[rescue] Re: Visualize C160 workstations

[Mark Gill]

> Date: Fri, 13 Dec 2002 03:57:53 -0500
> From: Kevin <kevin at pipeline.com>
> To: rescue at sunhelp.org
> Subject: Re: [rescue] Re: Visualize C160 workstations
> Reply-To: rescue at sunhelp.org
>
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> This is correct, same as Voodoo1.
>
> You could pair up two Voodoo2 cards in "SLI" mode.
>
> /KRM
>
> On 13 Dec 2002 21:14:14 -0500
> Dan Sikorski <me at dansikorski.com> wrote:
>
> > On Thu, 2002-12-12 at 17:49, Bill Bradford wrote:
> > > If these just need "normal" voodoo2 cards, local
> > > goodwill has about 10 of them in a box for $5 each.
> >
> > Um, unless i'm rather mistaken, voodoo2's are
> > 3d-only, you need to have a 2d card to use for 2d,
> > and the voodoo2 takes over for 3d
> >
> > 	-Dan Sikorski

Sorry guys, that's not entirely correct.  It IS the case when the Voodoo2 is
used in a PC, but if you read the links I sent before, the HP is able to use
it as a fully-fledged video card.

Here's a brief description of the reason from one of the mailing lists:

>>>>>>
Moreover most graphics card require to be initialised by a PC BIOS (using
ix86 instructions). For that reason XFree86 comes with a small Intel
emulator that does the initialisation on non-Intel architectures.
The linux kernel does not do this and the Linux Framebuffer device drivers
for Voodoo,Radeon, Nvidia etc. won't work on non-Intel architectures for
that reason (unless a graphics card can and is initialised by some
other method not involving/requiring a PC BIOS. These cards are rather
rare and usually older graphics cards or plain framebuffers).

Some people try to get Voodoo2 running on a C2xx because this kind of card
is one of the exceptions mentioned above: it doesn't need to be
initialised by the BIOS, you can use glide for that (which is available
for linux).
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