VooDoo 3 3000 OCability

[RustyCannon]

Ok, i'm new here and this is my first question.

I'm sort of a youngin so I don't have much money, so that rules out upgrading. My question is I have a voodoo 3 3000 that I can overclock upto 187 MHz before my screen starts to get lines on it.
I figured I would be able to get more since i'm using a 19" fan that is blowing right on my V3. Should that be enough to push it alot farther? I see other people getting the V3 3000 to 203MHz with a much smaller fan. Whats up?

Here are my PC specs. Laughable =)

Intel Pentium 2 400MHz MMX
384Mb PC100 SD-RAM
2 8.4Gb UDMA-33 Hard Drives
3DFX VooDoo 3 3000 (Device Manager in Win2k says I have Driver Version 5.0.2195.232 and its date is 11/2/2000
Crystal SoundFusion 1046 Sound Card
ViewSonic PS790 19' monitor
speakers and mouse and such
Macronix MX98715 Family Fast Ethernet (ACPI)
Windows 2000 Pro SP2

Thx in advance.

~RC

[Tycho]

The problem i remember with the voodoo3's was the ram quality, I have a voodoo 3 2k that won't do much over 166 before the ram starts to putter out and start displaying artifacts, my buddies however would do 197 without flinching. So its just kinda luck of the draw, maybe some ram sinks could gain you some but i doubt it would be worth the trouble.

[RustyCannon]

Hmmm......Would a different driver set help?

[PsycoPhreak]

I had a voodoo 3 2000 PCI ( still have it, though not in a system )that wouldn't go above 160, but then i flashed the bios to that of a voodoo 3 3000 ( the voodoo 3 2000 and 3000 PCI versions were the SAME cards , just that the 2000 was clocked lower by the bios) after the flash I was able to run it steady at 200 no problems. I also ripped off the stock HSF and stuck on one from an old pentium...took up 3 pci slots...lol

But the RAM thing is a big problem for those cards, it was truely the luck of the draw..if your ram is of the "Hyundai" brand, then it *should* be able to do more, but you might need to change the HSF on the GPU itself, the stock one is put on with a gob of "crap" that the HS doesn't even touch the GPU...in 2 words..IT SUX! so heat might be the problem wheather or not you have a big fan blowing on it.

:D

PS..its a shame that 3DFx is gone today, if they were still here, they'd have probably blown away the competition with the tile based rendering technology ( code named "Mosaic" ) that they WERE working on...tsk tsk tsk :eh?:

[RustyCannon]

What do you recommend to fix the "gob of crap" that's on the GPU? I can just scrape it off and put on arctic silver can't I?

And what program did you use to flash the bios on your voodoo 3?

~Rusty Cannon

[RustyCannon]

I managed to get it to 193MHz Stable. Thats with a much bigger fan that moves tons more air.

[PsycoPhreak]

ASII will be fine, as far as the flash program, i'l have to look for it on one of my backup cd's, i know I got it, just will take me some time to look for it, i'll post back here when I find it...i'll also look for the newest bios file I *might* have onhand, i might have to set up my card in a system and extract the bios file from the card itself, i don't remember backing those up....dang it...

[RustyCannon]

Wholey COW. Folks here are very smart and nice. Thanks alot!!!

~Rusty Cannon:)

[PsycoPhreak]

OK, I found a couple bios files, what info I need from you is the bios version on your card right now (eg. 2.15.06SD) the LETTERS at the end of the number are VERY important, i need them, they tell me if the RAM on the card is either SDRAM ( SD ) or SGRAM ( SG )

you can find out when you boot your system by reading the Voodoo Post screen, i need to know this so I don't post the wrong bios to you as this can result in your card not working at ALL!

PS...i'm still lookin' thru my cd's for the flash program..heh heh...i'll eventually find it...LOL

[RustyCannon]

The little V3 startup thing says my bios version is 1.00.01-SD
I assume that means I have SD-RAM.

~Rusty Cannon

[CrystalMethod]

When I started OC'ing my V3 2000, I got somewhat diminishing results past 179Mhz. So I left it with the better results and the lower clock speed. I'm in the process of trying third party drivers. My higest score to date with the 3DMark 2001, is 530 points. May be a while before I find the drivers that work best with my setup.

[RustyCannon]

LOL I never thought of using 3Dmark. I only ever use regular games to do my test. But I downloaded the demos for the 3 3dmarks and here are my scores with a core clock of 193 Mhz.

3DMark 99 Maxx:2914
CPU 3DMarks:4145

3DMark 2000:1388

3DMark 2001:654

~Rusty Cannon

[TUK101]

With my V3 3000 i was getting up to the mid 190's OC with just putting a fan on the heatsink of the card itself. Without the fan on there it wouldnt go over 170's. The card would get too hot playing good games. Those were and still are awesome cards for playing older games with Glide technology. good luck with your card:beer:

[Angry]

Would you guyz like drivers that enabled Hardware T&L?
I have them, kinda old, were striped from the V5 and V4 cards and combined with the V3's....

http://gamershq.madonion.com/compare.shtml?1879342

[Myself and I]

i Put a fan on the heat sink and got 197 out of my voodoo 3 3000
the card kicks butt. but it sucks in windows xp

[PsycoPhreak]

OK, I got the flash program and the bios for you if you want it.

The bios is Version 2.15.06-SD, Its the same one I flashed to my old V3 as it was the faster one and is 100% stable.

I have put the links below so you can get them...

V3 Flash program (http://members.aol.com/psycophreak/V3Flash.zip) Use this carefully, make sure to place this and the bios file on a BOOT DISK because when you run it, you want NOTHING else loaded in memory and the program will write a backup of the bios now on your card to the floppy when ran so you can undo the flash if need be.

V3 Bios ( 2.15.06-SD ) (http://members.aol.com/psycophreak/V3bios.zip) bios file...duh...:D

PS, use at your own risk, I'm not responsible for anything that may go wrong.....with that being said, ENJOY!

**EDIT** I have pretty much every bios that was put on the V3's, so i do have others, if anyone needs or wants, just give me a holler...:D :D :D

[RustyCannon]

Oook thanks for the files. However I have no idea what commands I need to run. I have never done anything like this before so I need a little help here. =)

~Rusty Cannon

[PsycoPhreak]

ahhh...sorry..heh heh...sometimes i forget to explain things, especially now, i'm in the middle of moving ( a sudden decision NOT on my part )...:D

Ok, here goes...

Runing the 3dfx EEPROM Flash Utility

FLASH [filename] | [/RESET] | [[/?] | [/HELP]]

filename Name of file containing VGA BIOS ROM image
RESET Reset to older ROM image
? or HELP Display this message


Don't type the "[ ]" marks as those are just there to separate the commands.

To show an example lets say the bios file was named...."Overclockers.rom" you would then type in the following EXACTLY:

FLASH Overclockers.rom

the program does the rest..now lets say you get a BAD flash and the card don't work..all is NOT lost, there are 2 ways to resolve this:

1."blind flash" make sure the bootable floppy with the flash program is in the drive, boot from the disk (you won't see the screen at all..pay attention to the floppy light, when it goes out lets say for about 30 or more seconds to be safe) you would type in the following:

FLASH save.rom

remember, you won't see what its doing since the card didn't initialize, so, give it a little time, wait like a minute or two (again, just to be safe) then reboot, the card should again work with your original bios restored.

2. If you have one laying around, or can borrow one if you don't, stick in an ordinary ISA or PCI card, but do NOT remove the voodoo, the other card will initialize and you will be able to reflash the 3dfx card because you'll be able to see what your doing...lol..again...type in:

FLASH save.rom

After the flash, remove the card you stuck in and all *should * be well.

DO NOT use the "/RESET" command, as i have seen this destroy cards beyond saving.

Last but not least...MAKE SURE the floppy is in excellent condition, even if you have to BUY ONE BRAND NEW...nothing like a floppy crappin out just when you need it...so format it fresh and make it bootable, then scandisk with surface a few times to make sure..(nothing like a little safety...) then copy the flash program and bios file to it and make sure it isn't WRITE PROTECTED when you boot, as the flash program will backup the original bios to the floppy before it flashes the new one.

Thats about it, I can't explain it any better than that, besides...even my cat can do it now..heh heh, she was sitting on my lap while I was typing this out...:D

[RustyCannon]

Ok thanks for those files. One little problem. I use win2k so I can't make a boot disk. I tryed using an old one and just putting the voodoo 3 files on it but when I boot up it says "NTLDR Not Found. Press any key to restart" I have my bios set to boot the floppy first so that isn't it. Any ideas?

~Rusty Cannon

[RustyCannon]

OH wait I got it!!! It flashed completely and now says I have bios version 2.15.06-SD But for some odd reason it isn't stable at even 193Mhz anymore. :( I have to clock it at 188mhz now for it to even work. Do I need to change my drivers? I'm using the same ones I was using. Does the new bios work best with a different driver set?

Thanks in advance!

~Rusty Cannon

[PsycoPhreak]

Definetly try a different set of drivers, I stuck my card in a system just for old time sake to try it out again and used the original drivers off the CD and it wouldn't clock past 173 stable, get last official driver set that 3DFx released before they went bust, thats the ones I used with the card to get it past 200, and don't forget to have a good fan on that sucker, heat will most definetly keep you from reaching a high clock (just for reference, the V3 gpu runs at about 60c at stock 166 under full load!!! So crankin up the clock will make it run even hotter, i stuck a temp probe down in the middle of an old socket 7 heatsink, drilled a hole actually, to get the temp. the V5 is even worse at about 70c with them crappy little tin sinks and 5 volt fans on the 2 gpu's) you can, if your willing, try the V5 drivers on that sucker, they DO work, but obviously the features of the V5 won't be available...:D


PS. sorry for the delay in response, i been moving (under much protest) and am now reduced to a 28.8 dialup conection to the net till this wed. thats when I get my cable..WHOO HOO!!!

[Jinco77]

If you want to get the latest BIOS's go to http://welcome.to/3dfxbios
2.15.12 (Powercolor)
2.15.12 (Modified)

These are the latest ones they have for SD-RAM

As for drivers go to http://3dfxunderground.cjb.net
Here they have really nice drivers that they are working on and are one of the best sets around.

If anyone has a newer voodoo 3 3000 Bios later than 2.15.12 Please let me know because I want it and so do a lot of other people :)

[RoadWarrior]

Here's a volt mod for you all....
http://www.geocities.com/frankisger/v3volt.htm

My 2000PCI has run nicely up to 190 in cool weather with just a 486 fan on the stock sink. I have the SGRAM on mine, dunno really whether that is better or worse than SDRAM. It's going to get some serious modding done on it when this is not my main internet system anymore and my new XP system is in full service. I'm going to resink it, RAMsink it, and voltmod it and try to push 200+. I've gotta get it fast enough for some multiplayer action on more modern games.

It only used to do 183 with occasional artifacting, but it was still fairly new then, after I ignored it a while and tried again I got 190 stable as long as the ambient didn't get above about 21C. Then it artifacts up to about 25C ambient then crashes.

Road Warrior

[Xaeron]

My v3 3k would hit 200 easily with the latest drivers and that latest bios plus i slightly lapped the hs and put 2 small cpu fans on that huge hs.....oh and my own thermal paste