Official Launch date...

[Cobos]

But to again keep thing on topic
What kind of features would that be ? I'm not very knowledgeable on the technical side of graphic adapters, but I'm curious as to what kind of features which would be nice to have, and then not on some techdemo, but in an actual game or application. Looking at the nVidia side of things it seems to me that even in the GF3 there are lots of stuff in the core which isn't yet touched by any game (like the programmable shaders f. inst.). So if not Parhelia somehow becomes a true mass market product (and I don't really beleive that with the pricing I've heard) would it really help if Parhelia could do some special cool trick that no program uses ?

But by all means feel free to teach me the error of my ways

Cobos

[az]

Anti, Umf, what are you, lawyers? jeez...
Anyway, I don't care all that much. Found your discussion amusing, but it's become far too long for a joke (NO offense meant!)

Cobos: I think he means things like DualHead, VCQ, DVDmax, or just outstanding image quality, stability, and support.

Of course these are all things from past Matrox products, but I cannot really think of any new ones which would fit a Matrox card (aside from uncreative ones like TriHead, even better quality etc.) - which is probably why I don't work for Matrox R&D

AZ

[TdB]

well, if they introduce a feature, with a great impact that will change the way people use their vgas, (like they did with dualhead), and not just a 3d feature. then they will do well compared to the competition for a long time.

if their new feature, is "only" a 3d-feature then they need to make it sell their chips by aggressive PR, and not just by making it popular among developers, for example T&L was a selling feature, even though it wasn´t used as much as EMBM, which i don´t think was a very selling feature. I know it doesn´t make sense, but over-hyped features sells cards better than used features.

BTW im not saying T&L is useless, just that it wasn´t used as much as it was hyped to be(when it was introduced).

[a13antichrist]

Originally posted by az
Cobos: I think he means things like DualHead, VCQ, DVDmax, or just outstanding image quality, stability, and support.

Of course these are all things from past Matrox products, but I cannot really think of any new ones which would fit a Matrox card (aside from uncreative ones like TriHead, even better quality etc.) - which is probably why I don't work for Matrox R&D

AZ

When you think about it, really great innovations are usually ones that aren't obvious at all, that you never thought you needed before, but after you've got them you wonder how you ever did without them - DualHead is a perfect example, DVDMax could be considered such also.

What I've always imagined would be very suitably Matrox would be an image-rendering technique that meant that FSAA was completely irrelevant - i.e., the way in which the card creates the images means that there is absolutely no need for FSAA because the distortions that require it simply don't occur. That would go perfectly hand-in-hand with their 2D mastery as well.

MPEG-4 copression on the graphics card wiould be awesome too but I guess I'm dreaming there..

[Umfriend]

Anti,

You were totally right, I was totally wrong.

Umf

[frankymail]

The skies suddently darkened and a great unseen voice descended from the Heavens and Announced: " Anti and Umf, it seems you have lost your way... Remember your mission... Only new Matrox hardware holds the key to your destiny... Now go, and for us find Matrox Info (or get me a Parhelia board ) ..." The skies then came back to normal and MURCers could now speak the universal language of peace: displacement mapping using their two vertex units

Seriously guys,
what I wanted to say (and this will save a lot of posts) is that :

From Matrox' point of view: if there is more competition, we'll have to cut profits to stay competitive, which will translate into less R&D, longer developement cycles and castrated products... and less profit

From MURCers' point of view: if matrox is less competitive, it will means more expensive products, provide less support and less competing with less features future products.

From any user's poitn of view: if Matrox goes the way of the dodos (at least their performance division), it will mean one less alternative to choose from, less feature introductions from other vendors, and higher prices from the remaining vendors...

Imagine a world were all vendors were created equals, with equals market shares; wouldn'T it be nice???

[Dr Mordrid]

Originally posted by az
I cannot really think of any new ones which would fit a Matrox card (aside from uncreative ones like TriHead, even better quality etc.) - which is probably why I don't work for Matrox R&D
AZ

Good thing too.

What's "uncreative" about something like TriHead (or QuadHead or.....)? A flight-sim fan would probably think three monitors (left window, ahead & right window) would be VERY cool indeed. Very much like what real flight-sims use.

As for better quality, that too could be interesting, especially for simulations but also for those of us who do grahpics or video. I'd personally love to see more than 8 bits/channel in my graphics when doing photo restorations etc. as well as a better VCQ engine, a more powerful DVDMAX for video editing or viewing DVD's.

What would REALLY float my boat though would be high end OpenGL support. My Oxygen GVX1 Pro needs to be replaced by something a bit more meaty, but not as expensive as a Wildcat ($3500 USD).

Dr. Mordrid

[Indiana]

Keep playing with avatars?

But this one is really fine

But more on-topic: What I really would like to see (as I believe 3D will be up to par) is some extra 2D speed/functionality: scrolling could/should be faster&smoother, as well as full-window-dragging, all those alpha-blending/transparency things. And of course better quality up-/downscaling for both overlay and Blitter operations.
How about supporting multiple Overlays, would be fine with all video-playback things and TVOut applications. A DVDMax-like full overscan mode, but with the possibility to display the DVD/video-player controls.
And some advanced hardware deinterlacing methods for overlays, maybe even some optional advanced hw de-noising, temporal-smoothing for playback of old bad-quality material. And.....

[a13antichrist]

Originally posted by frankymail
The skies suddently darkened and a great unseen voice descended from the Heavens and Announced:

You know I don't think anyone from that side of town (so to speak) is going to want to say too much to me.. I'm not exactly his greatest fan, after all..

[MK]

az:

Wer soll das bezahlen ...

MK

[Tempest]

Haig said that compatibility would be strictly a power issue... So I just ordered a 431W Enermax power supply I'll get the rest of my new system as soon as P hits the shelves (IF I still have the money at that point)...

[Rimfaxe]

Originally posted by Tempest





Haig said that compatibility would be strictly a power issue... So I just ordered a 431W Enermax power supply I'll get the rest of my new system as soon as P hits the shelves (IF I still have the money at that point)...

Makes me think of AGP Pro.











Plz god, let my Antech PP303XP 300W be enough power to run new "MatroxPro card >128MB really_fast_RAM"









I am saving my ass of to buy it, I sure hope that the pro version is a "bit" faster and got more features then non pro card. What if I stop drinking water at home, only drink at work... Would make me save some pennies.



Haig and Ant, if we would assume that we were in another dimension... (now, dont listen to this children... we are only talking about if we were in another dimension) Do you think parallel big M would realese pro card and non pro card at same time?

[Novdid]

Good question!!!

[Ant]

Yes and no

Originally posted by Rimfaxe
Haig and Ant, if we would assume that we were in another dimension... (now, dont listen to this children... we are only talking about if we were in another dimension) Do you think parallel big M would realese pro card and non pro card at same time?

[boorce]

Parallel thinking.

Originally posted by Ant
Yes and no

That's a parallel dimension answer !