CompuServe Thread

#MGA video card

6 messages in this thread
#83724From: Andrey ZmievskiyFeb 14, 1994 4:22 PM
I just saw an ad in PC Computing about an MGA video card. Have you heard anything about it? It says that it greatly speeds up rendering in AutoCAD and 3D Studio. Andrey Zmievskiy
#83814From: Conrad StolzeFeb 14, 1994 11:35 PM
Andrey, >> It says that it greatly speeds up rendering in AutoCAD and 3D Studio. << WRONG! I hate those adds, as they are VERY misleading. Don't get me wrong, the MGA's are very solid boards, but rendering is a 99.9% processor task. The only thing that will speed up rendering is more processing power (in the form of CPU, RAM, etc.)!!!! Chuck
#83844From: Andrey ZmievskiyFeb 15, 1994 1:01 AM
Is this card worth getting? Andrey Zmievskiy
#83938From: Bailey BrownFeb 15, 1994 12:50 PM
Chuck, I think the ads are trying to refer to the realtime flat shading (Garoud too?) the higher end MGA boards are capable of. I've seen this work in Autocad. I wish there were a way to use this in 3DS. I wish Autodesk would incorporate some sort of hardware rendering api into 3DS R4 so we could take advantage of boards like this.
#83951From: Jonas Ruikis [ADESK]Feb 15, 1994 2:04 PM
Bailey, << I wish Autodesk would incorporate some sort of hardware rendering api into 3DS R4 so we could take advantage of boards like this. >> I'll take this as a wish item.. jonas[adesk]
#83968From: Pavel KorenskyFeb 15, 1994 2:48 PM
>WRONG! I hate those adds, as they are VERY misleading. Don't get me wrong, >the MGA's are very solid boards, but rendering is a 99.9% processor task. The >only thing that will speed up rendering is more processing power (in the form >of CPU, RAM, etc.)!!!! Hmmm, but MGA cards with Z-buffer options can speed up rendering. Of course, the photorealistic rendering is processor task, but Impression Pro is doing Gourand shading in ACAD pretty fast. For visualisation of 3D models in ACAD (and for 3D preview in 3DS if I will write the driver) MGA is a very good option. Bye PavelK