer... which would actually have been an easy way to get depressed.

GreenBook wrote on 2024-09-09, 12:51:

Is that true in 2004, during the premiere of the FarCry game, no computer was able to run FarCry smoothly at maximum details?

That doesn't sound wrong, but again, at what resolution? I had a (very pricy) 1600x1200 LCD at the time, and while the gaming performance was 'good enough' with top end video cards (Ti500 and then ATI 9800 Pro), I was never a serious gamer. I suspect the kind of gamer who was still rocking a CRT and 98SE in 2003 would have been horrified by my FPS.

There were a number of games that pushed GPUs in the early 2000s - Far Cry, Oblivion, Crysis, etc. Ironically perhaps, not the type of games I paid most attention to. I am pretty sure those games all had a detail level or two that was unplayable on the hardware available at their release.

As an aside, I never managed to play Doom 3 (2004's big hyped title) on my Willamette P4 1.9 with a Radeon 9800. That game... did something... to that video card and had mad artifacting. It's funny, I was going to get a legitimate copy on release day for some reason, then the evening before I think, drove across town, got a... less legitimately-sourced copy... from a friend because something suddenly made me anxious about it, it wouldn't display right, and I ended up not buying it.

rmay635703 wrote on 2024-09-09, 22:48:

You do realize that the .com bubble affected tons of rudimentary generic office buildings filled with random crap? About 6 majo […]
Show full quote

ElectroSoldier wrote on 2024-09-09, 04:16:

The dead dot com servers used PC133? […]
Show full quote

rmay635703 wrote on 2024-09-09, 02:17:

I was getting $9.99 256mb pc133cl3 low density early 2k when sdram was getting dumped and overproduced from the .com bubble coll […]
Show full quote

I was getting $9.99 256mb pc133cl3 low density early 2k when sdram was getting dumped and overproduced from the .com bubble collapse , back in the days that shipping was $50 for a stick of ram but it was $52 to ship 10x sticks

64mb EDO simms were like $15 in that period as well and you could occasionally pick up a 512mb stick of high density for $35 on pricewatch (good on newish socket a boards)
I bought a pallet of Ppro workstations in 2000 that made great 2k internet machines when you bumped the ram to 256 or 384 (6x 72 pin simms)

I wish I would have kept screenshots from pricewatch because the fallout from canned “technology “ company pull outs from broken leases kept hitting the market for near nothing almost 3 years. A lot of pallets 2 year old equipment went straight to the dump in that period because so many businesses went under they didn’t even bother marketing it.

Tons of bad 1 year old motherboards and power supplies but the ram always was good.

The dead dot com servers used PC133?

The records from the day doesnt seem to back up what you say.

If you want to talk about RAM prices I can tell you exactly how much they were on exactly what days and who was selling to who.

You do realize that the .com bubble affected tons of rudimentary generic office buildings filled with random crap? About 6 major complexes in this very small area went empty and later leveled in that time, many were “support” functions where each minion had a pc and a phone and maybe a server for the building.

Our area started pushing for ewaste recycling about that time because our waste services couldn’t handle the volume of pc ewaste starting in 2000. This area all combined is about a 100k population and thousands of machines were piling up every month.

I have posted screenshots from pricewatch before albeit from early 2002 that show $9.99 256mb dimms.

If you want to prove anything by me generate a lowest price day to day map of 256mb dimms on pricewatch, when I’ve tried in the past it had very few snapshots on archive making it difficult because each capture of the memory page was months to years apart.

There were a couple years of places about once every month or so dumping pc133cl3 for pennies on the dollar on pricewatch, shipping was egregious but you just had to order 5+ to make it work.

For me starting about 2003-2004 is when the pc market became impossible to find any deals or discounts, stable predictable prices does not make for good home build and resale possibilities and honestly it continued to shrink and get worse from then on

Like I said you can pick up second hand cheaper than you can new.

VivienM wrote on 2024-09-09, 22:50:

What are the 'games of the time'? If you wanted to play CivII, then yes, CivII would absolutely scream on a PIII. Same with Age […]
Show full quote

GreenBook wrote on 2024-09-09, 12:51:

@VivienM that is, games released during the era of Pentium 3 dominance did not run very smoothly on these computers.

I didn't think about it that way. It seemed to me that a powerful computer from 1999 could easily handle the games of the time.

What are the 'games of the time'? If you wanted to play CivII, then yes, CivII would absolutely scream on a PIII. Same with Age of Empires and other non-3D-accelerated strategy games.

People had software libraries that evolved at different times. You got a new computer, you dug up your existing games, and by and large, they ran much better. Then over time you start acquiring more and more games that actually need your new hardware, and those perform worse and worse. Repeat with the new computer. No one would only run games released in the last 3-6 months on their brand new computer... which would actually have been an easy way to get depressed.

GreenBook wrote on 2024-09-09, 12:51:

Is that true in 2004, during the premiere of the FarCry game, no computer was able to run FarCry smoothly at maximum details?

That doesn't sound wrong, but again, at what resolution? I had a (very pricy) 1600x1200 LCD at the time, and while the gaming performance was 'good enough' with top end video cards (Ti500 and then ATI 9800 Pro), I was never a serious gamer. I suspect the kind of gamer who was still rocking a CRT and 98SE in 2003 would have been horrified by my FPS.

There were a number of games that pushed GPUs in the early 2000s - Far Cry, Oblivion, Crysis, etc. Ironically perhaps, not the type of games I paid most attention to. I am pretty sure those games all had a detail level or two that was unplayable on the hardware available at their release.

As an aside, I never managed to play Doom 3 (2004's big hyped title) on my Willamette P4 1.9 with a Radeon 9800. That game... did something... to that video card and had mad artifacting. It's funny, I was going to get a legitimate copy on release day for some reason, then the evening before I think, drove across town, got a... less legitimately-sourced copy... from a friend because something suddenly made me anxious about it, it wouldn't display right, and I ended up not buying it.

What model LCD was that?

GreenBook wrote on 2024-09-09, 12:51:

Is that true in 2004, during the premiere of the FarCry game, no computer was able to run FarCry smoothly at maximum details?

No that wasn't a thing so don't try making it one. Likely some idiots with old hardware at high resolutions complaining. Where before for a period of time you could run at 1600x1200 on older hardware you now had to lower details or resolution.

In 2003/2004 (upgraded to x800 later that year I regularly gamed at 1600x1200 likely at 85hz with this older at the time hardware: Re: DosFreak All System Specs 1-6-2020
Unknown if that is the res I played the game at (likely not) but if not then drop to a lower resolution would have been fine and possible lower some details on this older hardware.
I was purposely skipping generations and waiting for better hardware before upgrading.

ElectroSoldier wrote on 2024-09-09, 23:38:

What model LCD was that?

My super-expensive original 1600x1200 LCD? A ViewSonic, VP201m I think, then they offered a black version which was a VP201...mb maybe? I had the beige one. Had huge bezels, built-in speakers IIRC, etc.

Nice monitor in some way, way ahead of its time, the colour reproduction was... not great (you couldn't see light greys for example), etc.

Ended up replacing it with a dramatically more affordable Dell 2007FP (that I think I still have, it's been in a box for 9 years though) in 2007ish. Probably a mistake in hindsight, not sure why I didn't get a 1920x1200 as those were becoming the new standard.

Do you want to say that in 2004 was possible play in FarCry on maximum setting and details? I heard even P4 3,0 ghz and powerful graphic card release to 2004 can't run on full.

GreenBook wrote on 2024-09-10, 06:04:

Do you want to say that in 2004 was possible play in FarCry on maximum setting and details? I heard even P4 3,0 ghz and powerful graphic card release to 2004 can't run on full.

Check Anandtech's review of the GeForce 6800 Ultra from April of 2004.

Per their benchmarks, it almost hit 80 FPS at 1280x1024 and got close to 60 FPS at 1600x1200, without AA and AF. If you wanted AA and AF at such high resolutions (for the time) the results were of course lower, but they still didn't drop below 30 FPS on that card. The CPU they used for that test was an Athlon 64 3400+ with 1 GB RAM.