N3, Cyrix 300, Voodoo3 2000?

I'm trying to get a friend of mine up and running on Nascar3. He started with a Packard Smell computer with a Cyrix 300MHz processor and generic sound and vid. He got what looked like about 1 fps (thats with ALL details OFF), no exageration. I told him the processor was probably his biggest bottleneck, but that a new video card might help. So we went out and got a Voodoo3 2000 PCI. And it helped, some. With all details OFF, he gets maybe 3-5fps. What I would like to know is, will getting an AMD K6-2 333 fix his problem (333MHz is the highest speed his m/b will support)? I know a new sound card would help as well, but he's tight on money and we just want to get N3 running acceptably (800x600, good detail, 20-30fps). He doesn't run quake, or any other game accept N2. Any help is appreciated. Thanks in advance, Shannon T

I say this at great risk of being flamed, but I believe the K6-2 processors were still weak in floating point math, therefore I would recommend you try a Celeron 333, if your friend can afford it. This game is pretty thirsty, so even with a 333 you'll probably have to run at 640x480 with a lot of details turned off to get halfway decent frame rates. Anyone have any performance numbers running N3 with a K6-2? Zog

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> I'm trying to get a friend of mine up and running on Nascar3. > He started with a Packard Smell computer with a Cyrix 300MHz processor and > generic sound and vid. He got what looked like about 1 fps (thats with ALL > details OFF), no exageration. > I told him the processor was probably his biggest bottleneck, but that a new > video card might help. So we went out and got a Voodoo3 2000 PCI. And it > helped, some. With all details OFF, he gets maybe 3-5fps. > What I would like to know is, will getting an AMD K6-2 333 fix his problem > (333MHz is the highest speed his m/b will support)? > I know a new sound card would help as well, but he's tight on money and we > just want to get N3 running acceptably (800x600, good detail, 20-30fps). He > doesn't run quake, or any other game accept N2. > Any help is appreciated. > Thanks in advance, > Shannon T

I have an AMD K6-2 350 3d Now, a Voodoo 3 3000, 64 MB 100 MHz Ram. That machine blows my other pc, a PII 333, Pure 3D II, 128 MB 66 MHz ram away. Big time! Never did frame rates in N3, but in Viper Racing the AMD PC is 10-12 FPS faster all the time.

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> I say this at great risk of being flamed, but I believe the K6-2 processors were > still weak in floating point math, therefore I would recommend you try a Celeron > 333, if your friend can afford it. This game is pretty thirsty, so even with a > 333 you'll probably have to run at 640x480 with a lot of details turned off to > get halfway decent frame rates. Anyone have any performance numbers running N3 > with a K6-2? > Zog

Rich Koehler rgkoehler(at)lucent(dot)com killerk(at)home(dot)com

>I say this at great risk of being flamed, but I believe the K6-2 processors were >still weak in floating point math, therefore I would recommend you try a Celeron >333, if your friend can afford it. This game is pretty thirsty, so even with a >333 you'll probably have to run at 640x480 with a lot of details turned off to >get halfway decent frame rates. Anyone have any performance numbers running N3 >with a K6-2? > Zog Yep,I get a solid 36 fps at 800x600 with all details turned on except cars/track only in my mirrors. AMDK6-2/450 Voodoo3 3000 AGP 54 MB of SDRAM Joel Willstein W

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> >I say this at great risk of being flamed, but I believe the K6-2 processors > were > >still weak in floating point math, therefore I would recommend you try a > Celeron > >333, if your friend can afford it. This game is pretty thirsty, so even > with a > >333 you'll probably have to run at 640x480 with a lot of details turned off > to > >get halfway decent frame rates. Anyone have any performance numbers > running N3 > >with a K6-2? > > Zog > Yep,I get a solid 36 fps at 800x600 with all details turned on except > cars/track only in my mirrors.

Hmmm.. correct me if I'm wrong, but the mirrors come up that way only.

Here's my spec: AMD K6-2 333 128 mb ram a Voodoo2 card SB Live! Value soundcard In N3, with all details turned on, at 800x600, with draw ahead at 3, I get 30 fps when there's no traffic. In traffic, it would drop to about 22-25 fps, depending on how heavy the traffic is. If you don't have one of these new soundcards, you have the option of using 8-bit sound instead of 16-bit sound, which would help a great deal with the framerate. BTW, reading the original post, going from a Cyrix 300 to an AMD K6-2 333 is not that much of an upgrade. If your friend wants to run N3 now, then I guess that may help. Or you may consider getting more ram, if your friend has less than 64mb ram. Otherwise, I would suggest your friend saves a few more dollars for a new motherboard and a fast cpu. Ricky

>BTW, reading the original post, going from a Cyrix 300 to an AMD K6-2 >333 is not that much of an upgrade. If your friend wants to run N3 Actually it is a huge upgrade. PC Magazine had a great article on all of the common processors (Sept 99). The Cyrix was the biggest dog of all. Many may have forgotten that it's named by it's so called rating. The Cyrix 300 supposedly has the performance of an Intel 300mhz chip but operates at a much slower mhz, and floating point just plain sucks. The AMD will boost his performance *WAY* up, no problem. -- Header address intentionally scrambled to ward off the spamming hordes. cisko [AT] ix [DOT] netcom [DOT] com

On Fri, 24 Sep 1999 14:51:06 GMT, Doug Schneider >I say this at great risk of being flamed, but I believe the K6-2 processors were >still weak in floating point math, therefore I would recommend you try a Celeron >333, if your friend can afford it. This game is pretty thirsty, so even with a >333 you'll probably have to run at 640x480 with a lot of details turned off to >get halfway decent frame rates. Anyone have any performance numbers running N3 >with a K6-2? He said his friend is tight on money: your option would cost him a motherboard ($99), CPU ($99), and RAM ($175 now). Gunner

Correct. For some reason, I had it in my head that the Celeron PPG would plug into an AMD board. My bad. Zog

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> On Fri, 24 Sep 1999 14:51:06 GMT, Doug Schneider > >I say this at great risk of being flamed, but I believe the K6-2 processors were > >still weak in floating point math, therefore I would recommend you try a Celeron > >333, if your friend can afford it. This game is pretty thirsty, so even with a > >333 you'll probably have to run at 640x480 with a lot of details turned off to > >get halfway decent frame rates. Anyone have any performance numbers running N3 > >with a K6-2? > He said his friend is tight on money: your option would cost > him a motherboard ($99), CPU ($99), and RAM ($175 now). > Gunner