Actually, I think Aureal died because nobody used the API. Actually, I wouldn't mind 3DFX dying. They are quite the bitches. (Not the 3DFx of yore, the "new" 3DFx. The 3DFX of yore was a herioc company that brought great 3D to the masses. The "new" 3DFX is a crappy company that tries muscle tactics (the whole sticker deal) propriatory APIs (GLIDE and the dragging of feet over D3D and GL) and tries to control the market (buying STB) and delivers crappy products to boot. Any such company deserves to die.) Besides, ATI has proven that they CAN make a decent graphics card, as has Matrox. And neither of those two companies deserve the contempt of the gaming community.
Maybe this is a case where 3DFx really DID steal the idea? Think about this from a marketing standpoint (all that really matters, why else do you think ATI does so well with crappy products?) 3DFX had reason to sue NVIDIA over multi-texturing. They were LOSING! The TNT totally blew away the Voodoo2 in terms of features (and single card performance) and 3DFX was scared. NVIDIA has no reason to be scared. It's products are topping the charts in performance, features, and it's the only one that has a great OpenGL ICD. Why would they sue 3DFx?
Actually, the "64MB" 3Dfx card only has 32MB of RAM usable. The two VSA-100 chips each need their own texture memory, so textures are duplicated in each 32MB block. The upcoming V5 6000 will still only have 32MB of RAM usable. (4 chips X 32MB= 128MB.) Thus, the V5 5500 performs slower than a GeForce2 32MB at $13 MORE.
Seriously though, Glide is the result of strong-arming, overextending, uncompetitive behavior on 3DFx's part. Sure it has great when there WERE no APIs, but 3DFx tried to keep it way past it's expiration date.
A) Though courted developers to use only Glide.
B) They dragged their feet on supporting DirectX and OpenGL. Wheras TNT had full DirectX 6 support from it's release, 3DFx took more than a month to release theirs. Wheras NVIDIA did (and still DOES) have great OpenGL ICDs, 3DFx used mini-drivers for the longest time and still doesn't have an ICD as good as NVIDIA's.
C) They sued NVIDIA over multitexturing.
D) They strong-armed stores into putting "3DFx Required" stickers on games that supported Direct3D and OpenGL until the judge forced them to stop.
Support for an API more propriotary than Direct3D? On Slashdot? Where are your PRIORITIES!
Face it, Glide is a dead API. Even 3DFx realizes that. And the only reason that Glide is faster in some programs is because those games are written primarily for glide. Besides, Glide-only games are few and far between and none of the acutally need all the power of the newer cards.
What do you mean the competiton has been even? NVIDIA has been busting heads left and right ever since TNT2. For the last few years, there has yet to be a time when the fastest card available WASN'T a NVIDIA card. Voodoo2 was the last time 3Dfx beat to NVIDIA, and it's reign was quickly ended by the TNT. Sure it was still slower than a dual-voodoo2, but it cost half as much, and supported OpenGL REALLY well. Even now, the Radeon isn't appricably faster, the GeForce2Ultra reigns supreme, and the V5 6000 is nowhere to be seen.
I'm sorry, I'm a patch virgin. I copy everything from diff -u... down,
save it to nvidia.pat, and patch -p0 it in the same directory that contains
NVIDIA_kernel-0.9-4 right? So I've got
/root/NVIDIA_kernel-0.9-4 and/root/nvidia.pat and
I do patch -p0 nvidia.pat from/root? Also, I've
never gotten a patch to work. Is it supposed to take
insanely long?
Linux is nowhere near playing in the same league
as these microkernels (QNX and BeOS) until it fixes
several things.
A) Fix the versioning problem. If the binary standard
changes every kernel version, then I can't be expected
to use binary, pre-compiled modules, can I. Neither
can vendors supply pre-compiled modules. Sure it's fine now,
when all the hardware is supported out-box, but what
about when Linux "makes it." Driver updates are a common
occurance, and with the current situation, will be hell for users.
B) Fact: 99% of people CANNOT figure out modules.conf.
Fact: 99% of people shouldn't HAVE to figure out modules.conf
Fact: 99% of people have no DESIRE to figure out modules.conf
Fact: Unless everything comes preconfigured and you never upgrade your
hardware, 99% of people WILL have to figure out modules.conf
Fact: BeOS (and supposedly QNX as well, I haven't tried) can detect hardware and install
it without any knowledge on the users part. Linux can't even figure out
that tulip is an ethernet driver.
Fuckwit. True, QNX does have some niceties that BeOS doesn't. HOWEVER...
A) There is no proof that QNX can cut it the way Be can in media.
B) It still doesn't have plans for accelerated OpenGL (currently the only thing accelerated is Mesa/Glide.)
C) It might be more of a competitor to Linux than anything else. From my POV, it supports my hardware, is fast and small, and is a fully POSIX complient UNIX. Those are the only reasons I keep Linux around, and it might be nice to use a UNIX without all the attendant bloated-ness I had associated with the system. If all goes well, it's not bye bye BeOS, but bye bye Slackware.
PS> As of now, NVIDIA Driver 0.9-4 still doesn't work with kernel 2.4-test6+. Any kernel hackers have any clue why? It seems to have something to do with the dissaperance of MAP_NR.
The Radeon is slower than a GeForce2GTS. Given the scary small price differential between the two (none) I don't see how you can consider bundling them a good thing.
Are you deaf? The Harmon-Kardon speakers can't touch the Klipsch's on some Compaqs and are appreciably worse than my ACS495s. (Not to mention the fact that they lack a subwoofer!)
What does this have to do with Linux? QNX doesn't even use X. Also, GNOME might be doable. GTK was quickly ported, QNX is officially POSIX complient, and Photon is pretty compatible with X.
Exactly WHY wouldn't you want to give up Linux in favor of this? (Not a flame, I'd just like to know advantages/disadvantages compared to Linux.) Additionally, a platform that doesn't use X always gets points in my book.
BTW) Is Photon's solution a good one. It's fast, light, and mostly X compatible. Could we finally get rid of X with something like this?
Not really. By the looks of the review, it seems to be quite a competitor to Linux and Be on the desktop level. I mean just because it is fast/light (as if that precluded it from being a desktop OS.) Doesn't mean that it should be limited only to embedded platforms. I mean this WAS going to be the next Amiga OS you know.
Well, they are working on better networking. Clustering isn't forthcoming, but that's a user-space issue anyway. Linux SMP is better, but nowhere near as good as BeOS's yet. (actually it never will be. BeOS apps are inherently multi-threaded while Linux apps are not.)
You are. Serial enables higher clockspeeds and that's about it. A serial link running at 50MHz will always be slower than a 64bit wide link running at 50Mhz. The thing is, that serial links run at a higher clock-speed than parallel ones (generally.) However, serial is killer on latency.
Of course you can't argue that in general, second-rate hardware is put into first rate Mac systems. Take, for example, the G3. This multi-proc unfriendly, floating-point weak processor had no place in a Mac. The dual-G4 is seriously cool, and I'm actually considering it for my next purchase. However, it seems that all Macs come bundled with inferior hardware. Why put in a Radeon when you can get a GeForce2GTS at the same price? What is up with those gay-ass Harmon Kardon speakers on the cube. The less than spectacular CRT on the iMac, the list goes on. I have nothing against Macs and seriously want a dual G4. However, I have a problem with the fact that I can't use some top-flight hardware on it.
What are you talking about. As far as I can tell 50MB/sec is the limit for firewire. (400Mbps) I'm not talking about compressed rate, but an uncompressed image. True, most firewire transfers were are compressed, but this guy was talking about sending a video-game stream, and you wouldn't compress that.
Actually broadcast quality fullscreen fullmotion video is pretty low-res by PC standards. A 1600x1200 32bpp 60 fps video chews up around 460MB of bandwidth, significantly more than Firewire's paltry 50MB/sec. Although, I have now idea why the hell you'd pump a game through firewire, but higher quality video IS beyond firewire. (In fact, it would seem that Firewire can only barely keep up with a 30fps HDTV 1080i clip.)
What are the problems with AGP? Aside from the one card limitation, I can't think of any. It's fast, it's cheap, AGP cards don't fall out of their socket, it allows direct access to RAM, what more do you want?
Do some math buddy. The only time a video stream goes over the graphics bus (expect in cases like ATI's) is the final display. With a 1080 x 720 x 32 bpp x 30 fps HDTV stream, that works out to around 93MB/sec. A paltry sum even for PCI. Face it, the only reason AGP exists is for gaming and modeling.
Right focus. It's incredible how many people don't realize sexy techs rule the roost. AGP is sexy, PCI is not.
If you can find me a RAID array that does 500+MB/sec (the speed of 66/64 PCI) on a PC system, then call me. Otherwise, go talk to the Sun people.
Gamers don't have dual monitors or RAID. The practicality of the matter is, that 1GHz procs, AGP8x, and GeForce2Ultras are aimed at gamers. Gamers run the high-end of the processor business and that's just the way it is.
1) NVIDIA GeForce2 drivers are rock solid
2) They support Linux.
3) Yea, but todays mediocre is tomarrows Mac hardware.
4) If you can live with a $400 system, then more power to you. Some people actually NEED the extra power, and will pay for it. Question: Would you buy a Porsche?
5) It usually does. Either way, you get bragging rights.
6) I'm a consumer swayed by 40fps in 16K/12K Quake III.
7) To fill my needs, my system needs a lot of power. Live with it.
PS> Before y'all get all hot and bothered about that Mac comment, consider it. Right now, Macs are up to AGP2x and Radeon cards while PCs are at 4x GeForce2 Ultra cards.
Then don't USE it. AGP is just an extension of PCI, and as such, it adds very little to the cost of the system.
AGP is cool whether you like it or not. Sure the AGP texture thing kinda busted, but the extra bandwidth is always welcome. The best part of AGP, however, is that it allows you to blit from system to graphics memory using the hardware blitter. (A major turn on for DirectDraw freaks like me;)
Intel really doesn't care about your segment. In the consumer arena, gamers are a very powerful segment. They're the ones who buy the 1GHz procs and the $500 graphics cards. Intel figures that if you keep the gamers on your bandwagon, with little cost to everyone else, then why the hell not?
It seems that Intel wants to move to an entirely serial world. First it was USB. Then USB2, then Serial ATA, and now a serial graphics bus? As in one bit? The clock-speed of this bus is going to have to be in the dozens of gigahertz! Or am I missing something here?
Slashdot Mirror
Actually, I think Aureal died because nobody used the API. Actually, I wouldn't mind 3DFX dying. They are quite the bitches. (Not the 3DFx of yore, the "new" 3DFx. The 3DFX of yore was a herioc company that brought great 3D to the masses. The "new" 3DFX is a crappy company that tries muscle tactics (the whole sticker deal) propriatory APIs (GLIDE and the dragging of feet over D3D and GL) and tries to control the market (buying STB) and delivers crappy products to boot. Any such company deserves to die.) Besides, ATI has proven that they CAN make a decent graphics card, as has Matrox. And neither of those two companies deserve the contempt of the gaming community.
Maybe this is a case where 3DFx really DID steal the idea? Think about this from a marketing standpoint (all that really matters, why else do you think ATI does so well with crappy products?) 3DFX had reason to sue NVIDIA over multi-texturing. They were LOSING! The TNT totally blew away the Voodoo2 in terms of features (and single card performance) and 3DFX was scared. NVIDIA has no reason to be scared. It's products are topping the charts in performance, features, and it's the only one that has a great OpenGL ICD. Why would they sue 3DFx?
Actually, the "64MB" 3Dfx card only has 32MB of RAM usable. The two VSA-100 chips each need their own texture memory, so textures are duplicated in each 32MB block. The upcoming V5 6000 will still only have 32MB of RAM usable. (4 chips X 32MB= 128MB.) Thus, the V5 5500 performs slower than a GeForce2 32MB at $13 MORE.
Seriously though, Glide is the result of strong-arming, overextending, uncompetitive behavior on 3DFx's part. Sure it has great when there WERE no APIs, but 3DFx tried to keep it way past it's expiration date.
A) Though courted developers to use only Glide.
B) They dragged their feet on supporting DirectX and OpenGL. Wheras TNT had full DirectX 6 support from it's release, 3DFx took more than a month to release theirs. Wheras NVIDIA did (and still DOES) have great OpenGL ICDs, 3DFx used mini-drivers for the longest time and still doesn't have an ICD as good as NVIDIA's.
C) They sued NVIDIA over multitexturing.
D) They strong-armed stores into putting "3DFx Required" stickers on games that supported Direct3D and OpenGL until the judge forced them to stop.
Support for an API more propriotary than Direct3D? On Slashdot? Where are your PRIORITIES!
Face it, Glide is a dead API. Even 3DFx realizes that. And the only reason that Glide is faster in some programs is because those games are written primarily for glide. Besides, Glide-only games are few and far between and none of the acutally need all the power of the newer cards.
What do you mean the competiton has been even? NVIDIA has been busting heads left and right ever since TNT2. For the last few years, there has yet to be a time when the fastest card available WASN'T a NVIDIA card. Voodoo2 was the last time 3Dfx beat to NVIDIA, and it's reign was quickly ended by the TNT. Sure it was still slower than a dual-voodoo2, but it cost half as much, and supported OpenGL REALLY well. Even now, the Radeon isn't appricably faster, the GeForce2Ultra reigns supreme, and the V5 6000 is nowhere to be seen.
I'm sorry, I'm a patch virgin. I copy everything from diff -u... down, /root/nvidia.pat and
/root? Also, I've
save it to nvidia.pat, and patch -p0 it in the same directory that contains
NVIDIA_kernel-0.9-4 right? So I've got
/root/NVIDIA_kernel-0.9-4 and
I do patch -p0 nvidia.pat from
never gotten a patch to work. Is it supposed to take
insanely long?
Linux is nowhere near playing in the same league as these microkernels (QNX and BeOS) until it fixes several things. A) Fix the versioning problem. If the binary standard changes every kernel version, then I can't be expected to use binary, pre-compiled modules, can I. Neither can vendors supply pre-compiled modules. Sure it's fine now, when all the hardware is supported out-box, but what about when Linux "makes it." Driver updates are a common occurance, and with the current situation, will be hell for users. B) Fact: 99% of people CANNOT figure out modules.conf. Fact: 99% of people shouldn't HAVE to figure out modules.conf Fact: 99% of people have no DESIRE to figure out modules.conf Fact: Unless everything comes preconfigured and you never upgrade your hardware, 99% of people WILL have to figure out modules.conf Fact: BeOS (and supposedly QNX as well, I haven't tried) can detect hardware and install it without any knowledge on the users part. Linux can't even figure out that tulip is an ethernet driver.
Hey, thanks a lot.
Fuckwit. True, QNX does have some niceties that BeOS doesn't. HOWEVER...
A) There is no proof that QNX can cut it the way Be can in media.
B) It still doesn't have plans for accelerated OpenGL (currently the only thing accelerated is Mesa/Glide.)
C) It might be more of a competitor to Linux than anything else. From my POV, it supports my hardware, is fast and small, and is a fully POSIX complient UNIX. Those are the only reasons I keep Linux around, and it might be nice to use a UNIX without all the attendant bloated-ness I had associated with the system. If all goes well, it's not bye bye BeOS, but bye bye Slackware.
PS> As of now, NVIDIA Driver 0.9-4 still doesn't work with kernel 2.4-test6+. Any kernel hackers have any clue why? It seems to have something to do with the dissaperance of MAP_NR.
The Radeon is slower than a GeForce2GTS. Given the scary small price differential between the two (none) I don't see how you can consider bundling them a good thing.
Are you deaf? The Harmon-Kardon speakers can't touch the Klipsch's on some Compaqs and are appreciably worse than my ACS495s. (Not to mention the fact that they lack a subwoofer!)
What does this have to do with Linux? QNX doesn't even use X. Also, GNOME might be doable. GTK was quickly ported, QNX is officially POSIX complient, and Photon is pretty compatible with X.
Exactly WHY wouldn't you want to give up Linux in favor of this? (Not a flame, I'd just like to know advantages/disadvantages compared to Linux.) Additionally, a platform that doesn't use X always gets points in my book.
BTW) Is Photon's solution a good one. It's fast, light, and mostly X compatible. Could we finally get rid of X with something like this?
Not really. By the looks of the review, it seems to be quite a competitor to Linux and Be on the desktop level. I mean just because it is fast/light (as if that precluded it from being a desktop OS.) Doesn't mean that it should be limited only to embedded platforms. I mean this WAS going to be the next Amiga OS you know.
Well, they are working on better networking. Clustering isn't forthcoming, but that's a user-space issue anyway. Linux SMP is better, but nowhere near as good as BeOS's yet. (actually it never will be. BeOS apps are inherently multi-threaded while Linux apps are not.)
You are. Serial enables higher clockspeeds and that's about it. A serial link running at 50MHz will always be slower than a 64bit wide link running at 50Mhz. The thing is, that serial links run at a higher clock-speed than parallel ones (generally.) However, serial is killer on latency.
Except for gamers. (Awefully twitchy in Quake.)
Of course you can't argue that in general, second-rate hardware is put into first rate Mac systems. Take, for example, the G3. This multi-proc unfriendly, floating-point weak processor had no place in a Mac. The dual-G4 is seriously cool, and I'm actually considering it for my next purchase. However, it seems that all Macs come bundled with inferior hardware. Why put in a Radeon when you can get a GeForce2GTS at the same price? What is up with those gay-ass Harmon Kardon speakers on the cube. The less than spectacular CRT on the iMac, the list goes on. I have nothing against Macs and seriously want a dual G4. However, I have a problem with the fact that I can't use some top-flight hardware on it.
What are you talking about. As far as I can tell 50MB/sec is the limit for firewire. (400Mbps) I'm not talking about compressed rate, but an uncompressed image. True, most firewire transfers were are compressed, but this guy was talking about sending a video-game stream, and you wouldn't compress that.
Actually broadcast quality fullscreen fullmotion video is pretty low-res by PC standards. A 1600x1200 32bpp 60 fps video chews up around 460MB of bandwidth, significantly more than Firewire's paltry 50MB/sec. Although, I have now idea why the hell you'd pump a game through firewire, but higher quality video IS beyond firewire. (In fact, it would seem that Firewire can only barely keep up with a 30fps HDTV 1080i clip.)
What are the problems with AGP? Aside from the one card limitation, I can't think of any. It's fast, it's cheap, AGP cards don't fall out of their socket, it allows direct access to RAM, what more do you want?
Do some math buddy. The only time a video stream goes over the graphics bus (expect in cases like ATI's) is the final display. With a 1080 x 720 x 32 bpp x 30 fps HDTV stream, that works out to around 93MB/sec. A paltry sum even for PCI. Face it, the only reason AGP exists is for gaming and modeling.
Right focus. It's incredible how many people don't realize sexy techs rule the roost. AGP is sexy, PCI is not.
If you can find me a RAID array that does 500+MB/sec (the speed of 66/64 PCI) on a PC system, then call me. Otherwise, go talk to the Sun people.
Gamers don't have dual monitors or RAID. The practicality of the matter is, that 1GHz procs, AGP8x, and GeForce2Ultras are aimed at gamers. Gamers run the high-end of the processor business and that's just the way it is.
1) NVIDIA GeForce2 drivers are rock solid
2) They support Linux.
3) Yea, but todays mediocre is tomarrows Mac hardware.
4) If you can live with a $400 system, then more power to you. Some people actually NEED the extra power, and will pay for it. Question: Would you buy a Porsche?
5) It usually does. Either way, you get bragging rights.
6) I'm a consumer swayed by 40fps in 16K/12K Quake III.
7) To fill my needs, my system needs a lot of power. Live with it.
PS> Before y'all get all hot and bothered about that Mac comment, consider it. Right now, Macs are up to AGP2x and Radeon cards while PCs are at 4x GeForce2 Ultra cards.
Then don't USE it. AGP is just an extension of PCI, and as such, it adds very little to the cost of the system.
;)
AGP is cool whether you like it or not. Sure the AGP texture thing kinda busted, but the extra bandwidth is always welcome. The best part of AGP, however, is that it allows you to blit from system to graphics memory using the hardware blitter. (A major turn on for DirectDraw freaks like me
Intel really doesn't care about your segment. In the consumer arena, gamers are a very powerful segment. They're the ones who buy the 1GHz procs and the $500 graphics cards. Intel figures that if you keep the gamers on your bandwagon, with little cost to everyone else, then why the hell not?
It seems that Intel wants to move to an entirely serial world. First it was USB. Then USB2, then Serial ATA, and now a serial graphics bus? As in one bit? The clock-speed of this bus is going to have to be in the dozens of gigahertz! Or am I missing something here?