Who made the best moderatly priced videocard in 1995?

[AaronP]

I paid about $200 for a Matrox Millennium II and loved it! I loved Matrox's drivers, you could adjust refresh in 1hz increments! I had a SB AWE32 also, and loved it.

 

[ElFenix]

Guillemot: Maxi Gamer 3D, 3Dfx, Voodoo II Bought by Hercules
Hercules: Intense 3D, True 3D, Thriller 3D, Stingray Still around if you look hard enough

actually its the other way around, guillemot bought herc.

 

[erikistired]

Memories.... When I built my P200 in 95 (or was it early 96?)

i don't think you guys are going back far enough. the p200 wasn't even out yet. intel released the pentium 120 & 133 in 95, and the pentium pro 200 or so in 95. the 150 and 166 came in early 1996 and the 200 in october of 96. if there were pentiums there were probably pci cards, but i still think this predates the matrox mystique cards. maybe not tho, it's harder to find a timeline of video cards than it is cpus. the mystique wasn't a bad card, but the riva128 was even better. i got to run a pre-release card for a bit, and man was it cool.

still looking for video card history tho, this has got me thinking hard. i went off to college in the fall of 94 with a 486 pc, and i know where i was in 95, seems like i didn't replace my vesa video card til after i moved out of the dorms in late 95. who knows tho, my memory is a bit foggy.

~erik

interesting article from '98.

Here's a rundown of the current (04/20/1998) 3D chipsets/boards available on the market today. Remember, some cards will sacrifice speed for quality:

ATI Rage II+ - good low-end/entry level 2D/3D accelerator. It's definitely not the fastest 3D card available, but you can't beat the price.
ATI Rage PRO - mid-range performance and good 3D quality. 2D performance is also good.
S3 ViRGE series - Forget about them altogether for 3D. Poor quality and performance. They make decent 2D accelerator, but that's about it.
nVidia Riva128 - Excellent 2D/3D performance. One of the top performer available. 3D quality may not be as good.
Premedia 2 - Good 2D/3D performance. Really intended for OpenGL machines.
Rendition V2100 - Good 2D/3D performer with good 3D quality graphics.
Matrox Mystique/Millennium - Good for 2D business graphics, but not for 3D gaming; poor performance and quality.
Matrox Productiva G100 - Excellent 2D performance and good 3D performance. 3D quality may be somewhat compromised, but you get an 8MB SGRAM AGP card for retail $90!
Intel i740 - The newcomer developed by juggernaut Intel. Excellent 3D performance and outstanding quality. The i740 was aiming for high quality 3D graphics and it's right on target.
3Dfx Voodoo - This is for 3D only; you'll need another video card for 2D. In the gaming realm, the Voodoo is the de facto standard for 3D speed and quality.
3Dfx Voodoo2 - Currently the king of the hill. Screaming 3D performance and excellent 3D quality. You can even double your performance by using two Voodoo2 cards in SLI (scanline interleave) mode.
3D performance doubles roughly every 12 months. So by X'mas of 1998, a rash of newer and faster boards will out.

preview of the riva128 4/14/97:

nvidia has announced its 3rd generation product, the RIVA 128, for Real Time, Interactive and Video & Animation. WAVE has seen initial results from this chip and it raises the bar again in 3D and 2D performance. nvidia has done 180 degree turn away from a special implementation of the 3D pipeline with its nv1 and gone for the maximum performance it can get in a mass market part - $30 in quantity. At the time this report will be distributed the part will be only 2 weeks out of fab and early test results are significant - the fill rate is 100 Mpixels/sec with all features turned on.

matrox awards for 95.

PC Direct- January 1995
"Product of the year"
Impression Plus

PC Pro - July 1995
"Recommended"
Millennium 2Mb,PCI

Window User - September 1995
"Best on test"
Millennium

CD-ROM Now Magazine - December 1995
"Best Product"
Millennium

Personal Computer Magazine - December 1995
"Best h/w of '95"
Millennium

PC Magazine - December 1995
"Editor's Choice"
Millennium

nothing for the mystique til oct 96. btw if you write hardware reviews DATE THE FRIGGIN THINGS. thx.

 

[ultimatebob]

I would say that the cards that used the Rendition 1000 were the best deal for gamers back in late 1995. They were the first cards that had any 3D hardware acceleration, and the 2D image quality was good. It's too bad that Micron bought Rendition, because they ran that poor company into the ground.