rec.autos.simulators

........
I've got a V4 4500 and tried a GeForce2 MX (Hercules Prophet), the V4 was
considerably faster in all my games except N4 where it was pretty close.
A friend has a V5 and that is considerably faster than my V4. (he previously
had a V4 and the performance on his PC was comparable to mine.)
---------------

Tell me more about YOUR system and or your FRIENDS system.  I hate the
GeForce, and the way non glide works with my older games (GPL, VIPER,
MTM1&2, MCM, Nascar 3 99 many more)  so I too would like to know what kind
of computer compared to mine you are comparing from.

:P
(j/k)

I posted this a few weeks back, maybe it'll be of some help.

I bought a GE Force MX 32MB (hercules prophet) on Friday to replace a Voodoo
4 4500 .
Here are my results on an Athlon 750 with 256MB RAM.
I used the Hercules version 6-35 drivers for the GeForce, the refernce
drivers wouldn't install correctly and gave me an error message when trying
to access the advanced properties page, and version 1.04 drivers for the V4.
I found the results rather shocking !! ;)

First N4, 1024 x 768 with shadows and reflections etc. off, medium car
detail and half way on the sliders for draw distance and world detail.
V4 D3D: 40 to 60 fps, with a drop to about 35 in a pretty big accident. Open
GL is pretty much unusable on a Voodoo card in N4, with framerates between
18 and 25 fps.
GE Force MX Open GL: 40 to 70fps but in an accident the drop was to about 25
fps. The performance was slightly less in D3D, but not by much.

Next GPL, 1024 X 768, rear of the grid at Monaco, full detail slider all
graphics maxed out.
V4 Glide: When entering track 30fps, dipping to the high 20's at the start
but maxing at 36 by the end of T1 and staying there unless a big accident
happens.
V4 D3D: 25 fps when entering the track, dipping just below 20 but  maxing at
36 by the time the field has spread except for the odd dip to 34 or 35.
GE Force MX D3D: 20fps on entering track, dipping slightly on the start, but
again maxing out after the field spreads, except in accidents or when the
field bunches etc.

Finally for race sims MBTR which has it's own benchmarking utility. I tested
both cards at 800 x 600 using the recommended settings in the config
utility.

V4 4500: gave a benchmark of 70fps.
GE Force MX: gave a benchmark of 35fps.

I then tried them both in Unreal tournament, the V4 running in glide and D3D
gave me an average framerate of about 60 fps. The Geforce running in D3D
gave an average of just under 40fps. The slowdown in UT was unbearable at
1024 on the GeForce card, but was quite stable on the V4. Thinking about it,
I should have given the GeForce a try in Open GL , but it was getting late,
and I'd pretty much decided that it wasn't the card that I had hoped for.

In conclusion, I had hoped for a good showing from the GeForce card, but
felt very let down after hearing all the good reports about them in this and
other newsgroups. The only sim it out performed my V4 was NASCAR 4, with
other sims being slightly better on the V4 and MBTR and UT seriously
knocking the performance of it. So i'll stick with my V4 for now (the
GeForce has been returned from whence it came), and hopefully there will be
a good video card manufacturer to take the fight to NVidia, possibly ATI
with the Radeon, but at the moment they are rather expensive here in UK.
<<

--
Ian P
<email invalid due to spam>

More info here too:  http://www.slottweak.com/v5500%20-%20gf2mx.htm
Saw the V 5500 for $113 on pricewatch.

--
Slot

Tweaks & Reviews
www.slottweak.com

SLOT,
    Do me (and my 5 friends) a favor, do a comparison of the 2 VIDEO boards,
with the cpu clocked down around most of rest of us have, (lots of us have
300 to 550 cpu's) and They aren't going to buy new machines yet...

      I'm struggling with what to do next, I have 2 machines I need to
upgrade, so I got to be careful with my money
I want to try and ascertain what would benefit the masses, the VOODOO5 or a
GEforce MX...  you know less than 150 dollar upgrade to make US more likely
to Enjoy N4.

   If you've got under 550MHz, I'd say you'd want *both* CPU and video
improvements (I know, you didn't want to hear that :).  I've got a

rates as high as 40 in some places, as low as 10 in some others.
(That's at 800x600x2xFSAA.)  Turning down res doesn't help much, you
need more CPU (OK, at least I do).  Others have reported that, in
general, faster cards like the V5 and GeForce2's really want a faster
CPU (500MHz+) to begin to show their stuff.

   For N4, the GeForce2MX is probably the best for frame rate (since
they both use T&L) and bang for the buck.  The 2MX's performance
starts to fall off at higher res, but that probably won't be a problem
for you.  OTOH, the V5 gives you superb FSAA (and is great with GPL).

"But in a way, fear is a big part of racing, because if there was
nothing to be frightened of, and no limit, any fool could get into
a motor car and racing would not exist as a sport." -- Jim Clark

A good point, Stingre. I knew this would come back and bite me, but I
actually did test both cards at 566 Mhz.. I was just too lazy to write down
the numbers. I don't have an MX card to test with right now, so that doesn't
help... but this might - both cards' performance dropped proportionately to
the cpu speed, and both by approximately the same percent. I don't recall
the exact frame rates, but somewhere around 30 for the 5500 and 19 for the
MX. Also remember, I saw no difference when I turned on T&L with the MX.
From those tests, and testing the 5500 now at 1.1Ghz, I'd say that the
5500's speed increase is just starting to slack off. In other words, if I
was to go to a 1.4Ghz cpu, I don't think frame rates would improve much with
the 5500. I'd see better results with a faster video card like the GeForce2
Ultra or GeForce 3. I'd say the MX starts slacking at around the 850 to
900Mhz range, depending on the game.
I don't know what you have for a video card now. If it's a TNT, TNT2 Ultra
or Voodoo3 3000, you might be better off upgrading to an overclockable
celeron 533 or 566 and an Abit BE6 II motherboard -  a bit over $200
altogether for a guaranteed overclocker. As far as the cards go, the 5500 is
about $113 now. I think I'll go out on a limb and say you can't get a faster
video card for that kind of money :)   If you're on a budget and want to
play N4, I'd say the oc'd celeron and 5500 are the way to go.  If you want
to go all out on N4, a 1.2Ghz Athlon and GeForce2 Ultra  would be nice.

--
Slot

Tweaks & Reviews
www.slottweak.com