PC grahpics card questions

[Sébastien Barré]

At 13:12 19/10/99 -0400, Volpe, Christopher R (CRD) wrote:

>  I'm in the market for a new graphics card, mainly for doing vtk-related 
>[...] I'm not necessarily looking for the best 3D
>graphics available, but rather the best combination of 2D performance and 3D 
>[...] a PCI card under $150 that can do at least 1280x1024x32bpp at 70Hz 

OK.

>I'd like it to be able to do 3D dubble-buffered with Z-buffering at
>that resolution as well. 

Oups :)

Hum, I would advise you, in that range, something like a TNT Ultra 2, or
more professionnal cards like these based on Permedia 2 or 3 which have
true geometry engines (or wait for the next which seems very powerful also).

Furthermore, Robert Riviere and I are maintaining a VTK benchmark project :

www.hds.utc.fr/~barre/vtk/sphere-bench.html
http://www-sop.inria.fr/caiman/personnel/Robert.Riviere/vtk/sphere-bench/

There are links and general considerations in both pages that might be of
some interest regarding your choice. I know that results have been
submitted for graphics cards in your price range.

>1) Since 2D performance is important to me, I'm wondering if I should pay a 
>few extra bucks for cards that have the more expensive SGRAM as opposed to
the ordinary SDRAM. 

I do not think that it is so important : performances are now aimed at 3D,
2D results are pretty much the same for all modern graphics cards. Of
course, the resolution and frequency will depend on the amount of RAM and
the quality of your RAMDAC if any, but that's a different problem.

Regarding NT support : that is an important consideration, basically
because 3D under NT means a true OpenGL support (no Direct3D for the
moment). And although most gaming cards do claim OpenGL support, it is
often very clumsy (writting a good OpenGL ICD is difficult). I know that
TNT products have good OpenGL support, as well, of course, as 3D labs
products (Permedia & so on).

Hope it helps


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