On Thu, Feb 19, 2004 at 03:06:13PM -0800, Ian Romanick wrote:
> jaspal kallar wrote:
> >I know there is already 2D support for the radeon 9600 pro in the upcoming 
> >4.4 release. My question is if I buy an Apple Powermac G5 with a radeon 
> >9600 pro card will I eventually in the future be able to
> >get 3D  support on the powerpc platform (not x86!!) ?
> 
> Only if ATI ports their closed-source driver to PowerPC.

And since they probably wont do it, there is little hope there. Maybe
you should send Apple some mail, telling them that you are thinking
about asking a linux machine, and that the G5 Powermac looks
interesting, but that the lack of 3D linux support would be an argument
to go for an x86 box instead.

I think that ATI is missing something here. I believe that Powerpc 
hardware with ATI graphics represent a ever growing linux installed
base, with the G5 Powermac, with the new powerbooks, as well as with
non-apple powerpc boxes like the pegasos motherboards. But then, it is
probably that the ATI drivers are not endian clean, and that they can't
be bothered to make a powerpc build, even an unsupported one, probably
because of that, or maybe for some hidden reason like the intel-ATI
connection or something such.

Anyway, i believe that the fastest 3D solution on powerpc hardware right
now would be a 3Dlabs wildcat VP graphic card, which have lowered in
price quite some lately, together with the paying AcceleratedX server,
altough they don't officially distribute powerpc binaries too, at least
they ship sparc ones, so they should be endian clean.

Friendly,

Sven Luther
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