Intel Pentium III

At the start of the gaming performance benchmarks we have the OpenGL performance of the nVidia TNT Chipset running Quake 2's demo1.dm2 timedemo file.  The entire Intel processor family seems to dominate the boards here with the closest runner up being the K6-3 400 with a reasonable 48.7 frames per second, although the Pentium III 500's 64.6 fps is definitely an improvement over that.  It's sad to note that the 3DNow! implementation in nVidia's TNT drivers is still lacking the quality necessary to receive the full benefit of the 3DNow! optimizations.  Chances are, Pentium III owners will see SSE taken advantage of in a more efficient manner than K6-2/3 owners have seen 3DNow! utilized; that's unfortunately the way things work in this money driven world.  In the CPU industry, the majority always wins...with the minority receiving a little attention.  Could this be an electronic representation of life itself?  That's just a bit too philosophical for this review ;)

The same story here, 3 Fingers' crusher.dm2 benchmark is an excellent CPU/Bus stressor test (Brett, you're da man) and as you can tell by the benchmarks, Intel's superior FPU does come in handy here with the TNT.  Once again, AMD is penalized by a poor implementation of 3DNow! in the TNT drivers.