Video card advances are stagnant without 3dfx

[nealh]

Without competition this area of PC hardwareis going nowhere fast IMHO...

ATI..has basically nothing new recently....I hope there next generation is big bump up...this is not ot say the Radeon 8500 is not a nice card....Nvidia...has not done much IMHO also

It is so sad...

 

[harbinger52]

I think things are going to get interesting with Matrox latest announcments and creative getting back into it. I really think the past year has been boring. I wanna see this Surround gaming! I wish game advances would come faster and force video cards to improve in other ways than clock speeds.

 

[MithShrike]

I agree with you there, but as we all know... 3dfx was lagging behind towards their end... It's just too bad neh?

 

[BFG10K]

Video card advances are stagnant without 3dfx

I disagree completely. Take a look around you at the video cards we have and look at the quality of gaming we're getting from them.

 

[earthman]

Video cards already perform far beyond what most games and monitors can handle anyway, whats the point? So what if the gForce4 can run Quake 3 at 300 frames per second? My monitor will only show 85 at 1200X1600, so who cares? Games need to be better, not faster. Too many games look great but suck to play. OS's and drivers need to be much more stable too. All that needs to come before more horsepower.

 

[HowDoesItWork]

Quake 3 really isn't a good measure though. The game is almost, what, 3 years old now? There are games that even a g4 can't run at 85 fps at 1600x1200 (especially with FSAA engaged). Heck some of the newer games I can't even pull 40 fps with a g4 at those settings. So the power does matter, just not if you are playing really old games on your computer.

Also, 3dfx only went belly up about 2 years ago. Since then we have had advances, and not just in raw power. Look at the directx 8 features, there have been real advances.

Don't forget why 3dfx went out as well. They started releasing products that were not keeping up with the competition. For a while they could do this, they had glide entrenched and a huge market advantage. But they could only get away with it for a couple cycles. The TnT put Nvidia on the map, the TnT2 really put them in the lead position, the original Geforce put 3dfx in a coffin and 3dfx's 'come-back' card (the V5) was 6+ months late on release and didn't compete with Nvidia in price OR performance. Game over.

 

[merlocka]

OMG

ATI..has basically nothing new recently

Yeah, they only have a $99 card which plays every game out there with excellent visual quality, as well as driving new features such as n-patches, advanced forms of FSAA, etc...

Have you ever looked at some of the demo's nVidia and ATI code for their top-tier cards? These cards are capable of some pretty awesome stuff.

It's the software that's lacking. Games selling right now need to run on TnT, Rage128, and Voodoo3 class hardware to sell. It's very difficult to scale a game such that it will play acceptable on that hardware and take advantage of the latest features in NV25 and R200 class hardware.

My monitor will only show 85 at 1200X1600, so who cares?

People who don't use vsync.

 

[nealh]

I figured many would disagree with me..I am glad..always good to start an interesting discussion...

I should clearify my opinion a bit..I have an ATI Radeon 64 mg card...I think games look very nice...but the hardware FSAA we saw with V5 was fantastic and IMHO instead of building on these feature it has been lost some...ATI truform looks very promising but I little about it..is it working well....

losing the jagged edges would be nice in games...better curves and less box appearances would be nice..

It just seems the innovation is not there with less competition..I was not suggesting 3dfx was that great in the end ..the screwed up and there product line was not as strong as Nvidia..although my V5 5500 was the best card for gaming overall that I have had....the 22 bit color was good but 32 bit would have been better

maybe the software is not keeping up maybe I am just way off

 

[Tominator]

The current crop of cards have just recently equaled the V5 in FSAA and are still lacking in 2D.

3DFX did not fail because of inferior products but bad business practices.

You WISH you could get the cash from you old XXX card that V5s still are bringing!

One big reason that programs and cards are not evolving in the leaps and bounds of the past, is need. There isn't a game or program that really taxes any newer video card.
In the past I upgraded everey few months, now....well..why upgrade at all? So you can brag about frame rates?:disgust:

 

[Weyoun]

I totally agree with Tominator on this issue. The capability and features of today's high-tier video cards are amazing - vertex and pixel shaders offer an entirely new level of flexability to programming style and effects, and are beginning to be able to use (IMHO) highly inefficient rendering techs such as FSAA. While I can see your point about an apparent lack of diversity, the problem really lies in the software, not hardware. I don't claim to be an expert, but how many games can you name that make heavy use of pixel and vertex shaders? Furthermore, when was the first DX8 card released?

OpenGL 2.0 and general shader languages would be a definite move forward here - GPU companies need to spend more time consulting gaming and rendering firms. If these companies are able to bridge the gap between software and hardware (through easy to use APIs), they just may be able to ensure their own existance as well as a larger potential customer base. This is where nVidia have really excelled - I haven't seen another graphics company that has such a thorough devrel site.

 

[Instagib]

Originally posted by: BFG10K

Video card advances are stagnant without 3dfx

I disagree completely. Take a look around you at the video cards we have and look at the quality of gaming we're getting from them.

I tend to agree with BFG on this one. Look at what's comin as well. I think your expectations are too high. If anything it's the software thats
laggin a little. I wish UT 2003 was out already. I need some gibs ya know.

 

[Instagib]

You WISH you could get the cash from you old XXX card that V5s still are bringing!

That's a lame comeback considering the only reason there holding any value is cause you cannot buy one new.

 

[hans007]

there arent any games that will reallyuse all that speed anyways. i've got a radeon 8500, and a p4 2.2 ghz (well soon to be). I'm soon going to have a 15" LCD panel to go with it. with that i can only run 1024x768 so for me i dont think it really matters. i'll just turn all the options up and be totally happy with 1024x768

 

[Tominator]

Originally posted by: Instagib

You WISH you could get the cash from you old XXX card that V5s still are bringing!

That's a lame comeback considering the only reason there holding any value is cause you cannot buy one new.

Tseng Labs ET6000 cards have not been made for over 5 years....You can't give them away even though their 2D is still top notch by today's standards.


Buy new V5 5500s? Oh, yes you can!

How many do you want? If the features were old and the card out of date before it even came out and with nearly no driver support, why is the demand there?

 

[merlocka]

why is the demand there?

perhaps because "a fool and his money are soon parted"

 

[VC15]

Does anyone know if a GF4 video card + the latest PC game can hold a candle to any of the XBox games, which "Virtualy" have the same hardware? It seems that console games throw a shitload of polygons around the screen while PC games have these Lego-Block man walking around

 

[Soulkeeper]

i agree stupid lego block men
i tellya

 

[MithShrike]

Aye, the XBox is pretty much a P3 system with GF3 graphics and have you guys SEEN those games? Hell, most of the PC games I see out there still look like something the PS1 had! WHY aren't these developers expanding into the PC market? The hardware is far more capable and there should be no reason why we don't have games that look like that.

 

[Alch]

Originally posted by: VC15
Does anyone know if a GF4 video card + the latest PC game can hold a candle to any of the XBox games, which "Virtualy" have the same hardware?

The xbox is based off an advanced GF3 core, so a GF4 is technically somewhat superior in performance and features to the xbox chipset.

I think the current crop of games out are far superior to xbox games. The problem with pc games is that developers need to make their games work with a wide range of hardware, unlike xbox developers who know exactly what every customer has under the hood so its eaiser to make their games look nicer.

On the topic of competition in video chipsets...I feel its pretty strong at the moment. But even when there was practically no competition for nvidia (after 3DFX went under, ATI had nothing to compete with Nvidia), Nvidia still innovated in their hardware designs.

Competition does not usually bring about the new features everyone wants...demand does that - this is especially evident these days where the true value of a cards feature set is its directx compliance. Instead, the main benefit of competition is that it forces hardware developers to make their cards cheaper and more economical to build then their competitors...which inturn advances overall hardware performance.

This was 3DFX's problem. They thought they reigned supreme and therefore had a very poor R&D staff developing new hardware manufacturing techniques due to lack of funding. Their hardware cost to much to build, and it drove them bankrupt.

Thats my $0.02

 

[VC15]

Originally posted by: Alch

Originally posted by: VC15
Does anyone know if a GF4 video card + the latest PC game can hold a candle to any of the XBox games, which "Virtualy" have the same hardware?

The xbox is based off an advanced GF3 core, so a GF4 is technically somewhat superior in performance and features to the xbox chipset.

I think the current crop of games out are far superior to xbox games. The problem with pc games is that developers need to make their games work with a wide range of hardware, unlike xbox developers who know exactly what every customer has under the hood so its eaiser to make their games look nicer.

I agree that the GF4 cards probably outperform the XBox's quailty in textures/fill-rates etc... but i think the amount of polygons thrown in PC games is too low to my taste, that is my only real beef with PC games.

I installed RTCW on an old P2-300 System with a Voodoo3 card, and it ran at 12-20 FPS. LOL Sure it wasn't fun to play but it was still running. The game looked like crap though. I just wonder how far back are the developers going to support old hardware? Are they going to still support P2-300's? or are they moving on up to P3-500's? So if i get a P4-2.26Gig CPU will i have to wait 4 years before they code games for that CPU?

 

[Tominator]

Originally posted by: merlocka
why is the demand there?

perhaps because "a fool and his money are soon parted"

Or just maybe because the 2D is still unequaled. Drivers were right the first time. Compare that to weekly release of buggy drivers by the competition.

The only 'fools' involved were the people that mismanaged 3DFX and caused it's demise.

 

[HowDoesItWork]

"Buy new V5 5500s? Oh, yes you can!

How many do you want? If the features were old and the card out of date before it even came out and with nearly no driver support, why is the demand there?"

Ah, did you think about that before you wrote it? If the demand was that high, why do they still have new cards on the shelves? They went out of production a long while ago, no? So the fact that you can buy a new V5 seems like proof that the card was not in demand, not the other way around.

The only time I have ever seen anyone recommend a V5 was for people who didn't have an AGP slot. You could get a V5 PCI and slap that baby in there....

 

[Mday]

attn dumbass, the only thing innovative 3dfx did was 3d acceleration. that was all. all that other stuff already existed.

 

[sodcha0s]

attn dumbass, the only thing innovative 3dfx did was 3d acceleration. that was all. all that other stuff already existed.

What about SLI? Nobody else did it, and it was pretty innovative if you ask me. 3dfx screwed up big time when they decided to go into the board business. They had the best all around products, bar none. (well, except the voodoo rush) You bought the card, put it in your machine, installed the drivers, and it worked, period. Also, they were going in a toatally different direction design-wise from everyone else, and if they would have just stuck to what they were best at I think they would still be right up at the top.

 

[nealh]

I agree never should have tried to manufacture the boards..lost sight of what was their core business...board design and production requires knowledge they lacked.....very sad...

It is true their boards were awesome in their ability to work with almost any game even after glide was gone...Glide was a very good API they should have licensed or something....