16-bit color mode

New ideas and suggestions.
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Kelton
Posts: 10
Joined: Tue May 17, 2011 11:28 am

16-bit color mode

Post by Kelton »

Hello there.

Even at it's current stage of development, nGlide has already surpassed every single glide wrapper out there as far as accuracy is concerned. Still, I couldn't help but notice there's no way to enforce 16-bit color depth so the games never quite look like they used to with my real Voodoo1.

One would assume 32-bit is always preferable to 16-bit, but that's not the case here since early 3dfx games were designed with this particular limitation in mind, often relying on banding as a mean of retaining detail.

IIRC Voodoo3's had some sort of pseudo-truecolor mode which was basically an enhanced 16-bit mode, but that's completely irrelevant to anything Voodoo1 was intended to handle.

Any chances for enabling/implementing this mode?

Much appreciated.
Gamecollector
Posts: 1067
Joined: Fri Jan 07, 2011 9:29 am
Location: RU

Re: 16-bit color mode

Post by Gamecollector »

Voodoo2 rendering model, AFAIK. 32-bit internal rendering -> 16-bit bramebuffer -> 16-bit output.
The difference in nGlide is - the output is 32-bit and rendered directly from PPU/TMU.
You want something like 32-bit internal rendering -> 16-bit framebuffer -> 16-bit output?

Well, the current target is "maximum compatibility".
When all glide games will be working perfectly and nGlide 1.0 will be published... maybe then. :)
Internal AA support, full mipmap support, shameless plug (for the completion :) ) etc.
And your's suggestion.
ASUS P4P800 SE, Pentium4 3.2E/2 GiB DDR400 (3-3-3-8), Sapphire Radeon HD3850 AGP, 2 Voodoo2 12 MB (SLI), Audigy 2 ZS.
Windows XP SP3 Pro Rus (w/o the POSReady hack), Catalyst 14.4, Voodoo2 W2k 1.02.00 drivers.
Kelton
Posts: 10
Joined: Tue May 17, 2011 11:28 am

Re: 16-bit color mode

Post by Kelton »

The output image, or what is presented to the person looking at the screen, should look the same as it did on a computer with a real voodoo, or that's the ideal case in my humble opinion. The way things are handled internally or the bit depth the display is set to is irrelevant since a 32bit display mode can handle a 16bit color image as good as a 16bit color display mode. In short, yes, bring back the banding, at least optionally 8-)
Squall Leonhart
Posts: 68
Joined: Wed Jun 01, 2011 11:55 pm

Re: 16-bit color mode

Post by Squall Leonhart »

you do not want 16bit output. dithering has been broken on 16bpp since G80
Kelton
Posts: 10
Joined: Tue May 17, 2011 11:28 am

Re: 16-bit color mode

Post by Kelton »

Even if that was the only way to display a 16bit picture, I know better than to buy garbage hardware incompatible with what I normally use and need.
Squall Leonhart
Posts: 68
Joined: Wed Jun 01, 2011 11:55 pm

Re: 16-bit color mode

Post by Squall Leonhart »

Kelton wrote:Even if that was the only way to display a 16bit picture, I know better than to buy garbage hardware incompatible with what I normally use and need.
you're clearly ignorant to the fact that ATI has the same problem.
Kelton
Posts: 10
Joined: Tue May 17, 2011 11:28 am

Re: 16-bit color mode

Post by Kelton »

Squall Leonhart wrote:
Kelton wrote:Even if that was the only way to display a 16bit picture, I know better than to buy garbage hardware incompatible with what I normally use and need.
you're clearly ignorant to the fact that ATI has the same problem.
You're the only one talking brands here.
Kingravel
Posts: 11
Joined: Thu Jun 03, 2010 11:05 pm

Re: 16-bit color mode

Post by Kingravel »

Hello,
I for myself was aware of these differences in Myth TFL (the old vanilla version Patch 1.3), where blood stains (I know, it seems like a minor detail) and the terrain looked different (transitions less soft) than on my old Voodoo 2-card. I don't understand much of the theories and I don't want to annoy, but will there be a possibility in the future, to make these games look like on real hardware?
I admire your hard work and thank you very much for the best glide wrapper so far! :)
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Zeus
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Re: 16-bit color mode

Post by Zeus »

Thanks for the kind words, Kingravel.

Unfortunately I haven't made any decision on this yet. There are still more important areas to improve like compatibility and performance.
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