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Old PIII for MAME, AGP card doesn't help
u_rebelscum:
--- Quote from: TheManuel on November 16, 2007, 09:05:11 pm ---The MB southbridge chipset is VIA VT82C596 and the onboard video is NVidia Riva TNT2. This is an HP PIII 800MHz that was donated to me by co-workers for my arcade project along with an Athlon T-Bird 800MHz. The video card came from the latter and is a GeForce2 MX/MX 400 (powered by). Coincidentally, the Athlon PC runs the game at the same speed as the PIII when they both have the same video card. The Athlon's MB does not have integrated video.
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Considering the tnt2 was a great (at it's time) video card, yes card, you have one of the few video card quality onboard video chips, so....
--- Quote ---d. I was hoping that simply having the card, the CPU would be freed of some load but maybe all I'm freeing is the memory of which the computer has plenty enough for that game (512MB)
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... Ya, probably only helping memory. :-\ However, it might not even be that, depending on how the memory was handled. (I have no idea how the onboard TnT2 worked.)
--- Quote ---b. I will play with switching back between D3D and DDraw. I always use DDraw thinking it would be faster by default.
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Probably right to use ddraw with those cards, but no harm trying d3d.
--- Quote ---a. I don't know if even DX 8.0 was available when these products were made ::)
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;D
--- Quote ---e. Again, I have been trying this with DDraw but I could very well be a case of a very crappy card being outperformed by onboard video
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I'd guess they're about the same level in proformance. Sure the GeForce 2 MX is two generations after the TnT2, but since it's the MX (read "value") version, it's performance is probably about the same as GeForce 256 (the previous gen to GeForce 2, and the gen after TnT2). And IIRC, the TnT2 beat the GeForce256 in a few tests; sure it lost more, but mame wasn't one the the tests. :dunno
--- Quote ---As far as a margin of error for the benchmark, it would be less than 1FPS in this case. I always start the game, insert coins and press P1 to go to the character selection screen. 10 out of ten times I get the same number of FPS in each case so it is pretty clear that the total variability is dominated by the video cards and not the measurement system.
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If you really want to benchmark, use mame's -seconds_to_run option (aka -str). Not only will the runs being compared be the exactly same, but you will have higher precision numbers than mame's onscreen FPS. That said, you'll probably get the same results as you've been getting, but even if you're getting the same numbers your way of testing there are variables that can be removed by using -str.
--- Quote ---...By adding the card I was simply hoping to give it a little boost. I can't count how many people give the advice of buying a separate card rather than onboard video to "not steal away from the CPU". I am pretty convinced by now that this is rubbish. Video cards are for PC games, video rendering etc...
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It's general rule. IOW, it's usually true. IOW2, it's sometimes not true.
In your case, you're replacing a video card (that just happens to be onboard) with another a little newer but "value" video card.
So in your case, it sounds like it's rubbish.
Please don't make the same mistake you are knocking by taking your one instance, (converting it to a general rule,) and believing it's always true.
Don't make me get on my soapbox ranting about general rules incorrectly being said and read as altruisms, again. ;)
TheManuel:
Even though in my cases, I've dealt with two instances of this issue, generalization is alwasy dangerous. I agree. :cheers:
At any rate, I went back last night and pulled the card out and ran the game with the onboard video again and now I am getting the same number of fps as with the video card. Clearly something changed since I did the first tests with the onboard video but I have changed so many things that I lost track and it now confounds the whole issue.
At any rate, it does not seem like it is much of an issue either way. I will simply find older versions that allow me to play the slow games better.
I'll concentrate now on deciding whether to use an arcade monitor or a TV but I am leaning toward the first.
By the way, what was the name of your old mame build that handled multiple mice and such? I will not be needing it now but humor me for nostalgia's sake.
Thank you.