Voor de laatste bijgewerkte lijst van 3DNow! geoptimaliseerde producten en games, klik hier.

Nieuw is o.a. VideoLogic's PVR250 powered Neon 250, Voodoo3, Army Men 3, Crusaders of Might and Magic, High Heat 2001, Mortarman, Official Formula One Racing, Premier League Manager 99 en Softball from 3DO... (lijstje gejat van Voodoo Extreme )

3DGN heeft een korte preview geschreven van Team Fortress 2. Dit spel lijkt bijna te mooi om waar te zijn... Check de preview voor de rest, en 3 screens van de game.

As cool as it would be to be a ninja (I suspect pretty much every gamer and their mother will use this class), the commander has to be the single most intriguing addition to the tried and true Team Fortress formula. The commander will be a character that can fly anywhere on the map and see anything he wishes, including the women troopers when they're in the shower. There's obviously more strategic use to this position than just that, and it involves coordinating attacks against the enemy by seeing what you're up against and figuring out ways to counter it. The commander could make or break an attack in the game, so it's important you pick someone more adept at the role than your cousin Billy Bob who's sure he can do it fine… The game will revolve around working as a team. Part of this will be achieved by having gamers wear the headsets that ship with the game so they can communicate with real time speech to teammates. In the game, the character's lips will move perfectly in sync with the speech… cool. I guess this means you can whisper stuff to snipers far away like, "I'm going to ram that rifle up your ass if you try and shoot me," all the while hoping they can read your lips. Everyone can hear your speech however, so if the enemy is closing in, it might be wise to whisper. You can also try shouting, "INCOMING!" to see if anyone dives to the ground.

AnandTech heeft een review van de Gigabyte GA-6BXDS i440BX Dual Slot-1 moederbord geplaatst. De test is gehouden met 2 Pentium II 400's. Check de review hier.

Gigabyte's GA-6BXDS is a dual Slot-1 board with on-board SCSI all on a (fairly) compact PCB. The Intel i440BX chipset is at the heart of the GA-6BXDS, with Adaptec's 7895P handling dual channel Ultra Wide SCSI duties.

[...]

A single jumper provides for bus speed selection, either 66 MHz, 100 MHz, or Auto. Auto, of course, uses the state of B21 to set the bus speed and the other settings force the specified FSB. It would be nice to see some overclocked bus speeds here, but Gigabyte apparently does not think those are necessary for a multiprocessor board. Four DIP switches control the clock multiplier settings, which is of course not necessary to set on today's multiplier locked CPU's. Stability is excellent as we've come to expect from Gigabyte.

DemoNews meldt dat v1.5 van de Voodoo3 Tweaker uit is. Nieuw in deze versie:

Now you can save your tweaks into different profiles !
2 new pre-set profiles added (Max Performance & Best Visual)
Added 'Enable Hardware GDI' under the DirectX/D3D section
Added a 'About' button, fixed a bug, and change the interface a little.

Download het zaakje hier!

Tweak 3D heeft een review geplaatst van een "Super Cooler System Monitor". Dit is dus een apparaatje waarmee je de staat van tot 8 PC componenten kunt bijhouden, en hij vertelt je wanneer de zaak begint te koken. Zeer leuk en handig voor overklokkers!

Wouldn't it be really cool if you could monitor the temperature of your video card, CPU, hard drive(s), motherboard, and sound card at all times? How about if the device that monitored these items had a built in clock, heat alarms, and two powerful fans to cool your hard drive? This kind of device would be a dream for overclockers, or anyone that is really careful about the heat their system produces. But wait - this isn't a dream; it's a reality! AMK Computers has these puppies for sale. They sure sound like a great idea.. but they cost a pretty penny. Are they worth it?

Ik zag op Tweak3D dat iemand van nVdia wat info heeft los gelaten over die 2.09 beta drivers van gisteren:

NEW (SUPPORTED) DRIVER RELEASE -- 208

Apparently a bunch of new drivers have popped up on the web. None of them are quite ready for prime time, in my opinion, but really soon (I hope within the next day or two) NVIDIA is putting some new ones on our web site that will kick some pretty major butt. The list of problems fixed that I know of include things like:

- Much improved OpenGL performance in Tribes. See below for details.

- Support for VSYNC wait now works much better than it ever has before. We have left it disabled by default, but to enable it, you can change the registry key:

\\HKLM\Software\NVIDIA Corporation\RIVA TNT\OpenGL\DefaultSwapInterval from 0xffffffff to 1. What you're setting when you do this is the minimum number of vblanks that will pass between each rendering frame. If you use this to play quake, when you want vsync disabled, you can use some Quake variable (gl_swapinterval or r_swapinterval) to set this without having to muck with the registry.

- K6 had problems where on some systems we could crash upon exiting Quake. This has been fixed.

- Some minor bugs have been fixed in the Direct3D driver, as well as some obscure crashes

- Windows NT 4 drivers are available

- ALI chipset workarounds. We've found what we hope is the secret sauce for allowing our graphics cards to work in the ALI 154x chipset-based motherboards.

Games Online heeft een interview gehad met Mark Reign over Unreal Tournament. Hier heb je een paar vragen, check deze site voor de rest! (staan ook een paar mooie screenshots bij)

[Q] From the graphic point of view, what will be the winning API? Direct 3D, GLide, OpenGL? And for the audio?

[A] We've taken over OpenGL support in-house (it was previously done by a contractor) and it will probably get the most attention going forward because it needs the most attention. But there are no winners or losers. We try to find the best API for each peice of hardware we need to support.

[Q] Carmack thinks that curved surfaces and mirrors are the future of 3D graphic, and he will use them in Quake III: Arena, the most important rival of Unreal Tournament. Why did you choose to not use them?

[A] We have mirrors. We had them in Unreal. Curved surfaces are cool but we decided we already have a great engine that delivers previously-unmatched visual quality so we chose to spend most of our time improving gameplay and performance.

Extreme Hardware heeft de Logitech WingMan Gaming Mouse effe getest. Quakers werken natuurlijk met goed materiaal, dus misschien moet je maar even de review lezen.

Another area that really impressed me was the button feel and tension. This is a big point, especially since the Gaming Mouse is being marketed to gamers who depend on their mice in some very hectic conditions. A button misstep here and there can mean the difference between victory and defeat. Depressing on the Gaming Mouse’s buttons gives a satisfying click, and they really need to be pressed to initiate an action. You’ve probably used one of those cheap mice whose buttons depress under a strong wind, but the Gaming Mouse compares well to the high-end mice as well. I tested it against the Logitech MouseMan Wheel and Microsoft Intellimouse, and found the wingman Gaming Mouse had the best buttons of the bunch.

AnandTech heeft wat info via email ontvangen over de AMD Athlon processor:

According to Infopro, AMD will release the Athlon processor to the masses in August. AMD has also chosen ASUS, GIGABYTE and MICROSTAR to manufacture AMD Athlon motherboards based on the AMD chipset. The chipset is exclusive to AMD and they will distribute it themseleves.

There are already two manufacturers doing Athlon mainboards. One is Fester, the other is Shina. Fester uses 6 layers PCB, 1 AGP, 4 PCI and 3 ISA. Shina uses 4 layer PCB with 5 PCI and will mass produce in September 99.

Another news is that, two of the major chipset players VIA and ALi in Taiwan will be releasing their Athlon compatible chipset. They will make use of DDR technology. FSB will remain at 100Mhz. It will incorporate support for PC133 SDRAM.

AGN Hardware heeft net een review van de 13GB grote Quantum Fireball CR klaar. Hij draait op 5400rpm, 9.5ms access time en heeft 512kB cache. Hij wordt vergeleken met de Western Digital Caviar, ook 13Gb, en dit kwam eruit:

I was very surprised at how the Quantum CR drive consistently outperformed the Western Digital drive. Not once did it finish in second place! I have no reservation in declaring the Quantum CR 13.0 GB the hands-down performance winner in this head-to-head review.

If 13.0GB is the capacity that you are looking for, I recommend choosing the Quantum Fireball CR over the Western Digital Caviar. Both drives boast the same specifications and carry the exact same cost; however, the Quantum outperformed the Western Digital in every test. The only drawback to choosing the Quantum is that it is slightly louder than the Western Digital, but if performance is all you care about, by all means, go for the Fireball.

The Super 7 Hardware Guide heeft een review gebrouwen van de Yamaha CRW4416EZ. Een IDE brander die op 4 speed (her)schrijft en op 16 speed leest.

Yamaha has produced a fine and effective component in the CRW4416EZ and all at a very attractive price. If you are going to be doing a lot of copying of audio CDs I'd still recommend going with SCSI but for normal home or office backup use this drive is just fine. A great software bundle and the ability to flash update device firmware as well as stable fast performance make the Yamaha CRW4416EZ a drive you'll get lots of use out of with a minimum of fuss. Highly Recommended!

Alweer een review van deze speakers, gisteren had Live Like a Savage er ook al eentje. Deze is echter van Wicked PC en is hier te vinden.

Applying the FPS2000 for use in games proved quite simple. I found that using 3D positional sound such as Aureal A3D or Creative EAX, the speakers worked quite well. Sound is as usual, crisp and clean, with no over-bass or over-tweetering as I call it. The sound sounded just fantastic. It was quite clear that the rear speakers were working well, and it sounded a bit better if you set the rear speakers a hair louder than the fronts, since it seemed to even out the sound levels. Playing CDs and MP3s in Windows sounded like they would in a default car audio system with a decent subwoofer.

We tried the Sound Blaster Live! DIN connector and didn't really see any performance or sound quality level increase. They claim it should be cleaner and crisper, however if it was, I couldn't really tell. Either way, it's an option you should use if you have a Live! sound card. Owners of the Diamond MX300 or other new high quality sound cards that Creative Labs doesn't make will find the sound to be just as clean and crisp. The sound isn't something we can emphasize in a review as much as we'd like to since you'll have to hear it to see it.

The Register meldde dit stukje, waarin staat dat de prijzen van 64mb DRAM omhoog gaan. Niet fijn dus voor arme tweakers. (en die zijn er veel )

The price of 64Mb SDRAMs has shot up over the last four days but there seems little rhyme or reason behind the price moves. According to Alan Stanley, MD of memory company Dane-Elec, the price has risen by about 50 cents on a price of $4. John Byrne, joint MD of VML UK, said prices had risen further than that and stood today at around $4.60. Last week, Micron US dispelled any rumours that it had problems with its DRAM production and maintained its fabs were working normally. Said Byrne: "As far as I can see, there's no real reason for the rise -- there hasn't been a downturn in production nor have any really big orders been won." Some reports have suggested that Micron has had difficulty converting its TI fabs to its own technology, causing something of a shortfall in supply. But Micron told The Register last week: "We don't respond to rumours". Dresdner Kleinwort Benson in Japan is believed to have issued a warning on the matter.

Unreal gaat geport worden naar de PSX2, de console die qua snelheid nog veel sneller is dan een PIII + TNT2. Hier een stukje wat Tim Sweeney heeft geschreven:

“There will be other significant enhancements, almost all along the lines of increasing polygon counts and exploiting the massive floating-point capabilities of the machine. Other than the animation, the new features are just in the concept stage, so I don't want to go hyping anything yet,” Sweeney said. Additionally, the extensibility of the engine should enable it to mature on the PSX2 platform just as it has on the PC, meaning developers could receive code updates during a project and become familiar with a tool that could support their creative efforts across several titles. It should also facilitate the efficient porting of PC games to the PSX2, broadening the sales potential of games using the engine and bringing more meat to the console arena.

Volgens VoodooExtreme hebben is er een nieuwe Rage 128 Tweaker. Check 'm uit als je zo'n kaart hebt.

Sharky Extreme heeft een hele uitgebreide hard drive guide in elkaar gezet. Ze leggen de verschillende termen en types heel goed uit, best wel goed artikel.

With the advent of the new Ultra DMA/66 and Ultra3 SCSI hard drive transfer protocols, it has become increasingly difficult to muddle through the mess of technologies to find a total hard drive solution that's right for your needs. Is SCSI right for you? Should you go out instead and buy an add-on UDMA/66 controller and hard drive? Will you really see a performance difference between any of these options?

Sharky Extreme's hardware staff has been asking these same questions for the past month and has finally compiled a full list of answers in the form of our Hard Drive Technology Guide. From IDE to Fiber Channel, if it concerns hard drive technology it's here.

When it comes to hard drives, one of the most difficult things to get a firm grasp on is all the terminology. To aid in your pursuit of knowledge and understanding we've provided a full glossary of common hard drive technology jargon, from areal density to PIO modes.

Bij Voodoo Extreme las ik dat er hier een weapons Guide te vinden is voor Q3Test. Per wapen bespreken ze hoe je hem het beste kunt hanteren, best handig.

In the Quake world, it's a dog eat dog world, and you need to know how to bite first, bite hardest, and bite last. Become the frothing, bad-ass, dog that eats the neighbor's cat and sends the mailman running with the Q3test Weapons guide to end all weapons guides, with full coverage of every weapon in the Q3test, and how to use them. Add punch and precision to your game, and never leave the top of the scoreboard again. Follow the first link, and happy fragging!

Voor een 13 in een dozijn review van de Xentor32 Ultra TNT2 kaart van Guillemot, klik hier.

Here’s the low down, this card is awesome. Being the only TNT2 card we have reviewed so far, we can’t say much how it performs in comparison, but from hearing other people, not many reach as high as this one. We were astonished at initial testing, when its high frame rates wow’d us. Drooled when, by upgrading to the latest drivers, gained an extra 10fps in Descent3. And better yet, when we pushed it to 183/200, and gained more frames. Yes, the Xentor TNT2 Ultra can be over clocked to that speed. We ran several benchmarks on this card, so take a look, we think you’ll like them a lot.

Hm, tussen het nieuws van AGN3D liep ik tegen een First Look van Carmageddon 3, The Death Race 2000 aan. De game-engine zou nogal verbeterd zijn, en 2 keer zo snel draaien dan die van Carma2, met dezelfde hardware.

Carmageddon The Death Race 2000 has been developed with world leading technology. The focus of the game is centered round fast action gameplay in a completely new 'immersive' environment, which is far more advanced than in previous Carmageddon™ games. The humor of the game surpasses that of previous releases, and just imagine, aggressive zombies! In short, nothing like this has been seen before. Players will be able to customize vehicles and pedestrians from the start of the game (e.g. car colors and decal). A sophisticated editing tool outside of the game will also allow for more complex editing e.g. creation of new vehicles, Zombies etc. Over the last two years, SCi has been working on a next generation racing engine. Already, this engine achieves twice the frame rate as Carmageddon II™ on the same hardware. Combined with the revolutionary physics engine first seen in Carmageddon II™, this title is set to redefine racing games - on any PC! And on-line...

Carmageddon™The Death Race 2000 will be the first in the Carmageddon™ series to be designed from the ground up for on-line Internet playing. With unique on-line arenas and play modes, this game is going to keep those telephone lines engaged for many long hours! And of course these levels will be full of highly charged AI computer players whose only purpose in life is to see you smash, crumple and burn.

Hier staan nog meer screenshots!

Errug handig, Tweak3D heeft een TNT/TNT2 Tweak Guide in elkaar geflanst. Ze behandelen o.a. de bios settings, AGP snelheden, drivers en hoe je ze het beste kunt installeren, Super-7 compatibility problemen, Direct3D en OpenGL settings, overklocking, en ga zo maar door. Hij is 4 pagina's lang.

FiringSquad heeft nu ook een review van deze professionele videokaart gebouwd. Er zit dus een Permedia3 chippie op, en is bedoeld voor grafische workstations. Voor gamers dus niet zo interessant, ook omdat ze $999 moet kosten.

Hier heb je een stukkie over de 'Virtual Texturing' feature van de kaart.

Virtual Textures is a technology that the Oxygen GVX1 utilizes to essentially provide more texture memory. Although the Oxygen GVX1 already has 32MB of texture memory, which seems like a good deal for a gaming card, remember that we are dealing with a high-end piece of work here, and 32MB is not enough. Virtual textures allows the card to use its onboard texture memory as a cache for textures that are actually stored in the system memory. Since a high-end graphics workstation (or any machine, for that matter) could easily have 1GB of RAM or more, we have many more textures stored.

Thus, the textures are stored in their entirety in the system memory. When a certain texture is needed, then, it is retrieved from the system memory. However, the whole texture is not retrieved. Instead, the GLINT R3 chipset determines how much of the texture is needed based on what the scene that is being rendered looks like. If the entire texture is not visible in the scene, then the GLINT R3 will break up the whole texture and use only the parts that are needed.