View Full Version : OpenGL supported finally!
PowerVR finally released support for OpenGL on the N800 and N810!
This is the very same chip that powered quake 3 arena on Symbian phones. I can see lots of great games coming up on the tablet. =)
here:
http://www.internettablettalk.com/forums/showpost.php?p=95276&postcount=51
Actually, from the PDF Guide:
OpenGL ES libraries are not distributed with the PowerVR Linux SDKs. Ask your platform provider for these if you do not have them. Copy all the libraries (*.so) into: \SDKPackage\Builds\OGLES\<platform>\Lib
So we need them from our "platform provider", i.e. Nokia.
Argh. That sounds like we won't get them unless Nokia pays $$$ to license them. Me not happy.
Yup, that's a real shame :/
Anyway, may be they paid them and are working on integrating the libraries into the Maemo APIs :)
Nokia are listed as partners here (http://www.imgtec.com/powervr/insider/partners/OEM/index.asp) and the N800 is listed so maybe, just maybe. Fingers crossed :)
Well, that's "just" the list of devices that use this chipset :/
here:
http://www.internettablettalk.com/forums/showpost.php?p=95276&postcount=51
Actually, from the PDF Guide:
So we need them from our "platform provider", i.e. Nokia.
Hmmm, actually i was thinking somewhere along the lines that it is already inside the new firmware.
It rather looks as if their dev kit now supports the N800 as a target. Nokia still have to integrate and release a XGL driver.
Sevo
Actually, the PowerVR release is irrelevant to the tablets.
Although the N800/N810 are built around an OMAP2420 they don't use the PowerVR on the chip. The reason is that it only comes with 5Mbits of VRAM which is nowhere near enough for the 800x480x16 resolution. So Nokia had to use an external LCD controller (Epson Blizzard or Hailstorm I think), which is the reason for the not so great video performance (bandwidth to/from the CPU is slow).
The OMAP3430 will support resolutions up to 1024x768x24, so next year's tablet (the one after the N810) is likely to finally have hardware-accelerated 3D and possibly a higher-res screen as well (why else would they spend time making hildon resolution-independent earlier this year?)
The reason is that it only comes with 5Mbits of VRAM which is nowhere near enough for the 800x480x16 resolution. So Nokia had to use an external LCD controller (Epson Blizzard or Hailstorm I think), which is the reason for the not so great video performance (bandwidth to/from the CPU is slow).
But is that 5Mbits just an on-chip framebuffer? I see no mention of whether the PowerVR has its own dedicated memory, shares that framebuffer memory (which is unlikely as it would be hard to fit full screen display + intermediate structures into that space) or accesses the main memory (which I think is most likely).
If the powervr memory is in fact part of the standard RAM, there's no reason why its output can't be copied into the LCD controller framebuffer. This will still have the same bandwidth issues, but the point of the 3D hardware isn't to do more frames, it's to cut the cost of doing the 3D transforms on the data.
http://focus.ti.com/pdfs/wtbu/TI_omap2420.pdf says the 5Mbits supports a VGA framebuffer for example
http://www.imgtec.com/PowerVR/Products/Graphics/index.asp
Specifically:
"PowerVR cores use an on-chip tile buffer to keep all bandwidth-intensive pixel processing on-chip, where it can be executed most cost effectively and efficiently.
Memory bandwidth requirements are minimized by eliminating all Z-buffer traffic between the 3D core and external memory, and by ensuring that only visible pixels are ever written to the frame buffer. "
So, no reason to expect it not to work on something like the N800/N810 with an external framebuffer.
Though it does ask the question of whether or not the last sentence is to be interpreted literally, in which case the data would need to be copied from the 5Mbit omap on-chip framebuffer to the lcd controller framebuffer.
why else would they spend time making hildon resolution-independent earlier this year?
video-out at higher res
aleksandyr
2007-11-15, 20:23
video-out at higher res
Hildon's being used for UMPC-Linux, which runs on those 1024x600 screens, mostly.
I thought the N800 had DMA (Dynamic Memory Architecture) just like all the other Symbian phones. Why would they only give 5mbits of VRAM to it when it can use whatever memory is available?
Oh!! You guys mean the 5mbit SRAM?? That's not VRAM that's an on-chip tile?buffer which is extremely fast (maybe faster than Embedded RAM).
I thought the N800 had DMA (Dynamic Memory Architecture) just like all the other Symbian phones.
The N800 is _not_ a Symbian phone! ;)
The N800 is _not_ a Symbian phone! ;)
Yes, but it uses the same chip that is used in 3 top Symbian phones i.e. n93/n95/n82 so in other words, hardware-wise it is.
Well I've got the pvr.ko driver to load and it looks like it has initialised at least (working entries under the sysfs). The other libraries and binaries that came with it are all compiled for the old abi though unfortunately.
pipeline
2007-11-19, 23:55
Wow... any chance the builds done by this guy will work with that driver?
http://unrealvoodoo.org/hiteck/blog/category/maemo/
(his repository : ) http://muksuluuri.ath.cx/maemo/dists/bora/main/binary-armel/
and finally the 'Vincent' os project he based builds on :
http://www.vincent3d.com/
No, the powervr kernel driver needs some of the userspace-side libraries to actually do anything afaict.
Although I've got the lib to load with nothing other than a kernel tainting warning, it doesn't produce the proc entries it ought to, and I can't work out why it's still loaded if it hasn't been able to do that (i.e. that would presumably be an error which should unload the module).
I need to do some more digging.
spirytsick
2008-01-06, 22:15
so we will probably not see opengl accelerated graphics on n800/n810. Well, I hope Nokia seriously includes such capability with their next IT...
Never say never, I'll get back to looking at the driver once I've caught up on the post Christmas rush of things to do now I'm back at work... :)
I need to trace the execution of the driver to see if I can work out what's stopping it from producing the proc entries.
If anyone else fancies having a go then let me know.
spirytsick
2008-01-07, 19:51
<quote>http://www.symbian-freak.com/news/008/01/flip_silent_for_n95.htm</quote>
So can you tell for sure whether PoverVR part of the ARM cpu is there ? Or whether Nokia used a version or the processor without that functionality ?
spirytsick
2008-01-07, 19:54
<quote>http://www.symbian-freak.com/news/008/01/flip_silent_for_n95.htm</quote>
So can you tell for sure whether PoverVR part of the ARM cpu is there ? Or whether Nokia used a version or the processor without that functionality ?
Sorry, bad quotation above :)
DataPath
2008-02-15, 21:15
Wow... any chance the builds done by this guy will work with that driver?
http://unrealvoodoo.org/hiteck/blog/category/maemo/
(his repository : ) http://muksuluuri.ath.cx/maemo/dists/bora/main/binary-armel/
and finally the 'Vincent' os project he based builds on :
http://www.vincent3d.com/
That guy appears to have a video of opengl running on the PowerVR chip. Has anyone else tried this? Why isn't this getting more attention?
He's not using the PowerVR chip, but software rendering.
vinilios
2008-03-21, 06:20
any updates on the topic ?
Yeah Nokia research lab showing off what looks like accelerated OpenGL ES at 2:06 and 2:09-2:13 in this video.
http://youtube.com/watch?v=7K4veJMCM_Q
(p.s. Don't post the email addy here cause spamcrawlers might find it)
(edit) Note that the video shows a higher resolution on the projector than on the N810, so they may be rendering the projected video on a PC/laptop. Also note that the GL apps on the N810 are only isplaying a few polygons - i.e. the whale is displayed but no sharks, and there is only one building showin on the rotating green rectangle at 2:09
scumgrief
2008-03-21, 23:45
i still don't understand what stops them from using the powervr chip.... i hope nokia's next ITT actually has a DSP chip that works at full res and out of the box hardware openGL ES.
For now i dunno if its worth to but a NIT.... but i think i can find money to but a n800.. n810 is too much $ for the same hardware platform with most of the same flaws.
GeneralAntilles
2008-03-21, 23:55
i still don't understand what stops them from using the powervr chip....
A couple reasons. As the OMAP2420's built-in LCD controller only supports 640x480, they had to use a 3rd party controller, which complicates the hardware setup, and the PowerVR chip isn't capable of driving more than 640x480, so not having drivers at all was probably more agreeable to management than paying for drivers that would have given you subpar performance.
i hope nokia's next ITT actually has a DSP chip that works at full res and out of the box hardware openGL ES.
Most of the OMAP3 chips are capable of driving 1024x768, so Nokia could even go as far as upgrading the screen resolution to 1024x600 without having to resort to hardware hacks again. This, of course, means that there are no hardware limitations to having good OpenGL performance.
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