NEWSPAGE DEUTSCH RIVASTATION - There“s something FISHY when you can read this!

15.11 - Napalm & Co

Voodooextreme hat schonmal die 3dfx Pressrelease auf einem europäischen 3dfx Server finden können:

3dfx Interactive® Inc. (NASDAQ: TDFX) today announced the first implementation of its new Voodoo Scalable Architecture technology. The initial advanced processor, the VSA-100™, is a highly scalable design that supports the integration of one to 32 chips per system, using proprietary programmable scan-line interleaving (SLI) techniques, to deliver ultimate fill rates and high visual reality through breakthrough digital cinematic effects. Additionally, the VSA-100 architecture substantially improves the overall 3D rendering quality by incorporating advanced full-scene anti-aliasing technology, available for the first time at real-time frame rates and consumer prices.

The Company also announced the Voodoo4™ and Voodoo5™ board products based on the VSA-100 processor. Voodoo4 and Voodoo5 are expected to ship in March, 2000.

At the heart of the VSA-100 is a new advanced 3D engine which enables extremely high fill rates. Sustaining high fill rate is critical to deliver real-time frame rates at high resolution, with significant depth complexity, digital effects and the highest visual quality. For the consumer market, products based on the VSA-100 deliver from 333 megatexels/megapixels per second up to 1.47 gigatexels/gigapixels per second fill rates using 16-128 MB of video memory and one to four processors per board. In the professional market, Quantum3D will manufacturer systems that will utilize eight to thirty-two VSA-100 processors and 128 MB to two gigabytes of video memory to attain fill rates greater than three gigatexels/gigapixels per second in their Aalchemy product line.

The VSA-100, composed of over 14 million transistors, is fabricated in an enhanced .25 micron, 6-layer metal semiconductor process. The architecture incorporates industry standard 3D features including 32-bit RGBA rendering, 24-bit depth-buffer (Z and W), 8-bit stencil rendering, DXTC and FXT1 texture compression support, 32-bit textures, 2048x2048 texture size support, and advanced texture and color combine capabilities. Additional support is provided for both AGP 4x and PCI, DVD hardware assist, and the world’s most powerful 128-bit 2D engine. All VSA-100-based products include support for all major APIs including DirectX®, OpenGL® and GLIDE® providing the highest possible software compatibility. The VSA-100 is designed for optimal performance on current and future CPUs from Intel and AMD.

The Voodoo4 family of products feature single-chip implementations of the VSA-100 architecture and are targeted to deliver great performance at mainstream prices. The Voodoo4 4500 will be available in both PCI and AGP versions, and will feature a single VSA-100 processor and 32 MB of graphics memory. The boards, which render two fully featured pixels per clock, will deliver between 333 and 367 megatexels/megapixels per second fill rates and are expected to be priced at $179.99*.

The Voodoo5 family of products feature multi-chip implementations of the VSA-100 architecture including both dual-chip and quad-chip configurations. The multi-chip capabilities of the VSA-100 allow for the first time, true full-scene, hardware anti-aliasing at real-time frame rates. True full-scene anti-aliasing removes visual artifacts, such as “jaggies” and triangle “popping,” to create smooth images that create a substantially improved immersive experience for the viewer. Additionally, Voodoo5 products enable advanced T-Buffer™ digital cinematic effects including motion blur, programmable depth-of-field, soft shadows and soft reflections.

The Voodoo5 5000 PCI will have dual VSA-100 processors and 32 MB of total graphics memory. The Voodoo5 5000 PCI board, rendering four fully featured pixels per clock, will deliver between 667 and 733 megatexels/megapixels per second fill rates and is expected to be priced at $229.99*.

The Voodoo5 5500 AGP will feature dual VSA-100 processors and 64 MB of total graphics memory. 64 MB of memory allows for higher resolutions and pixel depths with full-scene anti-aliasing and T-Buffer effects enabled, along with more memory available for texture storage. The board, which renders four fully featured pixels per clock, will deliver between 667 and 733 megatexels/megapixels per second fill rate and is expected to be priced at $299.99*.

The flagship product of the VSA-100 architecture, the Voodoo5 6000 AGP, will feature quad VSA-100 processors and 128 MB of graphics memory. It will be the first consumer graphics product to break the one billion pixel per second fill rate barrier. The Voodoo5 6000 AGP, which renders eight fully featured pixels per clock, will deliver between 1.33 and 1.47 gigatexels/gigapixels per second fill rate. It is expected to be priced at $599.99*.

Pricing and Availability

Voodoo4 and Voodoo5 products based on the VSA-100 are scheduled to be in volume production in the first quarter of 2000. Final board pricing and performance will depend on memory prices and will be announced in the early part of 2000.

So we“ll see the follwing 3dfx products:

Voodoo4 4500 - One VSA-100 Processor, 32MB RAM PCI / AGP cards, 2 Pixel per clock, 333-367 megatexel/sec. (ca. 179$)
Voodoo5 5000 PCI - Two VSA-100 Processors, 32MB RAM, 4 Pixel per clock, 667-733 megatexel/xec. (ca. 230$)
Voodoo5 5500 AGP - Two VSA-100 Processors, 64MB RAM, 4 Pixel per clock, 667-733 megatexel/xec. (ca. 300$)
Voodoo5 6000 AGP - Four VSA-100 Processors, 128MB RAM, 8 pixel per clock, 1.33-1.47 gigatexel/xec. (ca. 600$)

So 3dfx does the same as ATi MAXX does: parallel using of multiple processors. Disadvantage: Every processor needs its own memory. So 128MB of Voodoo5 6000 are only effective 32MB (4 units į 32MB).

15.11 - Quake3 Demo

This has not been on the id page a few minutes ago when I wrote the former news but now it“s out: Quake3 Arena Demo (50MB)

Mirrors:
Fileplanet - Fileplanet / Gamespy Industries
MNG Network - MNG Network
Splatterworld - Splatterworld (DE)
AVault - The Adrenaline Vault
Blue's News - Blue's News
CDROM.com - CDROM.com
Quake3Arena.de - GXP (DE)
Gamers.de - Gamers.de (DE)

15.11 - 3dfx

3dfx will announce the specs of the Voodoo3 successor with the codename Napalm today. Here some rumors how they will look like:

The new chip from 3dfx :

Voodoo X:

coming early 2000 to your pc
capable of SLI
multi-chip solution
over 1 gigapixel fillrate
up to 64 MB memory SDRAM segmented memory
enhanced rendering and texture capabilities to deliver 32-bit per-pixel color and Z, source, and destination alpha-blending, stencil buffering, advanced texture compression, enhanced transparency support, and advanced video capabilities.
T-Buffer(TM) technology enables the graphics subsystem to deliver unmatched, full-scene sub-pixel anti-aliased image quality, along with previously impossible special effects that significantly enhance visual realism. The architecture approach will enable wide parallelism for single-pass, full-scene, sub-pixel anti-aliasing with greater polygon throughput and deep parallelism for scalable fill rate
faster texture download
improved image quality
enhanced triangle and texture paging throughput to deliver industry-leading peak textured triangle rates and texture paging performance, capable of supporting 1280 x 1024 resolution or greater
dxtc texture compression
and much much more

15.11 - GeForce comparsion

Gamecenter made a review with the Guillemot 3D Prophet, Creative Annihilator and Leadtek WinFast GeForce 256: GeForce roundup

15.11 - Quake3 Demo - sson!

The end-demo version of Quake3 Arena (should it have the name Q3Test? <g>) is not far away now. Found this on Voodooextreme: finden:

taken from John Carmack“s .plan file:

The demo test is built. It should go up in a couple hours if nothing explodes. Mac and linux builds won't be out tonight.

and....

Graeme Devine: Just so we’re all sure. This isn’t the general demo. If all goes well we’ll upload the general demo in a few days. The demo contains four maps (q3dm1, q3dm7 (q3test1), q3dm17 (q3test2)& q3tourney2 (q3tourney) and six characters (Sarge, Visor, Major, Grunt,Daemia, & Stripe). Bots are in there on five difficulty settings (from “I can win!”to “nightmare!”).

Xian: Ok. For the curious, it's looking like...

11/14/99 07:34p 52,123,258 q3DemoTEST.exe We're doing final testing now. Sandpiper has been called and they are aware that we're planning on a release tonight. The file will simultaneously be made available on our FTP site (heh) and Sandpipers distribution network through www.quake3arena.com.

Todd Hollenshead: As Graeme indicated, this is a preliminary release. We are retaining the prohibition on physical media distribution until we release the final or "gold" demo. That means that magazines will NOT be allowed to distribute this version of the demo on coverdisks. This is marked all over the test, however I would appreciate it if all of the Quake 3 and game site webmasters that are mirroring or covering the release would lend me a hand and make sure our friendly neighborhood game and computer magazines understand this.

Rest assured, we will allow physical media distribution of the final demo, once it is released, but not yet.

Second, although the 1-800-idgames number is on the screen, we (id) aren't accepting orders yet. Also, please remember that number is not for technical support for Quake III Arena, the demo test, or any other id game. Feedback, bugs, etc., in the demo test should still be sent to feedback@quake3arena.com

Finally, before the crazy speculation starts, we aren't done with the game yet. We will be finished "when it's done!" Again, anyone besides id claiming to have the official release date is just pulling your chain.

12.11 - ASUS V6600 Deluxe

Click to enlarge

Here“s a first image of the ASUS AGP-V6600 with NVIDIA GeForce. It is equipped with TV-In, TV-Out, 3D Glasses and a hardware monitor function (see article: V6600 Deluxe SmartDoctor). So it“s the GeForce with the most features out there. ASUS uses a Chrontel CH-7005C-T for the TV-Out.

Memory is 5,5ns SGRAM (The V6600 Pure has SDRAM).

In Germany ASUS bundles the card with full versions of the games Drakan order of the Flame and Rollcage and a CD-ROM with 12 game demos. Bundled application software is Ulead VideoStudio, ASUS DVD and the video security software VideoSecurity.

12.11 - CPU Scaling and performance of NVIDIA GeForce

The most important new feature on the NVIDIA GeForce 256 are hardware T&L (Transformation & Lightning) calculations. These shall unburden the system CPU and also enable a much higher Polygon throughput.
But how“s GeForce performning on different CPU“s? And what about very fast CPU“s? Does the T&L unit limit fast CPU“s? RIVA Station ran a GeForce DDR reference card on a K6-2 350MHz, Celeron 300A, Pentium III 500MHz and on a Pentium III Coppemine running at 750/100MHz:

GeForce 256 on multiple CPU“s

12.11 - ELSA Erazor X

Details about the ELSA Erazor X: The GeForce card is equipped with 32MB 5.5ns Memory and offers the ELSA ChipGuard (Fan/temperature controll) technology. The software of the retail Version in Germany is: Full Version of MainActor v3, a 3D Demo CD, COREL Draw 7.0 and COREL Photo Paint 7.0 (on COREL Select OEM CD) and a bundled game: DRAKAN - Order of the Flame Full

The DDR-RAM Version Erazor X² will have a TV-Out.

12.11 - 3D Fight

The Techzone takes a look on the sittuation on the 3d graphics market:

The only other competitors to the Voodoo card was the PowerVR and RIVA128 but no one could match the excellence of all that was Voodoo and GLIDE. 3DFX later tightened its stranglehold on the market with the introduction of the ever so lovely Voodoo2. The top end Voodoo2 cost a mere £250 when it reached these British shores but many loved it and it loved them too, showing its affection by enabling the fastest, biggest smoothest 3D this side of reality. You could even 'mate' your card with another Voodoo2 resulting in the legendary SLI setup. But lets get serious for une momento. . .it was 3DFX who claimed proudly that, to be ahead of the rest (and they were ahead of anything else by quite a margin) they would release a new 3D card every six months. So what happened?

Read the whole stuff here.

12.11 - v3.53 vs. v3.56

VR-Zone made a comparsion of the NVIDIA v3.53 and the inofficial v3.56 drivers: NVIDIA Detonator v3.53 vs. v3.56

12.11 - New Annihilator drivers

Creative released new drivers for the 3D Blaster Annihilator: 3D Blaster Annihilator drivers

Creative included the follwing hints to solve hardware compatibility problems:

ii) Motherboard compatibility with AGP Cards
If you are still experiencing random screen corruption or system hangs when you run certain games, during video playback, or 3D applications, you can try the following:

a) Ensure that you have the following suggested settings in your system BIOS setup:
1. Enable "Assign IRQ to VGA" if possible.
2. Disable "VGA Palette Snoop".
3. Disable "Video BIOS Cache" and "Video BIOS Shadow".
4. Disable "C800-CBFFF Shadow" or similar options.
5. Set AGP Aperture Size to about half the size of system RAM size.

b) If you have an older LX series motherboard and are experiencing problems, check with your system vendor to udate your system BIOS.

c) If you are overclocking your CPU, you might want to revert back to the original clock settings.

d) The following motherboards were found to have problems working with the Creative CT6941 card. Please contact the motherboard manufacturer for an update. Asus P2L97-DS v1.03 (might need motherboard hardware patch) Gigabyte GA-6BXC rev 1.7 FIC CL31-A, Elite P6LX-A Elite P6LX-A+z

12.11 - Extreme Overclocking

Fastgraphics took an ASUS V6600 GeForce and put a peltier cooling device on it. With it they overclocked the card to 165MHz core (120 normal). Watch the results here.

10.11 - Savage 2000

S3 announced the new Savage 2000 in an official pressrelease:

Diamond Viper II comes powered with S3's own Savage 2000 processor and 32MB on-board memory to deliver true next-generation 128-bit 2D/3D graphics acceleration. It is also the first mainstream graphics accelerator to deliver a single-pass Quad-Texture(TM) engine designed for fast action multi-textured games. Capable of running all 3D processing functions without causing system delays, Viper II features a state-of-the-art transformation and lighting engine, in addition to S3's trademarked S3TC processing technology, to provide consumers with the ultimate tool for obtaining the maximum in visual quality for today's intense 3D applications. Customers can also run resolutions as high as 2048x1536 with fillrates of up to 500 Mtex/s. Additionally, Viper II delivers full API support for DirectX 7.0, 6.1, Direct 3D, OpenGL ICD and driver support for Windows 95/98, and Windows NT 4.0.

10.11 - More news about MAXX

Tomshardware did also take a look on the ATi Rage Fury MAXX:

First of all, we didn't have the chance to compare Fury MAXX to GeForce in a T&L-supporting game-title. The driver would not allow DMZG to run, which may make Fury MAXX look better than it actually is. We will test Fury MAXX with T&L-titles as soon as we can.

The Review can be found here.

10.11 - MadOnion and BAPCo

Again news about MadOnion. They announced a strategic alliance (No not with Pringles oil and onion crisps but..) with BAPCo:

BAPCo® and MadOnion.com™ Form Strategic Alliance Online Benchmark Technology for Business Applications to be Powered by MadOnion.com engine

Santa Clara, California - November 9th, 1999 - MadOnion.com™ (formerly Futuremark Corporation), the leading provider of PC performance and upgrade information, today announced a strategic alliance with BAPCo®, the Business Applications Performance Corporation, combining the strengths of Internet integration provided by MadOnion.com with BAPCo's technical expertise in business benchmarking. The strategic alliance enables the two companies to develop enhanced online benchmarking products that allow users to compare their systems globally.

Through the strategic alliance, MadOnion.com will integrate a new interface and Internet-based engine for BAPCo's SYSmark® 2000, adding a layer to its Web services by providing the MadOnion.com engine to drive the online benchmark. SYSmark® 2000 is a business application benchmark supporting popular business applications running on the Microsoft Windows 2000 operating system. Modifications to the SYSmark 2000 benchmark reflect a shift to the increased use of the Internet.

"The alliance will give BAPCo products, already at the cutting edge of benchmarking for corporate users, the power of global comparison in online benchmarks," said Aki Jarvilehto, CEO of MadOnion.com. "BAPCo's business applications, combined with MadOnion.com's online benchmark technology, enable business users to make more informed decisions about PC purchases."

Under the terms of the alliance, MadOnion.com is also providing marketing support and distribution services for the SYSmark 2000 online benchmark to deliver the products to a wider corporate market.

" BAPCo and its member companies are excited about the strategic alliance with MadOnion.com," says Andreas Uiterwijk, President of BAPCo. "This alliance will strategically enhance the ability of both companies to create and deliver both consumer and business benchmarking products. BAPCo's leadership in developing industry standard benchmarks, and MadOnion.com's marketing support and Internet-based engine, will create a synergy for success, benefiting all PC users."

Pricing and Availability

SYSmark 2000 will be available later this month at a price of $99.95 US.