486/120 vs P5/75 or 100 -- Which to get??

I'm going to be upgrading my system from the current 486/66 and was planning to get the p5/75 or 100, but the man at the computer store told me that for graphics applications, such at ICR2 and NASCAR racing, I'd be better off with the 486/120 instead. Certainly the 120 would be cheaper even though I'll have to buy a new m/b to have a BIOS that will work with the chip. But does anyone on here have any experience or facts that can help me choose. I've been to the Intel website, but they have no information on the 120 at all. Someone told me that was because the 120 was so good it made their Pentiums look bad. Any advice would be greatly appreciated... =p=

Quoted text (13 lines)

> I'm going to be upgrading my system from the current 486/66 and was > planning to get the p5/75 or 100, but the man at the computer store told > me that for graphics applications, such at ICR2 and NASCAR racing, I'd be > better off with the 486/120 instead. > Certainly the 120 would be cheaper even though I'll have to buy a new m/b > to have a BIOS that will work with the chip. > But does anyone on here have any experience or facts that can help me > choose. I've been to the Intel website, but they have no information on > the 120 at all. Someone told me that was because the 120 was so good it > made their Pentiums look bad. > Any advice would be greatly appreciated... > =p=I got an AMD 486DX4/120 and it is about 10% faster than a Pentium 75.

Need for Speed,Nascar Racing and Indycar Racing are great with it !

I have the Intel DX4-100 overdrive chip and it actually outperforms P-75's I've seen for Papyrus games. If you do a Pentium, don't settle for less than 120mhz. The 486-120 is not Intel, but probably AMD or Cyrix. You'll also need a voltage regulator or a mb that supports 3.5 volt power. Be careful and ask A LOT of questions.

Quoted text (11 lines)

>I'm going to be upgrading my system from the current 486/66 and was >planning to get the p5/75 or 100, but the man at the computer store told >me that for graphics applications, such at ICR2 and NASCAR racing, I'd be >better off with the 486/120 instead. >Certainly the 120 would be cheaper even though I'll have to buy a new m/b >to have a BIOS that will work with the chip. >But does anyone on here have any experience or facts that can help me >choose. I've been to the Intel website, but they have no information on >the 120 at all. Someone told me that was because the 120 was so good it >made their Pentiums look bad. >Any advice would be greatly appreciated...

You won't find any info on the 486-120 on Intel's WWW site, because as far as I know, AMD are the only people manufacturing this chip. I'd say the performance was somewhere between that of a Pentium 60 and Pentium 75. Personally, I'd go for a Pentium, even if only a 75Mhz. Simply because you'll then get PCI bus (useful for connecting fast graphics cards) and have the choice of swapping the processor for a faster Pentium at a later date without having to trash the whole motherboard (plus any VLB cards you get with the 486 board). As a guide, my brother has a AMD 486-120 machine with a fairly high spec. Diamond Stealth graphics card. His friend has a Pentium 75 system. On the Pentium system, Virtual Karts ran fairly smoothly in SVGA, on the 486 we had to go down to VGA graphics to get an acceptable framerate. Someone will correct me on this one I'm sure, but I do seem to remember reading somewhere (in this group) that ICR 2 takes advantage of the Pentium processor for SVGA mode. Could be wrong though. Steve.

: I'm going to be upgrading my system from the current 486/66 and was : planning to get the p5/75 or 100, but the man at the computer store told : me that for graphics applications, such at ICR2 and NASCAR racing, I'd be : better off with the 486/120 instead. I don't have any experience with racing sims on Pentiums, but I did once play Doom on a P75 (I have a 486dx2/66.) The graphics on the Pentium were MUCH smoother, it was extremely playable. A 486/120 would certainly be faster than your 66mhz model, but why not buy the best? The Pentium is the best available right now, if you buy the faster 486 you'll just end up wanting something better in 6 months. Do yourself a favor and get a P100 or P133. BTW: The 468/120 is not an Intel chip, it's made by Cyrix I believe. I remember reading about it in Computer Shopper's tech section.

I don't think you'll find that information is correct. Who told you, and on what basis was the testing carried out? My brother has a PC with a high spec motherboard, DX4-120 processor, top-range Diamond Stealth GFX card and 16Mb of RAM. His friend has a low end Olivetti P75, with a basic PCI graphic card (entry level), with 8Mb RAM. Both machines run Windows '95. They tried out Virtual Karts. On the 486 machine, it was unplayably slow in SVGA mode (well, some people would call it playable, but it wasn't up to the speed I would call comfortable). However, on the Pentium system it ran very smoothly. I wonder if this is because games produced these days are optimised in some way for the Pentium processor? I certainly seem to remember a thread from this newsgroup a few months ago discussing Indy Car Racing 2. Unless I'm very much mistaken, the extra performance in SVGA mode over that of NASCAR racing was down to optimised code for the Pentium processor. Maybe Rick Genter could confirm this? Personally, I have a Pentium 120, and even with that machine, I wonder whether it's going to be up to running those simulations that are just around the corner (I'm specifically thinking of Grand Prix II). In short, don't consider anything less than a Pentium 75. You may want to wait a few weeks, as Intel are just releasing two new Pentium models (150 and 166Mhz I believe). I'm not suggesting that you should get these processors, but they may force down the price of the processors lower in the range. Steve.

The main thing to bear in mind with the higher end pentiums (and indeed all powerful PCs) is the concept of balance. To give an example, I originally purchased a P100 system with 16Mb RAM and a Tseng ET4000/w32p PCI video card. A few weeks later, I was offered a P133 chip, which I duly bought. However, I have observed NO speed increase in games between the P100 and P133. I investigated further, using a variety of benchmarking and speedtesting software, and found that the original P100 system was speed limited by the video throughput. Putting a quicker CPU in did not speed up the system because the P100 was already idle some of the time waiting for the video to catch up. All I have achieved is increasing my CPU slack time. So, one of the main things to consider when buying a pentium is the bus speed. The P100 and P133 both have bus speed of 66MHz, and these are preferable to the P75 and P120, which have bus speeds of 50MHz and 60MHz respectively. Although a faster CPU will be able to carry out many functions quicker than a slow one, in terms of games playing you want the fastest video throughput you can get, in which case pick a pentium with a 66MHz bus speed. Ideally, a more powerful video card based on VRAM or WRAM would help reduce the video bottleneck. Bottom line - don't buy a ninja processor if you haven't got the video sub-system to back it up. -- *************************************************************************** * Paul L. Finnemore, Apprentice Veterinarian * * "Five tablets and a ten minute consultation. That's 50 please." * ***************************************************************************

Quoting myself in a previous note: I've been to the Intel website, but they have no information on I've been informed that the reason the Intel site didn't mention the 120 is because it's not an Intel chip... Sounds like a good reason to me. :) Shows what happens when you assume, huh? =p=

Thanks Gord and/or Jane: What detail do you run? Generally I'll use car detail, off track objects without detail, skid marks and smoke/dust, but leave everything else off. And thanks for pointing out that it's not an Intel-produced chip. I _hate_ it when I jump to conclusions like that... :) =p=

Quoted text (11 lines)

> >I got an AMD 486DX4/120 and it is about 10% faster than a Pentium 75. > >Need for Speed,Nascar Racing and Indycar Racing are great with it ! > Thanks Gord and/or Jane: > What detail do you run? Generally I'll use car detail, off track objects > without detail, skid marks and smoke/dust, but leave everything else off. > And thanks for pointing out that it's not an Intel-produced chip. I > _hate_ it when I jump to conclusions like that... :) > =p=I run Need for Speed in 640X480 with just the horizon turned off and

everthing else on high. Nascar and Indycar with all graphics on but not in 640X480 I think you need a Pentium 133 to run those in hi-res mode. Gord Hunt

Unless I'm very much mistaken, the extra performance in SVGA mode over that of NASCAR racing was down to optimised code for the Pentium processor. Maybe Rick Genter could confirm this? <<< That is correct. The graphics engine in IndyCar Racing II was optimized for the Pentium. This deoptimized it for the 486, so we actually detect at runtime whether you are running on a Pentium or not and use the old scheme if you are not. Rick Genter Technical Lead, IndyCar Racing II Papyrus Design Group, Inc.

Personally, I have a Pentium 120, and even with that machine, I wonder whether it's going to be up to running those simulations that are just around the corner (I'm specifically thinking of Grand Prix II). <<< I have seen a demo of GP2. On a Pentium-90 in VGA (*not* SVGA), setting the frame rate to 18.2 (the highest the demo allowed) resulted in a processor occupancy of 140%-150%. I'll bet it looks gorgeous on a Pentium Pro-200. (The above is my personal observation and has nothing to do with my position at Papyrus.) Rick Genter Technical Lead, IndyCar Racing II Papyrus Design Group, Inc.

>I'm going to be upgrading my system from the current 486/66 and was >planning to get the p5/75 or 100, but the man at the computer store told >me that for graphics applications, such at ICR2 and NASCAR racing, I'd be >better off with the 486/120 instead. >Certainly the 120 would be cheaper even though I'll have to buy a new m/b >to have a BIOS that will work with the chip. >But does anyone on here have any experience or facts that can help me >choose. I've been to the Intel website, but they have no information on >the 120 at all. Someone told me that was because the 120 was so good it >made their Pentiums look bad. >Any advice would be greatly appreciated... >=p= My advice is this, stay far away from this computer store. Mike

>That is correct. The graphics engine in IndyCar Racing II was optimized >for the Pentium. This deoptimized it for the 486, so we actually detect >at runtime whether you are running on a Pentium or not and= use the old >scheme if you are not. Rick: So what does that mean in real world terms? I can run NASCAR with the UNIVBE at a reasonable frame rate, but ICR is much worse. Is this the result of the P5 optimization? I'm close to being acceptable in ICR as long as I'm alone on the track. I would say that my ICR frame rate alone is about the same as my frame rate in a crowd in NASCAR. I'll still be using my same video card -- Stealth 64 w. 2megs of VRAM and will be using a PCI motherboard with the UNIVBE. If I have that setup with the 120 chip, approximately what frame rate could I expect with car detail on, outside objects on, but no detail and with skids and dust on. Any more detail than that is just distracting to me. Thanks for your help. =p=

-> Personally, I have a Pentium 120, and even with that machine, I wonder -> whether it's going to be up to running those simulations that are just -> around the corner (I'm specifically thinking of Grand Prix II). <<< -> -> I have seen a demo of GP2. On a Pentium-90 in VGA (*not* SVGA), setting the -> frame rate to 18.2 (the highest the demo allowed) resulted in a processor -> occupancy of 140%-150%. -> -> I'll bet it looks gorgeous on a Pentium Pro-200. -> -> (The above is my personal observation and has nothing to do with my position -> at Papyrus.) -> -> Rick Genter -> Technical Lead, IndyCar Racing II -> Papyrus Design Group, Inc. I did some extrapolating with the numbers provided by Rick Genter to come up with some very scary, and very inaccurate, ballpark numbers for WC2. Taking Rick's numbers of 18.2 FPS at 150% processor occupancy in VGA ONLY on a P90, I come up with the following wild numbers FPS Occupancy Video Pentim MHZ 18.2 140-150 VGA(320*240) 90 12 100 VGA 90 3 100 SVGA(640*480) 90 6 100 SVGA 166 30 100 SVGA 830 60 100 xVGA(1280*1024) 6,640 While the above is just some dumb arithmatic, it does show the amount of game tuning, or processor speed, or graphic accelleration required, before the "ideal" game graphic is obtain. Roman Tschoban

-> I did some extrapolating with the numbers provided by Rick Genter to come up -> with some very scary, and very inaccurate, ballpark numbers for WC2. Taking -> Rick's numbers of 18.2 FPS at 150% processor occupancy in VGA ONLY on a P90, -> I come up with the following wild numbers -> -> FPS Occupancy Video Pentim MHZ -> -> 18.2 140-150 VGA(320*240) 90 -> 12 100 VGA 90 -> 3 100 SVGA(640*480) 90 -> 6 100 SVGA 166 -> 30 100 SVGA 830 -> 60 100 xVGA(1280*1024) 6,640 -> -> While the above is just some dumb arithmatic, it does show the amount of -> game tuning, or processor speed, or graphic accelleration required, before -> the "ideal" game graphic is obtained. So, what do you think? Will Geoff ever be able to give us what we so desperately need and want? Bye for now, Rainer

Quoted text (19 lines)

>>I'm going to be upgrading my system from the current 486/66 and was >>planning to get the p5/75 or 100, but the man at the computer store told >>me that for graphics applications, such at ICR2 and NASCAR racing, I'd be >>better off with the 486/120 instead. >>Certainly the 120 would be cheaper even though I'll have to buy a new m/b >>to have a BIOS that will work with the chip. >>But does anyone on here have any experience or facts that can help me >>choose. I've been to the Intel website, but they have no information on >>the 120 at all. Someone told me that was because the 120 was so good it >>made their Pentiums look bad. >>Any advice would be greatly appreciated... >>=p= >I have the Intel DX4-100 overdrive chip and it actually outperforms P-75's >I've seen for Papyrus games. If you do a Pentium, don't settle for less than >120mhz. The 486-120 is not Intel, but probably AMD or Cyrix. You'll also need >a voltage regulator or a mb that supports 3.5 volt power. Be careful and ask A >LOT of questions.

Well... I have both a DX4-100 (AMD) and a Pentium 120 system. My friend has a Pentium 60 system. The P60 will outrun the DX4-100 system. I wouldn't run the DX4-100 in SVGA, while on the other hand, the P60 is playable in SVGA, but more suited for VGA, IMHO.... The P120 system runs great in SVGA, however, on the short tracks, running a full field, I have to turn off the object textures... There are alot of factors to consider, not just processor speed or chip. The pentium motherboards have a chipset that frees up most of the I/O. Make sure you get one with the Intel Triton chipset. Also, get a GREAT video card or suffer the consequences! Diamond Stealth 64 series with VRAM helps! 16 Megs of Ram is a must (minimum in my opinion!) Also, the settings within the software make a difference as well! adjust the maximum and minimum frame rates (if you're using any AUTO modes), check the number of cars heard, drawn forward and behind. These play a MAJOR part! And of course, the graphics options... again... the DX4-100 is NOT faster than the Pentium 75. Unless you have a really BAD Pentium 75 setup, I can't even see that happening. Go #6 Mark Martin and #16 Ted Musgrave - Jack Roush Racing!! NASCAR Racing!! http://innet.com/~sean/nascar/nascar.html <--NASCAR Racing Sim page

I think that if the game requires a Cray to function, no one will buy it. This has been an ongoing trend that is going to have to end someplace. =p=

-> I have seen a demo of GP2. On a Pentium-90 in VGA (*not* SVGA), setting the -> frame rate to 18.2 (the highest the demo allowed) resulted in a processor -> occupancy of 140%-150%. -> -> I'll bet it looks gorgeous on a Pentium Pro-200. -> -> (The above is my personal observation and has nothing to do with my position -> at Papyrus.) -> -> Rick Genter -> Technical Lead, IndyCar Racing II -> Papyrus Design Group, Inc. Taras, Rick Genter is a very well respected guy at Papyrus that developed IndyCar I and II and Nascar. Even though you may not like the games, this guy is level headed, knows what he is talking about and is well respected in the computer auto racing simulators newsgroups. I have extracted part of his response from a message dealing with Pentium upgrades and include it in this message to you, as it is the first occurance of someone outside of microprose quoting on frame rates. It is is true, that in is current form, WC2 needs a P90 to run 18.2 FPS, with 140-150% for VGA ONLY, I have extrapolated that with a P166 I will get 21 FPS with 100% processor occupancy, and that I need six (6) P166's to get 30 FPS in SVGA (640*480), if technicaly possible (which it is not). My point is that to get good frame rate (30 FPS) in SVGA (640*480) currently requires more hardware than is available next week. If we want to run at 60 FPS in 1024 * 768 we still need crays. I guess my real point is that Geoff Crammond still has a LOT of tuning to due before even really fast, never mind slow machines (the sidewinder and the Philly Flyer) will ever be able to run it at all. I thought Geoff was just tuning it for slow machines, but apparently he needs to tune it for ANY machine. Lets just wait and wait. On another note, someone is Lisbon, Spain says Microprose told a distributor to tell a dealer to tell its customers that WC2 is to be available Feb 24. 1996. Less than two months from now. Now you know how rumors get started. All for now, Rainer

What's all the fuss? My Gateway 486dx2/66 runs NASCAR just fine with everything on! How much RAM are you running? (I have 16MB)

: I think that if the game requires a Cray to function, no one will buy it. : This has been an ongoing trend that is going to have to end someplace. Especially since Cray is no longer! -- **************************** Michael E. Carver ************************* Upside out, or inside down...False alarm the only game in town. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=<[ /./. [- < ]>=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

>> So, what do you think? Will Geoff ever be able to give us what we so >> desperately need and want? >I think that if the game requires a Cray to function, no one will buy it. >This has been an ongoing trend that is going to have to end someplace. It's called progress I'm afraid. When the original game was released on the Amiga, the machine really struggled to shift it along at what turned out to be about 7 FPS. When the PC version was released, everyone had 286/slow 386 machines, suffering similar problems (with the track texture mapping switched on). So, although GP II may need some beefy processing power to run today, in a few years time, we'll all look back unable to believe how fast computer hardware developments have moved forward. The same used to be true of Microsoft Flight Sim 5. No-one had a machine that could run it properly, but today it runs quite happily on a 486DX2. Steve.

>On another note, someone is Lisbon, Spain says Microprose told a distributor to >tell a dealer to tell its customers that WC2 is to be available Feb 24. 1996. >Less than two months from now. Now you know how rumors get started. Let me just remind you that Lisbon is the capital of Portugal. If your knowledge of geography is so accuratte, how can we be sure of your extrapolations ? Jorge Loureiro

Quoted text (19 lines)

> >I'm going to be upgrading my system from the current 486/66 and was > >planning to get the p5/75 or 100, but the man at the computer store told > >me that for graphics applications, such at ICR2 and NASCAR racing, I'd be > >better off with the 486/120 instead. > >Certainly the 120 would be cheaper even though I'll have to buy a new m/b > >to have a BIOS that will work with the chip. > >But does anyone on here have any experience or facts that can help me > >choose. I've been to the Intel website, but they have no information on > >the 120 at all. Someone told me that was because the 120 was so good it > >made their Pentiums look bad. > >Any advice would be greatly appreciated... > >=p= > I have the Intel DX4-100 overdrive chip and it actually outperforms P-75's > I've seen for Papyrus games. If you do a Pentium, don't settle for less than > 120mhz. The 486-120 is not Intel, but probably AMD or Cyrix. You'll also need > a voltage regulator or a mb that supports 3.5 volt power. Be careful and ask A > LOT of questions.

Well, I have a AMD DX4-120, it runs Indycar 2 in SVGA mode just great! AMD claims it is supposed to be about equal to a P-83 if they made one, it benchmarks out at 13% faster than a P75, so, if that's all you were going to get, I would say the DX4-120 is faster, but if I had it to do all over agian I wouldn't buy anything less than a P-120, they just get faster and faster, and cheaper, so don't try to save a buck now and then wish you had a faster system later! Tom

Quoted text (35 lines)

>-> I have seen a demo of GP2. On a Pentium-90 in VGA (*not* SVGA), setting the >-> frame rate to 18.2 (the highest the demo allowed) resulted in a processor >-> occupancy of 140%-150%. >-> >-> I'll bet it looks gorgeous on a Pentium Pro-200. >-> >-> (The above is my personal observation and has nothing to do with my position >-> at Papyrus.) >-> >-> Rick Genter >-> Technical Lead, IndyCar Racing II >-> Papyrus Design Group, Inc. >Taras, Rick Genter is a very well respected guy at Papyrus that developed >IndyCar I and II and Nascar. Even though you may not like the games, this guy >is level headed, knows what he is talking about and is well respected in the >computer auto racing simulators newsgroups. >I have extracted part of his response from a message dealing with Pentium >upgrades and include it in this message to you, as it is the first occurance of >someone outside of microprose quoting on frame rates. >It is is true, that in is current form, WC2 needs a P90 to run 18.2 FPS, with >140-150% for VGA ONLY, I have extrapolated that with a P166 I will get 21 FPS >with 100% processor occupancy, and that I need six (6) P166's to get 30 FPS in >SVGA (640*480), if technicaly possible (which it is not). >My point is that to get good frame rate (30 FPS) in SVGA (640*480) currently >requires more hardware than is available next week. If we want to run at 60 >FPS in 1024 * 768 we still need crays. >I guess my real point is that Geoff Crammond still has a LOT of tuning to due >before even really fast, never mind slow machines (the sidewinder and the >Philly Flyer) will ever be able to run it at all. I thought Geoff was just >tuning it for slow machines, but apparently he needs to tune it for ANY >machine. Lets just wait and wait. >On another note, someone is Lisbon, Spain says Microprose told a distributor to >tell a dealer to tell its customers that WC2 is to be available Feb 24. 1996. >Less than two months from now. >Now you know how rumors get started.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Sorry Rainer but your statement is a bit shorted-minded. I have been following the discussion on GP2 for some time now and I resent your last paragraf. The nature of my post (which was titled : "GP2 Release Date: Feb 24 (maybe!!)"), was the telling of a mere fact. As you can see, I even had the care to put a "maybe!!" in the subject line, so that when people pulls the body of the article they would know in advance that the information they are going to read is not any sort of official or confirmed release date of the game. As for the body, which I present it to refresh your memory: ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ (Note: When I said game dealers I meant distributors) As you can see, I am only telling a fact, I also comment that "I dont know nothing about the veracity of that release date". Anyway, I am sorry that you didnt like my post, I dont know why you didnt but I supose it is because you are so F*CK UP with the delay that you cant stand anybody saying more about release dates. Well, maybe if you cant, it is better that you dont pull the articles you see are about it. As for me, I feel free to give my contribute to this newsgroup and I do it always with the care of adding information that I think is reliable and helpful so that people who reads it can respect me for that. And as for the rest of your post, all I can say its that at leats I dont post the sort of information you do: ... ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ at least I dont extrapolate. I only tell a FACT !!!!!!!!!! Heres more ... Gee, I dont know if Rainer is the same person than Roman Tschoban but if they are, You sure know how to multiply! The Pentium-90_in_VGA_18.2_frame_rate demo in that you were basing your EXTRAPOLATIONS was presented in early September (in the time it runned on a P75), which makes it and old one, and by this time the graphics engine should have been improved and have higher frame rates, though leaving your calculations a bit out of the present state of affairs. Here well and for once : GP2 IS NOT OUT YET. DONT SAY IT NEEDS A CRAY OR *** MHZ TO RUN IT, UNTIL YOUVE SEEN IT BTW, Lisbon is the capital of Portugal, it is NOT in Spain. Despite of NOT RESPECTING others people right of contributing to this newsgroup you also are an IGNORANT !!! (Sorry, I normally wouldt say this to anyone but youve asked for it) And finally, if you want some rumors (which I have all the right to post), here they go: <START OF RUMOR> Ive heard there is some RUMORS (see the Zonkers GP page - there is a link to it in the Dave "Gizmo"Gymer page) that Geoff Crammond said that he wanted to release it in January and that there will be the1995 season data disk and 1996s (when available). Also in the Silverstone British Motorracing fair some people said they played a SVGA release of GP2 that looked pretty finished and although "Frame rate was not grease lightening" "it was no slower than ICR2 with reasonably high detail on my machine (P75).", with SVGA, etc (see posts below). <END OF RUMOR> Everything is a rumor, inst it ? And here is an opinion (mine): <START OF OPINION> As far as playing GP2, althoug it is not out, I think we will have to make some trade, I BELIEVE that even with a Pentium 133 we will not be able to play it the way we played F1GP (25fps) with all detail and SVGA. Nevertheless, we can always switch from admiring the graphics with all detail in SVGA (at a lesser FPS) or alternatively, run our races with less detailed graphics but in a smoother way. <END OF OPINION> Bye for now, Miguel P.S. - Sorry about the meanless discussion, but I couldnt leave it unresponded. ********************************************** Carlos Miguel Santos Cordeiro **********************************************

Rick, since the VGA demo of GP2 is a several months old non-public beta quickly cobbled together for the several European shows, I would be very wary about making assumptions based upon it. A much more recent demo was shown recently at the Autosport show in London (SVGA) and all people who saw it _unanimously_ comment that it is (quote) "Miles better" than ICR2. Frame rate looking much better and still a couple of months to improve it. I fear you may be eating those words.... Cheers ;-) John PS - LOVE Indycar 2 by the way!

: > So, what do you think? Will Geoff ever be able to give us what we so : > desperately need and want? : : I think that if the game requires a Cray to function, no one will buy it. : This has been an ongoing trend that is going to have to end someplace. Oh, comeon, those calculations someone has made do not state ANYTHING about performance of GP 2. If someone at Papyrus says something about GP 2, I wouldn't trust him a bit, Microprose/Holobyte and Papyrus are rivals for god's sakes! And even better, if the Papurys guy was one of the developers of ICR/ICR 2, he is definately trying to push GP 2 down, since ICR 2 is something he made! AND, the Papyrus guy had tried out the DEMO version of GP 2, who knows how old version was that (last summer? October?) so the actual game might be different and better. Those guys at Papyrus should be quiet about rival products anyway, since they are just trying to turn people against GP 2. That's what I think. Antti -- -- Antti Rauhala

>I have extracted part of his response from a message dealing with Pentium >upgrades and include it in this message to you, as it is the first occurance of >someone outside of microprose quoting on frame rates. >It is is true, that in is current form, WC2 needs a P90 to run 18.2 FPS, with >140-150% for VGA ONLY, Well, all I can say is that I will NEVER play a racesim in VGA again on my 17 inch monitor. The graphics looks horrible ! The dots ar just to big. If this is all true, no harm done: I still can play the EXCELLENT ICR2 until GP3 will be released in 2005............ Cheers, Harald

: > [snipped..] : > I have the Intel DX4-100 overdrive chip and it actually outperforms P-75's : > I've seen for Papyrus games. If you do a Pentium, don't settle for less than : > 120mhz. The 486-120 is not Intel, but probably AMD or Cyrix. You'll also need : > a voltage regulator or a mb that supports 3.5 volt power. Be careful and ask A : > LOT of questions. : Well, I have a AMD DX4-120, it runs Indycar 2 in SVGA mode just great! : AMD claims it is supposed to be about equal to a P-83 if they made one, : it benchmarks out at 13% faster than a P75, so, if that's all you were : going to get, I would say the DX4-120 is faster, but if I had it to do : all over agian I wouldn't buy anything less than a P-120, they just get : faster and faster, and cheaper, so don't try to save a buck now and : then wish you had a faster system later! : Tom Which brings up something that needs to be brought up when comparing 486 and Pentiums. You need to Specify who made your computer. I don't know much about the video stuff and maybe someone who does could extend this, but I have found that in general, math apps depend heavily on manufacturer. Case in point, I recently went to the nieghborhood comp store and talked the saleguy into letting me try out a program I wrote that checks the time to do various math and read/write tasks. Results were that Compaq (P75) was 35%(!) faster than an 'identicle' Acer(P75) machine in doing just *** integer/floating point math and array read/writes. I'd advise anyone that's shopping to try the same thing, it's really an eye opener. Anyways the video parts I assume are probaly just as different in quality & sys. compatibility. *And* by the way, my 486/33 (by Northgate) was just 5% slower than that Acer P75. Just goes to show ya... Matt

Quoted text (21 lines)

>Subject: Re: 486/120 vs P5/75 or 100 -- Which to get?? >Date: Sun, 07 Jan 1996 11:57:19 -0700 >> >I got an AMD 486DX4/120 and it is about 10% faster than a Pentium 75. >> >Need for Speed,Nascar Racing and Indycar Racing are great with it ! >> Thanks Gord and/or Jane: >> What detail do you run? Generally I'll use car detail, off track objects >> without detail, skid marks and smoke/dust, but leave everything else off. >> And thanks for pointing out that it's not an Intel-produced chip. I >> _hate_ it when I jump to conclusions like that... :) >> =p=I run Need for Speed in 640X480 with just the horizon turned off and >everthing else on high. Nascar and Indycar with all graphics on but not >in 640X480 I think you need a Pentium 133 to run those in hi-res mode. >Gord Hunt

I got a DX4/120 AMD, and it is fast!! I've got 8mb. ram, and a 1 mb. Diamond Stealth vid card. I can run Nascar in 640x480 with everything on but road texture, and it runs fine. I'd get a PCI bus though, mine's VLB. IT scores 260 on Norton's sysinfo, a friends Pentium 60, PCI, scores 190. jive

I find the folks at Papyrus to be as user friendly as you can get. Until Papyrus goes into making a F1 sim, I really don't consider them to have much of a rivalry. Granted you make good points that the age of the demo is unknown as well as it having limited relationship to how it will actually run. Mike

says... Paul, If you are going to make the jump, I would recomend getting a Supermicro P55CMS motherboard with 256k pipeline burst mode cache and 16mb of 60ns EDO ram. TO run it, get the most CPU (pentium ) that you can afford and then overclock it a bit. The beauty of the supermicro board is that it will take ANY pentium chip and is very flexible and fast. It has the Triton chipset on it. I paid $670 for the board (no cpu) and 2 8mb simms. I took my pentium 90 cpu and overclocked it to run at 100mhz. My old Intel Plato MB gave a 3d bench of 83.1 (pci bus Diamond stealth 64 with 2 mb vram). Standard stuff for that configuration. With the new MB, video card and the cpu pushed to 100, my 3d bench is 100. a 25% increase. Nascar is now playable (I mean fast frame rates). Indycar 2 is smooth as glass with everything (except grass ). If you are going to upgrade, I would go for noting less than a pentium and I strongly reccomend the Supermicro, american made. Many of the flight sim guys swear by it, and now so do I. Let me know and I can give you a source that gave me those prices. They were quite aggressive compared to what I saw from others. Jeff

says... NO, There are too many of us idiots out there who buy new hardware every year to keep up. The other factor is people demand something "new" all the time. As soon as version 1 comes out, people are asking when version 2 is going to be released. Rediculous IMHO. This of course puts pressure on the design teams to push product out the door and not really refine things (generalizing here). Papyrus did take a nice approach with Indycar 2 that took advantage of the new hardware where applicable rather writing everything to the lowest common denominator. Face it, Geoff Crammond is probably the most independant sim developer out there and after a couple of years he can't cram ( no pun) all the good stuff into a 486 level machine. We want everything and don't want to pay for it. Don't work that way....... Jeff

^^^^^^^^^^^ What do you mean FOUR years - In about 9 months it will be like a 486DX33 is today. In four years it will be what a 286-16MHz is today!

I think the problem here is that everybody seems to be assuming that the performance of a demo is representative of the real thing. I'm in no particular position to comment whether the final game will be too slow or not, but my point is that speculation based on a demo isn't necessarily revealing. The factors affecting the construction of a demo are normally different to that of the sim itself, and so corners are cut, and things bodged just to get it to the show on time. It may have still had debug code, and non-optimsed routines floating around in it - in many cases the demos are built around versions of the code that are very much out of date. The same could be said of Nascar/IndyCar2 - neither of which will run at reasonable frame rates with all the details turned on (I run a P120). Lets just hope that GP2 will run okay on the kit we have. Cheers, Steve.

>> >I'm going to be upgrading my system from the current 486/66 and was >> >planning to get the p5/75 or 100, but the man at the computer store told >> >me that for graphics applications, such at ICR2 and NASCAR racing, I'd be >> >better off with the 486/120 instead. True, the 4/120 would be better TODAY, but if you buy a Pentium motherboard that supports faster processors, then in a year or two, pop a faster CPU in there, and it's a new system again. A DX4/120 system is already maxxed out. In four years, it will be like DX33s are today.

Quoted text (12 lines)

> >I have extracted part of his response from a message dealing with > >Pentium upgrades and include it in this message to you, as it is the > > >first occurance of someone outside of microprose quoting on frame > > >rates. It is is true, that in is current form, WC2 needs a P90 to run > >18.2 FPS, with 140-150% for VGA ONLY, > >Well, all I can say is that I will NEVER play a racesim in VGA again > > >on my 17 inch monitor. The graphics looks horrible ! The dots ar just > >to big. If this is all true, no harm done: I still can play the > >EXCELLENT ICR2 until GP3 > >will be released in 2005............ > >Cheers, > >Harald

Excuse me guys, but this looks a little bit like you are trying to put down a product before it has even come out in its packaged form. That you are fans of ICR makes your comments even more suspect. Let's wait until WC2 comes out, and then the first people to buy it and play it can tell us what the frame rates, occupancy and resolution are like. Bruno Schleich

Quoted text (9 lines)

>>> >I'm going to be upgrading my system from the current 486/66 and was >>> >planning to get the p5/75 or 100, but the man at the computer store told >>> >me that for graphics applications, such at ICR2 and NASCAR racing, I'd be >>> >better off with the 486/120 instead. >True, the 4/120 would be better TODAY, but if you buy a Pentium >motherboard that supports faster processors, then in a year or two, pop a >faster CPU in there, and it's a new system again. A DX4/120 system is >already maxxed out. In four years, it will be like DX33s are today.

In 2 years, the Pentium motherboard will be just as obsolete.

And even better, if the Papurys guy was one of the developers of ICR/ICR 2, he is definately trying to push GP 2 down, since ICR 2 is something he made! AND, the Papyrus guy had tried out the DEMO version of GP 2, who knows how old version was that (last summer? October?) so the actual game might be different and better. Those guys at Papyrus should be quiet about rival products anyway, since they are just trying to turn people against GP 2. That's what I think. <<< Well, you are incorrect in this case. I'm not trying to put down GP2, just report what I observed. The demo I saw was dated some time in October as I recall (I saw it last month), so I would assume that performance has improved since then. Formula 1 racing and IndyCar racing *are* two different sports; I believe there is room for both in the world :-). Rick Genter Technical Lead, IndyCar Racing II Papyrus Design Group, Inc.

Rick, since the VGA demo of GP2 is a several months old non-public beta quickly cobbled together for the several European shows, I would be very wary about making assumptions based upon it. A much more recent demo was shown recently at the Autosport show in London (SVGA) and all people who saw it _unanimously_ comment that it is (quote) "Miles better" than ICR2. Frame rate looking much better and still a couple of months to improve it. I fear you may be eating those words.... <<< Not at all. I can only report my personal experience. I would *hope* that it has gotten better since than, and from the demo I saw I know that it has better graphics than ICR 2. Rick Genter Technical Lead, IndyCar Racing II Papyrus Design Group, Inc.

>Formula 1 racing and IndyCar racing *are* two different sports; I believe >there is room for both in the world :-). I'd second that point of view Rick. I also like to reiterate yet again my personal thanks for your continued valued conributions to this forum. Regards, ---Cogito Ergo Sum--- * * Fidonet: 3:640/377 * Keiron Rado, Brisbane, Queensland, Australia *