Exploring the XGI Volari V3 *Updated*

[Avalon]

If you're reading this, you are most likely interested in one of the following:

1) A real end user experience with one of the first retail XGI cards

2) Knowing why I even bought a card like this

3) Thread crapping

Well, here's the scoop. My mother needed a cheap video card with TV/Out so she could hook it up to her TV via S-Video input. I thought I'd get this card and let her be the guinea pig. Heck, why not? The card is only a few bucks more than an MX4000. I was damn interested. Well, it turns out that I completely forgot her old HP system had no AGP slot, and this is strictly an AGP 4x/8x card. So, it was sitting here on my desk, and I decided to pop it into my rig and see how this new chip behaved. I cleaned all my ATI drivers out and removed my 9500, shut down, unplugged my power, and plugged this card in. I was up and running in just a few minutes. Windows automatically installed the Reactor 1.05 drivers, but I went and got the newest 1.06 WHQL drivers off the XGI website. I've done some benchmarks and some visual analysis, so I hope some of you out there are interested.

Why would you be interested in this?
You are possibly interested in this because it is a chance to see if this chip actually works, unlike its bigger brothers that have been tested on a few benchmarking sites. I think those samples were made by Club3d. AFAIK, the only site with the card I have, the Chaintech V3, is Ocworkbench. Here is a linky.

I'd link to Tom's hardware, but that is a much older article, and I feel it is not relevent to link to it due to that. If it can be proven that this chip isn't a complete failure, then it means that XGI may, in the future, have a chance of poking its toe through the door. That is why I'm doing this.

Now, onto the card. Here are the specs:

Chipset: XGI VOLARI V3
Core: 200mhz
Memory: 128MB DDR in a 64bit configuration @ 200mhz (400mhz DDR effective)
Pixel Pipeline structure: 2x2 (As I recall)
BUS: AGP 4x/8x
Ports: VGA Out(15 Pin D-Sub) + TV-Out(S-Video) + DVI
Support 3D API: DirectX 8.1, OpenGL 1.3
Max Resolution@32bit Color: 2048X1536
Cable/Accessories: Drivers CD, Manual
Retail Box (See pics for details)

I'll divide this "review" up into a few sections. These sections will be the 3d synthetic section, 3d games section, and image quality. I do have some screenshots to verify what I will say, but I'm still trying to find a host at the moment, so those will come shortly (even more so if someone could so kindly volunteer).


***3D Synthetics***

3Dmark2001SE:

Score - 3339
Game 1 - Car Chase - Low Detail - 50.8FPS
Game 1 - Car Chase - High Detail - 28.0FPS
Game 2 - Dragothic - Low Detail - 48.4FPS
Game 2 - Dragothic - High Detail - 27.7FPS
Game 3 - Lobby - Low Detail - 47.5FPS
Game 3 - Lobby - High Detail - 25.4FPS
Game 4 - Nature - 12.5FPS
Fill Rate Single Texturing - 213.8 MTexels/s
Fill Rate Multi Texturing - 344.8 MTexels/s
High Polygon Count 1 Light - 11.1 MTriangles/s
High Polygon Count 8 Lights - 1.9 MTriangles/s
Environment Bump Mapping - 32.3FPS
DOT3 Bump Mapping - 21.6FPS
Vertex Shader - 27.6FPS
Pixel Shader - 33.2FPS
Advanced Pixel Shader - 15.8FPS
Point Sprites - 3.3 MSprites/s

3dmark2003:

Score - 494


***3D Game Benchmarks***

Command Conquer Generals:

800x600 low detail - 18FPS average
Could not get screen captures or fraps to record framerate in this game.
Image quality looked correct, and there were no artifacts.

Dungeon Siege:

640x480x32 no shadows, bilinear filtering - ~7FPS average
Could not get fraps to record framerate in this game, but did manage to get one screenshot.
Image quality was not an issue, but the character portrait in the topleft corner was partially blacked out.

Screenshot

Counter-Strike:

1024x768 Software Mode.
2004-10-08 14:01:42 - hl
Frames: 13215 - Time: 342386ms - Avg: 38.596 - Min: 8 - Max: 52

Looked like Doom 2, but ran with no issues

1024x768 D3D Mode.
2004-10-08 14:17:08 - hl
Frames: 10918 - Time: 350682ms - Avg: 31.133 - Min: 1 - Max: 49

Screenshot #1
Screenshot #2
Screenshot #3
Screenshot #4
Screenshot #5

If you'll note Screenshot #3, it appears there is a lighting issue on the ground. I'm pretty sure that big square of ground is not bright like that during the game.

Natural-Selection:

1024x768 D3D Mode.
2004-10-08 14:13:46 - hl
Frames: 3120 - Time: 128203ms - Avg: 24.336 - Min: 3 - Max: 36

Screenshot #1
Screenshot #2
Screenshot #3

Image quality looked fine to me.

FarCry:

800x600 low details. Volcano level, second to last checkpoint. The big outdoor area before you kill Doyle.
2004-10-06 23:45:50 - FarCry
Frames: 996 - Time: 41056ms - Avg: 24.259 - Min: 11 - Max: 62

800x600 high details. Same Volcano level.
2004-10-06 23:49:06 - FarCry
Frames: 280 - Time: 48385ms - Avg: 5.786 - Min: 3 - Max: 14

800x600 medium details. Same Volcano level.
2004-10-06 23:51:35 - FarCry
Frames: 348 - Time: 40304ms - Avg: 8.634 - Min: 4 - Max: 16

Low detail Indoor SS
Low detail Outdoor SS
Medium detail Outdoor SS
Medium detail Indoor
High detail Indoor

Seems as if fraps worked
Screenshots also worked, and I have plenty for low, medium, and high detail quality. Image quality did not appear to be an issue.

To explain the erratic nature of the ammount of frames benched by fraps in each of the three settings, here is what I did. Upon level load, I turned on the bench counter, immediately ran outside and threw myself in front of as many enemies as possible until I died. That means bullets + rockets everywhere. I feel that is sufficient enough, better than a pier time demo where there is no action at all. Game looked rather crappy on low detail, alright on medium detail, and quite nice on high detail. Make what you will of this.

Doom 3:

Will not run at all.

Savage:

Will not run at all.


***Image Quality***

I had no issue with image quality with this card. The games all appear to look as they should, minus that one screenshot in CS. Let me know if you think the image quality is fine. As far as artifacting, I only noticed the bug in DS where the character portrait was partially blacked over, and a black square appeared beneath the cursor in the main menu once in a while.

As far as desktop use goes...2D quality seems fine to me. The text isn't any crisper or washed out to my eyes. There is a weird problem I'm getting, though. I'm seeing these extremely faint ghost images of things such as my mouse pointer, or text, or even these "post message" and "preview" buttons. Basically, it looks like an object was offset ever so slightly, leaving behind a light ghost of the exposed area. Most notably is my mouse pointer, and text on a white background. I can see what look like two partial mouse points, all offset slightly off my actual pointer. It's odd.

***UPDATE***

Using my VGA->DVI adapter from my 9500, I was able to plug my monitor into the DVI port on the Volari. The ghosting is gone. Text and 2D is as crisp as my radeon. I'm thinking the cause of that ghosting/blurring was the ribbon that was used to connect the card to its D-sub port. I'm not sure if it's just my card that does this, or if it's a known problem. But, I did find a solution


***More Discussion***
Well, I wasn't getting the 3Dmark scores that OCworkbench was getting, but ah well. I even renamed game exe files and re-benched, but there were no differences in score nor IQ. My scores were always the same, and they are different from OCworkbench. My system is slightly better than theirs, and I believe I'm using newer drivers, which may actually be the cause of the loss of performance compared to them. It would appear that a lot of IQ issues were fixed, so that may explain it.

Can you get a better performing card for $45?
Maybe.
However, I have to say that I'm a bit impressed with the card. Despite its flaws, which I'm sure can be fixed with driver updates, it seems to work well for a first attempt by XGI. Its added features (which are quite nice) don't completely outweigh the occassional bug you'll come across. There were a few bugs with the card, but I managed to fix nearly everything and get the card working pretty well. Their control panel is very lacking, though. There are very few options to change.

So...what else do you guys want to see?
I'm sure I can try to bench a few more titles.
Anything besides benching?
Questions, comments?
Any information you know about this card that I haven't posted?
I'd like a nice discussion, if at all possible.
Thanks for taking the time to read all this through, if you have


:beer:

 

[bunnyfubbles]

Originally posted by: AvalonCan you get a better performing card for $45?

Retail priced? You'd be hard pressed to do so...

Since companies like nVidia and ATI make much more money off of budget cards like these you'd think this would be a success, but its not if only because you also need a flagship to declare yourself a challenger and create a name to be known. People know of nVidia and ATI because they can bring the performance, they then choose one of their lesser cards thinking that because its nVidia or ATI they can't go wrong. Sadly people on extreme budgets that need a card to do some light gaming will quicky pass up such a card for a GF4MX or 9200SE.

Not enough money for XGI means less of a chance they'll make any noise

 

[Avalon]

Originally posted by: bunnyfubbles

Originally posted by: AvalonCan you get a better performing card for $45?

Retail priced? You'd be hard pressed to do so...

Since companies like nVidia and ATI make much more money off of budget cards like these you'd think this would be a success, but its not if only because you also need a flagship to declare yourself a challenger and create a name to be known. People know of nVidia and ATI because they can bring the performance, they then choose one of their lesser cards thinking that because its nVidia or ATI they can't go wrong. Sadly people on extreme budgets that need a card to do some light gaming will quicky pass up such a card for a GF4MX or 9200SE.

Not enough money for XGI means less of a chance they'll make any noise

Maybe not retail priced.
But, you must remember this card has its quirks.
So far, though, I'm pleased with it.
It's unfortunate that XGI cannot make a strong working flagship card.

 

[nitromullet]

nice job at doing some benches on this card. interesting read. :beer:

 

[JeremiahTheGreat]

nice review...

anyway, how is the TV-out quality? Better, equivalent or worse than the ATI? I'm looking for a cheapo video card for TV out as well...

 

[nemesismk2]

sorry for going slightly offtopic but while I was over at OCW I noticed an interesting review featuring the s3 deltachrome and xgi volari video cards:-

XGI Volari V8 versus Deltachrome S8

 

[dguy6789]

They have 9600 non pros for like 50 bucks now. so you can get way better performance for around that price.

 

[Ronin]

I've got the V3, V5, and V8's (none of the duo's, yet, but still working on them to send me some).

I'll run some tests across the board with all 3 on a high end box (FX53) and give you some results.

My first impressions of the V3 weren't good. Performance was absolutely abysmal, on par with what was said here.

 

[Avalon]

Originally posted by: dguy6789
They have 9600 non pros for like 50 bucks now. so you can get way better performance for around that price.

That's unimportant here. This thread is to give people information about this card, not tell them what their best bang for the buck is.

Jeremiah:
I'll see if i can get a chance to try the TV out. The retail package I received actually didn't come with an S-video cable, but I do have one handy. Give me a day or two.

 

[bobsmith1492]

I love dungeon siege though; it would barely be playable if it hits 7 fps even at 640x480 with no graphics options
Therefore, I don't like this card.... sorry man, that's the way it is.

 

[otispunkmeyer]

i have to say im quite impressed a new card for $45 that can at leat run 3dmark 2003 is pretty good. the V8 ronin linked too doesnt half look good plus its got HDTV outputs. looks like good IQ and it even ran doom3, and 10000 3d marks (01) is bout same as my 9500pro managed on my xp2000 rig. isnt 10000 3d marks about what u need to be able to play most games pretty decently?

 

[Avalon]

Originally posted by: bobsmith1492
I love dungeon siege though; it would barely be playable if it hits 7 fps even at 640x480 with no graphics options
Therefore, I don't like this card.... sorry man, that's the way it is.

Yes, that is the way it is. Dungeon Siege is very unplayable.
Still, I can't help but be impressed. It's a new, unexplored card, and it works. It shows that XGI can do it. All they have to do is continue working on their drivers, and release a higher grade card that works just as well.

I was toying with running 3Dmark05, but seeing as how my 9500 barely ran it, I didn't even want to bother

Oh, and big note here.
3Dmark03 said that the Nature test was unsupported on this video card, and therefore it didn't run that test.

What is different from that test and the other three? I know wings of fury is a DX8.1 test, and the others are DX9.0, so why didn't it run?

 

[Ronin]

I'm going to venture it has something to do with the VS portion of the card (the card might support PS 1.3, but only TnL on the VS side, perhaps?)

 

[Killrose]

You got your own Mother to buy this card? you bastard!!

 

[Avalon]

Originally posted by: Killrose
You got your own Mother to buy this card? you bastard!!

lol

As an afterthought, I was thinking how it would be nice if I had a method to overclock the card, heh.
The XGI control panel is really lacking.

 

[DAPUNISHER]

Refreshing to see a "off the beaten path" review here :beer:

 

[TStep]

Originally posted by: DAPUNISHER
Refreshing to see a "off the beaten path" review here :beer:

Ditto

 

[Avalon]

Welp, I'm in the process of putting my 9500 in so I can turn off AF in Doom 3, so I can run it on the V3. I noticed something odd when I was removing the display drivers in the add/remove new programs panel: The panel lists these XGI drivers as Nvidia Windows 2000/XP Display drivers. Heh.

 

[Killrose]

Originally posted by: DAPUNISHER
Refreshing to see a "off the beaten path" review here :beer:

I agree, and thanks for the warning.

 

[Avalon]

Alright, I'm about to try another small series of tests, to see if I can solve a few issues.
First thing I'm doing is setting Doom3 to its maximum lowest settings.
Next, I'm going to change my Counter-Strike/Natural-Selection renderer to software mode instead of OpenGL, and see if the games will run. If it does, I'll go and try to run it via D3D.
I'm also going to throw some Savage: Battle of Newerth benchies in there.

Lastly, I'm going to see if I can solve this 2D ghosting problem. I'm wondering if its because of the ribbon implementation to use the D-Sub connector. So, I'm going to borrow my VGA->DVI adapter from my 9500 so I can use the DVI hookup on the V3. We'll see what that does.

 

[Marsumane]

Well atleast its running games now. Beats what it was doing before. Maybe some UT2K4 socres?

 

[Avalon]

Alright, I added a few things in there. Let me summarize them:

1) Doom 3 would not run.

2) Savage would not run.

3) Counter-Strike ran in software and D3D mode. Benches and screenshots are provided above. The game does not run in OpenGL mode.

4) Natural-Selection ran in D3D mode only, as it does not support software mode. See above.

5) I solved the ghosting/text blurring issue by using a VGA->DVI adapter and plugging my monitor into the DVI port. The text and 2D is nice and crisp now, and there are no issues.

Marsumane, I will see if I can get my hands on UT2k4, perhaps the demo.

I was pondering the results, and it appears that this card has issues running OpenGL games at the moment. I don't know what OCWorkbench was smoking when they said the card would run Doom 3. I'm actually starting to feel like their review is a lie. Savage, I believe, is OpenGL. If someone knows whether it is or not, that'd be great to add to the discussion so we can figure out what's going on.

I got the older HL-based games to run fine. The framerate is actually quite stable, unless you hit a really big action sequence. Then the game nearly comes to a halt. When this card takes a hurting, it takes it pretty badly. Other than that, gameplay was smooth.

 

[WT]

Refreshing to see a "off the beaten path" review here

Definitely .... I love quirky hardware, and you will only find some of those reviews in, of all places, the AT forums. Great writeup, great review and you did a helluva thorough review using old and new titles. You just received a 10 rating fom me for your effort.

Anand, hire this guy !!!!

 

[klah]

A new Volari driver has leaked. It may fix Doom3.

http://www.szlg.com/chinese/news/news/200410071.asp

Reactor driver 1.06.57 (beta)
http://www.szlg.com/download/v...ianGuan-V8_V5_V3XT.rar

 

[Avalon]

Originally posted by: WT

Refreshing to see a "off the beaten path" review here

Definitely .... I love quirky hardware, and you will only find some of those reviews in, of all places, the AT forums. Great writeup, great review and you did a helluva thorough review using old and new titles. You just received a 10 rating fom me for your effort.

Anand, hire this guy !!!!

I wish
Unfortunately, I don't believe I have the technical knowhow to become a reviewer of that calibur just yet. Thanks for the kind words, though. It really means a lot to me that so many people are enjoying and appreciating what I've written. I was really expecting my thread to be littered with "My 6800 Ultra blows this thing away, so who cares!" replies. I'm really glad I haven't seen any.

Thanks for the links Klah. I'll try those drivers out right away and report back.


*Edit*
I won't be able to use those beta drivers, as they are for the V3XT, and not the vanilla V3. I did find a site that is dedicatd to Volari news, so I'll be keeping track of that. Was that where you found those drivers? On the actual XGI site, there are beta drivers available to me. They are the 1.06.10 betas, as opposed to 1.06 WHQL. I'll give them a try and see if anything improves. Something needs to be done with this XGI card not being able to run OpenGL games. Other than that, I'm having a great time with it. This would actually be a very excellent card for people who don't play games and just want something to plug their LCD into or use TV/Out with on the cheap with good image quality.