SFFT alpha drivers - V3/4/5 - Join to Testing

[Raff3DC]

Wooow ... the driver is damn fast. 3DMark2000 improves by 11 percent in 1.600x1.200x32 (V5 6000 @ 183 MHz). Even 2.048x1.536 works now in 16 and 32 Bit - fluent! The SLI f*ckup seems to be dead, finally. Great work, SFFT!

BUT: Many games now suffer from texture glitches. I've tested Max Payne 1 and 2. 1.024x768 works perfect, but 1.600x1.200 looks f*cked up - many textures look like a rainbow. Nice effect, but it should be fixed, I think. But even 2.048x1.536x32 is incredibly fast in MP2 ... because most of the textures are crappy, I assume.

SFFT, please keep up the nice work! The SLI bug is almost gone ... just a little step ...

Greetings and thanks,
Raff

[kalte]

Finally 1.0 release! I installed it today and tested what I can:
- 1440x900 resolution, like with previous versions of the driver, must be added manually with PowerStrip. Maybe contacting the developer of PowerStrip for some help it would be possible to add this resolutions, as well as all the other common widescreen resolutions, permanently to the driver.
- Heroes III works perfect.
- WarCraft III and Windows explorer now lets me choose resolutions up to 2048x1536. Previous driver only let me choose up to 1280x1024.
- UT99 works at very high FPS on D3D mode at max details, like with old alpha drivers (so high that the game is unplayable, I think it is because of the dualcore CPU). I tested it on Glide mode and the game also runs very fast at 1280x1024 at max detail. On Glide mode it only lets me choose 4:3 resolution, on D3D it gives me the option to play it at 1440x900, I assume that Glide mode doesn't use at all the available desktop resolutions but D3D does.
- CrystalMark OpenGL test still needs to use MesaFX to works. PowerStrip also needs it for an option to check OpenGL version.
- DivX videos are working OK around 18% CPU usage. I don't have any DVD close to me so I can't test them now.

It is so good to see that driver development is still going on, keep the good work!

[Raff3DC]

I did further investigation using my V56k. The rainbow textures and other corruption also appear in 3DMark2001SE and No One Lives Forever 2. Now we know four apps with this bug: These two and the Max Payne games. Important to mention again: Up to 1.024x768x32 the textures are fine.

Later, I played a bit with the texture options in 3DMark2001SE using the 1.600x1.200 screen resolution. 16 Bit textures seemed fine to me, "compressed" (which means 32 Bit and S3TC afaik) showed the errors first. "32 Bit" (uncompressed) caused even worse bugs ... and my card finally freezed. It seems to me that there is an internal problem if the VRAM is full. SFFT, does this help you?

The funny thing is: 3DMark2000 never shows the texture corrution.

Greetings,
Raff

[Chosen_One]

Great news!

I hope v1.0 will not be "the final one". Keep on programming! You do a really great job for this community!

[m14radu]

Agatha Christie:







Some texture errors: look at the roof right.

CSI Demo:



All at 4xAA on Voodoo5 5500.

Regards.
Radu.

[kalte]

Hi. Today I tested DVD playback with PowerDVD. It is using around 25% CPU power and with an older version it used around 17%.

I corrected the issue I was having with UT99 being at so high FPS that made it unplayable. I used ImageCFG to modify CPU affinity and set it to use only one core, now I have constant frames and the game runs perfect at max detail on D3D at 1440x900.

[Pulsus]

I can´t believe that, SFFT version 1.0, the best news i have about my voodoo card.

Thanks a lot SFFT for the great job, and pelase don´t stop it, if you need some support just open a way to we (all voodoo lovers) send some funds to keep the driver development.

I will make some tests at weekend.

VOODOO Forever....

[benna]

I tested SFFT 1.0
now GTA San andreas WORKS PERFERCTLY in single chip!!!!
With both vsa enables appears some coloured stripes both in game and in menus, but performances are good.
Also in 3DMark00 rendering errors (in inter-test screens) in single chip are gone!
Terrific work SFFT!!!
You are so close to have GTA:SA working on voodoos, please don't stop your work!

[ggab]

yessssss, very thanks you SFFT! the 1.0 release rock for sure

i'me very happy, as all together in all aorund the word

[osckhar]

3DMark2001SE
C2D@2.166MHz
V4 4800 AGP 64Mb @166MHz

- SFFT vers. 1 - 1.805Points
- SFFT Alpha 59 - 1.807Points
- Amigamerlin - 2.051Points
- Amigamerlin R1 - 2.040Points
- Amigemerlin R11 - Fail
- Beta KoolSmoky - 2.080Points

Oscar

[kukucs]

haliho
Witch motherboard's chipset functional sft 1.0 ??
p35, x38, 965 , nforce 5xxxx??? sorry english language..
I will buy new motheboard .
thxx

[osckhar]

Originally posted by kukucs

haliho
Witch motherboard's chipset functional sft 1.0 ??
p35, x38, 965 , nforce 5xxxx??? sorry english language..
I will buy new motheboard .
thxx

Hello,
I have tried differents motherboards wihtout luck with my C2D and V5 PCI:
- ix38
- Via PT880 Pro/Ultra
- i865PE
- i975

If you are using a V5 PCI the best way is go for a AMD platform. SFFT driver with new Intel system does not work very well though.

ps. I hope SFFT can fix such bug.

Oscar

[Glide]

Hi ALL.

Originally posted by osckhar

3DMark2001SE
C2D@2.166MHz
V4 4800 AGP 64Mb @166MHz

- SFFT vers. 1 - 1.805Points
- SFFT Alpha 59 - 1.807Points
- Amigamerlin - 2.051Points
- Amigamerlin R1 - 2.040Points
- Amigemerlin R11 - Fail
- Beta KoolSmoky - 2.080Points

Oscar

Oscar, thank you a lot for this comparison. It's very userful.
Just a question: could you make new tests using some game?

Bye bye

[osckhar]

Just a question: could you make new tests using some game?

Of course! Let me see what games I can use on new test. I will try with games launched between 2001-2003 Year.

Oscar

[Glide]

Hi Oscar

you could begin testing these games or demos: Unreal Tournament 99 (in both Direct3D and GLide rendering modes), Unreal Tournament 2004, Quake 3 Arena (testers on 3dfxzone.it italian forum - their reports on SFFT 1.0 driver are here http://www.forumzone.it/showthread.php?t=26683 - had issues/crashes running Quake 3 with FSAA enabled on Voodoo5 cards) as well as Half-Life 2 titles.

Let me know,

TNX.

Bye bye