ux-3 wrote:

In another forum, the GF3 (in combitation with V2 SLI) was presented as the ideal solution for an all in one retro machine. Before, I was under the impression, that a V5 5500 is probably best for this job.

If you have an informed oppinion on this, I'd like to hear it.

Voodoo2 cannot do FSAA in GLide games, Voodoo5 can.

But of course, if raw speed concerns you more than image quality, then GeForce3/Voodoo2 is a better combination. Just FYI, I was using GeForce2/Voodoo2 combo back then, but those were the days when I'm concerned more about frame rate than image quality.

Either way would certainly be a valid approach, with the caveat that any "all-in-one" system is inevitably going to have some compromises involved. It all comes down to what you want out of the system.

The GF3+V2SLI would offer the greater range of compatibility with games, allowing you to have playable results in pretty much any game from ~1998-2003. Newer games could be handled just fine with a modern system. OTOH, a V5 would give you better quality in Glide games, but wouldn't do as well with DX games... but again, most post-2000 DX games will run just fine on a modern system.

It's really just a matter of preference... though personally I'd go the V5 route.

For a pure retro gaming PC I'm inclined to say the V5. However, as my V5 recently burnt out and died miserably, I am at the moment running a Geforce 3 Ti 200 in my yet-again updated P3 gaming rig...though I haven't hooked up a V2 SLI with it yet.

A setup like this would be more flexible for sure with regards to being able to handle more recent games- in fact the GF3 is pretty powerful and plays everything up to at least 2003 decently- but then again this really is crossing the boundary into "modern" territory.

I find that to make such tough decisions 😉 it's easier on the mind to match the GPUs with the platforms (mobos and CPUs) congruent to the era. So my V2s are always on my P MMX, V3s/ Geforce 256/ V5 etc right up to GF3s are on P3s, GF4 - GF6 on my P4s and my newer Phenom systems use anything newer than that.

There is an urban legend that says GeForce3 can run GLide games. Is that true? I haven't got any chance to prove it. Anyone?

Kreshna Aryaguna Nurzaman wrote:

There is an urban legend that says GeForce3 can run GLide games. Is that true? I haven't got any chance to prove it. Anyone?

Only with a wrapper I suppose

fwiw i recently went from a voodoo5 to a dx8 card plus v2sli. it means i can play more games i want on it. the dx8 card i'm using is a vp870 but i was originally going to use a gf3.only issue i have is some slowdowns in diablo2 on 800x600, altho with the v5 it felt too fast. that game seems a bit of a pain anyway.

ratfink wrote:

it means i can play more games i want on it. only issue i have is some slowdowns in diablo2 on 800x600, altho with the v5 it felt too fast.

Funny. My subjective impression was that "Dominion Wars" runs smoother on V5 2x aa than GF3 2x aa. But that could just be me conjuring it.

Yeah well I got the game working on a Athlon 64 X2 4200+ running XP and with a PCIe X850. That was the smoothest I have ever seen that game run. I believe FSAA worked perfectly and fast.

I also tried it on a GFFX 5900U and it was pretty choppy with 4X AA.

I had a Voodoo Banshee and then a Voodoo 3 2000, and I found that some games failed when using the Voodoo 3 glide files. Also, some games had the glide compatibility embedded into the executable, so I guess that a Voodoo 2 would be a better choice.

I think that a single Voodoo 2 would be enough. The last "better glide" game that I played was Unreal, and the Voodoo Banshee worked well without loss in framerate (I may be wrong). Those games that needed more power were available as DirectX or OpenGL variants, often with better quality.

About the urban legend... I heard that during some time, Creative sold some cards (I think they were TNT2 based) that could execute some glide games... sort of. The truth was that they included a glide wrapper, but it was included in the drivers that were installed with the video card.

Googling creative and glide, one of the results is this article. Maybe that GF3 urban legend is related to this.

swaaye wrote:

Yeah well I got the game working on a Athlon 64 X2 4200+ running XP and with a PCIe X850. That was the smoothest I have ever seen that game run. I believe FSAA worked perfectly and fast.

I also tried it on a GFFX 5900U and it was pretty choppy with 4X AA.

Which of the here mentioned games are you refering to? I never got "Dominion Wars" to run on Geforce6/8/9 and XP. It didn't run on Win98se with GF6 either. Win98se and GF3 is the highest I got so far. Haven't tried GF4 or 5.

Which Patch version of the Game are you running?

Zup wrote:

I had a Voodoo Banshee and then a Voodoo 3 2000, and I found that some games failed when using the Voodoo 3 glide files.

Thats why even the V5 needs a V1/2 as a partner.

Also, some games had the glide compatibility embedded into the executable, so I guess that a Voodoo 2 would be a better choice.

I do have a passthrough Voodoo along with the V5 for those titles. (For games like Archimedian Dynasty)

I think that a single Voodoo 2 would be enough.

The resolution of 1024x768 is missing then.

ux-3 wrote:

Which of the here mentioned games are you refering to? I never got "Dominion Wars" to run on Geforce6/8/9 and XP. It didn't run on Win98se with GF6 either. Win98se and GF3 is the highest I got so far. Haven't tried GF4 or 5.

Which Patch version of the Game are you running?

Sorry, I should've said ST Dominion Wars, but I figured since it was right after your post that it would be clear. 😀

Yeah I've tried DS9 DW on a lot of cards myself. It does work with the Radeon X8x0 cards in XP. It works with GeForce FX too (I just tried it recently) in XP.

Athlon 64 X2 + Radeon X850 PCIe + XP
P4 3.2 + GeForce FX 5900U AGP + XP

Without FSAA, a Voodoo5 can run the game no problem. But if you want to use 4X AA, the X850 was the only card that I've tried that could do it well. I'm not sure why that is, but it's probably related to inefficient rendering. This game isn't exactly at the top of its class in programming quality. 😀

If the X850 can run the game, I am thinking that everything from a Radeon 9500 to the X850 should be able to. That whole range is rather similar overall. But I know that a Radeon 8500 will not work because the game has some problem with its implementation of dual display outputs (strange, I know.) I read that it will work if you hook up dual monitors (the game displays on the secondary!)

I use patch 1.04 because 1.05 changes all of the missions to some new ones, I think.

I am not even sure I can patch it to 1.05 cause of regional difficulty.