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Hi everyone,

I'm pondering if I should get an XVR-600 or XVR-1200 to supplement the
XVR-1000 in my SB2k.

The XVR-600 and XVR-1200 are both WildCat-IV-based. Only differences
appear to be the ammount of RAM (Texture, FrameBuffer, Display Lists,
etc..) and the fact that the XVR-1200 supports the ARB MultiTexture
OpenGL extension while the XVR-600 does not. Also, the XVR-1200 is
"supported" in the SB2K while the XVR-600 is not (Most Likely because
it's not supported as the primary console on the sb2k).

The XVR-1000 is quite a different beast and is MAJC-5200-based (a SUN
chipset).

I work on the Solaris/Sparc port of a small cross-platform OpenGL
application that has the following properties: It works fine on most
MacOSX, Linux or Wintel boxes with NVidia or ATI graphics but on the
Solaris/Sparc platform I found out that only the XVR-1200 would run that
application at respectable speed (50-60fps) while on my XVR-1000 it would
drop to about 7-8fps or less (much more than what benchmark data would
suggest). I attribute that significant difference to the difference in
chipsets between the XVR-1200 and XVR-1000: 3DLabs' WildCat IV appears to
be a more general-purpose 3D chipset while the MAJC-5200 chipset has a
different target market.. So, this result is not suprising considering
that the source port I'm working on came from general-purpose machines
(Mac's, PC's..).

So I want to get a WildCat-IV-based graphics card from SUN but I'm
wondering if I should get the XVR-600 instead of the XVR-1200 for the
following reasons:

1) I don't need multi-head and 32MB texture RAM is OK for me.

2) If I'm only using one head on an XVR-1200, its performance should be
similar to that of the XVR-600, right? I doubt 3DLabs implemented
something a la 3Dfx SLI on a single card.. Unless I'm wrong, I think that
both Wildcat-IV chipsets on the XVR-1200 drive only one video channel
(I.E: they cannot "join forces" if only one head is used).

3) The XVR-1200 (a 33Mhz or 66Mhz PCI card) can only (due to its width)
fit in a 33Mhz slot in the SB2K. The XVR-600, on the contrary, is a
single-width PCI card and -will- be able to fit in the only 66Mhz in the
SB2K.

Conclusion: Assuming that 1) and 2) are OK, 3) means I might get better
performance on the XVR-600 with my SB2K -with- my application..

Any comments or ideas? I'd really like to avoid spending a -lot- of money
on an XVR-1200 if I can get an XVR-600 and get similar performance (for my
app, that is, YMMV).

,-*~'`^`'~*-,._.,-*~'`^`'~*-,._.,-*~'`^`'~*-,._.,-*~'`^`'~*-,._.,-*~'`^`'~*-,
Vincent S. Cojot, Computer Engineering. STEP project. _.,-*~'`^`'~*-,._.,-*~
Ecole Polytechnique de Montreal, Comite Micro-Informatique. _.,-*~'`^`'~*-,.
Linux Xview/OpenLook resources page _.,-*~'`^`'~*-,._.,-*~'`^`'~*-,._.,-*~'
http://step.polymtl.ca/~coyote _.,-*~'`^`'~*-,._ coyote@step.polymtl.ca

They cannot scare me with their empty spaces
Between stars - on stars where no human race is
I have it in me so much nearer home
To scare myself with my own desert places. - Robert Frost

Vincent Cojot wrote:
> .
> .
> .
>
> So I want to get a WildCat-IV-based graphics card from SUN but I'm
> wondering if I should get the XVR-600 instead of the XVR-1200 for the
> following reasons:
>
> 1) I don't need multi-head and 32MB texture RAM is OK for me.
>
> 2) If I'm only using one head on an XVR-1200, its performance should be
> similar to that of the XVR-600, right? I doubt 3DLabs implemented
> something a la 3Dfx SLI on a single card.. Unless I'm wrong, I think that
> both Wildcat-IV chipsets on the XVR-1200 drive only one video channel
> (I.E: they cannot "join forces" if only one head is used).
>
> 3) The XVR-1200 (a 33Mhz or 66Mhz PCI card) can only (due to its width)
> fit in a 33Mhz slot in the SB2K. The XVR-600, on the contrary, is a
> single-width PCI card and -will- be able to fit in the only 66Mhz in the
> SB2K.
>
> Conclusion: Assuming that 1) and 2) are OK, 3) means I might get better
> performance on the XVR-600 with my SB2K -with- my application..
>
> Any comments or ideas? I'd really like to avoid spending a -lot- of money
> on an XVR-1200 if I can get an XVR-600 and get similar performance (for my
> app, that is, YMMV).
>
> ,-*~'`^`'~*-,._.,-*~'`^`'~*-,._.,-*~'`^`'~*-,._.,-*~'`^`'~*-,._.,-*~'`^`'~*-,
> Vincent S. Cojot, Computer Engineering. STEP project. _.,-*~'`^`'~*-,._.,-*~
> Ecole Polytechnique de Montreal, Comite Micro-Informatique. _.,-*~'`^`'~*-,.
> Linux Xview/OpenLook resources page _.,-*~'`^`'~*-,._.,-*~'`^`'~*-,._.,-*~'
> http://step.polymtl.ca/~coyote _.,-*~'`^`'~*-,._ coyote@step.polymtl.ca
>
> They cannot scare me with their empty spaces
> Between stars - on stars where no human race is
> I have it in me so much nearer home
> To scare myself with my own desert places. - Robert Frost
>
>

Check out the following link:
http://www.sun.com/technical-computi...html#GRAPHPERF

It may be of relevance.

--
----------------------------------
Randy Jones
E-Mail: randy@jones.tri.net
----------------------------------

> The XVR-1000 is quite a different beast and is MAJC-5200-based (a SUN
> chipset).
>
> I work on the Solaris/Sparc port of a small cross-platform OpenGL
> application that has the following properties: It works fine on most
> MacOSX, Linux or Wintel boxes with NVidia or ATI graphics but on the
> Solaris/Sparc platform I found out that only the XVR-1200 would run that
> application at respectable speed (50-60fps) while on my XVR-1000 it would
> drop to about 7-8fps or less (much more than what benchmark data would
> suggest). I attribute that significant difference to the difference in
> chipsets between the XVR-1200 and XVR-1000: 3DLabs' WildCat IV appears to
> be a more general-purpose 3D chipset while the MAJC-5200 chipset has a
> different target market.. So, this result is not suprising considering
> that the source port I'm working on came from general-purpose machines
> (Mac's, PC's..).

It is interesting to see you say about your dissapointment with XVR-1000
performance. I got to play with an XVR-500 not that long ago and was
surprised at just how spritely it was relative to the XVR-1000.
Considering the amount of money it cost us when it was launched, the
performance has been very dissapointing. The Sun document referenced by
the other poster is interesting in that it shows a significant
performance deficit from what i would have expected previously.

Ade <ade@here.invalid> writes:

> It is interesting to see you say about your dissapointment with
> XVR-1000 performance. I got to play with an XVR-500 not that long ago
> and was surprised at just how spritely it was relative to the
> XVR-1000. Considering the amount of money it cost us when it was
> launched, the performance has been very dissapointing. The Sun
> document referenced by the other poster is interesting in that it
> shows a significant performance deficit from what i would have
> expected previously.

XVR-1000 is the last product of the Bill Joy reality distortion field,
which somehow made Sun think it should design its own graphics chips
in the 21st century. Every subsequent Sun graphics card (which I
_think_ means every other XVR- device) uses a 3d party chipset (ATI,
3dLabs) and is better off for it.

Chris
--
Chris Morgan
"Post posting of policy changes by the boss will result in
real rule revisions that are irreversible"

- anonymous correspondent

In comp.unix.solaris Vincent Cojot <coyote@step.polymtl.ca> wrote:

> Hi everyone,

> I'm pondering if I should get an XVR-600 or XVR-1200 to supplement the
> XVR-1000 in my SB2k.


Well, perhaps the following link might help:

http://home.comcast.net/~xperf/

I have been collecting X11 2D performance numbers for Sun systems.
There is a table there wilth XVR-1000 numbers in it, but not the XVR-600.
And if you'd like, please feel free to download the package and run the
performance suite on your cards as well.

The more data one has the more intelligent a decision one can make.


--
---
Jim
email: echo balsonAcomcastDnet | sed s/A/@/ | sed s/D/./

Ade <ade@here.invalid> wrote in message

> It is interesting to see you say about your dissapointment with XVR-1000
> performance. I got to play with an XVR-500 not that long ago and was
> surprised at just how spritely it was relative to the XVR-1000.
> Considering the amount of money it cost us when it was launched, the
> performance has been very dissapointing. The Sun document referenced by
> the other poster is interesting in that it shows a significant
> performance deficit from what i would have expected previously.

Don't get me wrong: I like the XVR-1000 in my 900Mhz SB2K (I got the
workstation -new- for very little off a bankrupt company in '02 so I
can't complain) and it drives the SUN 24" LCD just fine but it's true
that its performance for general use (I.E: not just Pro/E or CATIA) is
a bit disappointing. I started wondering about that issue when I
played with SPECviewperf 6.1.2 on my sb2k and got about 1/10th the
numbers of a basic PIV with an NVidia Quadro4 550 card (I reproduced
the SUN SPEC numbers for my hardware very closely so it's not just my
mistake.. ).

The XVR-1000 is a great card with lots of RAM and features but it
tends to lack behind a bit in performance. SUN apparently agrees with
that issue as some OpenGL extensions are unavailable by design on the
XVR-1000 as they would be too slow on it (GL_ARB_texture_cube_map for
instance, was available on PGX64 in OpenGL 1.3 but a software fallback
wasn't even provided on the XVR-1000). Anyway the XVR-1000 will be
EOL'ed soon so it's not so much an issue anymore...

It's great to see SUN move toward industry-standard graphics chipset
(I.E: 3DLabs WildCat IV) but I hoped they wouldn't just provide us
with 33/66Mhz PCI graphics cards after all the APG8x vs. UPA2 hype..
At last, PCI-X is coming so perhaps we'll see a SUN version of the
3Dlabs VPro 990 (2GFlops) supported in a current line of workstations
some time in the future..

I had almost given up on finishing the OpenGL client port of the
Torque engine to Solaris/Sparc because of the (relative) lack of fps
on my XVR-1000 (not to mention the other cards I tried) when I had the
chance to test my port on an XVR-1200 and was very happily surprised
by its performance there. In fact, the difference in end-user
performance was much more (for my app) than what the numbers suggested
(XVR-1200 vs. XVR-1000) so I started to wonder if OpenGL features'
hardware acceleration wasn't directly related. I hope the XVR-600 will
be able to reproduce this performance (I'm concerned about its lack of
GL_ARB_multitexture, unlike the XVR-1200) but I sure cannot buy an
XVR-1200 (anyone want to donate one? ).

Vincent S. Cojot, coyote@step.polymtl.ca

Chris Morgan <cm@mihalis.net> writes in comp.sys.sun.hardware:
|XVR-1000 is the last product of the Bill Joy reality distortion field,
|which somehow made Sun think it should design its own graphics chips
|in the 21st century. Every subsequent Sun graphics card (which I
|_think_ means every other XVR- device) uses a 3d party chipset (ATI,
|3dLabs) and is better off for it.

Actually XVR-4000 was the last of those, though I believe it uses the
same chipset as the XVR-1000, just many more of them. Of course, since
XVR-4000 can only be plugged into the CPU bus of the V880, it's not
likely you'll see one unless you're in the really specialized fields it
was designed for.

--
__________________________________________________ ______________________
Alan Coopersmith alanc@alum.calberkeley.org
http://www.CSUA.Berkeley.EDU/~alanc/ aka: Alan.Coopersmith@Sun.COM
Working for, but definitely not speaking for, Sun Microsystems, Inc.

Alan Coopersmith <alanc@alum.calberkeley.org> writes:

> Chris Morgan <cm@mihalis.net> writes in comp.sys.sun.hardware:
> |XVR-1000 is the last product of the Bill Joy reality distortion field,
> |which somehow made Sun think it should design its own graphics chips
> |in the 21st century. Every subsequent Sun graphics card (which I
> |_think_ means every other XVR- device) uses a 3d party chipset (ATI,
> |3dLabs) and is better off for it.
>
> Actually XVR-4000 was the last of those, though I believe it uses the
> same chipset as the XVR-1000, just many more of them. Of course, since
> XVR-4000 can only be plugged into the CPU bus of the V880, it's not
> likely you'll see one unless you're in the really specialized fields it
> was designed for.

Ok, I'll take your word on that. I'm probably showing my bias towards
slightly more mass markets than the ones you refer to. If my customers
aren't using a graphics card in their Solaris workstations, it might
as well not exist for me.

Thanks

Chris
--
Chris Morgan
"Post posting of policy changes by the boss will result in
real rule revisions that are irreversible"

- anonymous correspondent