Announcement

**tish beta2** · 1 October 1999, 02:38

And the fish is back yet again to corrupt another thread

Forget it. They have no chance whatsoever in creating another driverset for yet another OS. The win9x drivers are still buggy, win2k is just around the corner, NT lost a year ago, and well, why on earth should big M do anything about that now?

Yes I know they've "improved" lately in driver dev/driver supp, but if you look at the big picture, not much has actually changed... They'r same old Matrox with same old ideologistics.

Lastly, how can they aquire yet another OEM deal? they have almost stopped selling through dristributors because of limited production capabilities.

Let's see though, that turboGL thing might be a hit... I'm only afraid of possible bugs it may introduce.

Now I must continue with my plan on how to become a beta tester.. hmmm.... hmmm

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I'd rather be rich than stupid.

**Maggi** · 1 October 1999, 05:06

Hi KvH,

did you notice the G4 has AGP2x and comes with an ATI ???

I'm pretty sure big M is doing something on that topic, because they already have drivers for the former G3 to work with G200 PCI ...

I will get a G4 in mid November for my departement and you can bet that I will ask Matrox for drivers supporting the G400 ...

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Cheerio,
Maggi
________________________
Asus P2B-DS @ 103MHz FSB
2x P3-450 @ 464MHz
512MB CAS2 SDRAM
Millenium G400 32MB DH

**Ant** · 1 October 1999, 05:59

If you look at the real big picture and not just the last year you would see that up until the G200 Matrox had the best driver support by far. Matrox would always make a quality driver release every 6 to 8 weeks for all their supported OSs: Windows 3x, Windows 9x, Windows NT 3x, Windows NT 4, Windows Alpha, OS/2 and Mac OS. Matrox reorganised at about the time they launched the G200s and that is where things went wrong. Unfortunately market forces have driven them to become a little too Windows 9x/gaming centric for my liking but I suppose they have to go where the money is. I hope they get back to what they were. I and the MURC have now been around for 4 years so have seen it all with Matrox, they didn't begin with the G200.

**LAMFDTK** · 1 October 1999, 06:25

Maggi what color are you gonna get??...oh damm the G4 is only silver, shoot....thats no fun

**Filmgeek** · 1 October 1999, 20:27

I think you nailed it on the head, Ant. My first Matrox card was Millennium I. And I loved it, screaming fast 2D, superior picture quality and constantly updated drivers that almost always increased performance or stability. Sure its 3D capabilities were nonexistant (by today's standards), but that wasn't a real concern until 3dfx changed everything. (I'm not a big fan of 3dfx, but they did cause huge changes in the videocard market).

So, even though the Millennium II and the Mystique weren't even close to competing with other cards as far as 3D, I still had respect for Matrox because I thought they made quality product and drivers were always top notch. Then I got a Marvel G200, and I'm still dumbfounded as to what the hell happened.

Even most cheap P.O.S. noname brand $50 videocards have had better driver support than Matrox cards have had recently. I've heard about this "reorganization" several times, but this seems to be the wrong term. I wish somebody would really write an indepth story about what happened, why it happened, and if Matrox is truly ever going to be the same company that I used to admire.

Getting back to this thread's topic, well, I think making drivers and cards for Mac is just fine, but I don't see how they can support Mac if they can't even support Windows properly.

Filmgeek

[This message has been edited by Filmgeek (edited 10-02-1999).]

**RoGuE** · 2 October 1999, 07:41

Hardware wise the G4 Mac looks impressive. Shame MacOS sucks big time.

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aka Chris H

**rickn** · 2 October 1999, 07:41

OS X will kick

**tish beta2** · 2 October 1999, 08:56

3dfx, but they did cause huge changes in the videocard market

Nah, I'd rather say the commersial technology reached an acceptable level for that sort of idea.

Matrox reorganised at about the time they launched the G200s and that is where things went wrong.

A-ha! so when the "3d accelerator era" had just taken off, big M decided to jump on the wave. What else could they do? Continue making cards just for linux and workstations? nah, they desided to throw themselves into the gaming bouqé and go for jackpot.

But then they couldn't get a hold of any good OGL driver developer, like nvidia did (they have a very skilled one). The G200 lost grandly, but they returned strong with the G400.

I hope they get back to what they were.

With that I hope you mean the driver thing. Not the not-so-commersial thing. I want that G400 Max to work in win2k so badly you wouldn't know. Ok you might have a little clue after all my postings...

up until the G200 Matrox had the best driver support by far.

And they still do. They are very much exactly the same as they were. Or shall I say, what they were. 2D is one thing, the G200 needed an OpenGL, that's another thing.

Dammit I can play all my 2D games (except Tiberian Sun) in windows 2000 with no bugs whatsoever (uhm as far as I've played).

You know what I would like to see? a list over which games work in win2k, on what hardware! anyone know of such a thing? :O

btw, what's windows alpha? windows NT running on an alpha?

[This message has been edited by tish beta2 (edited 10-02-1999).]

**KvHagedorn** · 3 October 1999, 19:35

Here it goes back to page 1.. Haig, do you have any idea if Matrox is going to do this?

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Kind Regards,

KvH

**Haig** · 3 October 1999, 19:49

Can't comment.

Regards,

Haig

**tish beta2** · 4 October 1999, 01:36

He can't comment, but now he knows it. So, then he might tell the big M leader-hut about the idea. But, honestly, they MUST have evaluated this a loong loong time ago (when they heard the name Power PC G4 )

Damn even settlers 3, darkreign, transport tycoon and railroad tycoon 2 works in win2k! good thing they vere 2D

**Jutai** · 5 October 1999, 09:24

i was thinking the same thing when i saw the g4 with an ati i thought Matrox can mop the floor!! but i know the OS sucks voodoo with their super framerate madness couldn't do as well on a g3 as a celeron or amdk62 pci sucks compared to the higher bandwidth agp but we know that wasn't the only problem maybe the Velocity engine has some really good commands eh hem (turbo gl)as it looks faster and more advanced than the sse and 3dnow based streaming simd commands. Matrox jump on-board the train is moving... Or maybe you already have..??..

huh haig?
you go big daddy Matrox!

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-Chris K.

**Hodge Podge** · 5 October 1999, 10:55

Before you run out and pick up that G4 take a look at this article explaining why the consumer level G4 will provide very little performance increase over the latest G3.

http://www.computoredge.com/sandiego/Editorial/mac.htm

HP

[This message has been edited by Hodge Podge (edited 10-05-1999).]

**tish beta2** · 5 October 1999, 15:22

yes, it's like having a 3d accelerator without software support for it... *hint* g200+ogl *hint*

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