v3 3000 or viper II

[cigarman]

I am going to pick one of these up on Monday. Which one should I get. I play some games, UT, q3, High heat and design web pages and general surfing. My system is:
P3 450
224MB Ram
2 13.6Gig h/d's
72x cdrom
vs-195 KDS 19" Monitor
Use Roadrunner cable modem service

Please give me an honest opinion.

 

[cigarman]

The reason I have narrowed it down to these two are that they are both $99.00 or so. I have tried a geforce mx but have had constant lockups. So it is between the v3 and the viper. I have had both in the past and had no trouble with them. Don't want ati.

 

[MustangSVT]

if u've had both in the past then u should know the best one for your system. My vote is on Voodoo3.

 

[cigarman]

I never really put them to their full potential. Only had them for a few hours each. Why do you select the v3??

 

[Deeko]

Voodoo3. The Viper II is plaqued with problems, I don't know if they ever even got the T&L unit to work. Plus, Diamond/S3 isn't in the graphics business anymore, so guess what, there's no chance of ever seeing a driver update The V3 is probably faster in alot of games, and it has glide support, which does help in a few of the new games that are out. Not many, but some. UT may run better on the Viper, cause of MeTal, but it's not worth it. Go with the V3. Or shell out another $50 and get a V4, a bit more speed, lots more features.

 

[BFG10K]

I agree with Deeko on this one. Most of S3's boards were plagued with problems while the Voodoo3 is very reliable and stable.

Not only that but S3 is out of business which means no driver updates or support of any kind. It is usually always a bad idea to buy hardware from companies that don't exist anymore. If you buy the Viper II you are essentially stuck with whatever came in the box.

 

[SuperGroove]

S3's not making videoboards anymore? When did that happen?

Paul

 

[cigarman]

Are there no viper supporters out there?? Is the voodoo4 4500 a $50.00 improvement over the v3 3000?

 

[Bartman]

my brother(who never listens to me) just upgrade from a V3 2000(overclocked to 180) to a V4 4500 agp overclocked to 177... Do I think he's getting that much better preformance..no not really for the price.

Bart

 

[Deeko]

It's not worth it to upgrade from a V3 to a V4, but it is worth it to get the V4 instead of the V3, IMO. So I would suggest the V4. It has important features for quality that the V3 doesn't have, such as 32-bit color, FSAA, large textures, and so on. It's worth the extra $50.

 

[BassWriters]

It sounds like the v3 may be better, but the Viper is 59.99 at computers 4 sure, plus there is a 20$ mail in rebate. 40 bucks for a card with TV Out was enough to make me overlook the Viper II's downfalls.

Here is the link:
http://www.computers4sure.com/Product.asp?ProductID=87193

Cameron

 

[vss1980]

Since when did S3/Diamond stop doing drivers for the Viper II.

Those of you who instantly have rushed in and said they have stopped are obviously full of it and love your V3's. <- oh BTW, can you say 32-bit colour? No, didn't think so.

The last driver update from S3/Diamond came this very month and there is no reason to suggest that they will not keep coming. Also, S3 haven't completely pulled out - they are still planning to carry on their very high-end graphics chipsets and will also need so support VIA with their integrated North-bridge/Savage chipset, and for the moment haven't announced an end to new driver releases for any cards.

While I will admit the future looks bleak for any S3 cards after Win2k passes by, the ViperII is not a bad card and many of its flaws have been fixed. Oh and the T&amp;L unit does work in D3D and OpenGL, make sure you have the latest drivers.

As for speed, the ViperII is faster than the V3 and it even has Metal, which is S3's own super-fast API (a bit like Glide). Also has S3TC/DXTC so in terms of future games, it should stand up a little better. As for 2D, this is one of S3's stonger points and DVD quality from S3 cards has always been good (on the Matrox/ATI level). Also, if you download a set of tweaked drivers, you can even try playing around with FSAA/supersampling (not recommended, due to card having lack of performance).

The Voodoo3 on the other hand is also no slouch, and while not faster than the ViperII, it has a lot of support out there from programmers, etc., and of course Glide.

As for Deeko's suggestion to get the V4, not a bad idea that - it has suitable performance for any of today's games and also has the texture compression features, etc. and while not as fast its bigger brothers, it should be a good card (if the price drops!!).

To sum up, if you want the gamers card (despite being slightly slower), get the V3, as it will do its job perfectly well. If you want the total package card (ie. more features) then consider the ViperII. Either way, its your call.

 

[Deeko]

If they are still producing drivers, then hey, I was wrong, that's just what I had heard. And about

<< Those of you who instantly have rushed in and said they have stopped are obviously full of it and love your V3's. >>

, the V5 was my first 3dfx card, I bought a TNT2u over a V3, so I'm not in love with V3's. If they fixed all the problems, then it is probably better than the V3, but, the V4 is still a better choice, at least IMO.

 

[vss1980]

&quot;Those of you who instantly have rushed in and said they have stopped are obviously full of it and love your V3&quot;

No particular offense intended to anyone - I know this forum has its 3Dfx and nVidia lovers.

Actually, my reasoning comes from exprience of a V3 &amp; ViperII. If this topic was brought up 1/2 a year ago I'd have said get the V3, but now Diamond seem to have got it right and the latest drivers since version 9.51.xx seem to deliver the latest from the card. T&amp;L support is there, but in all honesty is nothing to shout about compared to the Geforce line-up.

But all-in-all I would say that it is the better card than the V3 3000 - if it was the V3 3500 that would sway my decision.

It's a shame he couldn't get the GF2 MX to work, that would have blizted them all.

 

[rwin]

Hi cigarman, rwin here.
I have a Viper II and I like it.
Go to www.altavista.com and search for Viper II or Savage 2000 or anything like that.
There are websites devoted to S3 cards.
I found some tweaks for Q3 and UT for Savage 4 and Viper II that improves performance.
MeTal in UT is great!!!!
Quake 3 runs and looks great also.
K6III+450@5x110=550
GA-5AX mobo
128mb/ram
Viper II

rwin@pdq.nt

 

[hans007]

people in the forsale forum are selling v4 4500s for like $115 , so maybe you should get one of those, then again you only have a p2-450

 

[rameshms]

ATI Rage fury 32MB AGP 2X

This one costs $50, has S-video o/p but catch is AGP 2x and not sure if this is retail or oem.

Can someone suggest which one,
V3 or Viper II or ATI Rage Fury
is a good deal ?
(also any idea which one will be more supported in Linux)

Thanks, newbie.

 

[vss1980]

rameshms,

All 3 cards are closely matched in performance. I'll stick to my guns and say the ViperII is over-all the best card when taking into account 2D quality and performance.

The V3 is the gamers card (despite being a small bit slower), that means for those who have the overclocked PIII's and only switch their computer on for UT or Quake1/2/3.

The ATI is a good card, but is let down a bit by its performance (it is a little slower than the V3, but if you wnat to do nothing but watch DVD's and use MS-Office, then no probs there. NOTE: An important thing about the ATI Rage 128 chip is that there is a Pro version - this one is much more enhanced, performs better, and supports S3TC/DXTC and AGP 4X. The one you have linked to is the standard version - if you could find the pro version for only a few $'s more then that would be a good deal.

 

[OuranosEXX]

i day u get a viper ii i had one and in opengl (quake3)it i was getting about 60fps at 1024*768*32*32 thats hell better than v3, but in direct3d it was as fast as a v3 3000, also i could o/c this card at 170/195 (defaukt: 125/143) and get about 72fps at 1024*768*32*32 whats wrong with that???
but diamond stopped making card since 3-4 months now but until the end of 2000 t will continue to support its cards

 

[ET]

I want to add to the pro-Viper II voices. First, regarding support, S3's graphics unit has moved to VIA as is, and while there may be changes to it, as it moves more toward embedded graphics, driver support is still pretty good.

I can't really see how the Viper II can be attacked on bad T&amp;L support, when compared to the Voodoo3 that doesn't have T&amp;L at all.

One good thing about the Viper II is its support for texture compression. UT with S3TC textures is much better looking than normal UT.

I suggest that you go to www.sdnews.net. Check the forum, find the compatibility FAQ... You'll then have more info.

 

[hans007]

viper2 has bad win2k. the 2d speed and quality (blurry etc) wasn't so hot either.

 

[Aboroth]

The Viper II pretty much sucks for everything EXCEPT Quake 3 and UT.
It has OK 2D if you use the right driver. Different drivers have horrible 2D performance or corruption on different systems. You have to try them all out to see which one is best for you.

Oh, and the T&amp;L engine technically works on the Viper II if you don't mind clipping problems and horrible game play.

If you only play Quake 3 and/or UT and love tweaking drivers then a Viper II is your best choice for a budget card.

 

[Pacfanweb]

I've had a Viper 2 for some time, and it rocks. I mostly play UT and there is no better card for that game, bar none, when taking into account looks and speed.
I play some RTS games also, and the Viper does fine there. The 2d looks great, and I'd agree the latest drivers do make a big difference.
I now have a GF2 GTS and I must say that other than my 3dMark scores being drastically better, I can't tell a difference in anything I do. It doesn't run UT a bit faster than the Viper, in fact, may be a couple of frames slower. It looks good, but not like using the Metal driver.

I'd get the Viper 2 unless you have a bunch of old Glide games you like.

 

[Deeko]

I read somewhere that the T&amp;L unit of the Viper II is actually slower than the CPU...that it is a geometry decelerator....is there any truth to that?

 

[kmmatney]

Another option can be the Voodoo3 3500. On sale at http://www.mwave.com for $133. It is faster than the Voodoo3 3000, and has full Video In/TV Out, a TV tuner, and an FM tuner. It also has WIn 2K support, and is faster than the V4 in most situations. After seeing a friend record a full length movie with it (and then encode to MPEG 4 and fit the whole movie onto a regular CD-ROM) I decided that its the next video card for me.