Voodoo3

3dfx Interactive

Industry	Computer hardware
Founded	1994 (1994)
Fate	Acquired by Nvidia
Products	Voodoo3 graphics cards, Velocity graphics cards
Parent	STB Systems (merged entity)

Voodoo3 represented a line of gaming graphics cards created and produced by 3dfx Interactive. Serving as the follow-up to the premium Voodoo2, it drew heavily from the earlier Voodoo Banshee design. Revealed at COMDEX '98, its release in early 1999 marked the first offering from the merged entity of STB Systems and 3dfx.

History

The graphics core known as 'Avenger' succeeded the Banshee but was given precedence over the postponed next-generation 'Rampage' initiative, a factor that ultimately contributed to 3dfx's downfall. Essentially, Avenger upgraded Banshee by incorporating a second texture mapping unit (TMU), reinstating features lost since the Voodoo2. It merged a pipeline reminiscent of Voodoo2 with built-in 128-bit 2D acceleration and increased clock frequencies.

Architecture and performance

Though criticized for what appeared to be 16-bit color output, Voodoo3 internally processed textures and pixels at full 32-bit depth (8 bits per color channel). To optimize framebuffer usage, its output was dithered down to 16-bit but then enhanced by the RAMDAC to simulate near 24-bit color fidelity, which 3dfx promoted as equivalent to "22-bit" color. This method achieved visual quality on par with Nvidia's RIVA TNT2 and ATI's Rage 128.

The Avenger core utilized a traditional single-issue pipeline capable of dual-texturing, akin to Voodoo2 but with improved accuracy and an integrated high-speed 128-bit GDI accelerator for enhanced 2D rendering.

The Voodoo3 series—comprising the 2000, 3000, and 3500 variants—primarily differed in clock rates (143 MHz, 166 MHz, and 183 MHz respectively), influencing their multi-textured fill performance. This allowed them to outperform competitors like the TNT2 (125 MHz) in multi-texturing tasks; however, TNT2's dual single-texture pipelines delivered superior performance in single-texture scenarios. The higher-tier models incorporated TV output capabilities; notably, the 3500 model included a TV tuner along with various video input/output options.

Upon release, Voodoo3 performed strongly in contemporary multi-texturing titles such as Quake III Arena and Unreal Tournament, providing close competition to Nvidia's RIVA TNT2. Nonetheless, it was occasionally outmatched by dual-card Voodoo2 SLI setups. The series also featured support for MPEG-2 video acceleration.

While competitive throughout its market presence, Voodoo3 was eventually overtaken by Nvidia's GeForce 256 and ATI's Radeon R100, leading 3dfx to pursue development of the ultimately unsuccessful Voodoo 5.

3dfx Velocity

The Velocity lineup represented a range of business and value-focused graphics cards from 3dfx, built around the Voodoo3 Avenger chipset. After acquiring STB Systems, 3dfx gained control of several established brands including Velocity, which was favored by OEM system manufacturers. Earlier Velocity products such as the S3 ViRGE VX-based STB Velocity 3D and Nvidia RIVA 128-based Velocity 128 were widely implemented in OEM systems from vendors like Gateway. The 3dfx Velocity graphics cards were equipped with 8 MB of memory—half that of standard Voodoo3 boards’ 16 MB—and had one TMU disabled, making them similar to Banshee models. However, enthusiasts discovered a registry modification that could reactivate the disabled TMU. These cards operated at a clock speed of 143 MHz, matching that of the Voodoo3 2000 model.

Drivers

The last official drivers released for the Voodoo3 series on Windows 9x were version 1.07.00, while Windows 2000 received its final update at version 1.03.00. For Mac OS versions 8 and 9, dual monitor support was introduced with driver version 1.1.3b. Following the shutdown of 3dfx, unofficial drivers were developed by third parties for Windows 98/98SE, 2000, Me, and XP platforms, with Microsoft still providing drivers compatible with Windows XP.

Models

Model	Release Date	Code Name	VGA1	Process (nm)	Bus Interface	Memory (MB)	Core Frequency (MHz)	Memory Frequency (MHz)	Core Configuration2	Fillrate				Memory			Direct3D Compatibility
										Million Operations/s	Million Pixels/s	Million Texels/s	Million Vertices/s	Bandwidth (GB/s)	Type	Bus Width (bit)
Velocity 100	July 26, 1999	Avenger	✓	250	AGP 2x	8	143	143	2:1	143	143	286	0	2.288	SDR	128	6.0
Velocity 200	Unreleased	Avenger	✓	250	AGP 2x	16	143	143	2:1	143	143	286	0	2.288	SDR	128	6.0
Voodoo3 1000	March 1999	Avenger	✓	250	AGP 2x	8,16	125,143	125,143	2:1	125	125	250	0	2,2.288	SDR	128	6.0
Voodoo3 2000	April 7, 1999	Avenger	✓	250	AGP 2x, PCI	16	143	143	'2:1'	'143'	'143'	'286'	'0'	'2.288'	'SDR'	'128'	'6.0'
Voodoo3 3000	April 7, 1999	Avenger	✓	250	AGP 2x, PCI	16	166	166	'2:1'	'166'	'166'	'333'	'0'	'2.66'	'SDR'	'128'	'6.0'
Voodoo3 3500 TVsi	April 7, 1999	Avenger	✓	250	AGP 2x	16	166	166	2:1	166	166	333	0	2.66	SDR	128	6.0
Voodoo3 3500 TV	June 1999	Avenger	✓	250	AGP 2x	16	183	183	2:1	183	183	366	0	2.928	SDR	128	6.0
Voodoo3 3500 TV SE	June 1999	Avenger	✓	250	AGP 2x	16	200	200	2:1	200	200	400	0	3.19	SDR	128	6.0

• ¹ VGA denotes the presence of an integrated VGA controller for independent functionality.
• ² On Velocity models, one TMU is disabled when using OpenGL and Glide APIs but remains active in DirectX environments.

Competing chipsets

• Nvidia RIVA TNT2
• ATI Rage 128
• Matrox G400
• S3 Graphics Savage4