Visit the 3D Logos page and vote for your favorite reader submitted logo
for the 3D Column here at the site. The authors of the 6 most popular images will get a free prize from Kensington. First/Second prize is a Turbo Mouse trackball, third/fourth prize is a Orbit trackball, and fifth/sixth prize is a 2-button Kensington Mouse.
These will be shipped direct from Kensington to the winners.
Gamecenter.com is reporting PC Voodoo 2 card prices are plummeting. Memory and Voodoo II chipset price reductions were cited as reasons for the drops, but I think it's also due to very heavy competition (there are more than half a dozen brands of Voodoo II cards now on the market). Prices are expected to drop even further as the holiday season approaches, spurred by the new 3Dfx Banshee (2d/3d combo card) and nVidia TNT chipsets. If you missed it, Gamecenter has a chart of the performance advantage of SLI (dual Voodoo II Scan Line Interlacing) that shows benefits scale with faster CPU speeds and by game title. SLI does make resolutions like 1024x768 in Quake possible, whereas 800x600 is the max with a single Voodoo II card.
Today's Apple InfoAlley has links to TILs on:
The latest printed MacWeek has a price listing showing Apple G3/333 and 366 (future systems expected to be announced mid-month).
The G3/333 with 64MB/8GB/ZIP/AV/24xCD/100BaseT was shown as $2599,
The G3/366 with 128MB/4GB UW SCSI/24xCD at $2999.
Sonnet G3/6100 Video Solution: Chris Whittier writes with a workaround:
"
So if you have a [Sonnet] G3 upgrade in your 61xx series Mac, you can't have a video
card right? Wrong!
I had a spare 7100 video card laying about and lo' and behold that sucker
fit into the Video adapter in the 61xx machine with the upgrade. I had to
not push the HD in the sled ALL the way in, but the case closed and I now
have my full video RAM running with the cresendo card! Neat huh?
Chris Whittier
Terra Pacific, Inc.
IS Director
"
[12:00 PM Update]
ByteMarks: Mach 5 9600/400 vs. Apple G3/333: The G3-ZONE and Mach 5 page
has the ByteMark scores of my 604e-400MHz (9600) and the Apple G3/300 running at 333/222/66.
Quantum Dual Voodoo II Revisited: Back on April 23rd I broke the story on the Quantum dual Voodoo II cards (SLI on a single card) and the news spread to other
Mac sites like wildfire. The next day I posted a call for readers to write Quantum to request a Mac version
(they did) but I never heard back from Quantum. There may still be a chance based on this reader mail from Chris Mark yesterday. He said they replied by email and phone that they were 'evaluating' the possibility of creating Mac drivers for the card and
that time and interest from the Mac community at large were factors.
Once again I'm asking for readers to email obsidian@quantum3d.com requesting a "Obsidian2 MAC attack" - we may still have a chance. If we do nothing, we surely lose.
(Note - this was posted in 1998, the card is obsolete now.)
[I later posted a review of the Obsidian X24 dual Voodoo2 on one PCI Card, including tests with 3dfx's Mac Voodoo2 drivers, which worked.] Other cool Voodoo II cards of interest is the Wicked 3D with optional 3D glasses. Reports say that the effect in Quake is amazing. They offer the 12MB Card and 3D glasses for $299
for a very limited time. I expect our chances are slim that MetraByte (makers of the card) would do a Mac version, but you never know.
Ram Sticker Shock: Jose Maria sent links to two pricey ram upgrades for iMacs
http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/980810/ok_periphe_1.html
http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/980811/newerram_1.html
Is there anyone that will really pay $2995 for a 256MB upgrade? It makes no sense to me to invest $2995 or more to add 256MB of ram to an iMac. For less than the cost of the ram upgrade I can get a G3/266 or faster Minitower upgraded to 384MB or ram (3rd party upgrade).
theimac.com has a "iMacs are Arriving!" article with a preview
of one that a reader received yesterday.
ZD/Net's Anchordesk has a article called "Is it Smart to Buy an iMac?"
3dfx/Hornet Framerates: Lee Graham wrote in response to yesterday's
request for info on how Hornet framerates:
"
Mike,
I recently read in the GSC BBS posted by Jon Blum, formerly of GSC, this message concerning the PC version and I assume it would be the same for Mac:
'the internal timing of the game (not just the graphics) is limited to 20fps'
I assume this to mean that no matter what your hardware can do fps wise, the
most you will see is 20 fps.
Lee Graham
"
Dave Riggle wrote that Techworks is doing a Power3D 2 card (Voodoo II) but
apparently only for Windows. http://www.techworks.com/products/power3d/2/PC/index.html. (Page later removed.)
Naritomo Mizutani wrote about his new PB 2400 pages:
"
I'm webmaster about PowerBook 2400c.
I have beta version of NUPOWR 2400(Newer) and impression, picture on my site. I'm working translate to English, please visit my site.
http://www.powerbook.org/2400/
(Japanese)
http://www.powerbook.org/2400/English/index-e.html
(English)
"
Mactell announced new 333 and 366 MHz G3 upgrades. See the press release for more details. The press release notes September availability on the new 333/366MHz models. I'm still waiting for their G3/ZIF upgrades announced many months ago.
Internet Explorer 4.0 Users: As mentioned previously, there is a bug
in IE 4.x that does not refresh frame pages. This site is updated several times
a day so I recommend you do a Option-Refresh or point the cursor into the
main news text area and hold down the mouse then select 'refresh' to force
a reload of the page if you are revisiting the site . Netscape does not have this bug.
Need Help?: If you have a tech support question (News and other items for posting should still be sent to me) please try the new Men in Mac
tech support page. It's in beta form and will be improved but I urge readers to
use it immediately as a means of getting some expert help on a huge variety of
topics covering most every Mac ever made, upgrades, software and more.
You might want to follow the tips/steps listed on the Site Guide for Answers to your Questions. A MIM Bio page is also posted that has info on the volunteers that
have offered to help provide reader support. My sincere thanks go out to each of them. Give them a try - I think you'll be impressed.
For common questions on CPU card compatibility and performance
- check the G3 CPU Card Survey Results for many owner comments on all the brands selectable by
Mac model.
Recent Site News/Reviews:
Mac Advantage URLs:
If you have links that show comparison scores between the Macs and PCs,
please contact me. TIP: If you need ammunition on the Mac advantage, just go to www.dejanews.com and search on windows and any topic such as video, audio, registry,
IRQs, etc. (or windows and problems). That will usually get many cases of why the Mac is more productive.
For a great list of Advocacy Links - check out Richard Long's Advocacy page.
Make a Difference: Be the Difference
Randy Mita, Brad Lau and I came up with a new slogan and theme for Mac advocacy
- "Make a Difference: Be the Difference". We're asking that
all Mac owners take advantage of every opportunity to let others know the
Mac advantage. It's a grass-roots approach that will surely help. You might save someone from a lifetime of Windows in the bargain.
Yesterday's News
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