3dfx is Back… In MXM Form! Testing the Voodoo4 M4800 (64MB)

The legendary 3dfx Voodoo4 has been resurrected in MXM form. Thanks to Daniel Simionescu at SDZ-Mods, this custom card brings 2000’s-era Glide gaming to modern(ish) laptops like the Dell M4800. Inside is a VSA-100 GPU running at 166 MHz with 64 MB of SDRAM, paired with a Spartan-7 FPGA and a PCIe-to-PCI bridge to make it all work. We’ll look at how it handles Quake III, Unreal, and even Half-Life 2, plus some deeper details like why DVI output was broken on Voodoo cards and how FPGA fixes it. We also explore features like FSAA, paletted textures, DirectX 6 hardware support, and the quirks of getting Windows 98 running on a modern laptop BIOS—with Coreboot as the solution. And yes, there are other MXM Voodoo cards too, including a compact Voodoo 3 and a dual-chip Voodoo 5 5500. Timestamps: 0:00 Intro & What We’re Testing 0:38 Voodoo MXM Family 1:39 Inside the Voodoo 4 3:58 Memory & Display Output 4:40 Back in the Year 2000 5:21 Benchmarks on Modern Hardware 6:29 Testing Challenges 7:04 Image Quality Perks 8:04 Paletted Textures 101 9:17 DirectX & Game Compatibility 10:04 Windows 98 Limitations 12:07 Other Voodoo MXM Cards 13:21 Wrap-Up & Where to Learn More Highlights: Voodoo 4 teardown: VSA-100, PCIe bridge, FPGA, and SDRAM explained Why DVI output was buggy and how FPGA fixes it Benchmarks compared: year 2000 CPUs vs. modern i7 laptop Coreboot unlocking Windows 98 compatibility on Dell M4800 Voodoo 3 and Voodoo 5 MXM cards revealed Tech details: MXM Type-A card (82 x 70 mm) for Dell M4800 VSA-100 GPU @ 166 MHz, 64 MB SDRAM Spartan-7 FPGA converts DVI to LVDS/eDP TI XIO2001 PCIe-to-PCI bridge FSAA, paletted textures, and Glide support tested Big thanks to Daniel at SDZ-Mods for making this possible: sdz-mods.com #3dfx #Windows98 #RetroGaming #MXM #GPU #PCMods