That's good. I guess it depends on what you would consider a
'budget-end' card. I figure I can get a decent card for less than
$150.
True, I was thinking low-end when I wrote that, today's $100-150 cards
do often use a significant bit more power than your Voodoo3.
I've seen some that are AGP 2x/4x. My motherboard would only run it
at 2x, of course, but if I get a new mobo, I would be able to use the
4x. (This is assuming that the card is 3.3v.)
It might be time for a new motherboard/CPU combo anyway, since it'll
be a primary bottleneck for many if not most uses.
I don't mind doubling up on something like a printer, but I do wonder
about doubling up on cards that will be used at the same time. (When I
first got the 3dfx card I talked to the techs at 3dfx and they said it
should be on its own interrupt. I never made that change and the card
seemed to work ok with only minor glitches.)
That would be the generic, canned reply from a hardware company. It
minimizes the potential for problems but it's not in itself a
necessity. I vaguely recall that an ATI AIW I have here shares IRQ 11
with a USB 1 controller, though which keyboard and mouse are used.
I tend to push software and equipment to its limit, except for
overclocking, so I can see how it might be useful in video editing and
music composition also.
Genrally those uses only require a frame buffer to fill the displayed
desktop resolution, which isn't much memory at all until very high
resolution. Other than 3D, which could have very large textures, the
primary need for more memory is when there is a panning of a
virtually-larger image. I suppose that's possible with the two uses
you mention but I've never noticed any sluggishness from lack of video
memory in those areas.
I never installed DX8. I read discussions in other groups about the
difficulties with certain software after installing DX8 and
difficulties reverting back to DX7.
I'd at least give it a a try... make a full system backup (like you're
doing anyway, right?) then if it doesn't work out you can just revert
back to the pre-DX8 state of the system. It seems that every time a
new DX version comes out there's similar talk about problems with the
new version, but then eventually there's that problem you're running
into, that it's benefit (hopefully) outweighs the risk.
In the future I will get a new barebones system and move some of the
cards over to a newer machine. Then I will put the Voodoo3 card back
in and just use that system to run older software.
BTW, I have read where some people have the Voodoo3 cards and another
video card in the same system. In most cases one card has been AGP
and the other PCI. I'm not sure that would work in my system even if
the newer card were PCI.
Why wouldn't it work? You'd need a power supply capable of supporting
both cards, and it'll depend on the OS too... most later (maybe all)
Windows versions have display adpater compatibility lists (at
Microsoft's website) to help determine if a particular card is suited
for primary and/or secondard display use. I do vaguely recall that
when the tuner card uses an overlay (which is the norm) it will need
be output on that video card, to it's attached monitor. That is one
benefit of the video cards with tuner onboard, that this overlay can
be used and it preserves as much bandwidth on the port/bus as
possible, but only until you start capturing that overlay.
Dave
