VOGONS


First post, by Brawndo

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Hi all, so I currently have 2 Diamond Monster 3D II 12 MB boards and 3 STB Black Magic 12 MB boards, and wondering if there are any major differences between the different brands? I've heard there is slight image quality differences but I can't personally vouch for that. Other than my desire to hoard as much vintage tech as possible, I'm trying to decide if I want to eventually purchase the Creative brand cards and others. Not long ago I passed up a chance to pick up 2 Orchid Righteous 3D II boards, kicking myself for that one.

Reply 1 of 6, by texterted

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Sometimes, differences were just down to the quality of the pass-through cable that they shipped with.

Some of them were rubbish.

Cheers

Ted

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Reply 2 of 6, by mzry

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They pretty much all stuck to the reference design, so I wouldn't be bothered collecting them all. Unless you just love collecting 3dfx stuff. The only two brands that differed from the reference designs were the Miro and Canopus branded cards, these would be the ones to have & use if you wanted the best.

Reply 3 of 6, by The Serpent Rider

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The only two brands that differed from the reference designs were the Miro and Canopus branded cards

Gainward, Quantum 3D. Not to mention that some boards had 110Mhz and 125Mhz rated memory, which is beneficial for overclocking.

I must be some kind of standard: the anonymous gangbanger of the 21st century.

Reply 4 of 6, by RaverX

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The image quality difference is 99% from the passthrough cable. But there's quite a few other differences, most Voodoo2 have only tantalum capacitors, but some have a few classic liquid capacitors. Memory modules is another difference, manufacturer and speed vary a lot. Some V2 have heatsinks (on one, two or even all three chips). Late versions even have different chips, engraved with new 3dfx logo. Some cards have TV Out.

And the biggest difference is the memory size, there's 8 MB and 12 MB versions, but also 10 MB (some Quantum3D cards). X24 and X16 are made from two cards. And there's S12 Obsidian that have AGP interface.

Probably there are other differences...

Reply 5 of 6, by Weebob

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RaverX wrote on 2020-01-28, 20:14:

The image quality difference is 99% from the passthrough cable. But there's quite a few other differences, most Voodoo2 have only tantalum capacitors, but some have a few classic liquid capacitors. Memory modules is another difference, manufacturer and speed vary a lot. Some V2 have heatsinks (on one, two or even all three chips). Late versions even have different chips, engraved with new 3dfx logo. Some cards have TV Out.

And the biggest difference is the memory size, there's 8 MB and 12 MB versions, but also 10 MB (some Quantum3D cards). X24 and X16 are made from two cards. And there's S12 Obsidian that have AGP interface.

Probably there are other differences...

Never heard of a Voodoo 2 with TV out but seems it was thing, kind of, had a vid encoder

http://www.3dfx.cz/collections/no-x/miro_v2.jpg

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