The S3 Trio 3D/2X: One of the Worst GPUs Ever Made?

Patreon:   / computerretrobus   ☕ Support the channel: https://buymeacoffee.com/retrobus The S3 Trio 3D/2X was released at the height of the late-90s 3D acceleration boom — but how does it actually perform in a proper retro gaming PC? 🤔 In this video, I install the S3 Trio 3D/2X into a Pentium II 450MHz system with 128MB RAM and test it in classic late-90s games and benchmarks. 🧪 Tested Games & Benchmarks: 🎮 Moto Racer 🎮 POD 🏎 Need for Speed 3: Hot Pursuit 💥 Quake II 🗿 Tomb Raider II 🔬 Half-Life 🔥 Unreal Gold 📊 3DMark 99 The results were… shocking. ❌ Quake II wouldn’t run ❌ Tomb Raider II failed to render ❌ Half-Life displayed a full white screen ❌ Unreal Gold rendered incorrectly 📉 3DMark 99 barely crawled to a score of 126 For a graphics card released in 1999, when TNT2 and Voodoo3 were already on the market, this level of performance is hard to excuse. Even compared to the notoriously weak SiS 6326, the Trio 3D/2X struggled badly. Was this ever meant to be a real gaming GPU — or was it simply an OEM cost-cutting solution marketed as “3D capable”? 00:00 late 90's GPU's 01:00 S3 history and card 02:13 Picking card to benchmark 03:25 Moto Racer 06:05 Quake 2 06:49 POD 08:45 Tomb Raider 2 09:21 Need for Speed 3 Hot Pursuit 11:52 Half Life 13:26 Unreal Gold 15:05 3D Mark 99 15:47 Worse than SIS 6326 17:06 Prices and other cards at the time 17:57 Peak GPU war Let’s find out. If you enjoy retro GPU reviews, late-90s PC hardware testing, and honest benchmark analysis, consider subscribing for more classic graphics card deep dives. #S3 #S3Trio3D #RetroPC #RetroGaming #PentiumII #3DAccelerator #VintageHardware #GPUReview #PCGamingHistory #3DMark99 #HalfLife #Quake2 #TombRaider2 #NeedForSpeed3 #UnrealGold #90sGaming #ClassicPC #RetroComputing #Voodoo3Era #TNT2Era