Speed isn't everything. Well....
Product: WinFast 3D L2300 (other Permedia2 cards will be similar)
From: Leadtek; distributed in Canada by Compucon
Price: US$100 - US$150 or less
Updated Drivers: www.leadtek.com or www.3dlabs.com
Pros: Best OpenGL performance we've seen in a low-cost (8MB) card. 3D Labs Permedia2 chipset delivers impressive OpenGL performance under Win95/98 and NT; Direct3D and DirectX are also supported under Win95. Some images, such as the AGP demo section of the Final Reality benchmark, are displayed many times faster via AGP. The card co-exists peacefully as a primary or secondary adapter in a Win98 "dual display" setup.
Cons: No TV out or other bells and whistles. Transparency effects, such as those demonstrated in the Final Reality benchmark, are not rendered correctly. Some operating systems and/or motherboards do not support AGP.
The WinFast won "best overall" card in Byte magazine's 1998 3D graphic card shootout, and it's not hard to see why. At the time of its release, the card offered a better price/performance ratio in 3D graphics than any other card we're aware of. Unlike Byte, however, we did find a few issues to quibble about.
We tested the Winfast 2300 with a suite of 3D benchmark tests from 3Dlabs and performed real-world tests using such popular 3D graphics packages as 3D Studio MAX (R1 and R2) and Newtek LightWave 5.5. Performance was good, but when we ran benchmark tests designed to gauge OpenGL acceleration, we began to see just how fast the card is.
Compared to the generic OpenGL drivers Microsoft supplies for Windows 95 OSR2, Win98 and NT, for example, the WinFast was nearly ten times as fast. Indeed, its blazing OpenGL performance is the primary reason to consider this card.
Although rendering a complex 3D scene primarily taxes your computer's CPU, the performance of real-time OpenGL previews, such as are possible in the above-mentioned 3D packages, shows how much time a fast graphics card like this can really save.
For example, X29.exe is an animation benchmark test that displays an animated shaded model of an X29 jet. On a Pentium II/233:
41 = max. frame rate for ATI 3D Xpression+ PCTV
185 = max. frame rate for Leadtek Winfast 2300 AGP (It is worth noting that the Creative Labs Graphics Blaster Exxtreme, a PCI card based on the Permedia2, also scored a 185 in this test.)
For comparison, the ATI scored only 19 when tested on a P180, while the Permedia2 rated a 90. On a faster machine, the Permedia2 performs even better. On a Celeron 300A overclocked to 338MHz, it scored 238. Faster CPUs will yield even higher gains in Open GL performance.
As the tests above show, the card delivered a stunning improvement in 3D performance over the consumer-grade ATI card we had previously been running in our Pentium II-based system. However, its 2D performance when playing AVI and MPEG movies was surprisingly mediocre. Our $200 ATI card was significantly better at playing back full-screen movies than the Leadtek card. And, as we've mentioned in our 3D Games review, the Permedia 2 definitely has problems displaying certain transparency and overlay effects.
Nevertheless, in OpenGL and Direct3D performance, this is the fastest card we've tested yet. An impressive real-world demonstration of the card's 3D prowess occurred when we fired up Microsoft Flight Simulator 98. The WinFast delivered smooth full-screen animation, 16-bit texture support, mip-mapping, and bilinear filtering even when the resolution was set to 1280x1024. Highly recommended, although we do not recommend a Permedia2 card for the avid gamer, because of its poor rendering of transparency effects.
Interestingly, the AGP-based 2300 compared favorably to a much more expensive PCI card, the Glint-based 2510. On a 200 MHz Pentium Pro (roughly comparable to a 233 MHz Pentium II in these tests), a PCI-based 2510 card scored 185 in our benchmark. On a 233 MHz Pentium II, the $500 L2300 (AGP model) matched the score. We ran tests of the L2300 and compared it to an Nvidia Riva128-based Total 3D 128V and All-in-Wonder Pro. The Leadtek WinFast L2300 was almost five times as fast as either one. We believe this is more a credit to the Permedia2 chip than it is a testament to the wonderfulness of AGP, which our comparison with PCI-based Permedia2 cards and other tests show produces a negligible speed improvement.
3D Labs, like virtually all manufacturers of computer products, frequently releases new drivers for its chips. See Drivers and Demos at www.3dlabs.com for details, or visit the website of the manufacturer of your graphics card.
Product: Graphics Blaster Exxtreme (8MB "Professional" version for PCI bus tested)
From: Creative Labs
Price: US$199 (8MB Professional, bundled with productivity tools); Originally priced at US$129 (4MB Value); US$149 (4MB expandable, with bundled games), the Graphics Blaster Exxtreme Value was, as of Oct. 1999, available on Creative Labs' website for an amazing US$29.99.
Pros: Comparable performance to the above-mentioned Leadtek card, plus better utility software and support. The card co-existed peacefully with a second PCI adapter in a Win98 "dual display" setup. We tested the 8MB (SGRAM) version of the Exxtreme card. 3D Labs Permedia2 chipset delivers impressive OpenGL performance under Win95/98 and NT; Direct3D and DirectX are also supported under Win95.
Cons: No TV out or other bells and whistles. HEIDI (3D Studio MAX) driver supplied did not work on our test system, although an updated version works as expected. Note that some games, such as Quake II, do not provide their best displays when running "system-level" OpenGL such as that provided by this card. (A card such as the Creative Labs Graphics Blaster Voodoo2 provides the best Quake II performance.) Transparency effects, such as those demonstrated in the Final Reality benchmark are not rendered correctly.
Although Byte magazine elected to award the Leadtek Winfast 3D L2300 card its "Best of Byte" designation, we think the Graphics Blaster Exxtreme is a worthy contender of that title. Superior software and better dual-monitor support under Windows 98 make this a card to consider carefully if you are looking for a low-cost, high-performance OpenGL accelerator optimized for CAD and 3D rendering. However, because of its poor rendering of transparency effects, we do not recommend a Permedia2 card for the avid gamer, unless a Voodoo or Voodoo2 add-on card is included.
Creative Labs released several new driver versions for the Graphics Blaster Exxtreme in the months following its debut that improved its X29 score to 185, matching the score of the AGP-based Winfast card.
Product: Total 3D 128V
From: Canopus www.canopuscorp.com
Price: street US$229
The Canopus Total 3D 128V is based on the Nvidia RIVA 128 chipset and, as such, provides very good performance in Direct3D games and other tasks requiring a good balance between 2D and 3D acceleration. However, it fared poorly in side-by-side video overlay tests (and overall software functionality and elegance) when compared to the All-In-Wonder Pro. In 3D performance using the X29 benchmark there was no appreciable difference between the cards. However, the Canopus Total3D 128V produced superior results when running 3D games, such as Flight Simulator 98, CART Precision Racing, etc. It is also worth noting that the video-input quality of the Total3D 128V is considered the best of the RIVA cards that are so enabled.
Product: Graphics Blaster Voodoo2
From: Creative Labs
Price: US$199 (after mail-in rebate; 8MB); US$299 (12MB)
Pros: The definitive Quake II accelerator. PCI card adds amazing full-screen 3D game performance to your existing video card via a pass-thru cable design. Two Voodoo2 cards can be "daisy-chained" for further enhanced performance. Easy installation. Control panel allows configuration of gamma and many other advanced settings. The Voodoo2 does not suffer from the "corner condition" problems widely associated with the company's Voodoo Rush 2D+3D product.
Cons: Lacks 2D support. Max. 800x600 Z-buffered resolution. 12MB card doesn't offer any additional framebuffer size over an 8MB card, although developers can (and almost surely will) design games that can exploit the extra memory. Skimpy documentation (the manual is a single sheet of paper!). Although the Voodoo2 is mostly software compatible with software designed for the original Voodoo Graphics chipset (Glide 2.5 or later required), the Creative Labs Voodoo2 FAQ lists numerous titles that don't work as expected.
You haven't played Quake II until you've played on a Voodoo2-equipped system. It's quite shocking, really, how much different the game looks and feels when the Voodoo-enhanced graphics add the colored lights, enhanced anti-aliasing (trilinear filtering) and ultra-fast frame-rates that are coded into the 3DFX video option of the game. (The OpenGL driver also provides support for colored lights.)
Creative elected to take the Voodoo2 chip to its maximum memory capacity with its top-of-the-line 12MB board configuration. The card's 4MB framebuffer and 8MB texture memory allows gamers to play at 800*600 with Z-Buffer enabled. (a card with only 6MB could allocate only a 2 MB framebuffer and 4 Mb texture memory, limiting play to 640x480 resolutions max. With the board installed and the pass-thru cable connected to your existing video card, the Voodoo2 adds dramatic 3D acceleration to games designed to benefit from GLIDE or Direct3D acceleration (limited OpenGL support is provided as well). And, if one Voodoo2 card isn't enough, the board's design lets the hard-core gamer go even further. If you install two cards, you can connect them via a short ribbon cable and run them in what is known as SLI (scanline interleave) mode. That way, you combine the two framebuffers and you're able to get 1,024 by 768 resolution with Z buffering. Cowabunga!
Dr. Tom Pabst has benchmark tests and an article on how to overclock the Voodoo (entirely in software!).
You can get the latest drivers for Windows 95, Windows 98 and Windows NT from the Creative FTP site.
Products: Xpert@Work, Xpert@Play, All-in-Wonder Pro; Xclaim VR for Mac
From: ATI
Pros: Good overall 2D and 3D performance; good support of advanced 3D rendering effects such as bilinear filtering, MIP mapping, transparency, fog, etc. Unsurpassed AVI and MPEG playback quality. All in Wonder Pro has excellent video in/out and capture capabilities.
Cons: Limited OpenGL support, some bugs in newest "Turbo" drivers. Transparency effects in games like Monster Truck Madness 2 not rendered correctly.
Canada's ATI Technologies Inc. has several graphics cards based on its latest generation graphics chipset, the 3D Rage Pro. The 3D Rage Pro graphics chip provides advanced 3D performance features including floating-point triangle set-up engine capable of processing up to 1.2 million triangles per second, 4K texture cache, bilinear and trilinear filtering, Z-buffering and perspective correct texture mapping. With texture filtering increased to 75 million pixels/second, the rendering performance is three times that of ATI's RAGE II technology.
For Intel-compatible systems, the Rage Pro is available in several cards: the Xpert@Work and Xpert@Play (an Xpert@Work with a video out connector and different software bundle) and the All-in-Wonder Pro. In March 1998, the company released its so-called "Turbo" driver as version 5.0. Subsequent update added Windows 98 and Windows 2000 compatibility. Third-party support for other operating systems, including BeOS and Linux, makes this one of the best-supported cards on the market, despite its now-lacklustre 3D performance.
The AGP versions of cards based on the Rage Pro are able to perform software DVD decoding and playback from a PII/266 or better equipped with a DVD drive.
Amazingly (we had to run the test twice before we could believe our eyes!), the ATI All in Wonder Pro outperformed a Voodoo2 card in every major category of the Final Reality benchmark tests, and rendered transparency effects with 100 percent accuracy. However, in some games, such as Turok, the Voodoo2 card shows its superior rendering and performance prowess. Still, the ATI is an excellent all-around card, particularly well suited to 2-D display and video-input tasks.
And, for PCI-based PowerMacs, ATI in March, 1998, released new high-performance drivers for the Xclaim 3D graphics accelerator, the latest generation of its highly successful 3D RAGE PRO family of graphics accelerator technology for PCI-enabled Power Macintosh systems. Based on ATI's 3D RAGE PRO technology and specifically engineered for Power Mac systems, the company says the Xclaim 3D provides a doubling of 2D performance compared to previous technology. With 8MB of SGRAM available, the Xclaim 3D supports resolutions up to 1600x1200 in true color. See ATI's tech info pages for the latest ATI video drivers for Mac.
In 1999, the Rage 128 superseded the Rage Pro as ATI's high-end card solution and, in Oct. 1999, ATI finally managed to ship a long-promised Mac version of the Xclaim VR 128. In Dec. 1999, the company is expected to ship an even faster version of the Rage 128, dubbed the Rage 128 Maxx.
Also Hot:
Another hot family of 2D/3D chips are from Nvidia Corp. The company's RIVA TNT 3D Accelerator dominated the market in 1998/99 and its successors, the TNT2 and the GeForce, were promising follow-ups. In each case, the cards leverage nVidia's own three-dimensional graphics processors and incorporate single-pass multi-texturing, offering full support for OpenGL with an ICD driver for Win95/NT. Additionally, the TNT supports Microsoft's DirectX 6.0 (and its successors) and can process two pixels per clock cycle.
And Not:
Matrox in May, 1998 decided to cancel development of a 2d/3D accelerator it was working on, dubbed the Matrox Marvel G100. According to a May 4, 1998 report on www.voodooextreme.com, the company decided to pin its hopes on the G200 instead. The G200 subsequently proved an also-ran in the 3D games market, despite its popularity in the 2D-focused DTP and office computing markets, and some success as the chip behind the Marvel G200-TV. In 1999 Matrox released the faster G400 and an even faster MAX version, each with an innovative Dualhead feature that allows more than one display to be connected and used. See the Matrox website for details.
Terms
Bilinear Filtering -- Smoother look, reduces "blockiness".
Mip Mapping -- Reduces "shimmering" or "dancing pixels" (e.g., the ground at the horizon) in far away objects.
OpenGL - a graphics language by SGI, designed for quick two- and three-dimensional shaded rendering. OpenGL is used by many 3D graphics programs to perform real-time shaded previews. At the March 1998 WinHEC conference, SGI announced Version 1.2 of the OpenGL. The new version enables faster Windows performance by natively supporting Windows pixel formats.
SGRAM - faster than SDRAM, but more expensive.
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