Voodoo 5 ?'s

[littletemple]

I know these are no longer in manufacturing but i want to know if it is a decent card or not? I am currently using a tnt2 riva card and my friend wants to sell his voodoo 5 to me. Will i notice a difference in 3-d or 2-d or speed??

 

[AA0]

even upon release it wasn't a great card, took forever to come out. I'd take it over a TNT2 though. But it isn't worth much now, both the GTS and Radeon cards outperform it by quite a bit.

 

[Rand]

2D visual quality is exceptional, 3D performance is okay, but not that great... slower the the GF2 GTS. The best FSAA implementation thus far.... unless ATi get's Smoothvision working with the Radeon 8500.
Drivers are extremely reliable... BUT as 3dfx is now dead you won't see any more official updates though third parties are still releasing drivers.
Can be a little troublesome under XP, as you'll have to rely upon third party drivers there as 3dfx died prior to XP release... so no official XP drivers.

It's undoubtedly a HELL of a lot better then any TNT2 though.

 

[vlieps]

Thats right what has been said so far. It is perfect in 2D and 3D image quality, not the fastest card, however. On the other hand I can still play all todays games with smooth framerates if I do not crank the resolution up too much.
About the drivers - I just love those posts from Radeon and Geforce users which You can read a lot every day - which driver is the best, keeps crashing in this and that game. V5 is a completely defferent story. You install one driver and run EVERYTHING.
Since I got my Broadband T1 connection at home, I have downloaded all possible game demos - like 50 or so. All installed and played flawless on Voodoo5. And all old games do work as well. So the stories about drivers is just a big BS. And there are 3rd party drivers for WinXP, and people say they work quite well. I mean, just look at all other cards - Geforce3 stays at 60 HZ under WinXP, Radeon has even more problems etc. None of the XP drivers are perfect yet. And I am completely sure a driver for Win XP and Voodoo5 is not going to be a problem. Already now people report that some 3rd party drivers run absolutely stable under WinXP.
And yes, Voodoo5 is a definite upgrade from tnt2. By the way, Voodoo's FSAA is superior still and the best FSAA in the market. It just works error-free for everything You throw at it, without any strange artifacts and things like this. If You play only FPS games, then FSAA is something You should not really bother about, in those games You can not see a big difference, apart from a quite big performance hit. Racing games and flight simulators MUST have FSAA on.

 

[Blain]

I've got a V5. They do have great FSAA. But they run hot, and they're L0NG. Unless your friend's going to give you a killer deal on it, I'd say go for some fast Radeon or a GF2 GTS or better. The GTS's have been going for around $80 shipped in the FS/T forum.

 

[Chikin]

<< About the drivers - I just love those posts from Radeon and Geforce users which You can read a lot every day - which driver is the best, keeps crashing in this and that game. V5 is a completely defferent story. You install one driver and run EVERYTHING. >>



Couldn't agree more. Having been a long term V5 user, I just bought a GF3 and have found that the "one driver works with all" philosophy from 3dfx-land does not translate into Nvidia-speak. I also think that the V5's FSAA still spanks the best that the GF3 can offer, even if it is slower. Maybe the Radeon 8500's smoothvision will finally take the FSAA crown from the V5.

 

[AA0]

thats another thing, V5s tend not to work in all systems. I remember something about p4s making it impossible to run, and the card is really long, so you have to make sure it will fit on your board.

 

[littletemple]

THanks for all the replies....exactly how long is the card? My friend is offering it to me for 25....good deal or what....? I'm mostly going to use it for 2-d applications...very few games...

 

[vlieps]

and the card is really long

Again some BS from someone who apparently has never owned a V5. Yes, it is longer than most video cards, but if You have a standard case there are absolutely no problems whatsoever to fit it in. I have still like at least 10 cm free space behind my card. I really would like to see a case in which You can not fit a Voodoo5.
The only thing You should be careful is the power supply. You must have a 250-300W PSU, otherwise there can arise some power shortage problems.
And, yes Voodoo5 DOES NOT run on P4 systems due to lack of support of the AGP 2.0 slot, and as far as I know, all P4 mobos have that AGP 2.0 slot.
But for 25 USD it is still a steal.

 

[bunnyfubbles]

The V5 is the fastest board that officially supports Glide... So if you have any Glide based games, those games should run like melted butter down a greased ice slope. WickedGL drivers are a life saver for OpenGL based games too. All in all it should be an awesome deal for $25. What are your system specs? Running a V5 on a low end system (perhaps below 500MHz, not sure though) might not show the full potential of a Voodoo5, however $25 is dirt cheap for just about any recent video accelerator. An AGP V5 can be found online for about $100, but it would be a new board, however.

 

[HJB417]

for $$25, you shouldn't even need to think twice about this one =)
Is your friend smokin' that rock?

 

[Blain]

In my full tower, there is plenty of room for the longer V5 card. But I've seen several cases that wouldn't allow for it's extra length.

littletemple,
The V5 is just short of 10" long. Measure the room you have for an AGP card in your case. If you've got the room, go for it! $25 is a steal

 

[Instan00dles]

I had a voodoo 5 and now I have an ati 7500. The cards was the best card I have ever onwed but the only problem was that it was long. to use the raid controllder on my asus A7V I had to make a cut in my IDE cable to put around the back of the card so it would fit. other then the size I loved it. it ran everything, tribes 2, max payne, UT quake 3 its not a bad card. I am making a buget comp for my brother and all he plays is UT and diablo 2 since both support glide I am gonna give him my voodoo 5

 

[The_Lurker]

OOH! $25 for a V5! MINE MINE MINE!


Ok, to answer ur post, GET IT FOR $25! It'll be MUCH BETTER Than your TNT2.