Major A wrote: > > Hi, > > I'm new to this list, so please forgive me if the question has been > discussed before. Currently it's impossible to search the archives.
Yup. But the 3D hardware changes a lot in a short while... > - how much does FlightGear rely on textures, and how large are they? FlightGear relies much on textures. But we don't use multi texturing. So FlightGear shouldn't be fillrate limited and thus the memory speed shouldn't be that important > - does a transform & lighting (T&L) engine improve performance > significantly? FlightGear uses T&L a lot. So a card that does fast T&L (i.e. a high GPU speed) helps a lot > - how much graphics memory is required? When you use the standard scenery (i.e. no satelite picture backdrop) we don't need that much memory. I'm sorry that I don't know any figures but I guess that 16 MB should be enough. And you should be on the save side with 32 MB. > - Matrox G450 with 32MB. (Would this really improve things compared to > the G400 with 16MB?) I don't know. > - ATI Radeon with 64MB > > - some nVidia (which one is better for FlightGear? MX400 with 64MB, or > Pro/Ultra with 32MB?) Get one with a high GPU speed. The difference between GeForce2 and GeForce3 shouldn't make a big difference as that's mostly about functions we don't use. So a fast GeForce2 should perform better than a normal GeForce3. Note: this is based on theory. I didn't do any benchmarking (I'd love to - but who sponsors me the GeForce3?) > > I tend towards the Radeon, simply because the drivers are open-source > (unlike nVidia). I have no experience with the Radeon. But at least the old ATi cards were crap under Windos. As you want a new one under Linux this doesn't apply to you. But I've *heard* that the nVidia cards are better when you look at the GPU (just search the fgfs-devel list when it's aviable again about the latest CLOD or ROAM discussion) > > Also, how do ATI and nVidia compare to Matrox in terms of signal > quality? Matrox have a good reputation for signal quality and ATI and nVidia one for fast 3D. IIRC is the signal quality for nVidia cards extremely manufacturer dependant. > BTW, computer will be one of the Athlon XPs on a VIA chipset with DDR > memory. OK, make sure that your power supply is *STRONG*. On the LinuxTag we had a machine with Athlon 1.3 and GeForce3 (+400W IIRC) that crashed reliably when we used 3D acceleration. A hardware monitor showed us that the 3.3V was on the bottom end during normal 2D opperation. We couldn't test it with 3D as the crash happened before we could read the values... CU, Christian -- The idea is to die young as late as possible. -- Ashley Montague Whoever that is/was; (c) by Douglas Adams would have been better... _______________________________________________ Flightgear-users mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/flightgear-users
