NetExcite heeft een review van de Matrox Marvel G200 op z'n site geplant. Hier wat spul over de video editing kwaliteiten van de Marvel:

Lets head on testing the main feature of this product. The video input feature of the Marvel has improved from the Rainbow Runners. Now, video can be captured smoothly via a camcorder with almost no noticeable image flaws even over long periods of time. The programs that were provided were very user friendly. After we have captured the video using Video CD standards, we can than create a Video CD with Adaptec Easy CD 3.5 successfully. Now, I have a Video CD of my summer '98 vacation! When we tried the Video CD on a dedicated Video CD player, the quality was exactly the same just like the ones that are professionally mastered. Therefore, the Marvel G200-TV is a 'no second thought' product if you are a video editing enthusiast. Again, if you decide to run this product for an extended period of time, make sure you get a decent cooler like the Lasagna X cooling fan from TennMax.

ActiveWindows (een of andere pro-M$ bedoening) heeft een review gepost van de Elsa Erazor II. Er staat nauwelijks info in, wel een paar benchmarks waarbij de Erazor II vergeleken wordt met de STB Velocity 4400.

ELSA has been a big name in the professional graphics market for quite awhile now. More recently, ELSA has also made a name for itself in the consumer graphics market. ELSA currently has two RIVA TNT boards in their lineup, the ERAZOR II, and the Synergy II. The ERAZOR II is designed for use in the consumer market, while the Synergy II includes custom drivers written by ELSA which make it better for Professional applications. The ERAZOR II is a unique TNT card. Unlike most of the cards on the market, it is not identical to NVIDIA's reference design. Instead, it is placed on a smaller board and includes SGRAM and a fan*.

PC Magazine Online heeft een artikel gepost over het verschil tussen de kaarten die zij krijgen aangeboden om te testen de retailkaarten zoals die bij de hardwareboer liggen. Hier een stukje:

The Diamond Monster Fusion card (based on the 3Dfx Voodoo Banshee chip) we tested originally was clocked higher than all other Banshee-based products, and the retail board was clocked slightly slower. However, the differential between the retail board's score and the original's was much larger than the clock-speed differences would account for. Diamond claimed 3Dfx was unable to sustain production of the higher speed part, so Diamond was forced to use the slightly slower components in volume shipments.

Overclockers Workbench heeft een 4 BX mammaplanken zitten testen; de Abit BH6, AOpen AX6BC rev 2.1, AOpen AX63 en MSI 6163. Hier heb je wat info uit hun BX mobo shoot-out:

The ABIT BH6 has long been "certified" as the Overclocking King Board by most sites due to it's voltage tweaking and AGP Ratio and SEL#66/100 (for unlocking clock multiplers of PII) and all can be done in SoftMenu II.

Will the BX6 Revision 2 be better. I suppose so as now you could set specific divider for FSB set above 100Mhz.. e.g. 1/3 or 1/4. Whereas you still couldn't do that in the 4 boards tested above.

Een kort berichtje: Duke World heeft een Duke Nukem forever FAQ (v1.0) gepost. Hieronder gelijk maar even een paar dingentjes waar mijn ogen op vielen toen ik die FAQ las:

• (2.1.1) Why not use the Quake II engine?

  Originally slated to use the Quake II engine, in July 1998, 3D Realms announced that Duke Nukem Forever was now in development using the Unreal engine. Here is what 3D Realms' George Broussard had to say about the switch: "It's very important to note that this was a tough decision for us. It does not stem in any way from hard feelings, nor in fact, anything to do with id software. Our relationship still remains very good. This was a business decision and based on what we wanted to do with Duke Nukem Forever as a game." Another main reason that has been talked about since then is that the DNF development team will save time by not having to program features into the Quake II engine which are already in the Unreal engine. This allows them to focus more on the game, and not on getting the engine up to date."

• (2.2) What are the System Requirements?

  George Broussard had this to say about system requirements: "We're thinking something like a P233-266 and a Voodoo 2 card would run DNF very nicely. But we'll have to wait a little longer to be sure. But low end Voodoo 1 cards with very little texture memory will probably have a hard time with the game."

  The official system specifications for DNF have not been released yet, but since the game will be using the Unreal engine, we can make a rough estimate by using Unreal's system specifications as a base:

  CPU: 233 MHz Pentium (266 MHz Pentium w/ MMX recommended)

  RAM: 32 MB minimum, 64 MB SDRAM recommended

  Distribution Media Drive: CD-ROM drive

  Video System: PCI Local Bus Video Card

  Audio System: Windows 95/98 compatible sound card

  Operating System: Windows 95/98/NT/2000

  Network and Internet Setup: 28.8 kbps or higher modem using TCP/IP

Voor de rest van de FAQ: check em uit op: http://www.dukeworld.com/?faq/dukeforever/

Niet dat ik van tennis houd (nouja, vrouwentennis is dan misschien wel leuk ), maar er kunnen mensen zijn die dit interessant vinden:

"The graphics are perhaps the best part of the game. The players are 3D models that actually look quite good. The animation is a little bit stiff, but pretty nice. The game is colorful, you have the option to choose something other than the standard white clothing. Some 16 actual Tennis players are available for you to choose the likeness that appeals to you. Courts are good looking as well, and you have four different choices of surfaces. Sounds are certainly nothing to write home about - the announcer voice is unclear and the sound effects are nothing special. "

Gebruikt Intel nou 0.18 of 0.13 micron technologie? Deze stukjes vond ik op The Register:

"Chip Goliath Intel claimed this morning that its 0.18 micron technology is really 0.13 micron technology and that puts it ahead of the chip rat-pack."

"Said Pierre Mirjolet, architecture marketing manager at Intel's European HQ in Munich: "The 0.18 micron generation is a path set up by the industry. We're achieving better performance than that. In actual fact, our 0.18 micron performance is 0.13 micron performance."

"He said: "We're able to get a little bit more out of 0.18 micron technology. We're moving faster than the industry. You can say [in Intel's case] that 0.18 micron is 0.13 micron."

"He continued: "We'll use shallow trench isolation in the P858 to increase the densities. The minimum gate dimension is .13 micron."

"Different chip manufacturers measured things differently, he conceded.

"0.13 micron is the width of the gate travelling from the source to the drain," he said."

Ook werden er plaatjes gepost om alles wat duidelijker te maken. Deze waren een beetje te groot dus die heb ik hier maar even niet geplaatst. De links ernaartoe zijn:

• http://www.theregister.co.uk/images/adverts/mic18_0.gif
  
• http://www.theregister.co.uk/images/adverts/mic18_1.gif
  
• http://www.theregister.co.uk/images/adverts/mic18_2.gif
  
• http://www.theregister.co.uk/images/adverts/mic18_3.gif
  
• http://www.theregister.co.uk/images/adverts/mic18_4.gif
  
• http://www.theregister.co.uk/images/adverts/mic18_5.gif
  
• http://www.theregister.co.uk/images/adverts/mic18_6.gif
  
• http://www.theregister.co.uk/images/adverts/mic18_7.gif
  

Hardware Pros heeft de Elsa Erazor II onder de handen genomen, een kaart die nog weinig positieve kritieken heeft gekregen (afgezeikt door Tom enz.). Hier de info uit de review van Hardware Pros:

In a few short words:  This card rocks!  ELSA has done a great job putting together a well rounded video card based on Nvidia's Riva TNT chip.  The optimized board design as well as the fan/heatsink combo are very welcome additions especially for squeezing out that extra bit of performance through overclocking.  The fan on this baby keeps the chip from getting too hot and causing system crashes even if you don't overclock.  The price is another great thing about this card, I have found the OEM version selling for very cheap here in Toronto as of late.  If ELSA had included TV-Out, this board would have been almost perfect.  ELSA being relatively new to the consumer 2D/3D video card market has done a great job with this product and because of their innovations, we have given the Erazor II the Hardware Pros Seal of Approval!

...die denken er dus anders over. De Erazor die Tom had getest had trouwens geen fan, dus het gaat hier om verschillende revisions.

Ik zag op AGN Hardware dat Abit nieuwe BIOSsen gereleased heeft voor z'n wonderlijke BX6 en BX6-II moederplanken. Hier heb je info (beide BIOSsen doen hetzelfde):

- Supports Socket 370 Celeron 433 Mhz CPU.

- Supports correct naming of Pentium III CPU.

De BIOS updates kun je hier downen.

JC heeft nieuws over de Intel Camino chipset. Volgens JC is de release vertraagd en zal de chipset nu in de herfst van dit jaar uitkomen. Dit wil zeggen dat chips met 133MHz FSB ook uitgesteld zullen worden. Hier de stuff:

Okay, I've gotten two emails, both from important people who urged me to talk about the Intel Camino delay. You see, I'm kinda iffy about the consequences from it, but it looks kinda like the Pentium 3's 133MHz bus will be coming a few months later, in the Fall of '99. This doesn't mean that the P3-533, which was slated for the second quarter of this year, will be similarly delayed. But if there's no 133MHz bus, then Intel will have to set the Pentium 3 chips to the 100MHz bus, so 533MHz is out. If this delay happens, then you should expect a P3-550 (which would have probably been about the same speed as the P3-533) coming a little later than the P3-533 would have come out. The P3-600 could run on a 100MHz bus, so that might mean that the P3-666 would be the first Intel >100MHz bus processor.

Meer nieuws vind je op JC's PC News'n'Links page.

Elke zichzelf respecterende games site heeft inmiddels een preview van Unreal Tournament op z'n site geparkeerd staan, dus ook Games.net. Hier heb je wat uit hun verhaal:

hile the original Unreal may not have offered the best multiplayer experience, its weapons were praised throughout newsgroups, Web sites, and even our offices as some of the best ever in a first-person shooter. Incredibly, the Unreal Tournament team plans to raise the bar even higher. Expect heavy artillery like the Redeemer, a rocket-powered nuclear weapon that'll utterly obliterate most parties, and graceful alternatives like the Impact Hammer, a glorious melee weapon that'll make wet spots of your opponents should they come too close.

Alex van Sharky Extreme heeft een artikel in elkaar geknutseld met daarin de final specs van de Voodoo3. Alex is nogal close met 3Dfx, dus dit zal allemaal wel kloppen. Hier wat nieuwe info die tot dusver onbekend was:

irst things first, the 'low-end' Voodoo3 2000 has had its clock speed increased from 125MHz up to 143MHz and should be (according to 3Dfx) dishing out an expected 6 million triangles and 286 Megatexels per second. This clock speed 'bump' might well please some of the more concerned entry-level gamers and is slightly (36Megatexels/second) more than the originally specified 250Megatexels/second.

...hmm....vraag ik me af hoe goed die V3-2000 borden te overklokken zullen zijn. Waarschijnlijk komen ze van dezelfde produktielijn als de 183Mhz V3-3000... Dat kan spass gaan machen...

Thresh heeft een review gepost van Total Annihilation: Kingdoms. Hier wat info over Cavedog's nieuwste:

While the bottom line has a familiar ring to it, Cavedog assures us that this won't be just TA with a Spice Girls makeover. By going with a mythological, medieval-esque storyline, Cavedog can infuse a lot of storytelling elements that was somewhat lacking in the original. Along the same lines, Cavedog will use a lot of character development to advance the plot and bring some personality into the game.

The most notable new feature is the inclusion of four races, or factions as they may be, each with its own unique set of units, strengths, and weaknesses. Unlike TA, where 80% of the units between the Arm and the Core were alike, you'll be hard-pressed to find similarities between any of the four factions.

News.com heeft een artikeltje over de PIII in elkaar gepleurd. Vooralsnog is er weinig reden om een PIII te kopen, tenzij je voor gek uitgemaakt wilt worden wegens het onzinnig besteden van je hard verdiende centen. Where's the beef?

The Pentium III will be faster than the Pentium II, and soon feature additional architectural innovations that will boost performance. But one of the main reasons to buy a Pentium III that computer makers will tout--a series of 70 new multimedia instructions--won't really have much of an effect on the user experience. Benefits from the new "Katmai" instructions won't become apparent until software vendors adopt them, and that is a process that will take time.

Analysts point to the recent history of Intel’s much-hyped MMX instructions as reason to doubt their efficacy. “Software developers have rewritten relatively few programs to take advantage of [Intel’s new technology],” said Ashok Kumar, an analyst at Piper Jaffray in Minneapolis, Minn.

3Dfx heeft een press release de deur uitgedaan over de Voodoo3. Hier een stukje:

"The Voodoo3 family of products will be our first 3Dfx-branded boards and we are committed to delivering the best possible experience for our customers," said Greg Ballard, president and CEO for 3Dfx Interactive. "With today's announcement, we are resetting the bar for performance and delivering an exhilarating visual gaming experience."

Industry-Leading Performance

At $129.99 (suggested US retail price), the 143MHz Voodoo3 2000 AGP and PCI boards are expected to generate up to 6 million triangles and 286 Megatexels per second at resolutions of up to 2,048 by 1,536 pixels. Targeting mainstream performance users, the Voodoo3 2000 boards will feature a 300MHz RAMDAC and 16MB of SDRAM.

For $179.99 (suggested US retail price), the 166MHz Voodoo3 3000 AGP board is expected to generate 7 million triangles and 333 Megatexels per second at resolutions of up to 2,048 by 1,536 pixels. Manufactured by STB Systems, Inc., Voodoo3 3000 designed for true 3D game enthusiasts, will feature a 350MHz RAMDAC, TV/S-Video Out capabilities as well as a yet undisclosed game bundle featuring best-selling titles. The Voodoo3 3000 will also feature 16 MB of SDRAM. The Voodoo3 is expected to lead in real-world game performance by delivering super-fast frame rates for the most popular games.

Billy van Voodoo Extreme heeft wat info over nieuwe G200dertjes van Matrox:

Matrox Graphics Inc. is proud to announce two new additions to the Matrox MGA-G200 Series of graphics accelerators: Matrox Millennium G200 LE and Matrox Millennium G200 SD 16MB.  The introduction of these new graphic solutions offers greater flexibility to system integrators, PC assemblers and end users.

Designed to deliver superior price/performance in 2D, 3D and video applications, the Matrox Millennium G200 LE is a new low cost, non-memory upgradeable, non-multimedia upgradeable graphics card available exclusively to system integrators and PC assemblers in Q1 99.

Matrox Graphics has also released the Millennium G200 SD 16MB for system integration and retail. The first MGA-G200 graphics accelerator designed with 16MB of SDRAM memory, the Matrox Millennium G200 SD 16MB version is multimedia upgradeable and will be available in Q1 99 for $139 US SRP.

Er is weer eens een nieuwe versie van Fastcard gereleased. Hiermee zitten we op versie 1.0.7. Hier een lijstje met de nieuwe features in dit handige videocard overklok proggie:

- NVidia Detonator driver support

- Unreal Direct3D settings support

- Voodoo2 core speeds up to 110Mhz

- Revised Banshee support

- Code optimisations, redundant code removal

- Visual tweaks

En-Riva heeft wat hete nieuws over de TNT2. Volgens een ventje bij Leadtek wordt de release van de TNT2 over twee week aangekondigd:

Well I must appologise to all the En-Riva readers, I was just contacted by Kevin from Leadtek and he said that they will possibly be announcing the Winfast S320 TNT II in a couple of weeks. At present arrangements are still being made with Nvidia. I will keep you up to date as more news comes to hand.

Duane's Hardware Homepage (k'weenie wat ik daar van moet denken heeft een artikel gebakken over de Intel P6, da's de architectuur waar Intel met de Pentium Pro, PII, PIII, Celeron en Xeon al 4 jaar op voort aan het borderen is. Hier wat info over de KNI/SIMD instructies van de PIII:

The addition of 70 new Streaming SIMD instructions, formerly known as Katmai New Instructions (KNI), is the more significant modification of the Pentium III. Similar in principle to MMX, the new instructions enhance floating point performance by allowing the processor to work on multiple pieces of data with a single instruction. Programmes, however, have to first be specially optimized before they can take advantage of this feature. Although this prevents many applications from realizing the benifit of the new instructions, large performance improvements of up to 35% can be achieved by SIMD optimized software.

Jo Lux heeft z'n megagrote 3D Chip comparison tabel nog groter gemaakt. Ga maar ff kijken als je de specs van de TNT2, Savage4, PVRSG, V3 enz. op een rijtje wilt hebben.

Game Asylum heeft een interview over Gabriel Knight 3 op z'n site gekickt. Hier krijg je een stukje:

Game Asylum: FMV has become infamous in every genre. Whether it is the pixels, the non-integration, the bad interface,or the bad acting, FMV is repulsive to almost all gamers. But somehow GK2 came through as a winner; why did you decide to take the risk by using FMV in GK2?

Jane Jensen: It wasn't much of a risk when the decision was made. Back in '94 when we decided to make it FMV it was the 'hot new' technology. Everyone thought it would be the future of gaming. So the question at the time was more 'Is GK2 a big enough project to get the hot, new, expensive technology or will we just do it with the old 2D animation?' I was thrilled that they let us to it FMV.

Adreline Vault heeft een review gepost van Excessive Speed, een arcade combat racer vergelijkbaar met Dethkarz en S.C.A.R.S., maar met een top-down view a la Death Rally en GTA. Hier heb je wat spul uit de review:

Excessive Speed gives you far more choices in cars, tracks, weapons and power-ups than most other racing games. Instead of the usual six to eight tracks in many racing games, this offering has 14 completely distinctive tracks from which to choose. Instead of a small selection of cars or a large selection where they all look virtually identical, this product allows you to pick among seven very different looking cars with widely varying performance characteristics in speed, handling, acceleration, weight, and strength. Instead of a few copycat weapon pickups, there are a full 17 different power-ups to collect, most of which are extremely innovative and not just clones of those used in other combat racing games. Some of the more exciting weapons are heat-seeking mines, chain guns, freeze devices, twisters, and earthquakes.

PC One heeft nog wat stuff over de nieuwe SiS 300 videochip van SiS. Weer een TNT killer?

4) What kind of performance are you expecting from the SiS 300 graphics chip in 2D and 3D? Will it outperform all current offering and how will it stack up against the next generation graphics chips (TNT2, V3, Savage4)? Does it support single-pass multitexturing and will it be integrated into core logic? Will it support 3dnow! and Katmai?

Based on Winbench99, SiS300 score 600 at the premier stage and will be enhanced to 800 later. (1024x768x16 bit at 85Hz)

Performance-wise, SiS300 will be a litter bit lower than TNT2, V3, Savage4, however, our features will be more than theirs. SiS300 supports single-pass multitexturing, 3DNow! and Katmai. It will be integrated into core logic in the long run, but it still months away.

De info staat in een interview waar ik twee dagen geleden ook al wat over postte.

PC One heeft het volk bij IDT zitten interviewen over hun Winchip, niet bepaald een winnend chippie. Hier wat van de saus:

Why are clock speeds on the Winchip2 so low compared to your competitors? When will higher clock speeds appear?

IDT's initial WinChip processors, while below the speed standards of the tier 1 OEMs, have sold very well in emerging markets, and this has provided us an excellent springboard to move to the next level. WinChip speeds will increase incrementally with the April introduction of the WinChip 2 (version A which fixes the 3dnow! erratum) and WinChip 3. Additionally, the WinChip 4 will take us to 500MHz this time next year. That will be a competitive product for the low-end. And when we move to 0.18um, we will get a significant boost in speed for products after WinChip 4.

Riva3D heeft een artikel gebouwd over de nVidia Detonator drivers. Naast een paar emmers met benchmarks zit er veel handige info bij. De conclusie:

So, we can indeed conclude that the Detonator drivers have much to offer all TNT users. Gamers, developers and 3D graphic designers are discovering that the newest drivers can give a needed boost if you know where to look for it.

Vind hier uit waarom...

Intel gaat een plank op de markt gooien met een geïntegreerde Riva TNT accelerator. Da's opmerkelijk, want Intel had een tijdje terug nog het idee opgevat om zich op de markt van video chips te begeven, met als gevolg i740, die inmiddels niet meer helemaal bij de tijd is.

Riva3D wist de laatste info te verkrijgen:

It appears that Intel is in the process of producing a new motherboard, called the SR440BX. What's most intrigueing is that this board will sport a TNT onboard along with a Creative Labs PCI64 sound chip. (A huge thanks to Scott S.) Here's the goods ripped from the .pdf file.