1. Q: If I have SLI should I get a Voodoo3?

   
   A: Your choice, but the Voodoo3 is the next generation product in the Voodoo family of products and clearly is the next level of performance in the 3D arena. Voodoo3 offers several significant advantages over Voodoo2 SLI that many users will find important enough to choose to upgrade. The first of which is that Voodoo3 can render from 6 - 8 million triangles per second versus Voodoo2SLI at 3 million, this enables the next generation of highly complex games to scream at ultra high resolutions. Second, the Voodoo3 3000 flat-out beats SLI in real-world game performance and in industy-standard benchmarks; even the Voodoo3 2000 holds its own against SLI. Next, Voodoo3 can display 3D in greater than 1024x768 mode and higher resolutions make for better-looking content. If you haven’t played QuakeII at 1600x1200 you’re missing something (sniping has never been so good). Also, Voodoo3 can also display 3D in a window. Voodoo3 has integrated the world’s fastest 128-bit 2D engine and a high-performance video engine, too that enables you to display resolutions up to 2048x1536 (dependant on monitor support). With a fully-integrated solution you can free up those two PCI slots and take advantage of the much faster AGP bus. Finally, we’ve improved our color filtering in 16-bit modes since Voodoo2 quite a bit: a discriminating eye will be able to see the difference (see #11 below). 

   
   
2. Q: Can I use a Voodoo3 with a Voodoo2?

   
   A: Yes, but why?. The Voodoo3 is a standalone product with 2D and 3D combined. No other graphics card will be required.



3. Q: Is Voodoo3 3D-only?

   
   A: Voodoo3 is a 2D and 3D card. No other graphics card will be required.



4. Q: Will there be a PCI version of Voodoo3?

   
   A: Yes. The Voodoo3 2000 will be available with a PCI bus or an AGP bus.



5. Q. Will you continue to sell Voodoo-based boards to other board makers? 

   
   A. 3Dfx will continue to sell and support Voodoo2 and Voodoo Banshee chips to our current add-in card and OEM customers.



6. Q: Who will be selling Voodoo3?

   
   A: Voodoo3 will be sold by 3Dfx. Authorized distributors and retailers will carry the products (examples include CompUSA, Best Buy, Electronic Boutique, MicroCenter and Fry's).



7. Q. When will 3Dfx products hit the retail shelves? How many SKUs do you expect? 

   
   A. We are planning to launch the first 3Dfx branded products powered by our recently announced Voodoo3 family of chips optimized for both the retail and PC-OEM markets. Four SKUs will be shipped: the Voodoo3 2000 AGP, Voodoo3 2000 PCI, Voodoo3 3000 AGP, and the Voodoo3 3500 AGP. Expect the products to be available in the late March time frame. 



8. Q: Are you going to sell a 3D-only version of Voodoo3?

   
   A: No. All Voodoo3 cards will be 2D and 3D combined, but the performance of the 3D is not lost in anyway with the combined card. Check out the web site for the increased 2D and 3D performance! 



9. Q: What TV resolutions will you handle?

   
   A: NTSC and PAL.  



10. Q: Why doesn't Voodoo3 support more than 16MB?

    
    A: A 16MB frame buffer supports 1280x1024, 16bpp, triple buffered, 16bit depth buffer, with 6MB of texture memory to spare. Voodoo3 will also do full 3D rendering at 1600x1200! There is no need for 32MB if 16MB produces same results! No popular games require 32 MB. Why pay an extra $$ for an extra 16MB memory for no perceivable benefit?



11. Q: Why doesn't Voodoo3 support 32b rendering, or large textures, or 32b textures?

    
    A: There are two reasons: frame rate and image quality. Frame rate is the single most important feature that a gaming platform can provide, and not just average frame rate but sustained frame rate. How many times have you been wiped out in a death match when your frame rate suddenly drops as a number of characters and weapons enter the scene? 32bpp rendering with full 32bpp frame buffer accesses requires twice the memory bandwidth of 16bpp frame buffer accesses regardless of the graphics engine: higher banchwidth requirement means lower frame rate. As for image quality, we’ve gone to great lengths to make games look great in 16bpp mode. We actually do the rendering calculations internally at 32 bits to have full precision with the16-bit operands. Then, instead of simply truncating the results to 16 bits for saving in the frame buffer we use a proprietary filtering algorithm that retains nearly the full precision of the color value. The result is something that rivals ANY full 32-bit rendering, only it goes a lot faster. We think that’s what gamers really want. 



12. Q:That OS's will be supported?

    
    A: Windows 95, Windows 98, and Windows NT 4.0.



13. Q: Can I get the 143MHz board with TV?

    
    A: The Voodoo3 3000 and Voodoo3 3500 are the only boards that will support TV out through and S-Video connector. We’ll also make an RCA “dongle” available.



14. Q: Why do I have to pay for LCD (DFP) output with the 183MHz product when I don't have one!

    
    A: As you may know the need for Digital Flat Panel support is a growing and will likely become a standard very soon. The Voodoo3 3500 card also allows a user to run their VGA monitor and the DFP monitor at the same time. If you currently do not have a DFP monitor, then this card will prepare you for one in the future.



15. Q: Will the Voodoo3 3500 still have support for regular monitors? In the Specs it indicated support for Digital Flat Panel Monitors.

    
    A: The Voodoo3 3500 will have support for all regular monitors and Digital Flat Panel (DFP) monitors as well as support for TV output for an NTSC or PAL TV.



16. Q: What is the highest color depth available for the 3D output? Is it still 16-bit color or has it been updated to 32-bit color?  

    
    A: The Voodoo3 uses internal rendering calculations @ 32bpp with a proprietary compression algorithm to store results at 16bpp. This gives us the best of both worlds: high color depth and low memory bandwidth!

     


17. Q: It also stated it has DVD Hardware Assist. I currently have a DVD Hardware Decoder card. When I purchase a Voodoo3 will I be able to remove the original DVD Decoder card and play DVD movies directly thru the Voodoo 3 Card?  

    
    A: You can still use your original DVD decoder card. The Voodoo3 card will just make the DVD decoding operate faster. By integrating offers planar-to-packed conversion in hardware the Voodoo3 offers full 30 fps (frames per second) MPEG-2 Playback with no dropped frames, and Soft DVD support for all major CODECs.

     


18. Q: Are all versions of the Voodoo3 going to be compatible with super 7 motherboards, I would make sure to have full compatibility because of the upcoming K6-3?  

    
    A: Yes. All Pentium based motherboards and AMD motherboards will be supported.

     


19. Q: Will you offer trade ins for those who want to upgrade from a voodoo2 to a voodoo3?  

    
    A: We don’t have plans for a trade-in program.

     


20. Q: Will there be a Voodoo3 4000? When will it be out? Will there be a PCI version of all Voodoo3 boards? 

    
    A: As for PCI versions of the 3000 and 3500, we don’t think that there will be much market demand. However, if that’s what end-users tell us that’s what they really want we can change the product mix. Voodoo3 4000? Sorry, can’t comment on un-announced cool stuff.



21. Q: Will the Voodoo3 support Linux as anticipated your flash presentation on the website didn’t mention it, only the windows platforms.

    
    A: We’re looking really closely at Linux as a gaming OS: it’s become popular in many areas. However, we can’t make any official comments one way or the other about potential future products like Linux drivers. 



22. Q. Are the Voodoo3 2000, -3000 and –3500 based on the same chip? What are the differences?

    
    A. The –3000 operates at 166 MHz and produces 333 million telexes (megatexels) per second, while the –3500 operates at 183MHz and produces 366 megatexels per second.



23. Q. Will 3Dfx have a Mac-version of Voodoo3?

    
    A. Just as there are Voodoo2 boards for the Mac, the Voodoo3 can also be a Mac graphics solution. We have received very positive response from Mac-Voodoo2 users and will continue to provide solutions for that platform. Currently, we are discussing this option with some of our board partners.



24. Q. At Comdex, you introduced Voodoo3 as a 125MHz chip and a 183MHz chip. Why the change?

    
    A. When we put Voodoo3 into production, three things happened which we think are very exciting for consumers and hard-core gamers.

    First, we discovered that we could beat our projected internal clock rate of our entry-level chip, so we decided to power the Voodoo3 2000 with a faster 143MHz chip. This still is offered under the price point we had pegged for the 125MHz chip, so it’s a real bonus for consumers.

    Second, we were able to yield excellent performance from a 166MHz version of the chip, so it made sense to make that the heart of the Voodoo3 3000, the high-end mainstream product. The Voodoo3 3000 offers industry-leading performance for the vast majority of game enthusiasts, and promises to be an enormously popular product for us. We think consumers will agree that it’s a tremendous value and very powerful graphics accelerator.

    Third, we discovered that the 183MHz chip again yields performance that exceeds even our expectations. Based on the relative performance of this chip versus the other Voodoo3 chips (not to mention the technology available from our competitors), it was clear that this processor was an ideal engine to drive the Voodoo3 3500 product. The –3500 is an ideal product for hard-core gamers who demand the ultimate in performance and interactivity.



25. Q. When will 3Dfx offer AGP 4X? 

    
    A. We’ve announced that a 4X member of the Voodoo3 family will be available to our OEM partners in time to intercept the debut of AGP 4X in the market. 



26. Q. When will the AGP 4X board be available?

    
    A. The AGP 4X member of the Voodoo3 family is timed to ship with the high-volume ramp of the first 4X AGP chipsets. 



27. Q. Does Voodoo3 support anisotropic filtering?

    
    A. When we launched at Comdex ‘98, this was primarily a software feature which we decided not to productize after having reviewed the resulting image quality that it provided. 



28. Q. Does Voodoo3 support full scene anti-aliasing?

    
    A. This is another primarily software feature that is under review.



29. Q. With the introduction of Voodoo3, will there be any revisions made to Glide? 

    
    A. We use Glide to tie together all of our hardware offerings with a common API. Glide 3.0 has recently been released and Voodoo3 is fully Glide 3.0 compatible. Voodoo3 is also fully backward compatible with the older Glide 2.X API.



30. Q. Will Glide be updated prior to the release of Voodoo3? 

    
    A. There will be unique Glide drivers for Voodoo3; however, the core Glide functionality and programming interface will be unchanged for Voodoo3. 



31. Q. Does Voodoo3 have any special support for AMD’s K6-2 and 3DNow! instructions? 

    
    A. We have worked diligently with AMD to insure that our drivers for Voodoo3 as well as drivers for Voodoo Banshee and Voodoo2 will get the maximum possible benefit from the 3DNow! instruction set. You can even see several AMD K6-3D systems in our booth today! 



32. Q. Are you providing optimizations for Pentium III? How about optimizations for Pentium II? 

    
    A. Collaborating with Intel, we optimized current and future Voodoo products for the Pentium III processor, enabling consumers to enjoy greater levels of realism in their games and entertainment content. All of the application programming interfaces (APIs) supported by Voodoo3 - including Microsoft's Direct X6, Glide from 3Dfx and OpenGL from Silicon Graphics - have been optimized for the Pentium III processor. As a result, content developers can incorporate more intricate models and scenes, and apply significantly greater realism to the movements of characters and objects.

    As for Pentium II, with Voodoo Banshee we introduced a patent to directly handle out-of-order commands from the Pentium II so that there are no CPU stalls. This hardware optimization results in as much as a 15 percent performance improvement.

Copyright 2000, 3dfx Interactive, Inc.
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