Mail Archives: djgpp/1998/03/09/05:04:54
Dominique Biesmans Wrote
>I've read somewhere else that intel is taking a hot at the 3D hardware
>market with their new chipset (i740), so how does that add up?
We've got an Intel card with the 740 chipset at work, and it performs
alright (pretty damn good actually), but I don't think that they are really
"hot" for the 3D accelerator market. From what this year is shaping out
like, that is definately one business that I would not want to be in right
now. The competition is intense and they need to do some real major work
before we can see any huge performance gains (over the incredible things
we're already seeing from those people - see Leath Muller's post above). Add
to this the fact that it looks like we'll have to wait until September to
see what the folks in Redmond are really up to ( Farenheit, DirectX 6.0...),
and even though they are starting to get there shit together, I don't think
drivers that implement any new tricks in the new APIs will ship before that,
and that the fact that we're starting to see nice 3D acceleration hardware
in the under $100 range.
I get the impression that Intel is just using the 740 to put pressure on the
card makers to do something better, sort of a, "You can start by topping
this!" sort of thing. It looks like they definately want ATI and some other
lower priced card makers to find a new line of business, although I'm not
exatly sure how that fits into the big picture. (low priced extraneous
hardware should be good for Intel's plan?)
Just remember, if Intel wants to keep this madness up, they _need_ people to
buy a new system _every_ year, and who wants to buy a new system when
there's no difference playing there favorite game on their old system vs. a
new system? Everybody has to play along (Intel + Hardware Makers + Software
Makers + Computer Outlets) for this to work properly. If it works, everybody
involved will make loads of money.
This is part of the reason I originally asked this question. I would like to
do really cool things with an API like Allegro, as opposed to something like
DirectX, where I have no idea what the hell they are up to. What happens
when Intel introduces Katmai and Windows 2000 (or more to the point, DirectX
7.0) isn't ready? Am I screwed? Do I have to wait on Microsoft? Or do I just
add a few simple patches to my Allegro based framework and start making
money?
I wish it could be the latter. I am not afraid of user's being afraid of the
"black world" of a DOS box, because it would be very easy to hide all that
behind a pretty icon, or a two stage start-up. I write Allegro programs now
that when I demoed them to my co-workers, everybody though that they were
written using DirectX (the tell tale flashing of the screen, no more task
bar...). This is really not a problem. To top it all off, my Allegro
programs could be run in DOS too! My boss loves this idea.
The problem has always been hardware support. How do I take advantage of the
newest Voodoo III card from Allegro? Sure it's possible, and it wouldn't
even be all that difficult (if I was getting paid), but then what about
Li-Tech cards, Asus cards, SiS cards??? Am I goinf to get stuck writing
cards specific interface code the rest of my life? Do we move to OpenGL (I
can probably get away with using that from DOS), write a public domain
library that everybody can use (and answer e-mail requests to update it or
fix it for the rest of our lives), or do we just give up and use DirectX?
If anybody is still listening and has something to add...
Chris Bilson
chrisb AT NOSPAMms12 DOT hinet DOT net
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