Topic: Graphics card need for SFC3?? (Read 6078 times)

ghostcamel · « **Reply #20 on:** February 04, 2003, 11:33:11 pm »

I believe i had that card. Not sure if it was the M1 version someone mentioned or yours exactly.

The 8mb rage card that i had wasn't DX8.1. No T+L engine, no pixel engine. The game would run, although i would get two bugs.

I would get the loading bug (where when a mission would launch and stick on the loading screen, requiring an alt-f4)

and, when it did launch the ship models wouldn't be drawn. It was like flying four shields through space, with no ship. When i would get hull damage plasma would leak from open space. It made all empires play like Borg becuase you couldn't tell which direction was forward. LOL.

It was a pretty wacky 'bug'.

On the plus side it was kool when i upgraded to a Gf3 Ti200 128MB card. The ships looked pretty sweet then. O yeah, i haven't had the Loading bug at all since the upgrade. I have Dx9 installed.

APEXNETHOR · « **Reply #21 on:** February 04, 2003, 11:52:36 pm »

For how inexpensive the Geforce 3 64mb line of video cards are these days I would definitely say go with one. The reason why I say go with the geforce 3 type of video card is due to it's core technology compared to anything below a gefroce 3 card in spec will not have support for vertex shaders and a lot of newer up and comming game titles are using these vertex shader components.The geforce 3, and geforce 4 Ti series of cards have Vertex shader support as the geforce 2, geforce 2MX, and geforce 4MX series of graphic cards do not have this added into their GPU core logic.

The choice is yours to make on what you want in a video card in the end of course.

Pestalence · « **Reply #22 on:** February 05, 2003, 12:28:28 am »

Quote:

I thinking about getting SFC3 later today, all the specs i have found seem to be ok with my system, but i can't find the minimum memory on graphics card needed, i have a ATI RAGE PRO TURBO AGP 2X with 8Mb (cr@p i know!!), which has worked with all previous versions of SFC, but i'm not sure if it will be ok for SFC3? anyone help??

ok .. first off, sorry for everyone going off topic on you...

second.. in your signature.. [img] tags are not supported.. you need to change them to [image] tags

third.. here is the Readme.RTF file found in the DOCs directory of SFC 3 installed by the Borg Bonus Edition

Quote:

Star Trek Starfleet Commandâ III Readme

Thank you for purchasing Star Trek Starfleet Command III. This Readme file contains all of the last minute information regarding this Best Buy? exclusive version of Star Trek Starfleet Command III.

IMPORTANT: If you are having issues connecting to the Dynaverse 3 multiplayer campaign mode, or need any information on configuring your router or your broadband connection to work with multiplayer, please consult the network_readme.rtf file. You can access the file through the Start Menu, or in the location where you installed SFC 3 in the \Docs\Help\ directory. It is also located on your SFC3 CD under D:\Docs\Help\network_readme.rtf.

October 25th, 2002


Table of Contents

1.   Minimum System Requirements

2.   Addendum to the Manual

a.   Gameplay Issues
b.   Video Issues
c.   Additional Issues
d.   Important Issues

1.   Minimum System Requirements

Minimum System Requirements
·   100% DirectX® 8.1 compatible 3-D Hardware Accelerator 16MB video card and drivers
·   English version of Microsoftâ Windows® 98/ME/2000/XP operating system
·   Pentium® III 450Mhz processor or Athlon? processor or faster
·   128MB RAM
·   650 MB of uncompressed hard disk space for game files; plus an additional 300 MB for Windows® swap file
·   100% Windows® 98/ME/2000/XP - compatible computer system (including compatible 32-bit drivers for CD-ROM drive, video card, sound card and input devices).
·   DirectX® 8.1 or higher (included)
·   100% DirectX® 8.1 or higher compatible sound card and latest drivers*
·   Quad Speed CD-ROM drive (600 K/sec sustained transfer rate) and latest drivers.
·   100% Microsoft®-compatible mouse, keyboard and latest drivers

Multiplayer Requirements
·   Internet (TCP/IP) and LAN (TCP/IP) play supported
·   Internet play requires a 100% Windowsâ 98/ME/2000/XP - compatible 28.8kps modem or network card
**Activision does not support more than 4 players over a dialup connection. We strongly recommend that games be hosted by a Broadband connection**

A 100% DirectXâ compliant 3-D video card is required. Star Trek Starfleet Command III uses DirectXâ 8.1 to support 3-D hardware acceleration. Star Trek Starfleet Command III has been tested on many but not all of the major cards incorporating the chipsets listed below:

·   nVidia? Riva TNT and TNT2
·   All nVidia? GeForce chipsets
·   ATI® Rage 128
·   All ATI® Radeon chipsets
·   Matrox® G400 & G550
·   Kyro® 1 and 2
·   Intel® i810e

2.   Addendum to the Manual

a.   GAMEPLAY ISSUES

·   To play the Borg Campaign missions (A Best Buy exclusive feature of Starfleet Command III), select ?Single Player Campaign? from the main menu. Then, on the ?Select Campaign? screen, click the ?List All Campaigns? button. The Borg Campaign and Conquest modes will appear in this list. Simply select the Borg Campaign and click ?Begin New Campaign.?

·   When using the tractor beam, your ship?s perceived speed is not displayed in the speedometer. Only when you disengage the tractor beam, will your ship?s speed be accurately reflected in the speedometer.

·   Deployed mines will eventually ?time out? and explode if no ships enter their proximity range after a certain amount of time.

·   When playing the Battlefest skirmish mode, players may notice a brief pause when a new ship spawns into the game. This occurs as the game loads the assets of the ship that is about to spawn in. The brief pause may last a little longer if multiple ships are destroyed and then spawn into the game at the same time.

·   When playing the Federation mission called ?Rendezvous at Khitomer?, some have experienced an issue where the AI ships do not turn hostile. If you experience this issue, fly closer to them, making it easier for the freighters shoot at you. The freighters should turn hostile after one of them hits you with weapons fire.

·   The officers? menu that appears at the top of the screen when the ?Officers? button is pressed is not an ?interactive? menu. Even though it displays the officers? health, clicking on that area will cause the player?s ship to turn around.

·   In the 4th tutorial mission, you will hear Captain Picard mention the ability to order your fleet to ?defend a target.? The fleet command menu does not allow a player to order his or her fleet to defend a target.

·   When repairing systems, you cannot remove a system from the repair queue if the repairs have already begun. You may remove a system from the repair queue if the system is still waiting its turn to be repaired.

·   When a player with a fleet of AI-controlled ships enters a battle with another allied human player, each player can take control of the fleet and give them fleet orders. In order to take control of the fleet, either player must hail the fleet, which activates the fleet commands.

·   If any of your ship?s officers are stunned or severely wounded in battle, you will lose their area of functionality in the tactical sim. A couple of instances should be noted:

o   If your Engineer is out of commission, you will not be able to perform repairs.
o   If your Ops officer goes down, you will no longer receive targeting information on the enemy vessel.

·   Nebula (which appear on screen as glowing clouds of energy and gas) can be dangerous to your ship. Not only do they prevent certain functions, like using the tractor beam or transporters, they may also damage your shields and hull. Be careful when fighting in these volatile areas of space!

·   It is sometimes possible to see the ?shadow? of a cloaked ship as they pass close to an enemy ship or against certain space environments (distant pulsars, etc.) This is entirely intentional and represents a limitation of the cloaking system on starships. However, unless a ship?s sensors detect them, it is still impossible to target a cloaked ship even in these situations.

·   If you perform a series of High Energy Turns or Emergency Stops, your ship may become temporarily unresponsive as systems are overloaded. Pay attention to your HET Percentage under the helm controls to prevent this from happening.

·   Certain weapons may affect the proper functioning of your ship - Myotronic beams disable some or all of your weapons temporarily. If you notice your weapon systems flickering wildly, it may be due to such an attack.

·   When refitting your ship, you may notice that components and systems cost more or less prestige than they usually do. Several factors go into the cost of refits including the game difficulty level, your Star Empire and the economic status of your Empire in any particular game.

·   Your target?s Angular Velocity is displayed on the tactical HUD. This represents how much their ship?s path is deviating from yours and how quickly. The higher the angular velocity between the two ships, the more likely weapon fire, especially torpedo loads, is to miss. Since the Angular Velocity is the sum of both ship?s trajectories, you can improve your chance to hit by limiting your ship?s movement or simply by tractoring the opponent.

·   While playing in Conquest you will be offered various missions including Scan and Distress Call. These missions are not available if you are part of fleet since your Empire's command considers that you should attack your Empire's enemies once you have formed a fleet.

·   Officer skills that are displayed as ?x levels away? are counting down towards the value at which the special skill activates.

·   Buying and bidding on starbases - You are able to bid on a starbase in the shipyard, while still in possession of an undelivered starbase. If you win the auction, your original starbase is lost, and you will be charged for the new starbase.

·   If all of the freighters manage to escape during a ?Convoy Raid? mission, the player must warp off the map to end the mission.

·   In Conquest and Dynaverse modes, you must destroy shipyards in order to successfully complete a shipyard assault mission. Capturing them will not win the mission.

·   The manual incorrectly states that a high Weapons Tech skill will allow your Tactical officer to fire multiple torpedoes in one volley. It is a high Targeting skill that allows your officer to perform this feat.

·   In Dynaverse, if you are a member of a fleet and warp out of the sector during battle, you fleet will split up and move to separate hexes.

·   When making your initial connection to Dynaverse, it may take a few minutes to establish the connection to the game server.

·   If you are playing or hosting a game of SFC3 over dialup modem we do not support more than four participants in the game (whether it is a Skirmish battle or Dynaverse fleet attack).

·   Playing Star Trek Starfleet Command III for extended periods of time without exiting may result in slow down when entering and exiting a battle.

·   If you do not see the movies or only hear the sound, it may be necessary to update drivers on your system. We recommend making sure that you have the most up-to-date drivers for your sound and video card, as well as downloading the latest version of Windows Media Player.

·   In some missions, the objectives will not complete until the player?s ship leaves the map. If you are in a mission and believe all objectives to be complete ? for example you have destroyed all enemy shipyards on a Shipyard Assault ? try warping off the map to receive your victory accolades

b. VIDEO ISSUES

·   Intel i810e users may experience decreased video performance when playing Starfleet Command III in 1280 x 1024 resolution or higher on Windows 2000. Intel i810e users should not try to play Starfleet Command III in resolutions higher than 1024 x 768.

·   Some ATI Radeon 9700 users have experienced a total screen blackout when exiting Star Trek Starfleet Command III on Windows 2000. Refreshing your desktop should return it to normal.

·   Players with Nvidia based cards may experience some video issues when using the version .4071 beta drivers. Windows XP users may not be able to run the game in 32-bit color using these drivers. If you experience this issue, lower your color depth to 16-bit before launching the game. Windows 98 users may notice the mouse cursor flashes when it is moved and disappears when it is not used.

·   ATI users may experience severe corruption of the interface when waiting on the mission debriefing screen for an extended period of time. Should any one experience these video issues, try installing the previous version of drivers.

·   ATI Radeon 7000 users may experience some graphical corruption when playing Star Trek Starfleet Command III at 1600 x 900 resolution or higher. Should you experience graphical corruption while playing the game, try changing to a resolution lower than 1600 x 900.

c. ADDITIONAL ISSUES

·   For Dynaverse logins the user's email address is verified via the GameSpy servers. Certain addresses (for example those with the extensions .ca, .de and .tv ) cannot be resolved. Please use another email address with a more common extension such as .com, .net or .org.

·   A few people have experienced an issue where Gamespy Arcade crashes when players from a multiplayer game return to the Gamespy Arcade game screen. Should you experience this issue, try opening up Gamespy Arcade?s sound options and de-selecting ?Use Direct Sound?. This may solve the problem.

d. IMPORTANT NOTES

·   In addition to the Minimum System Requirements for Star Trek Starfleet Command III, it is required that your system meet Microsoft?s requirements for your chosen operating system.

·   This product uses Microsoft DirectXâ technology, which requires your system to have the latest Windowsâ 98/ME/2000/XP drivers (for CD-ROM, video card, sound card and input devices.)

TM, ®, © 2002 Paramount Pictures. All rights reserved. Star Trek and related marks are trademarks of Paramount Pictures. © 2002 Activision, Inc. and its affiliates. Published and distributed by Activision Publishing, Inc. Activision is a registered trademark of Activision, Inc. and its affiliates. All other trademarks and trade names are the properties of their respective owners. The ratings icon is a registered trademark of the Interactive Digital Software Association. Uses Bink Video. Copyright © 1997-2002 by RAD Game Tools, Inc. This product is intended solely for private home use. Public performance or other use is expressly prohibited.

I would personally reccommend upgrading to at lease a 32 MB video card

Hope that this information helps

Blitzkrieg · « **Reply #23 on:** February 05, 2003, 02:59:16 am »

I know you were only trying to be helpfull but why did you copy and paste all that information? Clearly we only need the 100% Direct X 8.1 compatible hardware accelerated 16 MB slighly cool but not over zealous graphics card bit. Also now due to whatever the original format was... the page is ****ed

Copy paste into word should help (or am I only dreaming?)

Pestalence

Re: Graphics card need for SFC3??

Sorok

Re: Graphics card need for SFC3??

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