Menu
▾
▴
crystal-main
|
From: Jorrit T. <Jor...@uz...> - 2001-05-07 12:13:45
|
The glide renderer is heavily outdated and nobody is maintaining it
anymore. I plan to remove glide support from CS completely UNLESS
someone steps forward who is serious about maintaining this.
Greetings,
--
==============================================================================
Jor...@uz..., University Hospitals KU Leuven BELGIUM
Many people, meeting Aziraphale for the first time, formed three
impressions: that he was English, that he was intelligent, and that he was
gayer than a tree full of monkeys on nitrous oxide.
-- (Terry Pratchett & Neil Gaiman, Good Omens)
==============================================================================
|
|
From: Steven R. <ro...@ya...> - 2001-05-07 23:37:00
|
How much work does the Glide renderer need? The API to it was pretty easy to use. So if it is just adding plugin support and whatnot (stuff I can look to the OpenGL renderer for reference to), I am relatively sure I can maintain it. I think Glide support is important- Voodoo cards are quite widespread, and with their OpenGL implimentation, they run like dogs (particularly the Banshee and Voodoo3 2000). Glide is also quite popular on Linux, as 3dfx was the first generation of cards to support 3D acceleration under Linux. It is still reliant on how out of date it is. To test with, I have a P100 w/ Voodoo 1 4mb, and a PII 333 w/ Banshee 16mb SGRAM. Again, if it is just updating to support new features like plugins and the like, I'm pretty sure I'm capable. -Steven Rokiski __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Auctions - buy the things you want at great prices http://auctions.yahoo.com/ |
|
From: Jorrit T. <jor...@pa...> - 2001-05-08 04:50:50
|
Steven Rokiski wrote: > It is still reliant on how out of date it is. To test > with, I have a P100 w/ Voodoo 1 4mb, and a PII 333 w/ > Banshee 16mb SGRAM. Again, if it is just updating to > support new features like plugins and the like, I'm > pretty sure I'm capable. > Well, it is just that I'm seeing how much work I'm putting in OpenGL and how much work Philip is putting in the DX8 driver. I'm just wondering if there really is someone who can put the same amount of work in the glide renderer. I'm not exactly sure what the state of glide renderer in CS is. But I'm sure it will not be good since there have been huge changes to the other renderers (like OpenGL) and glide has never been updated. At this moment it will not even compile. Greetings, |
|
From: Steven R. <ro...@ya...> - 2001-05-08 21:38:20
|
I just want to say again that a Glide renderer is important to CS- a lot of people have them, and OpenGL runs like a dog on anything less than a 5500. I am willing to look at it, but I can't find a copy of the Glide SDK to download (the now defunct 3dfx site only offers drivers for download). Could someone point me towards it? Also, I will be testing this on windows only (my linux box fragged itself a couple weeks ago). This is unfortunate, as I think Glide is most important on Linux, because Mesa has problems on several common 3dfx-based cards. Because Glide is so close to OpenGL, I will use the routines in the OpenGL renderer (plugin interface code, etc.) as a basis for comparison/modifications. Note that it might be awhile (it sounds like massive parts of it may need to be rewritten). I will hope to try and have it concurrent with version 1.0 . -Steven Rokiski __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Auctions - buy the things you want at great prices http://auctions.yahoo.com/ |
|
From: Jorrit T. <jor...@pa...> - 2001-05-09 04:15:10
|
Steven Rokiski wrote: > Also, I will be testing this on windows only (my linux > box fragged itself a couple weeks ago). This is > unfortunate, as I think Glide is most important on > Linux, because Mesa has problems on several common > 3dfx-based cards. Well it is even more unfortunate because CS doesn't support glide on windows at all. The glide renderer in CS is only for linux. Greetings, |
|
From: Steven R. <ro...@ya...> - 2001-05-09 05:29:14
|
> Jorrit said: > Well it is even more unfortunate because CS doesn't > support > glide on windows at all. The glide renderer in CS is > only > for linux. Well, then there will be a new renderer for Windo'h!s, as well as an updated one for Linux... __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Auctions - buy the things you want at great prices http://auctions.yahoo.com/ |
|
From: Jorrit T. <Jor...@uz...> - 2001-05-09 05:55:26
|
Steven Rokiski wrote:
> > Jorrit said:
>
> > Well it is even more unfortunate because CS doesn't
> > support
> > glide on windows at all. The glide renderer in CS is
> > only
> > for linux.
>
> Well, then there will be a new renderer for Windo'h!s,
> as well as an updated one for Linux...
>
Not a new renderer. The renderer should remain the same. You
need to make a new canvas for glide and windows.
Greetings,
--
==============================================================================
Jor...@uz..., University Hospitals KU Leuven BELGIUM
"Pour encourjay lays ortras."
-- (Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!)
==============================================================================
|
|
From: Patrick M. <un...@pa...> - 2001-05-09 19:57:58
|
why even bother? since your providing the "CS3DAPI" anyhow, it doesnt matter. and if you didnt noticed, glide is dead, and 3dfx is dead, but the opengl and dx part of the drivers will be kept up by a third party opensource group. so its better to be using d3d or opengl with the voodoo series anyhow. Steven Rokiski wrote: > > > Jorrit said: > > > Well it is even more unfortunate because CS doesn't > > support > > glide on windows at all. The glide renderer in CS is > > only > > for linux. > > Well, then there will be a new renderer for Windo'h!s, > as well as an updated one for Linux... > > __________________________________________________ > Do You Yahoo!? > Yahoo! Auctions - buy the things you want at great prices > http://auctions.yahoo.com/ > > _______________________________________________ > Crystal-main mailing list > Cry...@li... > http://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/crystal-main |
|
From: Jorrit T. <jor...@pa...> - 2001-05-09 20:01:16
|
Patrick McFarland wrote: > why even bother? since your providing the "CS3DAPI" anyhow, it doesnt > matter. and if you didnt noticed, glide is dead, and 3dfx is dead, but > the opengl and dx part of the drivers will be kept up by a third party > opensource group. so its better to be using d3d or opengl with the > voodoo series anyhow. Well, I agree and I don't agree :-) I would *LOVE* to see 3dfx hardware accessed through OpenGL or Direct3D but the fact of life is that on linux the OpenGL driver for 3dfx is really bad. Using OpenGL (which goes to glide) is several orders of magnitudes slower than using glide directly. What would really be best is that more time was spend on improving this OpenGL -> glide wrapper. Greetings, |
|
From: Patrick M. <un...@pa...> - 2001-05-09 20:21:41
|
as much as i use *nix, i dont really care how much the voodoo drivers suck. you dont go around making yet another renderer just for glide. you either a) ditch the basically worthless voodoo, or b) you send coders over to hack a better ogl wrapper (or even a whole ogl driver that has all the stuff glide calls of the hardware internalized, which is much better imho) and i know im gonna probably be flamed to death (get your fork ready!) for this, but a X4 linux box still isnt ready for gaming. it just really isnt. and im gonna blame that on the lack of any good drivers. *evilpoints at nvidia hoping it either kills them or makes them smart and opensource frendly* Jorrit Tyberghein wrote: > > Patrick McFarland wrote: > > > why even bother? since your providing the "CS3DAPI" anyhow, it doesnt > > matter. and if you didnt noticed, glide is dead, and 3dfx is dead, but > > the opengl and dx part of the drivers will be kept up by a third party > > opensource group. so its better to be using d3d or opengl with the > > voodoo series anyhow. > > Well, I agree and I don't agree :-) > > I would *LOVE* to see 3dfx hardware accessed through OpenGL or > Direct3D but the fact of life is that on linux the OpenGL driver for 3dfx > > is really bad. Using OpenGL (which goes to glide) is several orders of > magnitudes slower than using glide directly. > > What would really be best is that more time was spend on improving > this OpenGL -> glide wrapper. > > Greetings, > > _______________________________________________ > Crystal-main mailing list > Cry...@li... > http://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/crystal-main |
|
From: Jan D. <joh...@go...> - 2001-05-09 23:25:23
|
On Wed, May 09, 2001 at 04:23:36PM -0400, Patrick McFarland wrote: > as much as i use *nix, i dont really care how much the voodoo drivers > suck. you dont go around making yet another renderer just for glide. > you either a) ditch the basically worthless voodoo, or b) you send > coders over to hack a better ogl wrapper (or even a whole ogl driver > that has all the stuff glide calls of the hardware internalized, which > is much better imho) I'm for better ogl too. Voodoo cards are widespread, but linux users will probably start to dropping them, if there won't be good ogl implementation. With 3dfx death, we cannot hope that game makers will do just extra glide renderer (instead of just ogl and/or directx) in way that quake and UT done it. However i am for resurrecting glide driver for CS, beacause now mesa for 3dfx sucks just too much - for example even UnrealTournament intro switches many times tosoftware rendering, while under glide it runs smoothly. Jan Dvorak <joh...@go...> |
|
From: Seth G. <sga...@li...> - 2001-05-10 00:48:30
|
On Thu, 10 May 2001, Jan Dvorak wrote: > However i am for resurrecting glide driver for CS, beacause now mesa > for 3dfx sucks just too much - for example even UnrealTournament intro > switches many times tosoftware rendering, while under glide it runs > smoothly. I thought 3DFX "open sourced" some of their Glide stuff when they dropped the API in favor of OpenGL and DirectX. Was this something that never came to pass, or is it just not helpful for the development of drivers and API wrappers for 3DFX cards? __ __ _ _ __ __ _/ \__/ \__/ Seth Galbraith "The Serpent Lord" \__/ \__/ \_ \__/ \__/ \_ sga...@kr... #2244199 on ICQ _/ \__/ \__/ _/ \__/ \__/ http://www.planetquake.com/gg \__/ \__/ \_ |
|
From: Norman <no...@ly...> - 2001-05-10 06:16:21
|
On Thursday 10 May 2001 02:22, you wrote:
> On Thu, 10 May 2001, Jan Dvorak wrote:
> > However i am for resurrecting glide driver for CS, beacause now mesa
> > for 3dfx sucks just too much - for example even UnrealTournament intro
> > switches many times tosoftware rendering, while under glide it runs
> > smoothly.
>
> I thought 3DFX "open sourced" some of their Glide stuff when they dropped
> the API in favor of OpenGL and DirectX. Was this something that never
> came to pass, or is it just not helpful for the development of drivers and
> API wrappers for 3DFX cards?
> __ __
They opensourced their whole glide sources (and iirc glide for the v5 series
were developed together with the people from MESA/3dfx).
The people who took over the glide support/devel, did it to make it work with
MESA and specifically work on XFree4 - that means to support DRI (direct
rendering interface). The bad thing is, that this DRI (or maybe their
implementation of DRI in the glide drivers) does not allow exclusive access
through glide (that is, fullscreen like it was in pre XFree4). So on the unix
platform you are bound to go with :
- XFree versions < 4 -> fast glide only mode (fullscreen only)
-> MESA through glide
* about 50% slower than glide only
* no further development of MESA
* fullscreen only
* no specific support for v5 cards
- XFree version >= 4 -> MESA through glide
* about 75% slower than glide only (this
is according to my v3 2000 experience))
* hardware acceleration in windows
* v5 support
* further MESA + XFree devel
On windows it looks like this (im not that sure about the win platform):
- glide access in windowed and fullscreen mode
- opengl through glide with the opengl drivers of 3dfx (whatever quality they
are) - this comes in almost as fast as the glide only version
greetings
norman
_ __ __
> _/ \__/ \__/ Seth Galbraith "The Serpent Lord" \__/ \__/ \_
> \__/ \__/ \_ sga...@kr... #2244199 on ICQ _/ \__/ \__/
> _/ \__/ \__/ http://www.planetquake.com/gg \__/ \__/ \_
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Crystal-main mailing list
> Cry...@li...
> http://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/crystal-main
|
|
From: Steven R. <ro...@ya...> - 2001-05-10 09:47:58
|
After reviewing the Glide code, I cannot tell whether the current implimentation is 2.x.x or 3. Based on the 1998 date on some of the code (written by Jorrit), I assume 2.x.x? __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Auctions - buy the things you want at great prices http://auctions.yahoo.com/ |
|
From: Jorrit T. <Jor...@uz...> - 2001-05-10 10:50:20
|
Steven Rokiski wrote:
> After reviewing the Glide code, I cannot tell whether
> the current implimentation is 2.x.x or 3. Based on
> the 1998 date on some of the code (written by Jorrit),
> I assume 2.x.x?
>
I never owned and 3dfx hardware. Don't know glide so I doubt
that I wrote any of that stuff :-)
Greetings,
--
==============================================================================
Jor...@uz..., University Hospitals KU Leuven BELGIUM
"Woof?"
-- (Terry Pratchett, Moving Pictures)
==============================================================================
|
|
From: Jan D. <joh...@go...> - 2001-05-10 08:23:40
|
On Wed, May 09, 2001 at 05:22:40PM -0700, Seth Galbraith wrote: > On Thu, 10 May 2001, Jan Dvorak wrote: > > > However i am for resurrecting glide driver for CS, beacause now mesa > > for 3dfx sucks just too much - for example even UnrealTournament intro > > switches many times tosoftware rendering, while under glide it runs > > smoothly. > > I thought 3DFX "open sourced" some of their Glide stuff when they dropped > the API in favor of OpenGL and DirectX. Was this something that never > came to pass, or is it just not helpful for the development of drivers and > API wrappers for 3DFX cards? IIRC, it was only voodoo3's glide3 (DRI version) and voodoo4/5 glide3. Let me check ... yes, linuxgames' mirror of linux.3dfx.com has sources only of those two (http://www.3ddownloads.com/?directory=/linuxgames/3dfx/ if someone missed it). I don't know if it is usefull even for voodoo3/4/5 programming, maybe mesa developers are better people to ask, as they should have experience with this. Anyway, it does not affects voodoo1/2 cards. Jan Dvorak <joh...@go...> |
|
From: Steven R. <ro...@ya...> - 2001-05-09 21:49:14
|
--- Patrick McFarland <un...@pa...> wrote: > why even bother? since your providing the "CS3DAPI" > anyhow, it doesnt > matter. and if you didnt noticed, glide is dead, and > 3dfx is dead, but > the opengl and dx part of the drivers will be kept > up by a third party > opensource group. so its better to be using d3d or > opengl with the > voodoo series anyhow. The reason Glide is important is that Voodoo series cards (particularly Voodoo3's in GAteway and Dell "gaming" computers circa 1998-1999) are a very cult-followed choice. 3dfx is dead, Glide is dead. Doesn't change the fact that OpenGL on Voodoo cards is horrible, and a lot of features supported in Glide aren't supported in the OpenGL mini/full ICDs. Voodoo cards don't do well with Mesa, either (unless that has improved over the past two weeks). Glide is also important for BeOS support (though the future of that OS is questionable). Direct3d performance is almost as poor as OpenGL on these cards as well. Why not? I'm not a particularly great programmer, I'm rather mediocre. I'm not sure you want me other parts of CS. You say 3dfx cards are dead, the only reason is that people started not writing directly to Glide. The Voodoo5 is competitive with a GeForce256 if Glide is used for the Voodoo5 instead of OpenGL/Direct3d. I will say that this is probably part of the reason teh company died. __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Auctions - buy the things you want at great prices http://auctions.yahoo.com/ |
|
From: Seth G. <sga...@li...> - 2001-05-10 01:22:03
|
On Wed, 9 May 2001, Steven Rokiski wrote: > The reason Glide is important is that Voodoo series cards > (particularly Voodoo3's in GAteway and Dell "gaming" computers circa > 1998-1999) are a very cult-followed choice. I have a Voodoo3 and many Glide games (designed for Voodoo1/2) simply do not work with it - somewhat of a disappointment because the only reason I bought the stupid thing was because I was hoping to see what those games looked like (although not supporting the industry standard OpenGL API knocks a game's score down about 99% in my book :-) On the other hand I have had almost nothing but good experiences with the Voodoo3 and OpenGL games. (Obviously the 16 bit color limitation means certain effects like subtle fog in a dimly lit area are extra cheesy.) The Voodoo3 is fast compared to other cards that appeared at about the same time and it was pretty cheap. (I use the Voodoo3 on my 166 Mhz Pentium on the theory that it's reasonable speed will keep that slow CPU working for a while longer.) So just based on my small personal experiences, I would assume that the main reason to support Glide would be for the older Voodoo1 and Voodoo2 3D add-on cards. I would also assume that people for whom the Voodoo1 and Voodoo2 are better than software rendering (ignoring small differences like the pixelated textures in software and the texture size limitation of those cards.) are people who have slower computers. (i.e. if you have a 400 Mhz Pentium II and a Voodoo1, you may be better off with software rendering.) There's a world of difference between Voodoo3 and the older Voodoos. > Why not? I'm not a particularly great programmer, I'm rather > mediocre. I'm not sure you want me other parts of CS. Since I personally would not use Glide, I would rather see you on any other part of CS than the Glide renderer. (If your code is so bad it breaks everything, CVS allows it to be rolled back by other developers :-) But your decision will be based on what you decide is important. Your experience may convince you that Glide is important for Windows and/or Linux and/or Beos, etc. By going with what you know, you make the software better for people in similar situations. > You say 3dfx cards are dead, the only reason is that people started > not writing directly to Glide. The Voodoo5 is competitive with a > GeForce256 if Glide is used for the Voodoo5 instead of > OpenGL/Direct3d. I will say that this is probably part of the reason > the company died. I've got to do a little political moralizing here: 3DFX got a lot of their initial success by monopolistic strategies - effectively convincing most PC gamers that the trademark 3DFX was synonymous with 3D acceleration (i.e. they assumed that "3DFX card" was just an abbreviation for "3D graphics card") and strongly pushing the proprietary Glide API. They got rich quick, but they stuck with their Glide API even when competitors in the domestic 3D accelerator market appeared supporting Direct3D and OpenGL, and they fought against other companies like NVidia when they tried to support Glide. Had they made Glide an open API or switched to OpenGL early on, they would not have been hurt so much by the performance issues later, but that is incompatible with their early get rich quick mentality. I am convinced that the company died because they could not shift down into a get rich gradually mode after years of getting rich quickly from their effective monopoly. I think software developers should consider larger social and economic issues of sustainability next time they are deciding whether to do something silly like writing a game only supporting the Glide API :-) __ __ _ _ __ __ _/ \__/ \__/ Seth Galbraith "The Serpent Lord" \__/ \__/ \_ \__/ \__/ \_ sga...@kr... #2244199 on ICQ _/ \__/ \__/ _/ \__/ \__/ http://www.planetquake.com/gg \__/ \__/ \_ |
|
From: Steven R. <ro...@ya...> - 2001-05-10 19:14:16
|
--- Seth Galbraith <sga...@li...> wrote: > On Wed, 9 May 2001, Steven Rokiski wrote: > > > The reason Glide is important is that Voodoo > series cards > > (particularly Voodoo3's in GAteway and Dell > "gaming" computers circa > > 1998-1999) are a very cult-followed choice. > > I have a Voodoo3 and many Glide games (designed for > Voodoo1/2) simply do > not work with it - somewhat of a disappointment > because the only reason I > bought the stupid thing was because I was hoping to > see what those games > looked like (although not supporting the industry > standard OpenGL API > knocks a game's score down about 99% in my book :-) The oldest games that were written only supported Glide 2.0.1 or similar. The Voodoo2 choked on these even. Not to mention that a lot of games were rewritten for the Voodoo Rush, which effectively breaks all the other Voodoo cards (some famously checked to see if the card had 2d capabilities; this broke the Banshee on up, and I bet that is what happened to you). By this time, the games in question were so old that it was no longer an issue. > On the other hand I have had almost nothing but good > experiences with the > Voodoo3 and OpenGL games. (Obviously the 16 bit > color limitation means > certain effects like subtle fog in a dimly lit area > are extra cheesy.) > The Voodoo3 is fast compared to other cards that > appeared at about the > same time and it was pretty cheap. This is why those cards were commonly shipped with PCs for a year. Cheaper and seemingly faster than the TNT/TNT2 family. > (I use the Voodoo3 on my 166 Mhz Pentium on the > theory that it's > reasonable speed will keep that slow CPU working for > a while longer.) This could be a reason that some of the games didn't work. Glide 2 and 3 windows drivers depend on knowing the motherboard chipsets capabilities to some degree; the Voodoo2 for instance would run on a Pentium, but it wouldn't reach its full capabilities (triangle rate not high enough on Pentium) until you had a PII 300. Voodoo3 was the same. > So just based on my small personal experiences, I > would assume that the > main reason to support Glide would be for the older > Voodoo1 and Voodoo2 > 3D add-on cards. Voodoo Banshee as well. And since BeOS is supported by Glide, I think that is important (if it doesn't slip under, I think BeOS has a chance in the market). > I would also assume that people for whom the Voodoo1 > and Voodoo2 are > better than software rendering (ignoring small > differences like the > pixelated textures in software and the texture size > limitation of those > cards.) are people who have slower computers. (i.e. > if you have a 400 Mhz > Pentium II and a Voodoo1, you may be better off with > software rendering.) The fill rate of the original Voodoo even outstrips what would be capable on a PII 400. Not to mention texture filtering, etc. The Voodoo2 is really what we want to support-it has multitexturing in a single pass, high fill rate (particularly in SLI). Its not the best choice of the market, but its a legacy worth supporting. The Banshee is still a viable card as well- despite being a Voodoo2 stripped of its second texturing unit, its higher clock speed boosts fill rate to TNT2 levels (particularly on a card with fast RAM). > There's a world of difference between Voodoo3 and > the older Voodoos. Voodoo2 comes close enough... > > Why not? I'm not a particularly great programmer, > I'm rather > > mediocre. I'm not sure you want me other parts of > CS. > > Since I personally would not use Glide, I would > rather see you on any > other part of CS than the Glide renderer. (If your > code is so bad it > breaks everything, CVS allows it to be rolled back > by other developers :-) Well, I am working on a game-specific scripting language too- but I am waiting until all the plugins are finalized and 1.0 is out before I do too muh on that. > But your decision will be based on what you decide > is important. Your > experience may convince you that Glide is important > for Windows and/or > Linux and/or Beos, etc. By going with what you > know, you make the > software better for people in similar situations. I am a member of a LUG (Linux Users Group). And the number of people there with Voodoo cards (all of them, sense they want good manufacturer support, and they can't afford NVidia because most of the attendees go to/are professors at the college I go to) is staggering. They have a hard time playing games under linux because of Mesa. I would like to change that (so I can beat them at games other than Quake and Alpha Centauri). > I've got to do a little political moralizing here: (snip) I agree with you. -Steven Rokiski __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Auctions - buy the things you want at great prices http://auctions.yahoo.com/ |
|
From: Tom G. <tg...@uw...> - 2001-05-09 18:48:44
|
On Tuesday 08 May 2001 17:38, you wrote: > I am willing to look at it, but I can't find a copy of > the Glide SDK to download (the now defunct 3dfx site > only offers drivers for download). Could someone > point me towards it? http://sourceforge.net/projects/glide/ but I think that might be just the Linux version... not sure... -- Tom Gwozdz tg...@uw... |
|
From: Steven R. <ro...@ya...> - 2001-05-09 19:12:48
|
Wow, BeOS Glide driver? Glide is still important... > http://sourceforge.net/projects/glide/ > but I think that might be just the Linux version... > not sure... Excellent. I have all the materials now. After looking over the source, it is apparent that a rewrite is needed for some parts of it. Thankfully, Glide 3.0 was designed around "vertex lists" (which are largely the same thing as OpenGL display lists). Z-buffering on 3dfx can be slower than their w buffering. I may try to wrap this around to pull performance out for Voodoo1/Glide. I have found some other semi-"open source" engines with Glide renderers, and I am going to look at those for some implimentation/optimization details. However, my first priority will be to get it working. Later, it might be redone from scratch, just for my learning purposes/to make it more similar to the OpenGL renderer (easier to maintain). Any further comments would be great... __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Auctions - buy the things you want at great prices http://auctions.yahoo.com/ |
Thanks for helping keep SourceForge clean.
X