Re: Linux 3D

[Ian Crawford <icrawfor@uoguelph.ca>]

> Do you know of support for the voodoo2?

All 3dfx chipsets (i.e., Voodoo, Voodoo Rush, and Voodoo2) are supported
by Glide. 

I believe that there is even support for some 3dlabs chipsets (glint,
etc.). 


> I'm just wondering what can be done to get support for the newest cards
> soon after they ship instead of a year or two later. i.e.  Matrox G200
> series. 

Since the manufactures generally don't provide Linux drivers, the only
alternative is to get register level information about the card from the
card manufactures and hack the drivers yourself.  This is how almost all
Linux hardware support has come about.  If you can get the technical
specifications of the new Matrox cards, you can write drivers.

There are people working on 3D support for Linux.  There is a _huge_ lack
of people actually writing the games to use the hardware support that we
already have.  That's what I think development should focus on.

The current hardware is good.  The frame rate on my machine at home is
limited by the cards refresh rate, not it's ability to crunch numbers
(P-II/266 with Diamond Monster 3D).

Don't get me wrong.  I'd love to see Linux hardware support go through the
roof and I support any projects that will take it there.  My personal
focus is on creating games because I think I can be of more use to Linux
in that area. 

Ian

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