Great for TV, 3d graphics not bad for a cheaper model
Written: Dec 16 '00
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Product Rating:
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Pros: We can watch TV on the computer whilst working
Cons: tech support / driver updates are not the best
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| calebu2's Full Review: 3dfx Voodoo3 3500, (16 MB) AGP Video Card |
I really don't make full use of the 3d graphics on this card, so I'm not going to write another review about how many megapixels it can draw in any given time span.
I played unreal on it and it looked pretty smooth at high resolutions. Tiger Woods 2000 looks smooth too, but I don't think that golf is a real test of its true power!
The option we really like with this card is the TV tuner. They have done a great job of integrating it into the card and we use our computer as a second TV. It's cable ready, so we can get any of the basic cable channels. The quality is almost as good as a normal TV, in many cases we wonder whether the fuzziness is just coming from the poor cable signal.
It has a very nice video cable attachment, so we can connect our VCR or camcorder and use it as a webcam or photo capture device - saves us having to get a dedicated webcam or digital camera.
Windows runs without delay with the graphics card, it is more than capable of handling high resolution, high color depth screens.
The main downsides to the card are the software and drivers. The card works well and under normal circumstances there is not a problem with it. But upgrading the display drivers is never straightforward - no matter how simple 3dfx try to make the process. It usually involves a lot of installing and uninstalling of drivers and software until you get the right combination down.
The suspend mode on the computer does not work because of some kind of glitch with the driver and a year later, 3dfx have not repaired it. There are some glitches on the Visual Reality TV software, but not enough to cause a problem. My main problem is finding software that will record video in a format that can be read into other programs (like realencoder or a video studio program).
This card is well worth the money. But try to get it cheaper than the $239 MSRP (I found it for under $150 through mysimon.com and shopper.com).
I know there are better cards coming out and I have been told that the TV tuner is no longer state of the art. For our simple needs, it's more than enough!
Recommended:
Yes
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Epinions.com ID:
calebu2
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Reviews written: 34
Trusted by: 2 members
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