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Nvidia Geforce 4 (NV25) Information
msolnik writes: "nV News has a
brief article about the long-awaited NV25-based video adapters. These graphics processors have similar capabilities compared to the XGPU, and are a lot more powerful than GeForce3 Ti500. Since they are manufactured using .13 micron technology, they will probably be clocked at very high levels."
It's amazing to see NVidia's dedication to forwarding their technology and continually improving a seemingly perfect line of cards, but with all this power, are we running out of an application to utilize this power?
I have a 800 Duron system with a Geforce 2 MX. It plays any new game at 1152x968 flawlessly. The GeForce 3 can pump out perfect refresh rates at even higher resolutions on any of the newest and graphical intensive game available today. There simply is no challenge, whereas years ago there was always room to improve - refresh rates, resolution, bit colour, texture size, etc.
Does improvement in the 2000's merely mean higher resolutions? If so, I don't want it. On average, most consumer level monitors are 17" and support a max resolution of 1280x1024. These new cards can easily support it flawlessly, so there lacks any point in investing a new card, and I see no point in running Max Payne, for example, at 4800x3600 resolution.
There is no "killer app" available today - even with the GeForce 3 being out for some time now - that will even begin to offer these cards a challenge, and with a GeForce 4 on the way, will NVidia be able to intise buyers into believing they need 300fps at 4800x3600 resolution? In the end, I begin to wonder if NVidia is beginning to find itself in a tough corner. Their hardware is revolutionary, but lacks any practical application.
To make a pun demonstrates the highest understanding of a language
I don't care whether they adapt any of 3Dfx's hardware ideas. What I really wish they'd do is either implement a Glide support into their drivers, or open up the Glide source code to whatever extent they can (some bits and bobs may be proprietary to other companies).
Obviously, I'm wishing for this for compatibility with old Glide-only apps, not so that new ones could be written. No one has written new ones in eons AFAIK, since as soon as more open standards like OpenGL and DirectX came onto the scene people dumped the 3Dfx-only Glide route, thank God. But there are still several older games written in the Voodoo and Voodoo 2's heyday which are Glide-only, or which work significantly better under Glide than they do in DX.
These apps are few but they contain a couple of early PC classics, as well as the first and still-most-compatible N64 emulator UltraHLE and its offshoot SupraHLE. There are several Glide-wrappers that translate Glide calls into standard DirectX calls, but they don't work well or at all for everybody--me included. None of the Glide wrappers will let me play any Glide-only games or any game through SupraHLE. In addition, some older titles like the first *Tomb Raider* look much, much better under Glide than they do under DX.
So, for the sake of compatability with old games I wish they would release as much of the Glide code as they can, if not write a quick-and-dirty Glide implementation into their drivers. Some may remember that Creative Labs had promised a near-perfect Glide compatibility for their TNT2-based cards back in 1999, in a driver they called Unified. But after 3Dfx sued them the project disappeared, and now that a couple years have passed the desire for Glide capabilities has died down since the games are now so old. But some of us like those old games, and the idea of continued compatability. I just hate it when things break unnecessarily. It's funny how, although some of them need CPU-slowdown programs because they lack internal timing routines, I can still run almost any DOS game with the oldest I've run going back to 1982, yet the development of proprietary 3D APIs like Glide and even DX (Microsoft could break backwards-compatibility with older versions any time they wish) takes away that continuity and certainty.
Just my opinion, though.
Chasing Amy
(We all chase Amy...)
"The more corrupt the state, the more numerous the laws"-Tacitus
Well, my truthful analysis of your nation was on-topic in the post you linked. It is a new level of lock-step McCarthyism to label anything that may question the decisions of your 'leaders' as "un-America", i have to commend you citizen, You Are Doing Good Work.
Seeing as how the truth makes me a " Un-American* Troll", I will repost them here for your pleasure:Read Here to learn how Bush has appointed ex-Iran-Contra Terrorists and convicted Congressional perjurer to key posts. Seeing all these cold-war CIA criminals in cabinet makes you wonder about GWB's father's involvement.
Click Here to learn how America has its own state sponsored Terrorist Training Camp, Colourfully called the School of Americas. Learn how its graduates form death squads in Central and South America.
Click here to learn about the United States Department of Defence's plan to kill domestic and foreign civilians in order to create a plausible excuse to start a war with Cuba during the 'ColdWar'. Funny, based on the actions/reaction of America and its citizens based on the WTC incident, you'd think that something like that might actaully work... or come to reality.... makes you wonder doesn't it.
*Thank you - Im glad you noticed. Your opinion is im "un-american", because you american, most others (them being Citizens of the World) would simply see me as truthful or possibly insightful... but hey, could be worse, I could be a xenophobic, ignorant jingoist.