Xi Announces Hardware Accelerated 3D X Server

Thanks to Jeremy Chatfield for poking me about Xig ^[?] 's recent press release regarding them being the first to market a commercial hardware-accelerated 3D X server. They will be showing at Comdex, next week, and shipping in December. Support for cards looks nice as well, with over 30 cards supported,from companies like 3Dlabs, ATI, Evans & Sutherland, Diamond, S3 and Matrox.

Comments

Re:No Voodoo?

[Pascal Q. Porcupine]

Not quite. The Rush, Banshee, and Voodoo3 series all can do windowed 3D as well. However, I think I have a better explanation as to why no 3dfx support - 3dfx cards just plain suck for actual 3D applications. Sure, they might be fine for games, but Xi's stuff tends to be for more practical, workstation-oriented applications. A real OpenGL card and not the crappy Voodoo chipsets are what's called for.

For example: 3dfx cards are limited to 256x256 textures, 16bpp rendering (don't give me any of that 22bit crap, all that is is a lowpass filter on the RAMDAC's lower bits to 'compensate' for the dithering), have a really crappy memory architecture, no stencil or accumulator buffer... there's no real reason for a workstation graphics developer to support what amounts to a kludgy legacy gaming card. A TNT1 is much cheaper and much more powerful, in terms of OpenGL features if not fillrate, than 3dfx's highest-end card.

That said, there's much less of a need for 3dfx support in the X server, Mesa already supports it through Daryll Strauss's Glide port. It works about as well as can be expected. (The buffer-copying thing you mentioned has been in fxmesa for quite some time, though it's quite slow.)
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"'Is not a quine' is not a quine" is a quine.

Concern about entertainment vs. professional

[Pascal Q. Porcupine]

I wonder what 'added functionality' will be in the professional edition on top of the entertainment edition. I'm quite concerned that they may consider the advanced OpenGL functionality (stencils, accumulation buffer) to be something which only the professional edition should have. Games are starting to use them for shadows, reflections, and motionblur. It used to be that having to support 3dfx cards led to stencil/accumulator-less legacy.

Regardless, what functionality could pros need which isn't in the entertainment edition? Don't they realize OpenGL is OpenGL, and that to restrict the hardware based on what amounts to not paying as much for drivers is somewhat asinine? If the professional edition means having better/faster emulation for what the card doesn't support in hardware, that's fine, but if it means crippling the hardware, that's outrageous. Then again, $100 is a bit outrageous for a video card driver, too. :P

I'm just going to wait for XFree 4.0. It'll be out soon enough; in the meantime, Mesa's software renderer is enough for me. (Yes, it's slow, but that just helps me optimize my code even better. :)
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"'Is not a quine' is not a quine" is a quine.

Re:xfree 4.0

[Pascal Q. Porcupine]

Matrox is supported as well; Matrox released the specs to the G200 some time ago (and the G400 is basically a faster version of the G200 with a few more features; it's low-level compatible, apparently). Xi has a history of trying to pollute the free software world with important commercial software; it's well-known that they like to sling mud at XFree86 to try to sell AcceleratedX, for example. If they took a route that MetroX did (make a commercially-supported XFree-based server and contribute their changes back into the XFree codebase) I wouldn't have a problem with them, but as it is, they make a big deal over nothing, and charge lots of money for it.

Yes, they're the first to release a commercial hardware OpenGL-capable X server for Linux. nVidia released an alpha-quality free OpenGL-capable X server quite some time ago, Matrox released the specs for one... I can't help but wonder if Xi has taken the various design documents put on the web by the various parties developing the free servers and used them to try to undercut them, beating them to market and trying to make a first impression.

As I've said elsewhere in this thread, I'm waiting for XFree 4.0. I know they can deliver, and will put out something which will hopefully work much better, and will certainly be freer. I'd be willing to accept a slightly slower OpenGL performance if it meant not having to spend $100 for a video card driver. So far the various clued-in vendors seem to be supporting the XFree efforts, in the meantime.
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"'Is not a quine' is not a quine" is a quine.

Some of Xi's typical FUD

[Pascal Q. Porcupine]

One of Xi's many Accelerated X ads doesn't exactly make them seem honest to anyone who knows what they're talking about. They make a lot of implied connections between the Linux kernel's stability and AccelX's, and imply (but never state) that XFree86 (they only refer to 'an X server') is inherently unstable. They also lovingly embrace the older closed standards, such as CDE and Motif, and appear to love trapping their customers into using those highly proprietary products.

My advice: Don't buy this GL server. Wait for XFree 4. Just because they're first to market doesn't mean they're the best; personally, I can't stand the thought of supporting any company which resorts to Microsoftian tactics to try to put themselves above the rest of the Linux world.

Speaking of Microsoftian tactics, they even have separate versions of their CDE for executives and developers each on desktop and laptop computers! Four different versions "optimized" to the supposedly different needs of different users, rather than having a single product which can be tuned to the needs of the individual! Pathetic.
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"'Is not a quine' is not a quine" is a quine.

Don't forget about Open Source!

[Kev Vance]

Don't forget that we have an open source project that works right now. Accelerated GLX for XFree86 3.3.5 supports Matrox G200 and G400 as well as Riva TNT2 cards. Support for Rage Pro chipsets is on the way, too. So you might want to consider contributing some code to the project rather than shelling out for the new Xi server...

Xig from a long-time customer

[Scurrilous Knave]

I've been using AccelX on and off for years now, since before Caldera bundled it with their first product. And here's my analysis of the company, to add a data point to help folks make an informed decision.

Pros:

• They sign NDAs and pay for hardware specs, so they'll nearly always support a new board before XFree does. These days, more vendors seem to be releasing specs freely, so this may change. But Xig will still have paid staff to devote to supporting even unpopular cards, so it won't change completely.
• They're fast. In only one case have I seen XFree outperform AccelX, and that didn't last long. In most cases, AccelX is faster (sometimes considerably faster) and almost always more compliant with X specs. Especially in certain obscure points of the spec, that only a programmer would notice.
• Their installation is almost always smooth and trouble-free. XFree has come a long way in this area, but AccelX still has a bit of an edge.
• The price isn't prohibitive. Higher than it needs to be, probably, but not outrageous.

Cons:

• Their tech support is wretched. Their personnel are surly, and their fixes are released Microsoft-style, in periodic large patches.
• They're inflexible. XFree often supports more of a card's modes, and always allows more tweaking, than AccelX. (On the downside, XFree often requires more tweaking to achieve acceptable operation.)
• Their software quality is only average. I've seen far far more outright crashes with AccelX than ever with XFree. Their non-crash bug rate is comparable to XFree, if not a tad higher.
• Their corporate attitude is reprehensible. As others have pointed out here, they have frequently tried to promote their own products not by extolling their own virtues, but by bashing the competition. They have been especially vicious and outspoken in their attacks on XFree. And their attitude toward Linux as a platform is one of reluctant tolerance.

On the other hand, I've never actually gotten a MetroX server to even work, so I cannot even compare their product to the others.

I hope this helps folks in their quest for knowledge.