Optimization Tips for my voodoo 5 PCI ?

[Duckers]

I bought a voodoo 5 PCI for my old computer, and I am not quite satisfied with its performance
I can't complain because it is at least better than my old riva 128, fsaa is nice, and I didn't pay a lot of money for it.

This computer has a Celeron 400 Mhz and 192 MB of RAM. I was laughing when I was getting not more than 15 fps in Q3TA, lol

Any optimization tip, other than buying a new computer / new components would be appreciated!

 

[Mule]

First of all the limiting factor is your CPU, your money would have been better spent on a new CPU rather then a new video card.

At this point your V5 is providing far more power then your celery can handle. Not much you can do really.

 

[Wingznut]

What settings are you getting 15fps?

 

[Tates]

Duckers,

Here's an article you might enjoy:


3d Spotlight's Voodoo4/5 Tweak Guide

Good Luck!!

 

[Sukhoi]

I believe since you're so CPU limited you should be able to crank up the graphics a ways before noticing much of a slowdown.

BTW, I have a Celeron 433 with a Voodoo3 3000 PCI, so I know your pain.

 

[Duckers]

Well, the settings I am using in quake are: 1024x 768, gl extensions on, lighting: lightmap, billinear, and everything else default or 16 bit.

What kind of perfomance boost should I expect if I upgrade to a p3 500-600 Mhz?

 

[LXi]

Turn off "Marks on wall" that thing is useless and I get 10 extra fps after that, play around with other game options like "High quality skies" and "Simple items" to get more fps.

 

[Tates]

Duckers,

Try 800x600 with FSAA set at 2x.

 

[Sukhoi]

Good suggestion. FSAA is all graphics card based, right? If so, that should really help him since he's still CPU limited at 800x600 and the Voodoo5 should have enough power left over to do atleast 2x FSAA.

 

[GoldenTiger]

Also, get WickedGL and the x3dfx.com HSR drivers. The wickedgl will help around your CPU's limitations, and the Hidden Surface Removal drivers (set the setting between 2 and 4, depending on how badly it artifacts in Q3; I've tested in Half-Life, Counter-Strike, Unreal Tournament, Starcraft, Diablo II, Age of Empires 2, Need For Speed series, and several others with no problems, but I don't own Quake 3 so I don't know how it will react. I know the beta HSR drivers hated Q3, but the x3dfx.com ones are made by a third party and seem to work fine for me, whereas the beta 3dfx ones didn't work for me. Give them a shot and see what happens, worst thing that can happen is you just don't use the HSR . More likely, however, you will double your framerate. HSR works by removing anything you can't see that is normally rendered, for example: You're running into a room that has a doorway tunnel, but you can only see into the very tail-end of the tunnel. Normally, your card would be rendering the entire tunnel, the room after the tunnel, and any rooms below the floor you're standing on that would be in sight if no floor/wall existed, sucking up graphics power for things you don't even see! With the HSR drivers, it detects what you can't see and tells the card not to render it, resulting in significant performance increases. I went from sometimes dropping to 40fps during firefights in CS to having my drops go only down to 70ish FPS on my system (Voodoo 5 5500 64MB AGP, PIII 700, 192MB RAM); I'm guessing you'll have similar results .

 

[Sukhoi]

Does the improved HSR still only run in OpenGL? Or will it also work in Direct3D and Glide now?