Brian Frank

I now have your souls, hahaha!

I also appreciate the fact that many people dont have clue about their computer, so even the simplest things like putting in a stick of ram will be good money for computer biz. Im not as familiar with all OSes, but ME did push me the wrong way. Im not saying eveyone that uses it is wrong for using it, if it works for you, go for it. ME works for you great, more power too you. It definitely is faster than Win2k on the same machine as I have set up a dual boot with 2k and ME, but I dont use ME that much. I really dont know why I havent sold it yet, but I still have my promo upgrade. I guess I still keep it around just for the limited dos it provides. I still like some of the old dos games, like duke nukem 3d, and unless XP can run a dos emulator, I dont see the point for that. ME does have some uses, but some things are really stupid. Like being able to control your refridgerator, gimme a break, although that would be funny, now that I think about it. ME just rubbed me the wrong way. I figure since Ive got it on my dummy system, if I tweak something that I shouldnt or other, so what, Ive only installed Windows a zillion times. For me, I'll play around with ME, but I dont think the little extra speed it gives is worth it to me for the headaches. I still like to dual boot for the heck of it. Somethings are worth the work put into them for me, and ME was one of them. Id really like to see a refridgerator that comes with drivers for a computer. Thats funny.

Exactly. If that Matrox card works for you, dont change it unless necessary. If I was going for CAD and the like, I would go for a Matrox card. Also, HL and Quake are not on the pinnacle of stressers for your system, so you shouldnt have problems. If you played a recent game like Serious Sam, you might not get the smoothness. Matrox cards are made for graphics and not for gaming.

Well, still, the K-6 line in its whole have not been good gaming cpus. Even the Celeron performs better than the K-6's 2 or 3. The Cyrix chips are the only ones who are even worse, and possibly the Transmeta Crusoe chip, but I havent seen anything about that. Not to say the K-6's are bad, but gaming was not the top thing on AMD's mind when they put it out. Its also on "old" techology--Socket 7. And yes, being that HL is based on Quake and partially on Quake 2, if Im not mistaken, thats not gonna be the best benchmarking tool to use. Ive run it, though not on Win2k with this low of ram, on a 400MHz P2 and 64MB of ram and a Voodoo 3 3000. And it still ran pretty good. Look, as much as it would be nice to not have to upgrade somewhere along the line to take advantage of the software out there, thats not gonna fly. Lets face it, in 5 years, a 1.5 GHz cpu is gonna mean jack---as in being like the 486 is in comparison to the 1.5 GHz P4. The Serious engine is a hefty one, and if you dont have a fairly hefty system, your not gonna have as smooth playing as someone with a 1.2GHz T-Bird. Duh. If you are really gonna play that game, you'd do well to get a new mobo and processor, like a Duron, which is cheap but more on par with the Pentium 3 at around half the cost. Also, Socket 7 chipsets dont have the muscle to push around games like Serious Sam. Once again, if you dont like it, dont play it. Sheesh, dont play something thats more trouble than its worth for you.

Rats, I missed the 1G mark.

LOL

Use the setting that the game has for 3dfx cards, ususally its Glide or Open GL.

If good looks are the primary concern, by all means, go with the Radeon. I have found though, for serious gaming the Radeon is not my cup of tea. However, it does have stellar 32-bit gaming performance and DVD playback. However, the drivers for the Radeon under Win2k are less than ideal, ATI needs to get up to par with nVidia. But those games probably wont push you too much. You probably should consider a Matrox card if those games wont be graphics intesive. I understand that Matrox has, hands down, the best 2d image quality. And Matrox was the first to get drivers out for Win2k. On the GeForce 2 family, the word of warning that I can pass along is stay away from Leadtek GeForce cards, both GF1's and GF2's. I have a Hercules Prophet II MX and am very happy with it. GeForce 2 MX cards can be had for ~$100 USD. If the games wont be very graphics intesive, go for the Matrox card. If you want some heavier 3d artillery, the Radeon should do pretty good, although when I tried one out, I didnt like it. Love the Radeons DVD playback though.

Nope. I keep this baby defragged, as in my computers hard drive. MY *hard drive* on the other hand...well, lets n o t g o the re . Of course, youre all mocking me I see. Of course, I am the supreme king of computer knowlege. [This message has been edited by Brian Frank (edited 11 April 2001).]

Yeah, Ive played the game once, and love the mindless action. My only complaint was that it was too short. If you play the game straight through w/o dying, it can be done in under 6 hours. Some systems it will run better on than other systems. Oh yeah, the K-6 cpus suck for gaming. Plain and simple. Its mainly because of the lack of L1 and/or L2 cache. I think that is more the problem than the video card in this case. Socket 7 and high-end gaming dont fly well from what Ive seen. In the manual, it says an 800MHz cpu or faster is required for optimal gaming. Its a stellar game. And its mostly because its a brand-spankin' NEW gaming engine. Id like to see you program a first person shooter with that many enemies coming at you and run it on a 300MHz cpu. And that video card will run fine for other, older games, but like the Voodoo 3 line its growing a bit long in the tooth. Also, ITS ONE FRICKIN' GAME! Id be much more concerned with the system if most of my games wouldnt play. I heartily agree with what everyone else has posted. Bottom line: If you dont like it, dont play it.

Are you overclocking? Have you tried other drivers besides the latest beta?

Ive got the 4.29a's and theyve run exceptionally well.

The only problem I noticed was under 3dmark 2000. Everything, especially under the P3 optimizations were psyachadelic. UT runs smoothly. The best part is the overclocking feature as a standard part, so you dont have to do anything once the drivers are installed. I wont complain, since they are MS WHQL certified.

Yeah, I saw both videos posted. I laughed at that Metallica video. Im sure the other "Every OS sucks" was funny for some although I didnt get it. I dont know about taking hits though, maybe valium would be nice too. It just feels like you have this thing about thinking those of us who are offened by ME are idiots, and it seems to have fallen on others besides myself.

Apparently, we are all fighting a losing battle with you, JJ32. You seem to think that you know all there is to ME and computers---WELL YOU DONT!! It also seems that anyone who disagrees with you at all is obviously wrong. It also seems that we must have the same opinions you do, or we are all idiots. Those of us who use Win2k out of preference over ME or 98, thats OUR choice. Some of us think that ME sucks for various reasons, that too is OUR choice. Nothings wrong with that. But the biggest thing isnt over the OS choice, JJ32--it seems to be the fact that you are, for a lack of a better term, a jackass, sir. I hope that the admins will not allow this type of personal attacks and continuious belittling of others who do not share your opinions. I no doubt know you have more knowledge than myself, but their actually are other people that might know more than you. Some of them might be members of this forum. And they also dont make everyone else who doesnt know it all feel like an idiot. I, for one, am getting very sick and very tired of your rants, sir. Please do everyone here at the forum and either start being a help here and not being an attacker or shut the f*ck up and leave.

I know they were. After I posted I re read it and got it...guess Im a little slow sometimes...

closer

*smack face* No,no,no,no! This post is about people who have some hardware problem and will give the problem but not the necessary specs, so then some one has to ask for the specs so the problem can be diagnosed. And no, Im not running ME on this machine, it is on my dual boot, and I really dont remember why Im using it in the first place, but oh well. Ive had no problems with VIA chipsets, but apparently Im either lucky or really, really damn ignorant. ;(

Yes, its just amazing aint it? ;(

Just to clarify what Im benchmarking with: 3dMark 2000 NOT 2001. And the answer--overclocking and some tweaks. There's some good ones in X-teq X-Setup. A lot of it has to do with things being cached. And that helps big time, some more than others. Also, there's probably a ton of crap that goes on startup, and X-Setup can clear those buggers away. I might be able to get higher, but I refuse to disable my firewall and completely shutdown my antivirus, though I do disable that for the time being. I benchmark right after a restart when resources havent been used hardly. There a little registry tweak with Max Cached Icons. In the registry go to HKey_Local_Machine--Software--Microsoft--Windows--Current Version--Explorer. Only in the Explorer folder, though, not one below it. And add the registry string Max Cached Icons just like I put it with the spaces. Then modify it by right clicking and hit Modify, and set the value to 8000. I, in my quest for more power have 95000, but Im not sure how much thats really doing stuff for me. I dont really know the reason having stuff cached speeds things up, but I just know regardless the reason, it works very well. Also, memory bandwith plays a BIG part in the grand scheme of things. With my ram at 100MHz in bios I could overclock the FSB up to 113MHz, only limited by the KT133 chipset, and have no stability issues. I have my ram now running at the 133MHz and my FSB at 107MHz. When I had my ram at 100MHz, no problems going to 113MHz FSB, but when I went to 133MHz ram, the ram wouldnt overclock too much so I guess its running at 140MHz, and 256MBs of it are some generic ram too. Anyway, my 3dmark scores jumped considerably due to bandwith. Thats why the 1.2GHz T-birds with the 12x100 mulitplier are beaten out by the 1.2 GHz T-Birds at the 9x133 multiplier. Its all because of bandwith. And that is the best thing Ive found to work.

Hey, good tips, Clutch Im too impatient to go for a full 4-year degree. I want to get my degree and get out ASAP!! Im definitely looking at the network stuff more, since thats a real biggie in the world.

Im wondering if this would do anything to speed me up? In Bios there's a setting for the video memory cache mode and the settings are UC (uncacheable) and USWC (uncacheable, speculative write combining) Does the GF2MX support this feature? The mobo manual says if things arent set right, might not be able to boot up at all. Here are the mobo and graphics card: Asus A7V 1007 bios and Hercules Prophet 2 MX.

Ive played around with it, and it only slows things down, but the only way I know is by running 3dmark 2000 and its just down by 15 or less points---in otherwords it does jack for you with video cards in recent history.

HarU, once again, while you do prefer ME, you do keep it in check. I know I kinda freaked out back there, but Im sure not every OS will be peachy for everyone. Im glad you are civil and do not resort to character assassination and low blows.

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