Personality A:
Wintel is good for PC 3-D graphics
I'm pleased by Microsoft's decision to delay support for hardware-accelerated 3-D
geometry and lighting at least until the release of DirectX 7, due next year. Microsoft
and Intel (plus AMD, Cyrix, and IDT) understand that not only system performance, but also
system price, is important to consumers. Software running on the host CPU is ultimately
the cheapest means of performing a given function. It happened with soft modems, it's
happening with soft DVD, and it should continue to happen with software-based geometry and
lighting.
Of course, high-end workstations do perform geometry and lighting in hardware; they use
either custom chips or off-the-shelf components, such as 3DLabs' Glint Delta and Gamma or
Fujitsu's FGX-1. But look how much those systems cost! There's no way that the complex
floating-point engines required to do hardware acceleration could hit a price point low
enough to penetrate the mainstream PC market.
Even if a vendor could squeeze hardware geometry and lighting onto its chip or into a
multiple-chip set, today's end user probably wouldn't see a performance boost. Most of
today's 3-D software doesn't even come close to saturating a Pentium-II processor's
ability to generate processed polygons. By the time such software exists, both the
AMD/Cyrix/IDT 3DNow! and the Intel Katmai MMX2 instruction set-based processors will be in
production. The SIMD floating-point engines on these CPUs will be ideal for geometry and
lighting tasks. Anyway, if not 3-D, what else would the software use 3DNow! and MMX2 for?
A number of silicon manufacturers have seen their PC business evaporate as hardware
functions move to software. Some have adapted and survived; others have disappeared.
Nobody promised them an easy ride. 3-D geometry and lighting is already a software-based
function; why buck the trend and move it onto hardware? Microsoft has more important
things to work on.
You can reach Personality A (Technical Editor Brian Dipert) at 1-916-454-5242, fax
1-916-454-5101, edndipert@worldnet.att.net.
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Personality B:
Wintel is bad for PC 3-D graphics
I'm disappointed by Microsoft's decision to delay support for hardware-accelerated 3-D
geometry and lighting at least until the release of DirectX 7, due next year. This delay
is clearly a result of paranoia within Intel (plus AMD, Cyrix, and IDT) that software
developers will run out of uses for increasing CPU MIPS. Cheap PCs won't sell if they
don't provide a robust end-user experience. Think about it: soft modems, soft DVD, and now
software-based geometry and lighting. Wintel has an interesting interpretation of the
words "balanced PC."
Of course, open GL-based workstations (and even some high-end Wintel PCs) do perform
geometry and lighting in hardware, and just look at how incredibly well they perform! I
don't buy the cost argument; Fujitsu's FGX-1 is less than $20 in volume in a market with
very few players. Combine several dozen aggressive competitors with a few
0.25-micron-lithography-capable foundries, and amazing things will happen. Intel, the
originator of Moore's Law, should know this.
Developers write to the largest possible installed hardware base; that's why software
always lags behind hardware. What motivation does a software vendor have to write a
3-D-rich application if the Pentium-II processor is the bottleneck? Add some hardware
assist, and then let the Pentium II hand off unprocessed polygons and focus its muscle on
higher-leverage tasks; then everybody wins.
SIMD floating-point engines may work well with certain audio- and image-processing
tasks, but it's not clear they're ideal for 3-D geometry and lighting. Put too many
software-based functions together (3-D plus video plus modem-based Internet access) and
the PC will choke. Anyway, host CPUs are supposed to be there for multiple-application
flexibility, not to execute standardized, repetitive tasks.
Continued reliance on software-based geometry and lighting is nothing more than CPU
vendors' attempts to gobble up more system silicon. Workstations do full hardware 3-D
acceleration, yet somehow software developers keep finding uses for high-end CPUs.
Microsoft has plenty of resources; it could pull off DirectX hardware support if it wanted
to.
You can reach Personality B (Technical Editor Brian Dipert) at 1-916-454-5242, fax
1-916-454-5101, edndipert@worldnet.att.net.
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