rec.autos.simulators

I have an opportunity to buy a used 16mb CL Banshee for a decent price and I
want to know if anyone has any experience using this card with GPL, NASCAR
3, or NFS High Stakes. I would like to know about any compatibility issues
as far as a SS7 mobo with VIA MVP3 chipset and K6-2 400 cpu with 64 mb of
PC100 sdram. Any help would be appreciated.
TIA,
Robin MacMahon

I have a Guillemot 16MB Banshee card.  Until recently, it has done just
fine.  But, probably since "upgrading" to DirectX7, I have trouble
running most directX titles.  Still, it works fine with Glide titles
such as GPL and Nascar3.  So, if you get it, I strongly recommend not
going past DX6.1, at least for now.  Yes, I've tried the latest 3dfx and
Guillemot (apparently identical) drivers.  Can't say anything about your
mobo/CPU combo as I have a c300a/450 and Abit BH6.

The Banshee is typically a little faster than a single old V2 due to it
being clocked higher.  But having only a single texel chip, the old V2
would be faster on multi-texture games (none of your listed titles
qualifies).  And two V2's SLI'd together would be faster.  The benefit
of the Banshee over a V2 is that it goes to higher resolution, has more
memory, and takes but a single space.

Having said all that, the Banshee is pretty much old hat.  A Voodoo3
would be significantly faster and can be had in V3 2000 form for under
$100.  So don't pay much for a used Banshee!  Also, if it wasn't for the
Glide support of the titles I like, including N3 and GPL, I'd consider
switching to a TNT2 or GeForce.  But for now, I'm pretty much locked
into Glide-supporting Voodoos.

I'm using a 16 MB Creative Labs Voodoo Banshee (PCI version, not AGP)
in my AMD K6-2 350 machine, and it runs GPL, Viper Racing, SCGT, NFS3,
NFS/HS, and DTR very nicely (plus Quake 2 and Half-Life, FWIW).  It
should work fine in your system, I would imagine.

Make sure to visit the Creative Labs Website to download their latest
drivers -- this will be important if/when you upgrade to DX7.

-- JB

Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
Before you buy.

Odd that you're having DX7 problems -- my Creative Labs card is working
great with DX7 installed (upgraded to latest drivers, of course).

-- JB

Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
Before you buy.

Not that odd, I've seen a lot of reports on it as I've been looking for
answers.  It appears to be rather hit and miss.  Some have huge probs,
some none.  What I don't see is a solution.  To be fair, I can't
absolutely say it is due to DX7.  I've since used directX uninstaller
(www.ebrink.com/dxun/direct.htm).  And it *appears* to have completely
removed dx7a and allowed me to install 6.1.  But I still get the
failures.  This is on games that ran fine previously.  Same system, no
new hardware, no new drivers (other than trying the newest Banshee
drivers and I've since tried the older ones).