My experience with both a Voodoo5 5500 and a Geforce 2 GTS 32 MB

[edm]

Not that anyone cares but here goes...

Let me first start by saying I have no bias toward either 3Dfx or Nvidia, none!.

In replacing the 5500 which I had installed for a couple weeks but was a little unhappy with, I purchased and installed a Leadtek GTS card and it is running a whole lot smoother than the 5500 did, and not that the 5500 is a bad card, but I just expected it to be able to play games like SOF, NHL2001, Midtown Madness, Mech Warrior 4, NOLF, etc. at 1024x768 32 bits without any major slow downs. Instead I got major slow downs (No FSAA) in SOF, NOLF, Midtown Madness, and MW4. NHL played well but only with the Details turned down to mid range or so.

The GTS on the other hand plays smooth in SOF, even in major battle seens, that slowed down the 5500 significantly. All my other games are playing noticeably faster too.

In any case, below are some benchmarks I ran...

PIII 500
128 Ram
40 GB 7200
Win98 SE
TNT2 V770D (3.63 reference Driver's DX 7.0a)
Voodoo5 5500 (1.04 drivers DX 7.0a)
LeadTek Geforce2 GTS w/ TV out (6.31 reference dirvers DX7.0a)

NOTES:

1) I also tested both under DX8 but got slightly slower marks for each.
2) Also tested the 5500 with the new beta 1.04.1 drivers but also got slightly slower marks than with the 1.04 drivers.
3) Also Tested with the HSR feature in the beta drivers and found little performance gains (2-3 FPS) in resolutions under 1024x768, I did gain about 10-15 FPS in 1280x1024 and 1600x1200 with 3 HSR but the game was unplayable, missing walls, all objects flashing in and out, so those gains are really for not. (and yes I know they're only beta drivers)
4) As far as FSAA goes I honestly like the picture quality more with this feature off, just seems sharper to me, where as FSAA made the picture too soft and a bit washed out for my liking, not too mention the speed hit.
5) Before I tested each card I formatted my hard drive and did a clean install of Win98SE so there was no chance of any driver conflicts.

My tests

Quake 3 Test

WinMark2000

 

[nitrousninja]

I V5500 is very cpu dependant. If you had a faster cpu like 700mhz or more you would have yielded much better results with it.

 

[Kingofcomputer]

From 3dmark result database,
you can see that
nvidia card is cpu independent,
3dfx and ati is very cpu dependent.

 

[AdamK47]

I also have both a Voodoo 5 5500 and a 32MB Leadtek GeForce 2 (Plus a Radeon 32MB DDR and a Kyro 32MB). With my 1GHz CPU, the Voodoo 5 performs very well in those games with even 4X FSAA on.

 

[Animal -OCXL-]

I am running a duron at 1ghz and 256mb of ram.
I also replaced a voodoo5 with a geforce2 32mb recently.

mixed experience.

the geforce is faster in most games like NOLF and Aces High (online sim I play)
the voodoo5 was actually faster with fsaa enabled. for example, I could run Crimson Skies
with 2x anti aliasing in voodoo5 very very smooth and in the gf i notice a fps drop
an interesting case was the mech4 was faster in the voodoo5 even with 2x anti aliasing
in the geforce the game is slower by default but it looks much better. Mech4 uses AGP a lot
so that would explain why it looks better on the gf, but I dont know why it runs slower.

NOLF is simply much better on the gf

I have to say with no bias that both cards are very good, and there is no clear winner
if you like FSAA, the voodoo5 is key. It is faster with it, much faster. And according to some people
it looks better with FSAA, I couldnt tell a difference between them with fsaa.
The GeForce is faster on most games and has less problems, looks better too. Thats without FSAA.

 

[RoboTECH]

yeah, no doubt

on a 500 MHz CPU, the GTS will really own the 5500.

On a stronger CPU, the 5500 does a real nice job.

But...to each his/her own.

 

[Spoooon]

Atleast this is a civilized thread concerning the merits of both cards, rather than the bashing prevalent in others.

 

[Mem]

LOL... Spoooon you know what some 3dfx fans are like you mention just once the Geforce can do this better then a 3dfx card & they all start throwing fits,if it`s the otherway round no-one really worries about it ,you know some 3dfx fans are there worst own enemy,maybe they should take a page out of the Matrox fans & just be happy without trying to flame every other brand.

 

[Nesta]

edm-

Did you spend time with the tweaking utilites provided in the new V5 drivers? I wasn't impressed until understanding and changing these options to suit my preferences.

 

[DannyLove]

wow, this thread really helped me in grasping the idea of which card is best depending on cpu. This i didnt know. I've been planning on getting a voodoo 5 or gf. but i needed more info on which card was best, and at what cost. I've also been planning on getting a p3, and now i know that if i get v5 then i should have a decent cpu. thanks guys. now here's a question.

what p3 is best with what motherboard?
or what amd is best with what motherboard?

keep in mind i'm aiming for about 800mhz, not counting overclocking. thanks.!



Danny

 

[SirFshAlot]

.

 

[han888]

i have an experience too, swap my asus v7700 with voodoo5 and feel happy here!

 

[RoboTECH]

Danny Love, MSI right now is, IMHO, the "king" of motherboards

P3-700 cC0 stepping should hit 1000+ easily. Check my sig - MSI BXMaster. I hit 1050, but my PCI NIC and burner aren't real pleased with that. If I disable them for gaming only, it runs like a cheetah

MSI won the Athlon crown in Anand's recent mobo roundup. MSI K7T Pro2 (or 2a) are top notch.

and a 700+ CPU is more than enough guts for the 5500, especially if you overclock.

 

[edm]

Nesta-

I played around a bit with the HSR on all 3 settings (2,3,4) but didn't get any huge performance gains. With that said, from what I heard this too is also CPU dependant and maybe with a faster processor (700 +) I'd have seen better performance.

I understood that the GTS was not as heavily dependant on the CPU as the 5500 was, so that did play a big part of me swapping cards as I don't plan on upgrading my CPU for another year of so, or at least until the 1 GHZ chips drop in price to a sub $200-$250 level. So in the mean time the GTS is a better fit for me.

I think we should all just hope both companies are around and producing quality cards or chips for a long time to come, having only one major player in the gaming card business will not help anyone. And now with ATI in the mix, three companies fighting for our consumer dollars we can only expect to see better cards at better prices.

 

[Nesta]

edm

Yes, let's hope all 3 companies are around to drive innovation.

I haven't tried the HSR betas yet, therefore, I can't speak to their performance. My cpu is running at 980, so the V5 is smooth. I'm referring to the advanced tweaks, i.e. FSAA on/off, LOD, and such. There are a few sites around that have guides up to help extrapolate these.

I switched from a CL DDR. I was considering a Radeon 32DDr, but the driver support was lacking for Win2K. For $150, I'm very happy with the performance of the V5.

 

[Shocker]

This thread like others has helped me to decide what video card I'll be getting after the new year. I have a classic slotA 900mhz CPU so the Voodoo5 5500 seems to be the choice.
Thanks.