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PREVIEWS
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3dfx Voodoo4 / Voodoo5 Preview
Not only did 3dfx announce the VSA-100 architecture, but they also introduced the board level products that will be using the technology. The product line from 3dfx includes boards from 1 - 4 chips, with Quantum 3D once again filling in the high end with 8 - 32 chip solutions. Both the Voodoo4 and Voodoo5 lines were announced Monday and both are based on VSA-100 chips. The distinguishing factor is that the Voodoo4 series is based on a single VSA-100 chip, while the Voodoo5 series refers to a board with multiple chips.
Voodoo4 4500 AGP & PCI Single 3dfx VSA-100 32MB memory 2 pixels per clock rendered 333-367 megapixels/s $179 US The Voodoo4 4500 is targeted at "mainstream consumers" and is thus the more cost effective single VSA-100 product. The Voodoo4 4500 will be available in both PCI and AGP versions at $179. Once again, note that T-buffer effects are not enabled on single chip products. Think of the Voodoo4 4500 as the Voodoo3 3000 with 32-bit rendering, large texture support, and 32MB of memory. Expect performance similar to the Voodoo3 3000, but with greatly enhanced image quality thanks to these new features.
Voodoo5 5000 PCI Dual 3dfx VSA-100 SLI 32MB memory 4 pixels per clock rendered 667-733 megapixels/s Real-time full-scene anti-aliasing T-Buffer digital cinematic effects $229 US The entry level for the Voodoo5 line, the 5000 PCI, is actually just $50 more than the Voodoo4 4500. You get quite a lot for that $50 though, including double the fillrate and T-Buffer effects thanks to a second VSA-100 chip. However, the 32MB of memory is slightly less effective here since texture data will be duplicated in memory thanks to the dual chip configuration. Also note that the Voodoo5 5000 is PCI only at this point. Performance is theoretically double the Voodoo4 4500 without full scene anti-aliasing enabled, or approximately the same as the 4500 with it enabled.
Voodoo5 5500 AGP Dual 3dfx VSA-100 SLI 64MB memory 4 pixels per clock rendered 667-733 megapixels/s Real-time full-scene anti-aliasing T-Buffer digital cinematic effects $299 US The first AGP card in the Voodoo5 line up is the 5500, which is much like the 5000 PCI with an additional 32MB of memory and an AGP interface. The increased bus transfer rate and onboard RAM serve to enhance performance as game complexity increases. All this will cost you $50 more than the 5000 PCI, primarily to pay for the additional RAM. If RAM prices drop, expect the cost difference between the boards to also drop.
Voodoo5 6000 AGP Quad 3dfx VSA-100 SLI 128MB memory 8 pixels per clock rendered 1.33 - 1.47 gigapixels/s Real-time full-scene anti-aliasing T-Buffer digital cinematic effects $599 US The Voodoo5 6000 is definitely the mother of all graphics cards with easily the highest fillrate of anything available at its launch. With 128MB of RAM, texture space should not be a problem as this card will have more RAM than many systems have. 3dfx is shooting for 85 fps at 1024x768x32 in Quake 3 with full scene anti-aliasing enabled - not too shabby. The price is quite high at $599 and is clearly targeted at the hardcore gamer. We know some people will buy it because quite a few people paid about $600 for a Voodoo2 SLI setup when it was released. The 6000 AGP will feature an external 100W power supply that hooks up to the board via a connector on the cards back plate.
Looks quite interesting so watch this space for future information.
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BENCHMARK
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Incoming
Another classic Direct3D game benchmark...
Open explorer in windows
go to the directory where you installed incoming.
double-click on gameindex.exe
Once the demo is completed, double-click on fps.txt to see the average frames rate
Jedi Knights
* Right-click and drag the JEDI.EXE file to the desktop, and create a shortcut. * Right-click on the shortcut, select Shortcut, and change the Target line so that it has -dispstats after "...JEDI.EXE".
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REVIEWS
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Elsa Erazor III Pro
Specification
Manufacturer- Elsa
Price �103.11 from www.software-warehouse.co.uk
Chipset- TNT2 Pro (128bit processor)
Core clock- 149Mhz
Memory- 32mb SDRAM
Memory clock- 166Mhz
Maximum refresh rate- 160Hz
Maximum resoloution-1920x1440
Taking advantage of that 0.22-micron process, NVIDIA has released a new variation of the TNT2, known as TNT2-A or TNT2 Pro. Internally, it is identical to the brilliant TNT2 we?re used to, but the die shrink allows for a cooler running part with the potential for higher clock speeds. The TNT2 Pro ships at a default clock of 143/166, which slots it between the standard TNT2 and TNT2 Ultra, but closer to the Ultra. Since the core of the TNT2 Pro is identical to the old TNT2?s core, the specs are the same as far as features go. This, of course, is not a bad thing by any means as the TNT2 had the most complete feature set at the time of its release. Even today, the only new features we?ve seen appear on the market are Environment Mapped Bump Mapping (EMBM), texture compression, and hardware transform and lighting.
Installation
The graphics card installed easily. You just have to place the CD in Your CDROM drive and press The Yes button at the bottom of the screen.
Overclockability
Well yes this is fun I have managed to get the card to run 100% at 165Mhz core and 185Mhz memory. This adds a couple of frames per second on the Quake 2 test as shown in Benchmarks, but it actually reduced the 3Dmark scores by about 20 points
The Benchmarks
The System
Celeron 333
64mb of SDram
PC Chips BXCEL PII 100Mhz
14" CTX monitor
40x Acer CDROM
The Elsa is advertised as being good for clocking so I ran the original hardware set-up (core speed 143Mhz and memory clock speed 166Mhz) while also running a clocked version running with a core speed of 160Mhz and memory clock speed 190Mhz.
Quake 2 was run in 16bit at two screen sizes 640x480 and 1024x768. The test is run five times and an average is taken.
The results from the Quake 2 are
640x480 1024x768
Clocked version 47.4fps 45.1fps
Of Elsa Erazor III pro
Elsa Erazor III pro 47.4fps 43.8fps
Original settings
Fps = frames per second
Those extra few MHz starts to show on Quake 2 at 1024x768, but at 640x480 the pace is the same.
The 3Dmark test is tested on the registered version of 3Dmark. It is run in 640x480 and 1024x768 in 16bit with all settings on.
The 3Dmark results are
640x480 1024x768
Clocked version 2209 2204
of the Elsa Erazor III pro
Elsa Erazor III pro 2219 2205
Original settings
The clocked version is suffering from a lack of processing power and ends a few points behind the original hardware settings.
OVERALL
This is a good clockers card but make sure you have at least 400Mhz of processing power or up as this card has the potential to run faster than an TNT2 Ultra based card. The picture quality is up with the best and Elsa offer there good driver and software package with this card. It's also cheaper than its slower brother the Elsa Erazor III so in my books its a bargin so buy it now.
Pro's
Fast
Easy to install
Cheap
Cons
You need at least 400Mhz of processing power to really see it at its best.
C.James
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