FalconFly News Archive 2003

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After D.Borca joining the 3dfxzone Team around AmigaMerlin several months ago, new life is about to be brought into 3dfx OpenGL issues.
A few days ago, Thomas Bruckschlegel (3D Analyzer, www.tommti-systems.de ) has as well joined the AmigaMerlin Team.

That eventually has made the 3dfxzone Team by far the strongest concentration of confirmed, highly capable people existing
nowadays around the 3dfx community, and already has become the center of focus for mostly all recent Driver deveopments.

While in the past, several "Teams" brought hopes and promises for those who followed their projects
(some of which turned out as partial or even complete failures, or even a hoax),
one can now safely say that actual progress is being made

The potential is now available to tackle both OpenGL and Direct3D issues still hurting 3dfx Users.

From now on, it is (as usual) only a matter of time before new Driver Cores are available.

The Archive's primary capacity has been increased to a solid 300 GigaBytes per month.
Despite most Users never notice, being the silent, trusted and reliable backbones of the 3dfx Archive for a very long time now,
this server-side improvement should provide more than sufficient bandwidth for all times to come

The world's first Driver to be equipped with :
- new VSA Display Driver V5.01.2600.0001 (07 Sep 2003)
- new VSA Miniport Driver V5.01.2600.0001 (07 Sep 2003)
- very latest Glide3 build V3.10.00.30303 (30 Aug 2003)

The (ab)user of the IP 80.145.62.126 seems to love getting HTTP 403 Errors

I take it trying to bring down a 4-way redundant, 20+Gbit Uplink seems an attractive challenge...

Looks like the external Stats take a downtime, thus preventing normal Downloads.
In case of errors, don't despair : All Files are still in place...

http://www.traumatic.de/pphlogger/dlcount.php?id=FalconFly&url=http://www.falconfly.de/downloads/File.zip
Orange Part : External Stats <==> Yellow Part : Download

Copy the Link into the Browser URL and cut the Orange part out. This entered, should initiate download immediately.
Things are expected to return to normal Ops within a few hours max.

Old story, but some don't adhere to common netiquette :
WEBMASTERS : Do NOT link directly to Files !

The Archive has been modified to block certain external Access to Files on the servers.
So unless you want to embarass yourself, you should refrain from Linking directly to Files.
(link to respective Main- or Sub-Page instead)

Old, simple rule of Webhosting :
If you can't afford the bandwidth : don't offer big downloads

Yet another 3dfx Behemoth has recently surfaced out of the depth of ancient myth and rumors!
Until recently, the 3dfx Rampage prototype was nothing but a spurious ghost, with only a handful of old Pictures taken from a 3dfx Lab proving its sheer existence.

Due to the user of the IP 212.188.73.2 being somewhat too interested in 2 Voodoo2 Linux .rpm's , these are temporary offline.
( 24395 initiated Downloads within the last 42 hours

)

It rarely happens that Driver announcements make Top News, but due to the great anticipation :

The Team around AmigaMerlin is currently working on the V3.0 Driver.
Apart from the normal polishing work, there's a good chance that the ageing Direct3D finally receives some fresh tweaks.

Raziel64 has also been busy keeping the venerable Voodoo Banshee up-to-speed, visit his site for the latest updates :
http://www.bansheexp.cjb.net

Weighting in now at a solid 1606MB, constituted by 555 dedicated Files, the 3dfx Archive is basically 71.4% full.
The remaining Volume is scheduled to be brought to use by additional SubSections, being :

- 3dfx Card Images + basic Specifications (for reference & identification purposes)
- classic 3dfx Patches for Games

For the longest time, the Voodoo5-6000 has been a spurious legend for most, and only very few in-depth details were available from running prototypes.
But recently, a former 3dfx layout engineer has managed to rework many of the prototype Problems
and even upgraded/fixed a number of semi- or non-functional Voodoo5 6000's...

That, coupled with the dedicated Voodoo5-6000 bugfixes in several of the most recent Driver releases, enabled the mighy Voodoo5-6000 to show her potential.
Meant as "the one card to rule them all" , one can only speculate what would have happened if 3dfx had managed to release it in numbers before their demise...

Not only does this Review contain all the -6000 specific Info's (and Images), but it also covers alot if in-depth material
concerning the card's development, it's prototype issues, and how to get around them...

3dfx Rampage Unveilled
Photos and even a Driver for the 3dfx Rampage have recently surfaced!

Another Milestone reached
Since today, the Archive contains and offers more than 500 dedicated Files for Download !
That likely makes it the most complete, and largest alive 3dfx File Archive in the world

Current Statistics
505 Files available for download, 1502MB in total
728.5GB served within the last 12 month, to 237500 Visitors
...and still increasing...

As I won't have any time to manage the 3dfx Archive during the next weeks, she will take care of it

That also means that in the future, updates to the Archive will likely happen at a higher pace, as it won't be dependent on one person only.

Keeping an almost 1500 MBytes, 450 Files large Archive and spanning over 3 independent servers running and up-to-date has become a rather time consuming task.

Besides offering Glide and other 3dfx friendly Games, there will be a Hardware Corner and even a complete 3dfx Museum (including the mighty 3dfx Voodoo5 6000 !)
Bottom Line : If you are a 3dfx Fan, and have a chance to participate, you should be there !

I'm into finding out what causes those Error 103 (unable to open xyz.dat) failures.
The errors came sometime this morning.

Problems should be fixed!
If you still find any Problems remaining, just let me know ASAP.

There are still way more Files and other submissions waiting, so if you supplied any of those, don't despair !
I did not forget anything, it's still here and coming soon to a 3dfx Archive near you

Downloading Problems ?
If you find the Page not fully loading correctly, or giving you significant delay, please note :

The small, external Webstats service is right now operating very close to its limit.
Usually, it does not fail; it can just create a delay when Downloading Files.
A bit of patience, or a 2nd attempt might be in order, if it get's extreme.

In case you really can't get the File you want :
Option 1 : just drop me an EMail, and I'll make the File available to you.

Option 2 : Cut&Paste the Link into your Browser, and delete the Webstats Part of it
Example :
http://www.traumatic.de/pphlogger/dlcount.php?id=FalconFly&url=http://www.falconfly.de/downloads/File.zip
Orange Part : External Webstats <==> Yellow Part : Download

Work often keeps my either busy or too tired to work on the Archive.
As of now, new Files are coming in at a far higher pace than I'm able to scan through and put online.

Main plans for the 3dfx Archive in 2003 :
- complete Visual and Navigational Overhaul

I'm well aware this Site has gotten relatively big, yet still offers a poor Visual experience for Visitors.
(and a Site Navigation based on 1990 style HTML Code *g*)
Anyway, those browsing the Archive are probably looking for something not found easily (or at all) elsewhere,
and browsing an old and full Archive always takes time

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