New 3d card question(voodoo 5500)

[Tony Glass]

I got a chance to pick one of these(Voodoo 5500 PCI) up
cheap(under 150-friend bought Geforce 2). I have a question. It's a PCI card, which is ok since I don't feel like upgrading my mobo and cpu. Motherboard isn't AGP 2.0 compliant, so this should work since it's a PCI card right? Will I see dramatic or just slight imrovement? And will my machine handle it?
I have:
Gigabyte Ga5ax motherboard
AMD K6-2 450w/ 3D Now
128 meg pc100
Soundblaster Live X-Gamer
Voodoo 3 3000 AGP
Windows 98SE

Should I just keep what I have and save for the mobo and cpu
then get a Geforce2 or ATI card.

tony

[Xayd]

Yes and no. Will it drastically improve game speed? No, because your slower CPU is a speed bottleneck. Will it improve somewhat? Yes, because the extra memory and faster fill rate on the Voodoo5 will translate into a more consistent frame rate.

I can get 80-90 frames per second on my Duron 1008mhz rig in UT for instance, but it drops to 30-40 frames per second in a big fight. With the Voodoo5 I still get the same frame rate, but it doesn't drop below 70 no matter what happens.

Also, if you play primarily single player or low speed games, the anti-aliasing is very nice. The image quality gets addictive ;).

Xayd

[Tony Glass]

Xayd, I play quake 1, 2 with expansion packs Unreal types,Theif 1 & 2, Madden Football and EA sports games. The speed of the games seems fine to me right now with what I have I was just wondering if it would help the visuals some untill I can upgrade my mobo and cpu. I'll try it out and also see how I like it with the new mobo and cpu I'm getting. Why spen 200 or more on a new card If I like what I see with the Voodoo 5 and a new cpu/mobo.

Thanks
Tony

[Xayd]

Very true. When driver compatibility becomes an issue with the Voodoo5's you may have to upgrade again, but that should be a year downn the road. For under 200 bucks, the Voodoo5's are great cards, no matter 3dfx's business problems.

Xayd

[Tony Glass]

So this card won't inprove the speed of my games because of my slow cpu but it will give me better graphics without compromising the speed I have now? Since I'm happy with my game play speeds now, I candy is what I'm after if the game is moving at an acceptable rate.

tony

[Xayd]

Yes, if you like the eye candy, you should be able to run your games with anti aliasing on, maybe 32 bit color, at the or very near to the speeds you get now.

Just a mater of whether the eye candy is worth an upgrade to ya or not ;).

Xayd