[raoul]

Is there a way to get the MPACT 3D fusion to run at 48 FPS?


R-S

 

[Esben]

Is it a 3D card? Perhaps you can overclock it with PowerStrip from www.entechtaiwan.com

 

[raoul]

it's not a 3d card. it used to be an old favourite around here. i love it but it's a dinosaur

 

[Mark Rejhon]

I rememeber those good old Mpact2's. Best HTPC DVD picture quality you could get in 1999. Those days when I helped start this forum!

 

[Cliff Watson]

Hi R-S,


48Hz is not a supported refresh rate and would require new firmware to support it.


Esben,


The 3DFusion was a 2D/3D/DVD hardware decoder with S/PDIF output mfg by Digital Connection and was king of the hill for several years. It was the first PC DVD player ever to pass-thru DTS.

 

[chrispy]

I just sold my MPact2 for $25. It's the most I could get for it on Ebay. Argh.


- Chris

 

[raoul]

It still gives a KICK ASS image too. I don't know what the new Radeon's look like, by now ATI must have worked in all the technology they acquired when they bought Chromatic Research. It had a few 'flaws' like a pseudo 24bit mode, but I put that word in quotes because the picture was so much better than anything that any DVD player put out at the time. I'm not sure if any consumer player comes close at Progressive scan video. Hell, mine is the PCI version at that.


I haven't upgraded because I haven't felt the need to at all. I'm never selling mine. I'll hand it down to my great grandchildren and say something grand like "Kids, this is what prompted teh start of the HTPC forum on AVSFORUM."

At which point they'll probably say, "Cool, but aren't electronics bad for you?" Or,

"What was the world wide web?"


But seriously, Cliff isn't there a custom resolution hack somewhere that may do this?

 

[gireesh]

Hey, watch it... at 800x600 MPACT2 is still king of the hill... till I retire my projector, I will continue to use the MPACT2 collection I have, one built in to the motherboard, 1 PCI and 2 AGP... I have tri-redundant back up, so to speak.

 

[clopez]

Hi gireesh,

Its been a long time..


Anyway people also forgot about the filter mod that we did in the last days of this product. I personally felt that while the radeon won only by the tiniest margin. I wonder that now I have CRT what the picture quality looks like??????


clopez

 

[Esben]

Ahhh Cliff, now I understand! It was the 48 fps (Hz) thing that confused me with a 3D-card


Thanks for the explanation.

 

[raoul]

clopez,


so, what is the list of all the mods that one can make with a 3dfusion?


r-s

 

[clopez]

Raoul,

The two major things were

a) A registry file to be added to your registry (I can't remember all it does)

b) Removing some of the Rf filters from the card to increase the picture quality. There was a long post on this. It included what was need and a detailed process.


clopez

 

[Cliff Watson]

WOW, Look at all the old timers in this thread.

 

[johnwcookjr]

Clopez,


There were three registry mods, a no 720 mod which allowed you to select [email protected], an auto start mod and a psuedo-24 bit mode mod.


Those coupled with the hardware filter hack provided pretty darn good quality.


Search Cliff's fourm on the Digital Connection web site for info on the software mods...


I too have two of these cards laying around in a box somewhere (PCI and AGP), can't seem to bring myself to part with them.



John

 

[clopez]

TThanks John for the refresher,


This is why I hate this forum .

You guys have just tempted me. (I realize that I do not use my HTPC for real movie watching any more, instead I use my CS-1) I may drop this card in and take it for a spin one more time ....


I love you guys (well there goes another 12 hours of my life)


clopez

 

[gireesh]

Colin, Cliff:


I tried various cards, NVIDIA, ATI Radeons, and so forth. I still can't part with the MPACT2 motherboard based solution... clean... I don't have to fool around with audio drivers... everything works, DD, DTS


Gireesh

 

[Ricardo Cruz]

gireesh,


like you, I stood by the MPACT 'till this Summer, but I finally gave up on it due to Dscaler, which is WAY better on a Radeon, with better picture and supporting Dscaler's overlays (the MPACT can't do this at pseudo-24bit).


The reg mods were once created by MRejhon, who personally took the time to help me via e-mail when I was a total newb. Thanks to him and others on this forum (and John Adcock who took the time to troubleshoot Dscaler's code with this card) it gave me countless hours of enjoyment, at a ridiculously low price (since CPU could be a PII, didn't need a sound card,...) and was easy to set up.


I now own a Radeon 9000 and, even at 800x600, it's better than my RFI modded MPACT, particularly in the color department. In all other aspects it's just as good as. And I was fortunate enough to install Sonic, ffdshow and CMedia audio painlessly on XP (or maybe that should be patient enough, since I held until these things/drivers were matured).


But it wasn't easy to part with the MPACT too , and I keep it and my old Celeron just in case...

 

[Erik Garci]

I have been using my 3DFusion DiVA AGP card since early 1999 (for almost 4 years). I have all the software mods, and the only hardware mod that I have done is the heat-sink wing for the memory chips.


I have seen the Radeon, and it does have better colors, but not by much.


I have two major gripes with the 3DFusion.

1. It lacks custom timings, so no 48Hz output.

2. De-interlacing of video-sourced material is very poor.