Subject: Re: Alpha vs Pentium Pro vs SGI
From: [email-masked] (Andrew Weiler)
To: Multiple recipients of list <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 13 Apr 1996 12:38:05 -0700

>>So, I imagine that a dual P6 TDZ workstation is even better, and don't forget
>>the great OpenGL card that comes with it, has hardware gouraud shading and
>>texture processing, 12Mb VRAM, 24bits Z buffer, 8Mb texture RAM and a zillion
>>vector/second!
>>
>>What do you think?
>
>Don't ask.  I know very little about OpenGL, how it works, or what supports
>it.  I recently bought a new video card to replace my old one and got a
>Matrox MGA because it was supposed to have hardware OpenGL support.  Havn't
>had a chance to try it out with it though because I don't really know to
>much about OGL.  If anyone would care to explain how it works that would be
>much appriciated!
>
>Thanks,
>Scott
>

I've been doing a bit of research into an NT based Softimage system which in
the process has aquainted me somewhat with the convoluted world of OpenGL.
OpenGL is a graphics library originally developed by SGI and now licensed to
Microsoft. Windows NT has built in support for both hardware and software
OpenGL, Win95 does with the addition of a few .dll files. From what I can
recall OpenGL supports extremely fast Gouraud shading, texture mapping,
depth of field, anti-aliasing and atmospheric effects. The solid-static
preview plugin for Modeler is a good example, but you'll have to work with
something like Softimage on an Indigo2 or Intergraph TDZ to see the full
potential, that is realtime shading and texture mapping. 

>From what I've heard, OpenGL support was sort of an after thought for the
Matrox boards, I'm holding out for the rumoured cheap NT boards. The
accelgraphics boards are beautiful though a bit pricey. 24bit support up to
1600x1200 plus wireframe acceleration!

Andrew Weiler
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