• AMD 1GHz Socket A Athlon "Thunderbird"
• Compaq KT133 Motherboard
• Hercules
• LeadTek GeForce2 GTS
• Voodoo5 5500
• 128MB VC133 Memory
• IBM Deskstar 24GB DMA/66
• Creative Labs Sound Blaster Live!
• Windows 98 Second Edition with DX 7.0 installed.
• NVIDIA Reference 5.22 drivers
• 3dfx Retail Drivers

For our first run of benchmarks we tested all the cards using the default "Normal" quality settings at various resolutions. Although "Normal" won't strain the limitations of any of these 3D cards (at low resolutions), we still get an idea of what performance can be had with an average of speed and quality. For testing purposes, v-sync was turned off, rear seat belts were worn and side impact airbags used.

Performing solidly across the board, the Hercules GeForce2 GTS 64MB beats the Voodoo5 5500 by a significant margin (26%@640x480) at the lower resolutions and by even more at the higher resolutions (70%@1600x1200).

The LeadTek GeForce2 GTS actually beats the Hercules 64MB GeForce2 GTS by 4 to 5% at 640x480 and 800x600 and just barely at 1024x768. This may or may not have something to do with us using the NVIDIA reference drivers for all tests instead of Guillemot's.

At higher resolutions though, the 64MB GeForce2 GTS scores a higher than the 32MB GeForce2 GTS as would be expected because the extra 32MB of memory really come into play at higher fillrates. The gap is most noticeable at 1600x1200 with a performance jump of nearly 19%.