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It has to be said, even though I've been messing with the TNT et .al recently, the Voodo2 still totally kicks ass in terms of its sheer speed in games. I tested on three machines (my nippy MF, 'mid-range' PII 300, and the slower Cricket D.), which included Quake 2 (surprise eh?) and Incoming (even bigger surprise?). When I kicked in the second Guillemot Maxi Gamer 3D2 the scores of course got a bit better. But the main advantage of SLI to this date is still the ability to play games like Quake2, SiN, Incoming, Battlezone and Redline Racer in 1024x768. That fact alone is of course incentive enough to go and purchase a Maxi Gamer 3D2- if at this stage a little expensive. Also, I didn't screw around with 3D WinBench 98 either because I can think of better things to do than watch uninteresting demos for 45 minutes a throw. So on with the scores:
Incoming Lux et Robur scores on PII400
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640x480 |
800x600 |
1024x768 |
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Maxi Gamer 3D2 |
83.8 |
60.2 |
N/A |
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Two Maxi Gamer 3D2's in SLI |
77.6 |
75.5 |
69.4 |
Incoming Lux et Robur scores on PII300
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640x480 |
800x600 |
1024x768 |
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Maxi Gamer 3D2 |
73.7 |
60.2 |
N/A |
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Two Maxi Gamer 3D2's in SLI |
77.6 |
75.5 |
69.4 |
Incoming Lux et Robur scores on a P200MMMX
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640x480 |
800x600 |
1024x768 |
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Maxi Gamer 3D2 |
31.4 |
30.2 |
N/A |
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Two Maxi Gamer 3D2's in SLI |
31.8 |
30.6 |
28.4 |
Quake2 v3.17 (timedemo1) on a PII400
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640x480 |
800x600 |
1024x768 |
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Maxi Gamer 3D2 |
87 |
59.2 |
N/A |
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Two Maxi Gamer 3D2's in SLI |
97.4 |
92.8 |
69.7 |
Quake2 v3.17 (timedemo1) on a PII300
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640x480 |
800x600 |
1024x768 |
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Maxi Gamer 3D2 |
69 |
54.2 |
N/A |
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Two Maxi Gamer 3D2's in SLI |
70.4 |
65.8 |
61.7 |
Quake2 v3.17 (timedemo1) on a P200MMX
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640x480 |
800x600 |
1024x768 |
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Maxi Gamer 3D2 |
41.1 |
38.4 |
N/A |
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Two Maxi Gamer 3D II's in SLI |
41 |
40.4 |
37 |
Were those fast enough then? I still think so... One thing though, if you've got anything less than a Pentium 200MMX, I personally wouldn't opt for a Voodoo2 (wait until you upgrade to a faster CPU first). As superb as the Voodoo2 is, it's not a miracle worker and is still somewhat CPU dependent, really kicking in with a Pentium II processor. But newer chipsets such as the TNT are even more CPU dependant. Don't expect any gains in terms of the SLI mode with a P200MMX either- as the results showed. And if you do own a lower spec PC, a Voodoo Graphics won't do you any harm whatsoever- especially at the low price that they can now be snapped up for. That is unless you fancy playing games at resolutions higher than that of 640x480, in which case you'll need a Voodoo2.
The memory itself that Guillemot have used isn't the same 25ns EDO Ram by Silicon Magic that was used by virtually everyone else. Silicon Magic's is still one of only three types of memory certified for use with the Voodoo2 chipset. But fear not because the EliteMT memory used by Guillemot is also certified. My point is that no other Voodoo2 card manufacturer can currently boast that their memory is faster or better for overclocking than other manufacturers', as was the case when Voodoo Graphics based cards spread like rabbits a year ago. Having said that a few months ago, Tom found no real significant benefit in overclocking anyway. Although, pending Maxi Gamer 3D2 owners will be chuffed to bits due to the easy overclocking method being at their disposal via the slider provided by 3Dfx's own Reference Drivers (Guillemot's drivers don't provide the slider). This can be easily located in the 'advanced' section of the Voodoo2's display properties in the control panel. The slider allows you to pop your card(s) up to 95MHz, which is useful.
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