I would say Geforce 4 MX 440 (not MX 440 SE) or MX 460. It supports up to directX 7. Basically a super-powered Geforce 2, but cheap. Can be had for under £20 or so in UK. The 440 does come in 64-bit variants, so be careful. The 460 is harder to find, but is only 128-bit.
Geforce 2MX for Geforce 4 MX440
paradigital wrote on 2026-01-07, 13:47:Be sure to also check for the equivalent Quadro models for any Geforce you are after. I tend to find they are cheaper.
the results of hours of searching were disappointing in price there was a few 32mb ram models available though but the more interesting 64mb models were way over the top in price and matched GeForce prices.
According to spec, my motherboard supports up to 256mb AGP aperture and since its running DDR like many GPU's in the proper generation spec any GPU with DDR RAM will benefit more than what most Pentium 3 boards did in the day (typically most did 32mb, 64mb, or 128mb)
RetroPCCupboard wrote on 2026-01-07, 15:26:I would say Geforce 4 MX 440 (not MX 440 SE) or MX 460. It supports up to directX 7. Basically a super-powered Geforce 2, but cheap. Can be had for under £20 or so in UK. The 440 does come in 64-bit variants, so be careful. The 460 is harder to find, but is only 128-bit.
I found some MX's added to watch list
So there's a lot of favour for NVidia's so far from the Vogons community be interested to hear from any ATI fans as well.
zapbuzz wrote on 2026-01-07, 21:54:So there's a lot of favour for NVidia's so far from the Vogons community be interested to hear from any ATI fans as well.
Couple of reasons:
- DOS VESA support. nVidia had one of the best out there from Riva128-GeForce FX. ATi Rage and Radeon were great in Windows but pretty bad in DOS SVGA.
- ATi Rage series had relatively poor 3D performance and image quality, nVidia TNT drivers & performance were exemplary
- higher-end early Radeon cards (eg 9700, 9800) had an alarming tendency to suddenly die
- more enthousiasts had nVidia cards back in the day than ATi cards so nostalgia
- some fanboyism
You don't mention DOS, so VESA support shouldn't be so relevant. You can get just about any performance point you want with well-chosen cards regardless of brand. You don't need to go for the hothead cards - and you are free to choose whatever is nostalgic for you.
Tbh, I'm more nostalgic for Matrox cards in the Win98 era - I had some very big CRT monitors and quickly discovered that analog signal quality mattered and that a G400 gave much better quality than my old ATi Xpert@Home card let alone my Pine TNT2-M64. It was also faster (the G400Max was the overall fastest card available for a few months when it was released in 1999 - although I didn't get mine until 2001 or so).
looks like I'll be getting a Gigabyte GF 6200 AGP 256MB AGP Card
its not an FX or GT ,nor is it new, but's got no cap bulge, has 9x support (and a unofficial tweaked driver)
price is great just going to need a DVI to VGA and a DVI to HDMI adapter since its a DVI out only model (found gold plated ones)
Considering it's running a updated 1GHZ Pentium 3 on a quite Tualatin wannabe motherboard there's good chance it'll be ok with a whopping 256mb video mem
and the fact I can run 256mb AGP aperture on this system means its got features unlike many before it. (Not many socket 370 motherboards can hold 4gb DDR system RAM too.)
Still 1 day left of online browsing before I snap it up if nothing better shows up and prepare for the showcase of my not quite period correct retro rig.
If it doesn't work out I'll put it aside for my next project: Pentium 4 with DDR3!
dionb wrote on 2026-01-08, 01:10:Couple of reasons: - DOS VESA support. nVidia had one of the best out there from Riva128-GeForce FX. ATi Rage and Radeon were g […]
zapbuzz wrote on 2026-01-07, 21:54:So there's a lot of favour for NVidia's so far from the Vogons community be interested to hear from any ATI fans as well.
Couple of reasons:
- DOS VESA support. nVidia had one of the best out there from Riva128-GeForce FX. ATi Rage and Radeon were great in Windows but pretty bad in DOS SVGA.
- ATi Rage series had relatively poor 3D performance and image quality, nVidia TNT drivers & performance were exemplary
- higher-end early Radeon cards (eg 9700, 9800) had an alarming tendency to suddenly die
- more enthousiasts had nVidia cards back in the day than ATi cards so nostalgia
- some fanboyismYou don't mention DOS, so VESA support shouldn't be so relevant. You can get just about any performance point you want with well-chosen cards regardless of brand. You don't need to go for the hothead cards - and you are free to choose whatever is nostalgic for you.
Tbh, I'm more nostalgic for Matrox cards in the Win98 era - I had some very big CRT monitors and quickly discovered that analog signal quality mattered and that a G400 gave much better quality than my old ATi Xpert@Home card let alone my Pine TNT2-M64. It was also faster (the G400Max was the overall fastest card available for a few months when it was released in 1999 - although I didn't get mine until 2001 or so).
I appreciate the info it's probably best to flip the birdy to ATI on retro!
I'll show off the front of the pc tower as i got it (will be a showcase thread for the finish) and a picture of a 1996 NOS multimedia keyboard.
The motherboard that came with the Tower has bulgy capacitors its a Gigabyte same brand as the Pentium 3 replacement so no need to remove stickers except AMD.
I have the choice of 2 17" CRT's an old IBM and a Dell touch panel thingy type both VGA of course.
Would be happy with 1024x768 @ 85 I can't stand CRT @ 60 even at 640X480 (except DOS)
zapbuzz wrote on 2026-01-08, 05:07:looks like I'll be getting a Gigabyte GF 6200 AGP 256MB AGP Card
By all means try it, if the price is good. But I found the 6200 (admittedly the PCI version) to have poor game compatibility (it worked in benchmarks though, and I think common games like Unreal and Quake worked).
To me, this is more of an XP era card, and your PIII isn't really powerful enough for it. Anyhow, you might want to watch this Pixel Pipes video on this card, as there are a lot of variants and the performance varies wildly:
Jasin Natael wrote on 2026-01-07, 20:50:Geforce 2MX for Geforce 4 MX440
GF4 MX440 and 460 (except MX440 SE which I believe is more like MX420) are indeed terrific cards and are a very good replacement for GF2 cards unless you aim for a period correct build. As the cards use NV17 chip which is a tweaked NV15 found on GF2 GTS/Ti/Ultra cards, you only don’t get a top end GF2 performance, but image quality with these MX cards is miles better than those of GF2, which were generally considered bad even back in the day. And nowadays you can still get these cards for a fraction of the price of high end GF2.
RetroPCCupboard wrote on 2026-01-08, 06:04:By all means try it, if the price is good. But I found the 6200 (admittedly the PCI version) to have poor game compatibility (i […]
zapbuzz wrote on 2026-01-08, 05:07:looks like I'll be getting a Gigabyte GF 6200 AGP 256MB AGP Card
By all means try it, if the price is good. But I found the 6200 (admittedly the PCI version) to have poor game compatibility (it worked in benchmarks though, and I think common games like Unreal and Quake worked).
To me, this is more of an XP era card, and your PIII isn't really powerful enough for it. Anyhow, you might want to watch this Pixel Pipes video on this card, as there are a lot of variants and the performance varies wildly:
Well, yeah I mean its cheap clean and healthy and if it doesn't work out it'll go on my next Pentium 4 system
I think this Pentium III system will give interesting results with the card.
Being supported on win 9x with official or tweaked drivers who knows if the full 256mb will be utilised at AGP 4X but I'll give it a go
What I need to ask though, what do I use to benchmark it and see if it breaks? on Windows 98SE?
CharlieFoxtrot wrote on 2026-01-08, 06:34:Jasin Natael wrote on 2026-01-07, 20:50:Geforce 2MX for Geforce 4 MX440
GF4 MX440 and 460 (except MX440 SE which I believe is more like MX420) are indeed terrific cards and are a very good replacement for GF2 cards unless you aim for a period correct build. As the cards use NV17 chip which is a tweaked NV15 found on GF2 GTS/Ti/Ultra cards, you only don’t get a top end GF2 performance, but image quality with these MX cards is miles better than those of GF2, which were generally considered bad even back in the day. And nowadays you can still get these cards for a fraction of the price of high end GF2.
Actually found decent prices on them today - thanks for the info.
zapbuzz wrote on 2026-01-08, 06:46:What I need to ask though, what do I use to benchmark it and see if it breaks? on Windows 98SE?
I use the futuremark tools. You can download from philscomputerlab:
RetroPCCupboard wrote on 2026-01-08, 09:38:zapbuzz wrote on 2026-01-08, 06:46:What I need to ask though, what do I use to benchmark it and see if it breaks? on Windows 98SE?
I use the futuremark tools. You can download from philscomputerlab:
that's cool thanks
CharlieFoxtrot wrote on 2026-01-08, 06:34:Jasin Natael wrote on 2026-01-07, 20:50:Geforce 2MX for Geforce 4 MX440
GF4 MX440 and 460 (except MX440 SE which I believe is more like MX420) are indeed terrific cards and are a very good replacement for GF2 cards unless you aim for a period correct build. As the cards use NV17 chip which is a tweaked NV15 found on GF2 GTS/Ti/Ultra cards, you only don’t get a top end GF2 performance, but image quality with these MX cards is miles better than those of GF2, which were generally considered bad even back in the day. And nowadays you can still get these cards for a fraction of the price of high end GF2.
Yes very true, however the GF2 cards can use earlier drivers which can help with performance on some more meager CPUs.
It's all relative though and with a PIII 1GHz it's not really a concern.
I am committing to buy a PIXELVIEW NVIDIA GEFORCE4 MX440 MVGA-NVG18A 128MB spec will be good for the motherboard with Direct x 8.1 support that suits the Pentium 3.
It will play some DOS games as well as many Windows games. It doesn't have DVI out but it does have solid caps and a powered cooler.
It was a bit expensive but I'll forgive myself
Coming from Poland
I appreciate the advice Vogons users contributed this will be special to me.
When its all here I'll showcase this machine.
zapbuzz wrote on 2026-01-08, 16:11:I am committing to buy a PIXELVIEW NVIDIA GEFORCE4 MX440 MVGA-NVG18A 128MB spec will be good for the motherboard with Direct x 8.1 support that suits the Pentium 3.
In case you missed it, this is a directx 7 GPU. Not 8.1.... it's basically an enhanced geforce 2
