Confused on Radeon HD Drivers & Stock X1000 Video Card

[amigasociety]

OK, I am a bit confused on the new drivers being mentioned these days:

http://a-eon.com/?news=03-10-2012

I am an owner of the stock X1000 First Contact as purchased from AmigaKit, and not sure if talk about these new Radeon HD drivers affects me or not.

If I am correct, the stock video card that came with the X1000 FC systems although are HD cards, that Amiga OS 4.1u5 does not take full advantage of them for 3D games and all that. Maybe I am wrong.

Am I supposed to be downloading these new drivers for a stock X1000 FC system to get better 3D support or?

Clue me in please.

TJ

[trevordick]

Short answer: Yes

Long answer: Your First Contact system was supplied wither the latest Radeon HD drivers available at the time of supply. As a First Contact owner you are entitled to free Radeon HD driver updates up to the release of Version 1.0 as and when they are released.

Trevor

[ChrisH]

Am I supposed to be downloading these new drivers for a stock X1000 FC system to get better 3D support or?

Trevor forgot to say something: Upgrading to these new drivers will not give you 3D *yet*... For that you will still need AmigaOS4.2 (whenever it is finished). Although Hans has written a few pretty 3D demos which work on current X1000s with the latest RadeonHD drivers.

If you want to run 3D software, you can try installing "Wazp3D" which does fake 3D using the CPU instead of graphics card. It is a bit fiddly to install & to use, but it does allow you to play relatively modern *2D* games that are implemented using 3D technology (such as that free Turrican clone, or the commercial Aquaria game), and also some real 3D software will also apparently work (e.g. Blender) although all but the most basic 3D games will probably be too slow (I haven't done much experimenting to say for sure).