Disappointed by S3SPDUP.
Tried it since I've got a Fahrenheit Pro 64 4Mb PCI video card with the
S3 964 chipset.
Made no difference to :-
1) CPU occupancy - 260-290% running the first lap of a race at Monaco
with all the textures turned on in main and mirrors views.
2) Estimated frames rates with different selections of graphics options.
3) GPLog figures......Speed (c.f. DX2-66): 128 (with or without)
Video speed: 118
Memory isn't a problem I hope - 32Mb in the machine and 4Mb on the video
card.
This seems to demonstrate the "bottleneck" in the system is in the
motherboard or CPU - Intel Mercury chipset, Award Bios, 66 MHz Pentium.
Not in the video system.....assuming S3SPDUP has anything to offer my
system(?).
I am planning to replace this for a Triton HX board with a 166 MHz
Pentium (NOT because of GP2, mainly for VoiceType in OS/2 Merlin) in the
near future so I'm expecting things to improve.
But I think this does demonstrate that for all the "..... card is THE
BEST!!!" claims made (or equally the "XXXMhz CPU runs it fine") what it
boils down to isn't a single component, but the balance of them. Think
others have been making more costly demo's of this by splashing out on a
panacea of a trendy video card or a CPU with a big MHz number attached
and then reporting it's made little or no difference.
Taking this further, I know it's in the interests of companies like
Intel to make big claims for the processor speed and makers of video
cards to promote their latest-and-greatest. But in upgrading my computer
over the years it's not been these that have made the biggest
differences - the CPU has been a 486 20MHz SX, a 486 66MHz and a Pentium
66MHz, the graphics has been a no-name Tseng card, a Hercules Graphite
Pro and then an Orchid card. No, the biggest functional differences were
in RAM (4Mb -> 16Mb -> 32Mb) and making the whole system SCSI based.
I wonder if many few people ought to look seriously at their system
before going for trendy, heavily advertised upgrades???!!!
Cheers!
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* RM 1.3 U0414 * ... Mating call of the Mail Duck --- QWK QWK QWK
