OpenGL 4.0 Spec Released

tbcpp writes "The Khronos Group has announced the release of the OpenGL 4.0 specification. Among the new features: two new shader stages that enable the GPU to offload geometry tessellation from the CPU; per-sample fragment shaders and programmable fragment shader input positions; drawing of data generated by OpenGL, or external APIs such as OpenCL, without CPU intervention; shader subroutines for significantly increased programming flexibility; 64-bit, double-precision, floating-point shader operations and inputs/outputs for increased rendering accuracy and quality. Khronos has also released an OpenGL 3.3 specification, together with a set of ARB extensions, to enable as much OpenGL 4.0 functionality as possible on previous-generation GPU hardware."

Comments

OpenGL on par with Direct3D11

[Thunderbird2k]

To give an idea to non-OpenGL developers, OpenGL 4.0 closes the feature gap with Direct3D11. If you want to use OpenGL 4.0 you need to wait a couple of weeks before drivers will be out. In case of Nvidia, the drivers will be launched together with their new GTX4*0 GPUs which are the first Nvidia GPUs with Direct3D11/OpenGL 4.0 support. AMD might release new drivers before Nvidia since their hardware is Direct3D11 capable already.

Re:DOA for anything but pro gear

[Again]

DirectX won, because it does sound and HID input handling, and because its on every PC sold to every mouthbreathing, Best Buy shopping, banana eating customer.

I wouldn't be so quick to say that DirectX won. The xBox 360 is the only current generation console which uses DirectX.