Friday, March 26th 2010
AMD First with OpenGL 4.0 Compliant Graphics Driver
Shortly after the Khronos group announced the OpenGL 4.0, the newest version of the multi-platform graphics API, AMD is out with a preview graphics driver for its ATI Radeon, FireGL, FirePro, and Mobility Radeon graphics accelerators, which includes the OpenGL 4.0 ICD (installable client driver). The driver is available for Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows XP, and Linux. OpenGL 4.0 is comparable and up to times with Microsoft's DirectX 11 API, it makes use of hardware features such as tessellation on the GPU, per-sample fragment shaders and programmable fragment shader input positions, 64-bit double precision floating point shader operations, etc., and has no restrictions on which later version of Windows it can run on. With OpenGL 4.0 for example, one can expect 3D graphics with the complexity comparable to DirectX 11 on Windows XP.
DOWNLOAD: ATI Catalyst OpenGL 4.0 Preview Driver for Windows 7/Vista, Windows XP, and Linux.
DOWNLOAD: ATI Catalyst OpenGL 4.0 Preview Driver for Windows 7/Vista, Windows XP, and Linux.
51 Comments on AMD First with OpenGL 4.0 Compliant Graphics Driver
OpenGL is used in quite a few games and that includes pretty much all the games that can run on Macs, WoW included.
OpenGL 4.0 is a new extension added which is never a bad thing.
Radeon HD 5000 Series and above gives you OpenCL 4.0
OpenGL was/is open source, so the developers of it weren't working for the profit part of it like M$. OpenGL is somewhat extensible... adding new shader models is possible. With DirectX, you are totally at the whim of M$.
If you want to see a quick, simple comparison of OpenGL to DirectX, install Google Earth. There is program menu option to start it in OpenGL or DirectX. Ironically, I have to use OpenGL to run Google Earth, as it will crash often using DirectX
openGL was king for graphics. it seemed to be the one for hardware acceleration, back when directX was still used for software.
Things changed however, because directX stopped being all about direct draw (2D) and became a 'bundle' - you got 2D (directdraw) 3D (direct3D) audio (directsound) input (directinput) and so on. Coding for openGL may have given you broarder support and potentially better work, but sticking with directX (and shafting linux/mac) made it easier, since you could get everything you needed in the one package - not just the video component.
Lately, people are just making directX games and swapping direct3D for OpenGL - which is why theres not many ports for other platforms. (they have to go to effort for input, sound, etc)
The OpenGL standard allows individual vendors to provide additional functionality through extensions as new technology is created. Extensions may introduce new functions and new constants, and may relax or remove restrictions on existing OpenGL functions. Each vendor has an alphabetic abbreviation that is used in naming their new functions and constants. For example, NVIDIA's abbreviation (NV) is used in defining their proprietary function glCombinerParameterfvNV() and their constant GL_NORMAL_MAP_NV.
Using the Linux Unigine OpenGl demo (not sure with the Windows OpenGl renderer), one can use the tessellation option with a pre-RV870 GPU (not an option with DirectX 11). Granted, the framerate takes a nose dive, but it is possible. It is unclear if the Unigine demo is using the built in tessellator of a pre-RV870 GPU (RV770 in my case) or just doing it in software. Because the Unigine demo (and Ubuntu Karmic and newer) require an R600 (or more recent GPU), one cannot see if tessellation would even work with a R500 or older GPU. It'd be cool if someone with a pre-Fermi nVidia GPU tries to run the Unigine Linux demo with tessellation enabled and reports their results.
Finally, one more thing to keep in mind is that many stubborn people (;)) chose to remain running Windows XP, and thus they loose out on the DirectX 10/11 features (regardless if their card is capable of them). Should a game support OpenGl 4.0, it will run in XP with graphics comparable to the same game being rendered on Vista/7 under DirectX 11.
As an aside, I would like to do something I don't typically do, and that would be commend nVidia on their Fermi tessellator. From benchmarks I've seen, Fermi's first generation tessellator eats the R870's tessellator for breakfast, yet AMD has had tessellation experience since the Xenos GPU (as I mentioned before). :respect:
Indeed!! Unreal 2, Unreal Tournament 2, Counter Strike, Half Life, Quake 3 Arena, Serious Sam, and some other games are using the tessellation option when they detect an ATI card. But the feature was actually implemented or coded in game not in the DX driver...I think...
Anyway that feature wasn't called Tessellation but, ATI TruForm
ixbtlabs.com/articles/atitruform/
www.anandtech.com/showdoc.aspx?i=1476&p=4
Truform has been around for a VERY long time, but since NV never used it, it died off. It was mostly used in openGL games, where it was easier 'per hardware' features in