Don't get it wrong. It's not that P4 performs badly on IEEE
double precision encoding algorithm. It's that it performs
badly on any x87 code. As soon as the same algorithm
gets optimized for double precision SSE2 equivalents P4
will get back on the playground. Of course I can't state
how well it will perform, but SSE optimized results of
Quake3 give a hint about it.
Leaving underpowered floating point unit could be also a
relatively smart decision on the Intel's side. This forces
software developers away from outdated stack-oriented
x87 architecture, so in the end we'll have all of the
software developed for much more optimal SSE.
Still, don't buy P4 just now...
BTW, does anybody remember that the original Pentium
was for some time codenamed P5 ? Talking about "P4"
now seems a bit funny.
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Don't get it wrong. It's not that P4 performs badly on IEEE
double precision encoding algorithm. It's that it performs
badly on any x87 code. As soon as the same algorithm
gets optimized for double precision SSE2 equivalents P4
will get back on the playground. Of course I can't state
how well it will perform, but SSE optimized results of
Quake3 give a hint about it.
Leaving underpowered floating point unit could be also a
relatively smart decision on the Intel's side. This forces
software developers away from outdated stack-oriented
x87 architecture, so in the end we'll have all of the
software developed for much more optimal SSE.
Still, don't buy P4 just now...
BTW, does anybody remember that the original Pentium
was for some time codenamed P5 ? Talking about "P4"
now seems a bit funny.
From looking at it seems that on hardware platforms that support transparency
blit it should be available via XDGACopyTransparentArea()
function call.
<p>I can't tell how well is it supported and whether it can
really get to be more standard than <i>yet another
extension</i>. Just try it for yourself.