"Radeon 9700 external power plug confirmed"

[Agent31]

A mate just sent me this link to an article on the inquirer...

http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=4299

I suppose ATI are just doing what they have to in order for their chip to work in your mobo and I can't bring myself to draw parallels between ATI's path and 3dfx's move right before their death since the R300 is supposedly going to knock your socks off... but... well, it's interesting!

[az]

Could you include an option like "I have no problems with an external power connector, but it makes me ware where all the power is going to go"?

AZ

[Jon P. Inghram]

I agree with that... it's not like the Voodoo 5 5500, or even worse... the monsterous Voodoo 5 6000.

Originally posted by az
Could you include an option like "I have no problems with an external power connector, but it makes me ware where all the power is going to go"?

AZ

[Agent31]

I think what ATI are doing is filling the hole in the market for case heaters.

[103er-Fan]

From the Article:
For those that can remember Voodoo 5500 cards, that also used this external power and worked just fine.

Now it would be interesting to see if they will go to use the PSU of comp (like the V5 5500 did) or an external solution like on the latest V5 6000 boards.
The solution with the V5 5500 was ok, but that also didn't need that much power, they only used a stand-alone power supply because many PSUs wouldn't have been able to handle the V5 6000.

That floppy connector on the R300 card looks like they are going to use the PSU of the PC, I am wondering what PSU would be the minimum for that card.
Especially people with Athlon XP 2100+, 2 HDDs, DVD drive, CD-RW, several case fans, and three PCI cards might need a pretty powerful PSU because of that card.


Oh, btw, I just remembered that there is also a GF4 Ti4600 (can't remembred who is producing it) which has to be connected to the PSU, maybe I can find a pic of it.

[RichL]

Just a thought, but the external power connector on the Voodoo5500 wouldnt have anything to do with it being available as either a PCI or an AGP card would it?
Can a PCI slot supply the same amount of power as an AGP slot? (bearing in mind the PCI / AGP spec's of the time.)

[103er-Fan]

Originally posted by RichL
Just a thought, but the external power connector on the Voodoo5500 wouldnt have anything to do with it being available as either a PCI or an AGP card would it?
Can a PCI slot supply the same amount of power as an AGP slot? (bearing in mind the PCI / AGP spec's of the time.)

I don't know about the PCI specs at the moment, but the PCI versions of the V5 5500 cards also had to be connected to the PSU.

[Tempest]

I know this is an ATi thread but...

Oh, No! The NV30 is coming (much later) !!! And it's finally going to have 3dfx tech!!! Oh No!!!

Current rumours from http://www.3dchipset.com/news.shtml

- Zero (0) performance cost using 4X FSAA
- 4-1 Colour Compression Technique
- 16 Textures/Pixel Per Pass
- 900MHz DDR is still a go
- Multi Chip capable
- Firewire Port

Number of chips in a multichip config is "an odd number, less than 8"

Now THAT might require a little more juice than your average AGP card...

[103er-Fan]

Re: I know this is an ATi thread but...

Originally posted by Tempest
Oh, No! The NV30 is coming (much later) !!! And it's finally going to have 3dfx tech!!! Oh No!!!

Current rumours from http://www.3dchipset.com/news.shtml

- Zero (0) performance cost using 4X FSAA
- 4-1 Colour Compression Technique
- 16 Textures/Pixel Per Pass
- 900MHz DDR is still a go
- Multi Chip capable
- Firewire Port

Number of chips in a multichip config is "an odd number, less than 8"

Now THAT might require a little more juice than your average AGP card...

Sounds interesting, but I am still not sure about that "Zero performance cost FSAA", I bet that it will be still ocsting performance.
Also I doubt that usual gamers will be able to buy any multichip solutions, I don't even want to know the price of a let's say 2xNV30 card with at least 256 MB RAM.

What I found even more interesting was the "Radeon 8500 MAXX" news right below that, I thought ATI didn't want to release anymore of their MAXX series cards?

[RichL]

Originally posted by 103er-Fan

I don't know about the PCI specs at the moment, but the PCI versions of the V5 5500 cards also had to be connected to the PSU.

Thats exactly what I meant - I have a Mac version of the Voodoo5500 spare at home and that has the same connector.

I've actually flashed the BIOS to make it a PC version, although running a 3dMark it came out only very slightly faster than my G400Max. I think perhaps the Mac versions were underclocked compared to the PC ones.

[103er-Fan]

Originally posted by RichL
I've actually flashed the BIOS to make it a PC version, although running a 3dMark it came out only very slightly faster than my G400Max. I think perhaps the Mac versions were underclocked compared to the PC ones.

No, all versions are clocked to 166/166 MHz, the same goes for all Voodoo4 cards, though I heard that the latest V5 6000 prototype was running at 183/183 MHz.
About the performance... usually you will need a fast CPU (above 900 MHz) to get more performance out of the VSA-100 cards, also they aren't performing well in 3dMark, especially 3dMark 2001 runs bad on them, the highest V5 5500 score I could find was something with 2700. They get even beaten by GF2 MX and MX-400 cards, though these MX things are much slower in the most actual games

[Drizzt]

Can you add the option:
"I have my floppy power plug connected to the floppy drive"?

[Agent31]

I can't change the voting options after they've been set... only one of our most gracious moderators could do that

<small>Don't hate me... I just put a Ti4200 in my machine</small>

[Greebe]

Better?