I was just given a 3dfx video board from a friend who scrounged it from a defunct computer a while back.

Research has led me to find the company no longer exists but there remains a decidedly lively community of 3dfx enthusiasts as found here and in several websites such as 3dfxzone.it, The Dodge Garage collection,  the 3dfx Archive hosted by Falconfly (and who hosts this board), and others. Cool!

Anyway, I've identified the board as a Voodoo3 3500/TV, 183 MHz. I've also discovered there needs to be a cable/breakout box assembly called a "Blue POD", or suchlike, in order to connect it to a monitor, etc. That POD cable assembly was not found with the computer, so I'm outa luck at the moment.

Before I pursue asking if anyone possibly has a spare POD cable they're willing to sell me I want to test the board to see if it even functions. I've recently become unemployed, so I need to be really, really careful on spending $$.

The tuner mounted on the board has two F-connectors and I believe I found mentioned someplace that one was a typical cable TV input and the other was an output like to a VCR or something.

Question:  Will I be able to at least test the basic functionality of this board by simply inserting it into a PC and attaching a coax cable between the output connector and a TV's cable input connection, therefore using the TV as a display? We're in the States, so we are talking NTSC-60. I presume the video BIOS banner would display upon bootup, which would indicate some minimally basic health condition at least.  I have several test-bed systems from which to choose that run W98SE, w2ksp4, and winXP.

Anyway, because of my rather meager budget, determining whether the board even works preceeds an effort in hunting up a POD.

Any thoughts on this matter?

Thanks much in advance,  Chris F.

Or you can buy this :

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/3DFX-Voodoo-TV-Tuner-RCA-SVideo-Cable-220-0100-001-A4_W0QQ...

and if the card is dead you can resell it.

Quote:


Thanks gtxe!

I had already found this document during my hours of researching 3dfx info (Google is your Friend - and I found a lot of good info!) This pinout doc was indeed one of the several a great helps I found in determining what the cable is that I need to interface the 3 3500/TV to the outside world.

I'm keeping a paper copy with the board.  I *think* I found a link to the original document in one of the many 3 3500/TV threads in this forum, but I had read so doggone much material that day from a bunch of different sources it all blends together in my mind now.

Meanwhile, with much thanks to outlaw for posting an ebay-uk listing as seen in this thread, I'm in the process of buying a cable pod I need for a reasonable price. It happens to be out in Cedar Rapids, Iowa :-)

Next, I need to pick out an appropriate set of drivers. I'll start a new thread on that subject if I feel I need to gather feedback & opinions on WinXP drivers that turn up.

And onward . . .