DirectX 9 Plugin

keyboardcaper · February 25th, 2003

would there be any benifits if a plugin maker was to make a plugin that used dx9 calls, or would the overhead out weigh the actual benifits of using dx9 (or there is no need for dx9 seeing as ps1 is pretty primitive compared to todays grafix standards)

anyway, just something i been thinking of for a while

Phoenix Flame · February 25th, 2003

There's no point to it. The new feature which DX9 has to offer don't have anything to contribute to better PSX emulation. Plus, everyone would need a DX9 card to get the most out of it.

Cyberman · February 25th, 2003

Quote:

Originally posted by keyboardcaper
would there be any benifits if a plugin maker was to make a plugin that used dx9 calls, or would the overhead out weigh the actual benifits of using dx9 (or there is no need for dx9 seeing as ps1 is pretty primitive compared to todays grafix standards)

anyway, just something i been thinking of for a while

I'll give you a simple list[list=1][*]The PS One has no features that would be used in DX9[*]This would require rewriting from scratch a plugin, this is because MS changes the entire API practically in each release of DirectX. This is also why Pete does not have a DX8 plugin. Too much too learn essentially.[*]A lot of work for no gain, pretty much summarizes it. DX9 is downward compatible with DX7/DX6 cards somewhat, so it's not really a big benefit other than a lot of work learning Yet Another New API from MS (pain in the $$$).[/list=1]

Cyb

February 25th, 2003

Speaking of benefts. I am curious Pete. What does DirectX 7.0 offer over DX 6.0? I guess better compatibility? It would seem DX 7.0's features wouldnt do emulation much good.

keyboardcaper · March 1st, 2003

rofl, deja vu

http://nextgl.ngemu.com/

**Kane** · March 1st, 2003

As I said in the Nextsoft post, NickK is something of an innovator, and likes to break the mould. Whether or not he is actualy doing anythoing with said DX9 support is anothmatter.

Phoenix Flame · March 1st, 2003

It's not a good move if you ask me. Not everyone has a 9700Pro.

keyboardcaper · March 1st, 2003

well, not all plugins are made to work with every card, i.e. Lewpy's Glide Plugin =P

**Kane** · March 1st, 2003

>It's not a good move if you ask me. Not everyone has a 9700Pro.

I think you are failing to see the point. Just as it's DirectX 9 doesn't mean it's using the features those with earlier generation cards can't use. IIRC Pete said that each new DX is an different beast. Thus you can write an app in DX9 that doesn't use any of the 8+ features.

**Pete Bernert** · March 1st, 2003

The differences between DX6 and DX7 are small in my plugins (the texture handling changed somewhat). DX8 had more changes, it moved more into the direction of OpenGL, imho, some DX things which were able to do before (like doing a stretched blit from one surface to another) have been removed from MS, on the other hand the famous "reverse subtractive blending" has been added in DX8.
And yeah, I didn't care for DX9 yet.

Personally I prefer OpenGL over DX8 or DX9, simply because a) the API/interface doesn't change from release to release, still b) a coder can use all the newest features of a gfx card (by using the OpenGL extensions), without having to wait for some new SDK/library release. And of course there is c): portability...

so, personally I would say that my OpenGL plugin is my "DX8/9" plugin, with OGL I can use all the features I need for psx emulation. On the other hand I've created the DX6/7 plugins for cards having troubles with OGL.

A DX8 or DX9 psx plugin from me wouldn't behave any better than my OGL one, so I don't see any reason to do such.

March 1st, 2003

Quote:

Originally posted by Pete Bernert
The differences between DX6 and DX7 are small in my plugins (the texture handling changed somewhat). DX8 had more changes, it moved more into the direction of OpenGL, imho, some DX things which were able to do before (like doing a stretched blit from one surface to another) have been removed from MS, on the other hand the famous "reverse subtractive blending" has been added in DX8.
And yeah, I didn't care for DX9 yet.

Personally I prefer OpenGL over DX8 or DX9, simply because a) the API/interface doesn't change from release to release, still b) a coder can use all the newest features of a gfx card (by using the OpenGL extensions), without having to wait for some new SDK/library release. And of course there is c): portability...

so, personally I would say that my OpenGL plugin is my "DX8/9" plugin, with OGL I can use all the features I need for psx emulation. On the other hand I've created the DX6/7 plugins for cards having troubles with OGL.

A DX8 or DX9 psx plugin from me wouldn't behave any better than my OGL one, so I don't see any reason to do such.

So you actually prefer the OpenGL extensions Pete? Don't those vary from graphic card to Graphic card (IE ATi to Nvidia)

How do you feel about the Arb 2 standard then? for OpenGL 2.0

**Pete Bernert** · March 1st, 2003

>So you actually prefer the OpenGL extensions
>Pete? Don't those vary from graphic card to
>Graphic card (IE ATi to Nvidia)

Sure, the newest features will be always vendor-specific first. But important features will get ARB'd in time, and in the meantime you can at least use your card's special goodies without waiting until MS decides what is good or bad. And don't make the mistake and think that a "standard" like DX9 does mean that a coder has not to do different code pathes for different cards as well.

>How do you feel about the Arb 2 standard then? for OpenGL 2.0

The current specs for OGL2 are really good. Of course I hoped for more, something like a full-programmable rendering pipeline (since 3DLabs are a major force behind it), but prolly that would make things a lotta more expensive. Anyway, there are very good points with OGL2, like a much better control over the card's vram, or the programmable color formats. As a matter of fact, I think when OGL2 will come out (maybe this year? we will see), I will make a completely new hw/accel psx plugin, with a totally different approach than my current plugins. We will see

Dukelord · March 15th, 2003

The awesome power of OpenGL

**Shadow Lady** · March 18th, 2003

/me loves OpenGL

F-3582 · March 18th, 2003

I've got a question about OGL2: Will it still be fully supported by "older" cards like my GeForce2?

**Kane** · March 18th, 2003

It's jsut a matter of drivers, so I'd assume yes with nVidia's top notch driver support.

F-3582 · March 19th, 2003

Wonderful! Thanx for that info.

**Shadow Lady** · March 20th, 2003

but it wont have full advantages of it, right? just as my gfmx440

F-3582 · March 20th, 2003

I guess that there'll be some severe slowdowns...

February 25th, 2003	#1 (permalink)
keyboardcaper Registered User Join Date: Jul 2002 Posts: 19	DirectX 9 Plugin would there be any benifits if a plugin maker was to make a plugin that used dx9 calls, or would the overhead out weigh the actual benifits of using dx9 (or there is no need for dx9 seeing as ps1 is pretty primitive compared to todays grafix standards) anyway, just something i been thinking of for a while __________________ AMD AthlonXP 1800+ \| SOYO SY-KYV Dragon Plus! \| 512 MB DDR (PC2100) \| ATI Radeon 9700 Pro \| Creative Sound Blaster Audigy Sound Card \| Logitech Z-680 Sound System \| Creative 16x DVD - TDK 48x24x48

March 1st, 2003	#5 (permalink)
keyboardcaper Registered User Join Date: Jul 2002 Posts: 19	rofl, deja vu http://nextgl.ngemu.com/ __________________ AMD AthlonXP 1800+ \| SOYO SY-KYV Dragon Plus! \| 512 MB DDR (PC2100) \| ATI Radeon 9700 Pro \| Creative Sound Blaster Audigy Sound Card \| Logitech Z-680 Sound System \| Creative 16x DVD - TDK 48x24x48

March 1st, 2003	#6 (permalink)
Kane 邪魔ゎ指せない Join Date: Jan 2002 Location: Gosport, England Posts: 26,255	As I said in the Nextsoft post, NickK is something of an innovator, and likes to break the mould. Whether or not he is actualy doing anythoing with said DX9 support is anothmatter. __________________ >Site Live< Pop over to my site for help with setting up PSX emulators. Help for the Final Fantasies and other RPGs avalaible Celes: (Desktop) Athlon 64 X2 4200+, 2Gb 400MHz DDR Ram, MSI K8N Platinum, GeForce 8800 GTS 320Mb, 500Gb RAID HDD, Vista Business Erika: (MCPC) Athlon XP 2400+, 1Gb 400MHz DDR Ram, geForce 6800 256Mb, 80Gb Hdd, XP 2005 MCE Kimiko: (Desktop 2) Athlon 64 3000+, 512Mb 400MHz DDR Ram, Asus K8V, geForce 6800 128Mb

March 1st, 2003	#8 (permalink)
keyboardcaper Registered User Join Date: Jul 2002 Posts: 19	well, not all plugins are made to work with every card, i.e. Lewpy's Glide Plugin =P __________________ AMD AthlonXP 1800+ \| SOYO SY-KYV Dragon Plus! \| 512 MB DDR (PC2100) \| ATI Radeon 9700 Pro \| Creative Sound Blaster Audigy Sound Card \| Logitech Z-680 Sound System \| Creative 16x DVD - TDK 48x24x48

March 1st, 2003	#9 (permalink)
Kane 邪魔ゎ指せない Join Date: Jan 2002 Location: Gosport, England Posts: 26,255	>It's not a good move if you ask me. Not everyone has a 9700Pro. I think you are failing to see the point. Just as it's DirectX 9 doesn't mean it's using the features those with earlier generation cards can't use. IIRC Pete said that each new DX is an different beast. Thus you can write an app in DX9 that doesn't use any of the 8+ features. __________________ >Site Live< Pop over to my site for help with setting up PSX emulators. Help for the Final Fantasies and other RPGs avalaible Celes: (Desktop) Athlon 64 X2 4200+, 2Gb 400MHz DDR Ram, MSI K8N Platinum, GeForce 8800 GTS 320Mb, 500Gb RAID HDD, Vista Business Erika: (MCPC) Athlon XP 2400+, 1Gb 400MHz DDR Ram, geForce 6800 256Mb, 80Gb Hdd, XP 2005 MCE Kimiko: (Desktop 2) Athlon 64 3000+, 512Mb 400MHz DDR Ram, Asus K8V, geForce 6800 128Mb

February 25th, 2003	#2 (permalink)
Phoenix Flame Flood Yourself Join Date: Aug 2001 Location: Adelaide, Australia Posts: 1,338	There's no point to it. The new feature which DX9 has to offer don't have anything to contribute to better PSX emulation. Plus, everyone would need a DX9 card to get the most out of it.

February 25th, 2003	#4 (permalink)
ChrisRay Guest Posts: n/a	Speaking of benefts. I am curious Pete. What does DirectX 7.0 offer over DX 6.0? I guess better compatibility? It would seem DX 7.0's features wouldnt do emulation much good.

March 1st, 2003	#7 (permalink)
Phoenix Flame Flood Yourself Join Date: Aug 2001 Location: Adelaide, Australia Posts: 1,338	It's not a good move if you ask me. Not everyone has a 9700Pro.

March 1st, 2003	#10 (permalink)
Pete Bernert FREAK Join Date: Apr 2001 Location: Germany Posts: 874	The differences between DX6 and DX7 are small in my plugins (the texture handling changed somewhat). DX8 had more changes, it moved more into the direction of OpenGL, imho, some DX things which were able to do before (like doing a stretched blit from one surface to another) have been removed from MS, on the other hand the famous "reverse subtractive blending" has been added in DX8. And yeah, I didn't care for DX9 yet. Personally I prefer OpenGL over DX8 or DX9, simply because a) the API/interface doesn't change from release to release, still b) a coder can use all the newest features of a gfx card (by using the OpenGL extensions), without having to wait for some new SDK/library release. And of course there is c): portability... so, personally I would say that my OpenGL plugin is my "DX8/9" plugin, with OGL I can use all the features I need for psx emulation. On the other hand I've created the DX6/7 plugins for cards having troubles with OGL. A DX8 or DX9 psx plugin from me wouldn't behave any better than my OGL one, so I don't see any reason to do such.

March 1st, 2003	#12 (permalink)
Pete Bernert FREAK Join Date: Apr 2001 Location: Germany Posts: 874	>So you actually prefer the OpenGL extensions >Pete? Don't those vary from graphic card to >Graphic card (IE ATi to Nvidia) Sure, the newest features will be always vendor-specific first. But important features will get ARB'd in time, and in the meantime you can at least use your card's special goodies without waiting until MS decides what is good or bad. And don't make the mistake and think that a "standard" like DX9 does mean that a coder has not to do different code pathes for different cards as well. >How do you feel about the Arb 2 standard then? for OpenGL 2.0 The current specs for OGL2 are really good. Of course I hoped for more, something like a full-programmable rendering pipeline (since 3DLabs are a major force behind it), but prolly that would make things a lotta more expensive. Anyway, there are very good points with OGL2, like a much better control over the card's vram, or the programmable color formats. As a matter of fact, I think when OGL2 will come out (maybe this year? we will see), I will make a completely new hw/accel psx plugin, with a totally different approach than my current plugins. We will see

March 15th, 2003	#13 (permalink)
Dukelord Registered User Join Date: Feb 2003 Location: From the land beyond beyond Posts: 782	The awesome power of OpenGL

March 18th, 2003	#14 (permalink)
Shadow Lady Advanced Newbie Join Date: Jul 2001 Location: Bogotá... not that it matters... Posts: 4,730	/me loves OpenGL __________________ Main Rig: Pentium Dual-Core E2160 @ 2.3GHz -- 7600GT @ 650/800MHz -- 1GB DDR2-667 4-4-4-12 -- Windows XP Pro SP2 Collecting dust: AMD Athlon XP 2600+ -- ATI Radeon 9500 Pro -- SB Live 5.1 Digital -- 2.5GB DDR 2-2-2-5 Ram -- Windows 2003 server r2 SP1

March 18th, 2003	#15 (permalink)
F-3582 Back to regular business Join Date: Mar 2002 Location: in Sachsen Posts: 3,242	I've got a question about OGL2: Will it still be fully supported by "older" cards like my GeForce2? __________________ In a world without walls and fences - who needs Windows and Gates?

March 18th, 2003	#16 (permalink)
Kane 邪魔ゎ指せない Join Date: Jan 2002 Location: Gosport, England Posts: 26,255	It's jsut a matter of drivers, so I'd assume yes with nVidia's top notch driver support. __________________ >Site Live< Pop over to my site for help with setting up PSX emulators. Help for the Final Fantasies and other RPGs avalaible Celes: (Desktop) Athlon 64 X2 4200+, 2Gb 400MHz DDR Ram, MSI K8N Platinum, GeForce 8800 GTS 320Mb, 500Gb RAID HDD, Vista Business Erika: (MCPC) Athlon XP 2400+, 1Gb 400MHz DDR Ram, geForce 6800 256Mb, 80Gb Hdd, XP 2005 MCE Kimiko: (Desktop 2) Athlon 64 3000+, 512Mb 400MHz DDR Ram, Asus K8V, geForce 6800 128Mb

March 19th, 2003	#17 (permalink)
F-3582 Back to regular business Join Date: Mar 2002 Location: in Sachsen Posts: 3,242	Wonderful! Thanx for that info. __________________ In a world without walls and fences - who needs Windows and Gates?

March 20th, 2003	#18 (permalink)
Shadow Lady Advanced Newbie Join Date: Jul 2001 Location: Bogotá... not that it matters... Posts: 4,730	but it wont have full advantages of it, right? just as my gfmx440 __________________ Main Rig: Pentium Dual-Core E2160 @ 2.3GHz -- 7600GT @ 650/800MHz -- 1GB DDR2-667 4-4-4-12 -- Windows XP Pro SP2 Collecting dust: AMD Athlon XP 2600+ -- ATI Radeon 9500 Pro -- SB Live 5.1 Digital -- 2.5GB DDR 2-2-2-5 Ram -- Windows 2003 server r2 SP1

March 20th, 2003	#19 (permalink)
F-3582 Back to regular business Join Date: Mar 2002 Location: in Sachsen Posts: 3,242	I guess that there'll be some severe slowdowns... __________________ In a world without walls and fences - who needs Windows and Gates?

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