The tree demo Nvidia used to show off GeForce is available for dowload.

[Nuno]

Here: http://www.demonews.com/demonews/fil...unt.asp?ID=378

Well, my G400 runs it

No big deal, anyway.

[SteveC]

Doesn't run on mine - I get about 5 'chord' sounds, as in summink's gone wrong, then I get a gpf in kernel32.dll.

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Cheers,
Steve

[Kruzin]

Works fine here.
A tree.
With leaves and branches you can manipulate.
Woohoo.

[SteveC]

Ah, turn off dual head and you get a tree. Woo bloody hoo.

[Nuno]

Amazing isn´t it

Steve, my desktop is at 1024x768x16. To be honest I only tried it once at that res and it worked first time. Tried now at 1024x768x32 and it works too...

(So my G400 runs the tree demo. I wonder if GF256 runs PR Land Bumpmapped and dual monitor...)

Update: Oh I see, Nvidia included a dual-head fool-proof detection

[This message has been edited by Nuno (edited 09-07-1999).]

[SteveC]

It's interesting actually. Running it at 1600x1200x32 gives me no perceivable performance difference to 640x480x16. Therefore either this is not pushing the G400 at all and it badly coded to be jerky, or its performance is simply limited by the number of polygons on screen (which I assume doesn't change by resizing the window or changing desktop properties??). And the G400 just cannot handle with ease the number it has? Any ideas anyone?

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Cheers,
Steve

[SteveC]

Have a quick look at
http://gtech.matroxusers.com/tree.jpg

(400kb!)

It's a screenshot of this running at 1600x1200x32 and I've flown into the tree. I pretty sure that the bump mapped effect there is completely done through the use of a heck of a lot of polygons which is why the G400 without T&L blah blah struggles a little (2fps).

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Cheers,
Steve

[This message has been edited by SteveC (edited 09-07-1999).]

[Kruzin]

"A quick look"?!?

It 1600x1200x32...how quick could that be for us poor modem users?


Anyway, I don't think the bumpmapping is done with polys....look at some of the leaves that are laying flat...they are totaly flat...so the BM is prob done normally with textures, but with that many hundreds of bumpmapped leaves, I'd expect it to go pretty slow

[SteveC]

Hmm, I don't care if I'm talking to myself

Anyway, although really great in the fact the geforce256 can throw around so many polygons it's unreal, why would you want to do that? For all who have seen the g400 techdemo, the water down the middle looks good, yeah? Well, on the G400, that takes up to around a dozen polygons, and then is bump mapped and reflection applied. To reproduce that on a geforce256, because it cannot truly bump map, it requires literally countless thousands of polygons to reproduce the ripples. The developer will then have to draw in all these polygons instead of the simple dozen or so the g400 requires.
So now, do you begin to understand that the G400 is not dead due to the geforce being released. Infact, it has never been doing so well.
Another way of explaining how bump mapping cannot be replaced by T&L but should compliment it is in a model of a car. Take a door for example. First, you need a few polygons to produce the shape of the door. Then you add the textures. You have a door. Now, say the door has been knocked during a race. There's a dent. A few more polygons shows that with ease. Both cards (geforce & g400) have no problems. Now, the dent in the door has scratches on the paint work, and has begun to rust. The G400 will not require any more polygons at all - it applies a bump map with minimal performance hit and minimal effort to the developer. What does the geforce do? It cannot bump map. Therefore, it must make up the scratches on the paint with polygons. The rusting effect must be made up with minute little polygons. Suddenly the number of polygons for the door has increased massively. The T&L on the card can handle this, but the developer has to draw all those little polygons! Think, if you were drawing that door, what approach would you take?
So there - both have their merits, both are required in the future when the number of polygons on screen is stupidly high, but NOW, and for the next 6 months or so, the G400 can cope without any problems with the number of polygons, and can bump map them into life. I personally cannot wait for more bump mapped titles to be released, especially dual head ones!

(thanks to Jason Della Rocca for opening my eyes...)

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Cheers,
Steve

[This message has been edited by SteveC (edited 09-07-1999).]

[Nuno]

Yes, it seems to. It´s like that ripple effect in MS Waves. It was possible to reproduce it using 10000 polygons. Matrox did it with EMBM, using 2(or so). Go figure. Wow, now we have to get a T&L board to get the same effect as EMBM.

mmmm, I seem to be late in answering.

[This message has been edited by Nuno (edited 09-07-1999).]

[SteveC]

Kruzin - a quote from nvidia's site:

" Now, each tree in a jungle scene may consist of thousands of polygons. Since the GeForce 256 GPU relieves the CPU of the burden of calculating the transforms -- you will see scenes that are rich with complex objects that not only look real -- but move like their real-life counterparts. "

I think that that tree has far too many polygons that are really needed.

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Cheers,
Steve

[SteveC]

Oh, one more thing - The G400 has been able to do this for months in directx 6. Nvidia's card required DirectX 7.
Sorry, it's Matrox all the way!

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Cheers,
Steve

[Dilitante1]

off to see if it runs on a Mill G200!
wish me luck....

[tish beta2]

Have you guys read this:

http://www.firingsquad.com/features/3dfxinterview/

He totally wash-out that G4ce256...
If it's true, then that card really suck. Yes, suck.



Btw, they have used a high-contrast texture combined with a high level of luminosity.

Just like the metal walls in decent 3 (no, not when they are EMBM'ed)

[This message has been edited by tish beta2 (edited 09-07-1999).]

[Dilitante1]

DOH!...gpf in g200icd... oh well cant say i didnt try

-Dil