Review of the Guillemot International
Maxi Gamer 3D2 Voodoo2 graphic card 12Mb PCI

September 28, 1998

Introduction

As soon as I installed this card I launched Unreal and I played for a while. The performance difference I noticed from the preceding system on which I tried a Voodoo2 graphic card was amazing. The first time I tested a Voodoo graphic card I was using an AMD K6-233mhz and I now know that this is far from being sufficient. Of course the game will play even on system with a slower CPU as Guillemot bottom recommendation are about a Pentium 166 with 16 meg of ram memory but in my opinion the minimal system would be a Pentium II of 300Mhz with at least 64 Mb of memory to be able to play with a minimum of comfort. The problem wityh this type of graphic card is that they require a tremendous amount of CPU power to perform correctly. So, according to this, I would't consider as a serious option anything under a PII-266mhz unless you wish to sacrifice on gaming comfort and performance.

On my actual system, a PII-350Mhz, 128Mb PC100 Sdram, the Maxi Gamer 3D2 is really flying high and playing Unreal with such a setup is a wonderful experience.

The bilingual (English and French) installation CD of this graphic card is including 8 playable demos of the following games: Shadows of the Empire, Jeidy Night in Dark Force II, Outlaws in Dark Force II, Subculture, Redline Racer, Hexen II, Incoming and Planet Caazy.

The users manual accompanying this graphic card is by far the most detailed and the best designed users manual I've seen to date of any Voodoo2 graphic card I've tested and believe it or not, it is translated in 6 different languages including: English, French, Dutch, Italian, Spanish and an other language I couldn't identify for sure.


Installation

Installing the Maxi Gamer 3D2 is a breeze and is accomplished within a few minutes. So, I wont say anything more on this subject as the installation procedure of this graphic card is totally straightforward and only require that you insert the installation CD into the CD-ROM drive.


The performances

How I tested.

All tests were performed with the following system setup:

Motherboard: TMC TI6NB
CPU: Intel Pentium II 350mhz
Memory: 128mb PC100 SDram (LGS)
IDE first channel Primary port: Quantum Fireball EIDE ST 3.2A
IDE second channel Primary port: Asus CD-ROM drive CD-S400
PCI slot number 2: Matrox Millenium 4Wram graphic card
ISA slot number 2: Ensoniq Soundscape soundcard
ISA slot number 1: US Robotic 56k X2 modem
OS: Win95B OSR2 4.00.950B


The graphic cards drivers used were those included on the installation CD. No foreign drivers were used and all the options enabled were the default options. No tweaking has been applied neither in the cards control panels nor in the games control panels.


Note: The "Don't Synch buffer swaps to monitor refresh rate" option has been checked for all tests except the 3D Winbench 98 benchmark.

The results

Forsaken + Intel PII-350mhz
Graphic card 640 X 480 - 75hz 800 X 600 - 75hz
Guillemot Int. Maxi Gamer 3D2 124.75 fps 89.32 fps

The Forsaken FPS tests were performed 3 times each and the mean value obtained is the one indicated in the above results.


Quake 2 + Intel PII-350mhz using 640 X 480 X 75hz
Graphic card Demo 1 Demo 2 Timerefresh
Guillemot Int. Maxi Gamer 3D2 75.47 fps 72.77 fps 133.47 fps

All the tests have been performed 3 times each and the mean value obtained is the value indicated in the above table.

Quake 2 + Intel PII-350mhz using 800 X 600 X 75hz
Graphic card Demo 1 Demo 2 Timerefresh
Guillemot Int. Maxi Gamer 3D2 57.17 fps 56.27 fps 82.52 fps


All the tests have been performed 3 times each and the mean value obtained is the value indicated in the above table.

Timedemo testing procedure used:

  • The computer has been freshly booted
  • The display configuration panel has been opened
  • The appropriate resolution and refresh rate rate have been selected
  • Quake 2 has been launched
  • The video console has been opened
  • The appropriate screen resolution has been selected
  • The game console as been opened by typing " ~ "
  • Once in the console I typed "Timedemo 1" and "Enter"
  • The command "demomap demoX.dm2" has been typed
  • Once that the demo was finished, I used to quit the game
  • The computer has been rebooted for the next test.

    Note: X stands for 1 or 2 depending if I wanted to use demo 1 or demo 2.


    Timerefresh testing procedure used:

  • The computer has been freshly booted
  • The graphic card control panel has been opened
  • The appropriate resolution and refresh rate have been selected
  • Quake 2 has been launched
  • The video console has been opened
  • The appropriate screen resolution has been selected
  • A new game has been started at the easy level
  • After the explosions, the game console has been opened by typing " ~ "
  • Once in the console I typed "Timerefresh"
  • Once the demo was finished, I used to quit the game
  • The computer has been rebooted for the next test.


    Unreal + Intel PII-350mhz
    Graphic card 640 X 480 - 75hz 800 X 600 - 75hz
    Guillemot Int. Maxi Gamer 3D2 43.8 fps 26.28 fps

    The Unreal timedemo test is an average frame rate benchmark. To have a valid reading with this game benchmark you have to let the flyby intro screen play for a while. So, I used to play the flyby intro screen for half an hour in each resolution to have a well stabilized frame rate value and this is the value indicated in the above tests results.


    Wizmark + Intel PII-350mhz
    Graphic card Number of frames Elapsed time FPS Wizmark value
    Gillemot Int. Maxi Gamer 3D2 1059 20.64 sec. 51.31 55028.9

    Wizmark is a 3D performance benchmark created by 3Dfx Interactive, Inc. that measures the performance of Microsoft's Direct3D(tm) and 3D hardware accelerators. The benchmark utilizes essential 3D rendering features which provide enhanced visual realism. These features include: Gouraud shading, perspective correct texture-mapping, Gouraud modulated texture mapping, texture bilinear filtering, texture LOD mip mapping, alpha-blending, and Z-buffering. WizMark is based on models and artwork from 3Dfx's "Wizard's Tower," a first person perspective walk through of a series of connected rooms.

    The value indicated above are the mean values obtained from 3 tests ran in a row.


    Final Reality 1.01 + Intel PII-350mhz
    Graphic card Fill Rate Bus Transfer Rate Reality Mark
    Gillemot Int. Maxi Gamer 3D2 50.31 42.95 4.01

    The above values are the mean values obtained from 3 tests ran in a row.


    3D Winbench98


    The Ziff Davis 3D Winbench98 is bringing very interesting additional information and is used to give a more indepth view about how is performing this card on many aspect not showed by the preceding Benchmarks.


    Conclusions

    My conclusions about the Maxi Gamer are that this is an excellent graphic card and I found nothing that could refrain me to warmly recommend it to any 3D gamers.


    Click here for more information about the Gillemot International Maxi Gamer 3D2.

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