From: paik@mlo.dec.com (Samuel S. Paik) Subject: Re: PEX Performance Date: 1 Jun 1993 01:08:36 GMT
In article <C7x1uI.836@cbnewsj.cb.att.com> dwex@mtgzfs3.att.com (David E. Wexelblat) writes:
>No. In my opinion, NO Intel box is a reasonable platform for PEX.
>PEX is floating-point hungry like nobody's business. I've run PEX on
>a SparcStation LX (which includes the GX graphics coprocessor - 106k
>xStones). The performance there is horrible. On an SVGA-based 486,
>it's unbelievably bad; acceleration won't make much difference, because
>the issue is the calculation, not the display.
>
>I don't believe that any platform with 3D support in hardware can
^^^^
>possibly be considered a reasonable platform for PEX.
I presume you meant "without". It seems to me that there are two
hardware components to 3D (i.e. PEX, GL, Starbase) performance,
geometry processing, which requires a lot of floating-point
performance, and rasterization, which is typically limited by
framebuffer bandwidth and latency.
While 386 & 486 CPUs typically have awful floating point performance,
the 586 seems to be more than competitive compared to the hot 3D boxes
of only a few years ago.
Memory bandwidth (and latency) can be attacked via smart frame buffer
techniques like Joel McCormack's (send mail with "help" in subject to
wrl-techreports@decwrl.dec.com). I don't know anything about PC video
boards, but KPC's Dore got not unbearable 3D performance on stock
workstations just using X calls to plot pixels.
>David Wexelblat <dwex@mtgzfs3.att.com> (908) 957-5871 Fax: (908) 957-5627
>AT&T Bell Laboratories, 200 Laurel Ave - 3F-428, Middletown, NJ 07748
Sam Paik