RadeonHD - Help Decide What is Developed Next

Posted by Hans de Ruiter

This is just a quick post to the RadeonHD development log in order to point people to the poll regarding what should be developed next. Basically the choice is between finishing off 2D support for R5xx based cards (i.e., Radeon X1000 series) in the form of hardware compositing, or starting on 2D blitter support for R6xx based cards (i.e., Radeon HD 2000 and 3000 series). This is your chance to have a direct input on what happens next. Please note that R5xx chipset compositing will be completed eventually regardless of which option is chosen; the results of the poll will change what order things are implemented.

The advantage of continuing with R5xx chipsets, is that implementing compositing would take less time than starting on hardware acceleration for the R6xx chipsets. It would also mean that one set of graphics cards is fully supported. On the other hand, this would mean that users of R6xx based cards would have to wait even longer. Also, AMD have recently dropped support for R5xx based cards from their drivers, indicating that they already see them as obsolete.

While the poll is active, work will be performed on implementing uploading of the command processor microcode, to the graphics card. This is required by all chipsets. R5xx chipsets require the command processor's microcode for 3D operations, whilst R6xx chipsets require the microcode for all GPU operations.

EDIT (2009/05/16): This poll is now closed. Thank you to the 151 voters for participating. Hardware compositing for R5xx chipsets will be developed next based on a majority vote.

Comments (0) | 2 May 2009