GPL and TNT?

Ok, somebody give me a reality check here. The new NVIDIA Riva TNT chipset looks pretty damned impressive. Superior image quality, higher resolutions (up to 1600x1200), and comparable framefrates to a Voodoo2, with just 1 card! (damn things actually a little cheaper than just ONE Voodoo2 card). Question is, I'm about to get a PII 400 and I'm really tempted buy the STB Velocity 4400, but will I be missing something in GPL and Nascar 3 because the TNT isn't 3dfx? Thanks in advance! Gritz

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> Ok, somebody give me a reality check here. > The new NVIDIA Riva TNT chipset looks pretty damned >impressive. Superior image quality, higher resolutions (up to >1600x1200), and comparable framefrates to a Voodoo2, with >just 1 card! (damn things actually a little cheaper than just ONE >Voodoo2 card). > Question is, I'm about to get a PII 400 and I'm really tempted >buy the STB Velocity 4400, but will I be missing something in GPL >and Nascar 3 because the TNT isn't 3dfx? > Thanks in advance! >Gritz

Won't do diddly for GPL, might for N3. GPL will run, probably well on that rig, BUT it won't use any of the 3D wizardry of the card, nada. Same goes for a number of games, they are 3dfx only. Yep, it does sound wicked, and IF the games you want to play are D3D, then you're set. But if not, then you really have to look at having a Voodoo 2, for compatibility. I'd rather play every game 3d accelerated, with some being 15% slower and looking a tad worse, than to play 65% accelerated faster and better looking, but that other 35% looking and running much worse in software mode. And, unless you're running Quad P-450's, I doubt that 1600x1200 resolution is even worth mentioning, it just won't have a playable framerate. If you were planning on replacing the video card on a pre-built system with the TNT, I'd suggest adding a Voodoo 2 now, and then putting in a TNT later if you want. If you're piecing this together, you're gonna need a 2D card even if you get a Voodoo 2, so this would probably be a great choice - I'm running a Riva 128 w/ my Voodoo 2, and it works pretty well for Windows, and I'd imagine the TNT is better in that area also. Won't help GPL, but will run a decent amount of stuff well, and tide you over until you get a Voodoo 2. Maybe D3D will start to take over, and relegate 3dfx-native stuff to obscurity, but I honestly don't see this happening for a good while. Pretty good bet that something in the next 6 months will catch your eye, and be 3dfx-only. And you already know it won't help GPL. I've heard of a D3D version of N3, but I would not be at all surprised if the native 3dfx / Rendition versions worked much better, as the programmers will know about those from GPL and haven't done D3D before. Ken

One more thing... GPL would work really nicely with some Voodoo2 SLI goin' on inside your super machine. Use the Witchdoctor arrangement on the Canopus Spectra 2500 and two Pure 3D II's in SLI mode and get the TV out, too. Kyle

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> Ok, somebody give me a reality check here. > The new NVIDIA Riva TNT chipset looks pretty damned >impressive. Superior image quality, higher resolutions (up to >1600x1200), and comparable framefrates to a Voodoo2, with >just 1 card! (damn things actually a little cheaper than just ONE >Voodoo2 card). > Question is, I'm about to get a PII 400 and I'm really tempted >buy the STB Velocity 4400, but will I be missing something in GPL >and Nascar 3 because the TNT isn't 3dfx?

GPL has both Rendition and 3dfx support. Kyle

Quoted text (11 lines)

> Ok, somebody give me a reality check here. > The new NVIDIA Riva TNT chipset looks pretty damned >impressive. Superior image quality, higher resolutions (up to >1600x1200), and comparable framefrates to a Voodoo2, with >just 1 card! (damn things actually a little cheaper than just ONE >Voodoo2 card). > Question is, I'm about to get a PII 400 and I'm really tempted >buy the STB Velocity 4400, but will I be missing something in GPL >and Nascar 3 because the TNT isn't 3dfx?

A few FPS for you: These were taken sitting still in the pit lane at Monza with no AI cars (from GPL version 0.2.0.0) on a K6-2/300 at the highest resolution supported by each video card: Diamond Viper V330 AGP 4MB, 640 x 480, ~4 fps Diamond Viper V550 PCI 16MB, 640 x 480, ~4 fps Diamond Monster 3D II PCI 12MB, 1024 x 768, ~23 fps The huge disparity is because GPL (and N2 as well) only support Rendition and 3Dfx with native code, and everything else is software rendering. Additionally, on the same machine the V550 PCI 16MB showed only ~10% improvement over the V330 AGP 4MB in ZDNet Winbench Business Winmarks. I don't have the 3D Winbench so I couldn't test that. There is no noticable difference in Windows 98, though I can run the V550 at 16.7M colors and it benchmarks about the same as the old V330 at 65K colors in 2D. On the MGP:RS demo I don't "feel" any frame difference between the Voodoo version on my Monster 3D vs. the DirectX version on the V550. Clark A. (ace29 on TEN) On Tue, 29 Sep 1998 22:17:52 -0500, "Gritz"

Quoted text (15 lines)

> Ok, somebody give me a reality check here. > The new NVIDIA Riva TNT chipset looks pretty damned >impressive. Superior image quality, higher resolutions (up to >1600x1200), and comparable framefrates to a Voodoo2, with >just 1 card! (damn things actually a little cheaper than just ONE >Voodoo2 card). > Question is, I'm about to get a PII 400 and I'm really tempted >buy the STB Velocity 4400, but will I be missing something in GPL >and Nascar 3 because the TNT isn't 3dfx? > Thanks in advance! >Gritz