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GenTimJS
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PostPosted: Thu Aug 19, 2004 7:05 pm    Post subject: question on Creator3d Reply with quote

As far as I can tell, there are 3 interfaces for the C3d cards .... Ultra1 style, Ultra2 style, and slot-style.

The SB1000 I just purchased has a slot-style C3D in it (latest/last revision model)

.. anyone know if the different interface models have odd driver issues?
anyone know the compatiblity status of the later-model C3D cards?

I figure I cant expect hardware accelleration, but it would be nice to get 24bit output ...
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Ferris
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PostPosted: Tue Aug 24, 2004 12:21 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Assuming that the board is recognized as some sort of Creator (ffb, ffb2, ffb2+) (which is outside the driver's control.
The driver asks for all its devices, and if the kernel doesn't classify your card as a Creator or as
an Elite, you won't get started):

The driver (sunffb) identifies and classifies the board by how it reports sbits = *((volatile unsigned char *)pFfb->strapping_bits);

If it doesn't recognize the board explicitly, it assumes Creator3D-vertical (ffb2(V)). So what matters
to the driver is how the board identifies itself.

As for 24 bits. If you have a Creator, you will use sunffb, and 24 bits is a mandatory option. (You must
specify the option, but 24 is the only allowed choice.)

As for acceleration, why not? You'll get what the driver believes the board has reported itself to be capable of.

If sunffb has trouble identifying the board, it will report "Unknown boardID[%08x], assuming FFB2"
and for the '08x' it will give what the board said. If that happens and you know what the board actually is,
it is easy enough to experiment with the type. E.g., if you get to that point, and it calls you an
ffb2, but you think it is really ffb2+, it's easy to make the driver go along with you.

But if you are wrong, the failure can be pretty dramatic.

Hope this is of some use,
Regards,
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GenTimJS
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PostPosted: Tue Aug 24, 2004 1:38 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Big help thanks.

I was under the distinct impresion however (from experiments, posts, and discussion) from using my Ultra1 with a Creator3d (ffb 1) that the sunffb driver was "busted" and did not support hardware acceleration, DRI, or OpenGL.

Given, this was two years ago, and the drivers may have improved ;-)
Any info on the status?
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Ferris
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PostPosted: Tue Aug 24, 2004 12:08 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

The xorg driver (sunffb) and the kernel support DRI (except for some problems with kernel 2.6.7, which is different issue).

xorg + libGL does not support libGL's acceleration for Mesa very well at this point. With any version of X11R6 (xfree, xorg)
up to and including xorg-x11-6.7.0-rx, support is not usable (incomplete).

With xorg-x11-6.7.99.902 (xorg-x11-6.8 release candidate 2), xorg+libGL direct rendering interface for Mesa3D
is complete enough to load and try. Mostly it does not work yet, but for a few applications it does work,
and the performance improvement is dramatic. So at some point soon, that should be taken care of one way or the other.
(It's a question of whether xorg or we get there first, and of what is going on in kernel land.)

Hope this helps clarify things.
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GenTimJS
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PostPosted: Fri Aug 27, 2004 3:41 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

So, at the moment,
xorg+DRI = go
xorg+OpenGL = kinda, but not mature

?

Semi-related question, and I only ask because I've got no idea, but is development with this/these driver(s) in a semi "active" state? Or are updates/features likely to be slow?
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Ferris
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PostPosted: Sun Aug 29, 2004 6:17 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

xorg+openGL works fine without dri. With xorg-x11-6.7.99.902 (6.8-rc2) dri for ffb+xorg+GL is
'kinda' and under active development.
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labrador
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PostPosted: Fri Sep 10, 2004 1:29 am    Post subject: What about on Solaris? Reply with quote

These Sun machines were called graphic workstations in the original
Sun literature of the day. So I take it that under Solaris these
machines were useable as 3D workstations? Did those applications
suck compared to our 3D of today? Just curious because I
own such hardware now but I wonder what the allure was when it
cost $20,000.
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