Aww, my Matrox G400 retires from gaming...

[antdude]

I had to retire my slow Matrox G400 from my gaming machine because today's games were a bit choppy. However, the card has a new home in my Pentium II 300 Mhz Linux box. And wow, Linux looks awesome with this video card (had a Diamond Stealth64 3000 4 MB VRAM; PCI).

I sure do miss the dualhead because the Leadtek WinFast GeForce 2 Pro doesn't do the same TV out. I can't play video files and DVDs to the TV out while keeping my monitor running. That's the biggest gripe I have with this GeForce 2. Maybe I overlooked something, but I didn't see that option in WinTek's options. I guess this is where the Matrox is strong at.

[ayoub_ibrahim]

today's games were a bit choppy

hey antdude, what cpu are you using on your gaming rig??

[antdude]

Originally posted by ayoub_ibrahim

hey antdude, what cpu are you using on your gaming rig??

I have an Intel Pentium III 600 Mhz.

[Wombat]

Well, there's part of it then. I'm not trying to criticize, or say that what you did was wrong. I don't care, really.

But you should be aware that a G400 will have noticable speed improvements with CPU speed up to 800MHz or more.

[antdude]

Well, I wanted to run at 1280x1024 32-bit, full details, etc. for gaming . I had to run 16-bit at 800x600 to maintain decent FPS.

[xortam]

A faster processor would have helped. I've seen improvements on my Max going from a P!!!/850 to a P!!! Gigger. At 600 MHz, you still had plenty of gas left in your G400.

[antdude]

Originally posted by xortam
A faster processor would have helped. I've seen improvements on my Max going from a P!!!/850 to a P!!! Gigger. At 600 MHz, you still had plenty of gas left in your G400.

How much FPS did you get from 850 to 1 Ghz? I wonder how much FPS I would get in Q3A at 1024x768. Oh well, the card is still with me but on my P2 box .

[xortam]

I never benchmarked the improvement but we observed that it was noticeably smoother and more responsive. I'll try to run some quick benches if I get the chance.

[antdude]

Originally posted by xortam
I never benchmarked the improvement but we observed that it was noticeably smoother and more responsive. I'll try to run some quick benches if I get the chance.

Do I assume there will still be an improvement with a non-MAX G400? I have the regular model.

[Illusion[Spirit]]

One of the respectable hardware sites (Tomshardware I think) recently did a feature about CPU scaling with different video cards, and they found that above about 800MHz, the gfx card had a much larger affect on game performance than processor speed. ie there wasnt much difference between 800MHz and 1GHz with a Geforce2mx (for example), but there was a pretty huge difference between the mx and a GF2Pro/Ultra...

[xortam]

Originally posted by antdude


Do I assume there will still be an improvement with a non-MAX G400? I have the regular model.

I can only speculate as I've never run with the non-Max versions. Certainly, were in the range where higher performance 3D cards will have a greater impact on general gaming performance versus increasing the CPU power. I rather increase the CPU power and gain overall system performance and eek out the rest of what the Max has to offer versus buying a replacement video card. I'm now at the point where I've maxed out on the CPU and am awaiting a Max replacement within the next year.

[Wombat]

A regular G400? It should still benefit to 800MHz or more. After that, it starts to become fill-rate limited, and then OCing the G400 will help.

[sasa]

Man, dont be ridiculous. In 1280*1024*32 in any game younger than 2 years he aint gonna get nothing with faster processor. My G400 in Q3 had exactly the SAME FPS with my old celery 400@450 and now, 566@850. He can gain some fps only in 800 or lower res. Thats the fact, why are you all ignore it? I like and have G400, but lets be real. It is good but rather prehistoric card those days especially if you want to play new games in high res..

[Wombat]

Sasa, that means you have something else wrong with your system. I got a nice speed jump from my Athlon@750 to my Duron. And my Duron even gave me more speed going from 850 to 1GHz.

And I mean in Quake3, specifically. Half-Life is happier too, but you didn't bring that up.

[good health to all]

I just did a comparison between frame rates with:

PII 400
PIII 800
Hercules Prophet Geforce2 MX, Drivers: 21.81
Vanilla G400, Drivers: 5.52

My Specs:
256 MB RAM, Sound blaster live value
Win2000 sp2

Quake 3, 1.29f, High Quality, demo: FOUR.DM_66

PII 400 geforce2MX
49.6 fps @ 800x600
49.0 fps @ 1024x768

PII 400 G400
41.2 fps @ 800x600
35.2 fps @ 1024x768

PIII 800 geforce2MX
87.1 fps @ 800x600
64.0 fps @ 1024x768

PIII 800 G400
55.9 fps @ 800x600
36.4 fps @ 1024x768

This is for the curious.