N4 & Transform and Lighting

Dave Henrie mentioned in an earlier N4 thread that N4 will support "Transform and Lighting" and Mike Carver asked for a source on how he knows that to be true. I quickly read through all of those post but didn't see any replies. Does anyone have a source on the N4 T&L support? PS. Ya, know, some may have their beefs against these some corporations for various reasons, but I just want to say ROCKON!!! to Sierra, Papy and Won, PRC and anyone else for taking online racing simulation seriously and trying to make it as good as some of the FPS online stuff out there! I can't wait to pay my $50+ US bucks or whatever it will be for N4 in order to support the awesome effort that has gone into making it possible for me to enjoy online racing at this level and with up to 32+ drivers at once! Any new goodies that N4 provides will be well worth the price no matter what video cards it supports the best! Just don't tell them that because I would really like to see a top racing sim support Transform and Lighting :) It makes me so technically happy that they've come this far that I think I'm going to cry, sniff sniff ;o) Bruce Moody Pro Racing Club - Advertising Manager Info: http://www.proracingclub.com Ads: http://www.proracingclub.com/N3/advertising/advertising.html E-mail: mailto:[email hidden] Car #33 aka Deiter Sponsor: American Network Products - http://www.networkcenter.com

Sorry If I missed that. Eric Busch formerly a sim racer here on ras, now a sound-code monkey with papyrus stated, either here or on Jacob's N3 server, that hardware accelerated T&L will be supported via D3D and Opengl. Glide will not be implemented at all. Our Voodoo cards will still work, using D3D or Opengl, but not with all the bells and whistles... I haven't pinned him down on the sound api yet... :) No inside info...just picking up the threads on a couple of different newsgroups. dave henrie "Bruce A. Moody (AKA PRC_Deiter)" wrote:

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> > Dave Henrie mentioned in an earlier N4 thread that N4 will support > "Transform and Lighting" and Mike Carver asked for a source on how he knows > that to be true. > > I quickly read through all of those post but didn't see any replies. Does > anyone have a source on the N4 T&L support? > > PS. Ya, know, some may have their beefs against these some corporations for > various reasons, but I just want to say ROCKON!!! to Sierra, Papy and Won, > PRC and anyone else for taking online racing simulation seriously and trying > to make it as good as some of the FPS online stuff out there! I can't wait > to pay my $50+ US bucks or whatever it will be for N4 in order to support > the awesome effort that has gone into making it possible for me to enjoy > online racing at this level and with up to 32+ drivers at once! Any new > goodies that N4 provides will be well worth the price no matter what video > cards it supports the best! Just don't tell them that because I would > really like to see a top racing sim support Transform and Lighting :) > > It makes me so technically happy that they've come this far that I think I'm > going to cry, sniff sniff ;o) > > Bruce Moody > Pro Racing Club - Advertising Manager > Info: http://www.proracingclub.com > Ads: http://www.proracingclub.com/N3/advertising/advertising.html > E-mail: mailto:[email hidden] > Car #33 aka Deiter > Sponsor: American Network Products - http://www.networkcenter.com

Man N4 and T&L would look saweeet on my CL AP Geforce DDR card. This only makes me want N4 sooner now! wahhhhh! ;o) thanks for the information Dave! -- Bruce Moody AKA Deiter #33 Pro Racing Club Advertising Manager - http://www.proracingclub.com Racing Sponsor : American Network Products - http://www.networkcenter.com _______________________________________________________________ Dave Henrie <[email hidden]> wrote in message news:[email hidden]... > Sorry If I missed that. Eric Busch formerly a sim racer here on ras, > now a sound-code monkey with papyrus stated, either here or on Jacob's > N3 server, that hardware accelerated T&L will be supported via D3D and > Opengl. Glide will not be implemented at all. Our Voodoo cards will > still work, using D3D or Opengl, but not with all the bells and > whistles... > I haven't pinned him down on the sound api yet... :) > No inside info...just picking up the threads on a couple of different > newsgroups. > dave henrie > > "Bruce A. Moody (AKA PRC_Deiter)" wrote: > > > > Dave Henrie mentioned in an earlier N4 thread that N4 will support > > "Transform and Lighting" and Mike Carver asked for a source on how he knows > > that to be true. > > > > I quickly read through all of those post but didn't see any replies. Does > > anyone have a source on the N4 T&L support? > > > > PS. Ya, know, some may have their beefs against these some corporations for > > various reasons, but I just want to say ROCKON!!! to Sierra, Papy and Won, > > PRC and anyone else for taking online racing simulation seriously and trying > > to make it as good as some of the FPS online stuff out there! I can't wait > > to pay my $50+ US bucks or whatever it will be for N4 in order to support > > the awesome effort that has gone into making it possible for me to enjoy > > online racing at this level and with up to 32+ drivers at once! Any new > > goodies that N4 provides will be well worth the price no matter what video > > cards it supports the best! Just don't tell them that because I would > > really like to see a top racing sim support Transform and Lighting :) > > > > It makes me so technically happy that they've come this far that I think I'm > > going to cry, sniff sniff ;o) > > > > Bruce Moody > > Pro Racing Club - Advertising Manager > > Info: http://www.proracingclub.com > > Ads: http://www.proracingclub.com/N3/advertising/advertising.html > > E-mail: mailto:[email hidden] > > Car #33 aka Deiter > > Sponsor: American Network Products - http://www.networkcenter.com

T&L will be necessary, even if you're just racing with a few cars. Those realtime shadows are most likely implemented using the stencil buffer (note, not all Voodoo cards support the stencil buffer, and I am not sure Glide supports it either). For example, with the correct settings, you can get Quake 3 to use stencil-buffered shadows instead of the boring circle shadows -- if I remember it correctly: r_stencilbits 8, cg_shadows 2, and a vid_restart at the console -- but those took a massive framerate hit mainly because it increased the polygon count quite considerably. I can't wait for N4. In the meantime, I'm gonna put my CPU/Video card upgrade on hold until N4 is released. Why buy something now for a product currently not available? When N4 is out in 6 months, NVIDIA's NV20 will be out for the picking. In the mean time, enjoy what you have especially when it is more than enough for racing sims like GPL. GM Bruce A. Moody (AKA PRC_Deiter) ([email hidden]) wrote: : Man N4 and T&L would look saweeet on my CL AP Geforce DDR card. This only : makes me want N4 sooner now! wahhhhh! ;o) thanks for the information : Dave! : -- : Bruce Moody AKA Deiter #33 : Pro Racing Club Advertising Manager - http://www.proracingclub.com : Racing Sponsor : American Network Products - http://www.networkcenter.com

How do you know that T&L games today are using T&L to their full advantage? Could it be that these certain games just happen to use T&L on one area in which the company then says "this game supports T&L?" The concept is quite similar to CL's EAX support, where any game can boast supporting EAX even if it doesn't do much. Have you personally played the special NV15 Quake 3 level which sports a massive polygon count with and without T&L? GM Steve Edwards ([email hidden]) wrote: : How can you say T&L will be necessary when hardware T&L today slows down : software compared to fast CPUs? It's like the Virge3D all over again, neat : idea but it ain't soup yet. A person would get better results from a 1Ghz : CPU than any hardware T&L board available. : Steve : "GEORGE ARUGAY MONTEMAYOR" <gmontem@libra> wrote in message : news:8fd0vm$[email hidden]... : > : > T&L will be necessary, even if you're just racing with a few cars. : > Those realtime shadows are most likely implemented using the stencil : > buffer (note, not all Voodoo cards support the stencil buffer, and I : > am not sure Glide supports it either). : >

How can you say T&L will be necessary when hardware T&L today slows down software compared to fast CPUs? It's like the Virge3D all over again, neat idea but it ain't soup yet. A person would get better results from a 1Ghz CPU than any hardware T&L board available. Steve "GEORGE ARUGAY MONTEMAYOR" <gmontem@libra> wrote in message news:8fd0vm$[email hidden]... > > T&L will be necessary, even if you're just racing with a few cars. > Those realtime shadows are most likely implemented using the stencil > buffer (note, not all Voodoo cards support the stencil buffer, and I > am not sure Glide supports it either). >

Point me to one reputable review site that shows a benchmark where HW T&L beats software T&L with a fast CPU. If you can't I stay with my position. In the mean time you can go to Toms Hardware, Sharky's or others and read what I am saying. Bedside's I think you are missing my point. I think T&L is a good idea. The implementations todate just aren't better than doing it in the CPU. They will get there and T&L will be a good thing. But for now, it's like the Virge3D from S3 again, or don't you remember that? Steve "GEORGE ARUGAY MONTEMAYOR" <gmontem@libra> wrote in message news:8fg6t7$[email hidden]...

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> How do you know that T&L games today are using T&L to their full > advantage? Could it be that these certain games just happen to > use T&L on one area in which the company then says "this game > supports T&L?" The concept is quite similar to CL's EAX support, > where any game can boast supporting EAX even if it doesn't do much. > > Have you personally played the special NV15 Quake 3 level which sports > a massive polygon count with and without T&L? > > GM > > > Steve Edwards ([email hidden]) wrote: > : How can you say T&L will be necessary when hardware T&L today slows down > : software compared to fast CPUs? It's like the Virge3D all over again,

neat > : idea but it ain't soup yet. A person would get better results from a1Ghz

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> : CPU than any hardware T&L board available. > > : Steve > > > : "GEORGE ARUGAY MONTEMAYOR" <gmontem@libra> wrote in message > : news:8fd0vm$[email hidden]... > : > > : > T&L will be necessary, even if you're just racing with a few cars. > : > Those realtime shadows are most likely implemented using the stencil > : > buffer (note, not all Voodoo cards support the stencil buffer, and I > : > am not sure Glide supports it either). > : >

Steve Edwards wrote:

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> > Point me to one reputable review site that shows a benchmark where HW T&L > beats software T&L with a fast CPU. If you can't I stay with my position. > In the mean time you can go to Toms Hardware, Sharky's or others and read > what I am saying. > > Bedside's I think you are missing my point. I think T&L is a good idea. > The implementations todate just aren't better than doing it in the CPU. > They will get there and T&L will be a good thing. But for now, it's like > the Virge3D from S3 again, or don't you remember that?

Well, it's just a trend with Nvidia. Putting features on the boards that are nice on paper, but not usefull with current sw and hw. 32bit, BIG texture sizes, T&L, what's next? Raytracing on chip with 4 fps? Each one of those features came at a time, where gamers turned had to turn them off, or weren't used by the games. Thanks, but I'll take FSAA in 32bit at 1024 with a mild fps hit instead. l8er ronny -- "You're one of those condescending Unix computer users!" "Here's a nickel, kid. Get yourself a better computer" - Dilbert.