i am just wondering af anyone shares me this idea. i think there is a problem with these extensions to be used that way. we are moving back to the early stage of game development. when programmers had to make a new rendering methods to many video cards... IMO opengl should be used on all cards the same way, i mean to have the extensions supported by software if they are not by hardware... i hate it to have a cool effect on NV or ATI and users of 3dfx can see how good the engine is ... The Railgun MasterDaHeR

Extensions have their advantages and disadvantages :

PRO :
- Developers can use the latest features of a 3d card without having to wait for an update of the api.
- You can write optimized code for a specific 3d card (e.g. NV vertex array range extension ... )
- We can use new features in windows (M$ refuses to update their stuf)

CONTRA :
- You have to check wether a card support''s extension''s and you have to supply backup code in case it doesn''t(or popup a messagebox and urge the user to buy a new video card).
- Some extension become standard (like the ARB multitexturing) some not, this is not the case with directx (microsoft dictates the standard and the video card manufacters have to follow)
- You have to write code for multiple 3d cards (extra work).
- Amateur developer''s (like me) can''t develop for other cards then those they own (unless they have enough cash in the bank, to buy a second card. It used to be simple you had ATI and NVIDIA, but now matrox is comming back, there is a new card called the Xabre and 3D labs is releasing a new one to)

I hope opengl 2.0 fixes most of these problems and kicks Direct3D ''s but for once and for all.

quote:Original post by George2
I hope opengl 2.0 fixes most of these problems and kicks Direct3D ''s but for once and for all.

Same here.

go to 3Dlabs site for opengl2.0 info. They "sloved" bunch of problems with 1.x verisons.

daher : You can''t have features emulated on software. Opengl is pure HW or pure SW. there is no mix. Imagine pixel shaders in SW. That would be slow even on P4 4GHz.

You should never let your fears become the boundaries of your dreams.

Actually it''s pretty much up to the driver whether all features are HW or SW.

Stencil buffers for example will probably happen in sw if unsupported even if your driver appears to be correct.

Helpful links:
How To Ask Questions The Smart Way | Google can help with your question | Search MSDN for help with standard C or Windows functions

Yeah I knew about 3DLabs having "solved" bunch of problems with OpenGL1.x
They''ve also added some cool features I guess, otherwise they wouldn''t call it OpenGL2.0 but OpenGL1.4. I''ve already gave a shot at official paper but there''s not much info out there except for the design of the OpenGL2.0 pipeline and the shading language. Btw you can already use this last thing since 3DLabs released, FOR FREE, their shading language compiler as well as its source code.

siaspete : if your card doesn''t support stencil buffer WHOLE opengl will drop to SW level, not just stencil part.

You should never let your fears become the boundaries of your dreams.