GPL frame rate question

I just got GPL and installed it on my system, Intel 233 mmx 96 megs of ram with a 16 meg creative graphics blaster riva tnt video card. The install went fine, not even a problem getting my thrustmaster pro wheel to work, however the frame rate, well it needs help. With most all the graphics options on the cars are all but undriveable, so I turned most of the graphics off, after seeing what the sim looked like with everything on, well what do i need to REALLY run this fine sim. Should i get rid of the riva tnt card for a voodoo2? or can i run both? would this help? not enough processing power. Any help would be great

Well, I will prob be more helpful tommorow, or so I hope. I am having same or worse troubles as you as have the biggest POS cpu, although meeting the "minimum requirements" listed on box..I can see what the game is supposed to look like from sitting in my stall, otherwise, I get less than a FPS with all graphics on. From what I have read however, a 233 matched with either a rendition card, or a voodoo2 will slightly increase your driving experience, but I saw a reveiw with a PII 300 and 2 Voodoo2's and still less than perfect framerate, so a processor upgrade would probably be the way to go. Hearing great things about the over clocked Celeron mixed with Rendition or Voodoo2 cards, however being the cpu illeterate that I am, I found a better fix and found a PII 300 SL2W8,which as it turns out is really a PII 450 cloaked in a 66mhz package, and when ran on a 100 mhz board, will run in all the glory of a PII 450 for over half the price. I will be adding to that a 4 meg Hercules thriller AGP rendition card and a Diamond Monster 2 3d card and am so looking forward to 30+ FPS as early as tommorow nite. Really looking forward to seeing past the frontstretch at Monza with all graphics...as those green walls I hear are trees really are getting on my nerves. Good luck, and it is quite a shame that to be a gamer nowadays, you gotta spend the kids college fund, or win the lottery.. John Tomlinson

go to the files section of this site http://gpl.gamestats.com/ and at the bottom of the page get the patch. also on a 233 you will have to turn a lot of graphics off to get 25 fps, to get max fps (36) with almost all graphics and a full field of cars you will need a 350mhz cpu. I built an overclocked 300a celeron to run at 374-450 just for GPL and it was worth every penny, unfreaking believable.

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> I just got GPL and installed it on my system, Intel 233 mmx 96 megs of > ram with > a 16 meg creative graphics blaster riva tnt video card. The install went > fine, > not even a problem getting my thrustmaster pro wheel to work, however > the frame > rate, well it needs help. With most all the graphics options on the cars > are all > but undriveable, so I turned most of the graphics off, after seeing what > the sim > looked like with everything on, well what do i need to REALLY run this > fine sim. > Should i get rid of the riva tnt card for a voodoo2? or can i run both? > would > this help? not enough processing power. Any help would be great

Well the TNT is a good card except that maybe a 3Dfx would be better for your Pentium 233. Either a 3Dfx or Rendition will be the better solution for Grand Prix Legends. It really depends on what games you want to run. If you want to play games based on the Unreal, first person based engine, or any other glidegames a 3Dfx based card has the most compatiiblity and thge best framerates. If you want the best performance wiith GPL then get a Rendition V2200 based card. I am a Grand Prix Legends nut so I have a Renditioin V2200 Geno V-Raptor card and a Voodoo 2 12 MB card for other games. I have a feeling that the direct 3D or opengl patches for Grand Prix Legends will never be as fast as the original Rendition and 3Dfx support. I would look into a Creative Labs Banshee 16Mb PCI card as it would probably give you the best bang for the buck on your Pentium 233 system. I have noticed that a lot of people want the Riva TNT or othe manufactuer to dethrone 3Dfx as the best 3D solution , I guess because they think they are monolpolizing the market like Microsoft or Intel. If we didn't have Glide we would never have had a Direct 3D that was fast enough or good enough. Competition drove MS to spend millions on DirectX to compete and now Direct 3D games are good. Actually I believe that 3Dfx is the only vidoe chipset manufactuer that actually delivers performance equal to the hype. With the original Voodoo 1 chipset they were the fastest game in town. Intels i740 is about equal to that chip in real game performance, and I know since I have both. When they came out with Voodoo2 they said you needed a Pentium II, and you wont see much improvement over Voodoo 1 with a Penitum 233, but add a Pentium II 233 and up and the performance scales up nicely. Even though the Riva TNT is on par with the Voodoo 2 it isn't the Voodoo 2 killer they said it would be or does it run a t 125MHz. On my system in Direct 3D games a TNT probably would be a few frames higher but I couldn't play Unreal or GPL in there nataive modes of 3D acceleration. When all the games I want to play come in Direct 3D and they are clearly faster then I may look at TNT or somebody else. Right now I can say that my 3Dfx based 3D cards have never let me down and all games support them. It is kinda like the old SoundBlaster standard, there are others but only one works perfect in every game. P.s. Don't pay over about $50 for a V2200 card if you go that root. The V200 isn't the fastest direct 3D card but for games like GPL that use redline API instead of Direct 3D then the V2200 is qutie good. Good luck Jerry

GPL is a 3dfx game, so you need a 3dfx card (voodoo) to really see it run. Your TNT will work fine with a Voodoo card in the next slot. Best bet in your case would be a single Voodoo2 (I hear Diamond has a $50 rebate on their 8MB V2). The Voodoo cards do not do 2d... you need two vid cards for this sim (or any 3dfx sim for that matter). Rgds, Mark R. ==============================================

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>I just got GPL and installed it on my system, Intel 233 mmx 96 megs of >ram with >a 16 meg creative graphics blaster riva tnt video card. The install went >fine, >not even a problem getting my thrustmaster pro wheel to work, however >the frame >rate, well it needs help. With most all the graphics options on the cars >are all >but undriveable, so I turned most of the graphics off, after seeing what >the sim >looked like with everything on, well what do i need to REALLY run this >fine sim. >Should i get rid of the riva tnt card for a voodoo2? or can i run both? >would >this help? not enough processing power. Any help would be great

You can try reducing RAM to 64MB. On older motherboards only the first 64MB is cached by the L2 cache, which is very important for GPL. Bart

not exactly right, papy sims are written originally for rendition chips and were patched for 3dfx

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> GPL is a 3dfx game, so you need a 3dfx card (voodoo) to really > see it run. Your TNT will work fine with a Voodoo card in the > next slot. Best bet in your case would be a single Voodoo2 (I > hear Diamond has a $50 rebate on their 8MB V2). The Voodoo cards > do not do 2d... you need two vid cards for this sim (or any 3dfx > sim for that matter). > Rgds, > Mark R. > ============================================== > >I just got GPL and installed it on my system, Intel 233 mmx 96 megs of > >ram with > >a 16 meg creative graphics blaster riva tnt video card. The install went > >fine, > >not even a problem getting my thrustmaster pro wheel to work, however > >the frame > >rate, well it needs help. With most all the graphics options on the cars > >are all > >but undriveable, so I turned most of the graphics off, after seeing what > >the sim > >looked like with everything on, well what do i need to REALLY run this > >fine sim. > >Should i get rid of the riva tnt card for a voodoo2? or can i run both? > >would > >this help? not enough processing power. Any help would be great

Seriously consider going ahead with the 8 mb Hercules card rather than the 4 if you can swing the price difference. -- Don Burnette Palmetto Racing Dburn on Ten AOLL Iroc Administrator snip I will be adding to that a 4 snip

That is the case for NASCAR 2 only. Cheers! John