Need upgrades for my Voodoo3 : D

[SonicIce]

Ok, so I got a Voodoo3 3000. Yeah, great card, I know. The only problem is, I only have a 300MHz celeron with no L2 cashe. It can run Quake 2 based games ok, but Quake III or Unreal Tournament is basically unplayable. My crappy motherboard only goes up to 300MHz, so I would like to know which motherboard and CPU I should buy. How fast could I go untill the Voodoo3 is maxed and any more power would be wasted? Where can I buy this old stuff? I have dual 64MB (128MB) sticks of ram, so I don't think that will be a bottleneck. If it is then I dont think I'll have too much trouble finding two 128 SDRAM's.

 

[Robor]

I'd have a look here

Go with something within your budget and you should come away happy. Good luck!

 

[SonicIce]

Originally posted by: Robor
I'd have a look here

Go with something within your budget and you should come away happy. Good luck!

Thanks but, anything there would be WAY to fast for my Voodoo3. Maybe something like a Pentium 3?

And don't think about giving me this crap about I need to upgrade. A 6800 Ultra will be outdated in a few months, and this thing will still be cool.

 

[MichaelD]

SonicIce,

I'm sure many of us can appreciate your frugality...but my friend, there comes a time when you've got to trade in the horse and buggy for an automobile, you know?

Your 300MHz Celeron is a steam powered automobile in an internal combustion engine world; none of the parts are interchangeable.

You NEED a newer PC, my friend. Do you have a budget in mind? If not, then your post is moot. Your Celeron rig is not upgradable, period.

 

[techwanabe]

Agree with MichaelD

I finally divested myself of my Voodoo 3 3000, which BTW, is the most I've ever paid for a video card ($180)!!! Yeah, I'm a cheapa$$ when it comes to video cards since then.

 

[SonicIce]

You can't even point me to a new mobo or cpu?

 

[Bateluer]

Originally posted by: MichaelD
SonicIce,
Your 300MHz Celeron is a steam powered automobile in an internal combustion engine world; none of the parts are interchangeable.

A 300Mhz cacheless celeron isn't even a steam powered automobile, it'd be faster to get out and walk.

Seriously, a Sempron 2200, a mobo, and 256MB of DDR400 RAM would run around 150ish. The Voodoo3 is pretty much an antique today, useless for almost all modern games. A 9800Pro can be had for less than 200. That brings a total cost to about 350. Not a bad cost for such an overall, quite a jump from the Celly.

 

[Boonesmi]

will the voodoo3 even work on modern boards? i thought it ran on higher voltage that isnt supported with 4x and 8x agp?

 

[Bateluer]

Originally posted by: SonicIce
You can't even point me to a new mobo or cpu?

Mobo 1 Asus A7V600-X

Mobo 2 Abit KV7

Sempron 2200

128x2 Kingston ValueRAM DDR400

 

[MichaelD]

Originally posted by: SonicIce
You can't even point me to a new mobo or cpu?

I can point you to countless combinations (as can most of the folks here at AT!) but we need a BUDGET. Assuming you have the following components to reuse:


1. An OS that is W2K or WinXP
2. Monitor
3. Keyboard
4. Mouse
5. Speakers


I can spec you out a sub-$500 system that will be 10x what you've got now.

 

[Robor]

Originally posted by: SonicIce

Originally posted by: Robor
I'd have a look here

Go with something within your budget and you should come away happy. Good luck!

Thanks but, anything there would be WAY to fast for my Voodoo3. Maybe something like a Pentium 3?

And don't think about giving me this crap about I need to upgrade. A 6800 Ultra will be outdated in a few months, and this thing will still be cool.

No offense but there's really no point in investing in a computer for you Voodoo3 - no matter how "cool" it is. But if you're dead set on a system for the V3 I'd suggest looking for something used. Go to a local computer shop and see if you can pickup something. If they still have any old P3's they'll probably let them go cheap.

 

[MichaelD]

Originally posted by: Boonesmi
will the voodoo3 even work on modern boards? i thought it ran on higher voltage that isnt supported with 4x and 8x agp?

Mwuahahahah!!! I am currently running a Voodoo3 PCI card in my server. Running W2K3 Enterprise, which happens to come w/a driver for this card. The video quality at 1280x960 is very good.

Granted, I can't game on it, nor would I try , but just for "server config screens" it's awesome.

I speak from experience on this card; I bought it in 1996...I think...for about $250. :eek;

 

[Boonesmi]

Originally posted by: MichaelD

Originally posted by: Boonesmi
will the voodoo3 even work on modern boards? i thought it ran on higher voltage that isnt supported with 4x and 8x agp?

Mwuahahahah!!! I am currently running a Voodoo3 PCI card in my server. Running W2K3 Enterprise, which happens to come w/a driver for this card. The video quality at 1280x960 is very good.

Granted, I can't game on it, nor would I try , but just for "server config screens" it's awesome.

I speak from experience on this card; I bought it in 1996...I think...for about $250. :eek;

i should have specified

i meant agp versions of voodoo3 (lol, i still use old matrox millenium 2mb pci cards in builds with athlonxp cpu's ) they are systems that only do office apps, plus it keeps people from gaming, lol

old voodoo3 agp cards are even keyed different then modern motherboards, so besides not being compatable voltage wise. heck it wont even be able to insert into an agp slot

 

[techwanabe]

Originally posted by: MichaelD
I speak from experience on this card; I bought it in 1996...I think...for about $250. :eek;

Are you sure about that date? I bought my Voodoo 3 3000 the same week they shipped nationwide spring of 1999. Or is my memory screwed up. I was working on a Superfund site in Coventry RI at that time and bought the Voodoo in a CompUSA in Warwick RI.

 

[Boonesmi]

Originally posted by: techwanabe

Originally posted by: MichaelD
I speak from experience on this card; I bought it in 1996...I think...for about $250. :eek;

Are you sure about that date? I bought my Voodoo 3 3000 the same week they shipped nationwide spring of 1999. Or is my memory screwed up. I was working on a Superfund site in Coventry RI at that time and bought the Voodoo in a CompUSA in Warwick RI.

yeah it was in the first couple months of '99

 

[MichaelD]

Hey, it was ages ago, AFAIC. Voodoo 3 is ancient history. You cant' play anything but the oldest of games at 800x600 on it.

 

[xxsk8er101xx]

they don't exist sonicIce. You won't be able to find them at your local store. Maybe check on ebay ... They all sell pentium 4/athlon xp/anthlon 64 boards with DDR RAM. No board uses EDO or PC100 ram anymore.

The cheapest radeon is faster then your voodoo. The cheapest pentium 4 is faster then your celeron. The cheapest RAM is faster and more abundent. The cheapest motherboard is more stable then your current one.

you can probably upgrade with these cheap parts for roughly 300 bucks. Throw in another 100 for a new case as you'll need it. 400 bucks to upgrade your dinosaur . Its not as bad as you think.

edit: i can't spell worth crap

Originally posted by: SonicIce
You can't even point me to a new mobo or cpu?

 

[Cawchy87]

Doesn't the voodoo use "old" style agp with the backwards slot? Thats why i couldn't use my voodoo3500 in my p4 system (that and stabiltiy)

 

[Boonesmi]

Originally posted by: Cawchy87
Doesn't the voodoo use "old" style agp with the backwards slot? Thats why i couldn't use my voodoo3500 in my p4 system (that and stabiltiy)

yeah they are keyed different, so not physically compatable

 

[sirfergy]

Just get the cpu/mobo combo from fry's for like $70.

 

[thermalpaste]

GO for a socket A motherboard and an athlon-xp. See if you can get yourself an athlon-xp 2000+, its out of stock mostly because they have stopped producing it, but you may be able to get it for something like $40 and a decent motherboard for around $40-$45. You can also go for PC-2700 DDR-RAM. The good thing is that the onboard graphics card will be better than your antiquated voodoo-3, so you can bid adeiu to your V-3. If your still in love with your voodoo-3, then shove it down the slot and be prepared for a sloppy gaming experience.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Originally posted by: techwanabe
Are you sure about that date? I bought my Voodoo 3 3000 the same week they shipped nationwide spring of 1999. Or is my memory screwed up. I was working on a Superfund site in Coventry RI at that time and bought the Voodoo in a CompUSA in Warwick RI.

LOL. I used to buy stuff from there, when I lived in RI. Did you ever visit "DG's Arcade", down the street? It used to have wonderful painted murals, and had a bunch of Sega sit-down simulator games, all for like a single quarter. It was heaven.. until they tore it down and put in a tires-sales place. Bastards!!!

Later, I was working for a vendor that did computer shows, and we would sometimes visit the college campus in that area for the shows too. If you ever went to some of those shows, you might have seen me. Or maybe not. Mwhahaha. I remember, we sold them for like $250 or so, for the high-end V3 3500 TV AGP model.

Sorry for the slight OT, OP.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Originally posted by: xxsk8er101xx
The cheapest radeon is faster then your voodoo.

At least in UT, a Radeon 7500 PCI is about the same as a V3 3000 AGP. A TNT PCI is half the speed. (TNT requires two passes to render.) A GF2 MX AGP is a tad bit faster than any of those prior cards.

A V3 3000 is pretty obsolete nowadays, in terms of driver support, etc. But if you wanted to set up an old-school gaming rig, using like a Pentium II/III and a i440BX chipset, V3 AGP, and some SDRAM, go for it. You should probably stick with Win98se as well, it always had better driver support for the V3 than NT-based OSes. You could also play DOS-based games that supported the Voodoo cards with that kind of rig. An ISA SB16 or SB Awe64 value or possibly a PCI Aureal Vortex2 card would be the perfect complement for the system.

Would it be worth spending money in the end to put something like that together? Well, unless there was a game that you really wanted to play, that wasn't compatible with today's systems, then no, most likely not. Could get a cheap NF2-based system with integrated GF MX video, 256MB DDR, onboard sound/LAN, and a cheap Athlon for under $200 easily, that would play all but the very-newest games. (FarCry, Doom3, HL2, etc.)

 

[SonicIce]

Maybe I forgot to mention that this PC is by no means meant to play todays games. I just want to have it around to play old Glide games. I'll be building a Athlon 64 3200+ and 6800GT rig soon for new stuff. I think I can get a CPU/mobo for less than $100 for 5 year old technology.

Edit: It's a PCI Voodoo3, if that wont work with any motherboards then i'll just forget the whole thing.

 

[Boonesmi]

Originally posted by: SonicIce
Maybe I forgot to mention that this PC is by no means meant to play todays games. I just want to have it around to play old Glide games. I'll be building a Athlon 64 3200+ and 6800GT rig soon for new stuff. I think I can get a CPU/mobo for less than $100 for 5 year old technology.

Edit: It's a PCI Voodoo3, if that wont work with any motherboards then i'll just forget the whole thing.

yeah, if its PCI then it should work with any new boards