# ATI does not support 1.4? **URL:** \ **Category:** OpenGL: Advanced Coding\ **Created:** [February 6, 2003, 9:14am UTC](https://community.khronos.org/t/ati-does-not-support-1-4/34203 "2003-02-06T09:14:00Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 19\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![bakery2k](https://community.khronos.org/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/b/a88e4f/32.png) [@bakery2k](https://community.khronos.org/u/bakery2k)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2003, 9:14am UTC](https://community.khronos.org/t/ati-does-not-support-1-4/34203/1 "2003-02-06T09:14:00Z")
After owning 3 or 4 nvidia based cards, I purchased my first ATI card today, a radeon 9000 64MB. I downloaded and installed the latest drivers from [www.ati.com](http://www.ati.com) and was dissapointed to not find OpenGL 1.4 support. I also looked at the hardware registry at [www.delphi3d.net/hardware](http://www.delphi3d.net/hardware) and could not see any radeon cards using GL1.4. BTW, I am using Win98. When will this feature be available (if it is not already)? I also had a problem with ARB\_vertex\_program. My cel-shading demo (available from my site) ran incorrectly and the frames per second dropped from 120 to 15 when enabling ARB\_vertex\_program. Also, my shadow volumes demo does not work correctly, although there is no speed drop. ---
**Author:** ![Korval](https://community.khronos.org/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/k/ecc23a/32.png) [@Korval](https://community.khronos.org/u/Korval)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2003, 9:21am UTC](https://community.khronos.org/t/ati-does-not-support-1-4/34203/2 "2003-02-06T09:21:00Z")
Why would you expect a Radeon 9000 (a cheap 8500) to support OpenGL 1.4? It can handle ARB\_vertex\_program, but not ARB\_fragment\_program. > My cel-shading demo (available from my site) ran incorrectly and the frames per second dropped from 120 to 15 when enabling ARB\_vertex\_program. A clear sign of software use. I don’t know why; the card has the vertex program hardware for it. ---
**Author:** ![bakery2k](https://community.khronos.org/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/b/a88e4f/32.png) [@bakery2k](https://community.khronos.org/u/bakery2k)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2003, 9:24am UTC](https://community.khronos.org/t/ati-does-not-support-1-4/34203/3 "2003-02-06T09:24:00Z")
OpenGL1.4 does not require the support for ARB\_fragment\_program. I had 1.4 support on my GF3. Anyway, on delphi3d even the 9700 cards do not have version 1.4. ---
**Author:** ![Ostsol](https://community.khronos.org/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/o/f19dbf/32.png) [@Ostsol](https://community.khronos.org/u/Ostsol)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2003, 9:40am UTC](https://community.khronos.org/t/ati-does-not-support-1-4/34203/4 "2003-02-06T09:40:00Z")
What are you refering to when you say “OpenGL 1.4” support? Are you refering to the functionality that has been upgraded from merely being extensions to being an integral part of the GL spec? ---
**Author:** ![bakery2k](https://community.khronos.org/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/b/a88e4f/32.png) [@bakery2k](https://community.khronos.org/u/bakery2k)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2003, 9:41am UTC](https://community.khronos.org/t/ati-does-not-support-1-4/34203/5 "2003-02-06T09:41:00Z")
Yes. My drivers, and all those which I can find, report “1.3.xxxx” in the GL\_VERSION string. It’s not a huge problem, as I can use extensions, but it was a bit surprising. ---
**Author:** ![OneSadCookie](https://community.khronos.org/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/o/ecd19e/32.png) [@OneSadCookie](https://community.khronos.org/u/OneSadCookie)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2003, 10:16am UTC](https://community.khronos.org/t/ati-does-not-support-1-4/34203/6 "2003-02-06T10:16:00Z")
The Radeon 8500/9000 series don’t support ARB\_depth\_texture or ARB\_shadow, and therefore can’t support OpenGL 1.4. The Radeon 9700 should be capable of it. The GeForce 3/4Ti apparently can’t support all of 1.4 either, but the NVidia drivers report 1.4. Unfortunately, I haven’t been able to find out what functionality of 1.4 the 3/4Ti don’t accelerate ![](http://www.opengl.org/discussion_boards/ubb/frown.gif) ---
**Author:** ![Elixer](https://community.khronos.org/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/e/cdc98d/32.png) [@Elixer](https://community.khronos.org/u/Elixer)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2003, 10:58am UTC](https://community.khronos.org/t/ati-does-not-support-1-4/34203/7 "2003-02-06T10:58:00Z")
I find it very strange you would get a 9000 if you had a GF3, that is a downgrade. Perhaps next time, you should do a bit more research, and then find out that the 9000 is the same thing as a 8500? I am still amazed that people that get GF4 MX cards think they they have a real GF4 card, and not a slightly updated GF2 MX card. ---
**Author:** ![vincoof](https://community.khronos.org/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/v/ec9cab/32.png) [@vincoof](https://community.khronos.org/u/vincoof)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2003, 11:39am UTC](https://community.khronos.org/t/ati-does-not-support-1-4/34203/8 "2003-02-06T11:39:00Z")
\>\> Unfortunately, I haven’t been able to \>\> find out what functionality of 1.4 \>\> the 3/4Ti don’t accelerate EXT\_blend\_func\_separate \>\> Perhaps next time, you should do a bit \>\> more research, and then find out that the \>\> 9000 is the same thing as a 8500? Actually, 8500 is (meant to be) superior to a GF3. So, if 8500 == 9000, and if 8500 \> GF3, then 9000 \> GF3. Logical, isn’t it ? \>\> I am still amazed that people that get \>\> GF4 MX cards think they they have a real \>\> GF4 card, and not a slightly updated GF2 \>\> MX card. GF4MX is really better than GF2MX, by far. There’s a huge gain. Though, if you mean “GF4MX is lower than GF3” then I agree. [This message has been edited by vincoof (edited 02-06-2003).] ---
**Author:** ![Ostsol](https://community.khronos.org/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/o/f19dbf/32.png) [@Ostsol](https://community.khronos.org/u/Ostsol)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2003, 11:49am UTC](https://community.khronos.org/t/ati-does-not-support-1-4/34203/9 "2003-02-06T11:49:00Z")
> Originally posted by vincoof: > Actually, 8500 is (meant to be) superior to a GF3. So, if 8500 == 9000, and if 8500 \> GF3, then 9000 \> GF3. Logical, isn’t it ? The 8500 is superiour in speed to the 9000 and the Geforce 3 and it does have advantages in terms of some features. However, there are some OpenGL 1.4 features that Geforce 3 supports while the 8500 does not, such as ARB\_shadow. ---
**Author:** ![Elixer](https://community.khronos.org/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/e/cdc98d/32.png) [@Elixer](https://community.khronos.org/u/Elixer)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2003, 12:02pm UTC](https://community.khronos.org/t/ati-does-not-support-1-4/34203/10 "2003-02-06T12:02:00Z")
I meant to say in features in all cases, as in the GF4 MX doesn’t really have anything new feature wise that the GF2 MX doesn’t have, it may be a bit faster, but it doesn’t even have the features that the GF3 has. Looks like Ostsol wrote what I meant to say. ![](http://www.opengl.org/discussion_boards/ubb/smile.gif) Damn marketing strikes again. I wonder if ATI will call their next card the 10K? ![](http://www.opengl.org/discussion_boards/ubb/wink.gif) ---
**Author:** ![Ostsol](https://community.khronos.org/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/o/f19dbf/32.png) [@Ostsol](https://community.khronos.org/u/Ostsol)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2003, 5:30pm UTC](https://community.khronos.org/t/ati-does-not-support-1-4/34203/11 "2003-02-06T17:30:00Z")
Heheh. . . I’m wondering if NVidia will remake the Geforce 3 or 4 and call it the GeforceFX MX. ![](http://www.opengl.org/discussion_boards/ubb/tongue.gif) Hmm. . . or maybe they realize how stupid a name that sounds. . . As for ATI. . . I really hope that don’t decide to name their next chip the 10k. Best to simply come up with a new name. . . ---
**Author:** ![bakery2k](https://community.khronos.org/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/b/a88e4f/32.png) [@bakery2k](https://community.khronos.org/u/bakery2k)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2003, 10:55pm UTC](https://community.khronos.org/t/ati-does-not-support-1-4/34203/12 "2003-02-06T22:55:00Z")
> Originally posted by Elixer: > [b]I find it very strange you would get a 9000 if you had a GF3, that is a downgrade. > Perhaps next time, you should do a bit more research, and then find out that the 9000 is the same thing as a 8500?[/b] I am aware that the 9000 is basically an 8500. That’s why I bought it. I now have access to ATI\_fragment\_shader etc on one card and NV features on another. My current project can thus run well on both vendor’s hardware. ---
**Author:** ![Tom\_Nuydens](https://community.khronos.org/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/t/e9bcb4/32.png) [@Tom\_Nuydens](https://community.khronos.org/u/Tom_Nuydens)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2003, 11:35pm UTC](https://community.khronos.org/t/ati-does-not-support-1-4/34203/13 "2003-02-06T23:35:00Z")
> Originally posted by OneSadCookie: > The Radeon 8500/9000 series don’t support ARB\_depth\_texture or ARB\_shadow, and therefore can’t support OpenGL 1.4. The Radeon 9700 should be capable of it. Not being able to accelerate all of it is no excuse for not supporting it. If it were, we’d all still be using OpenGL 1.0. Accumulation buffer, aux buffers, color index mode and more are not accelerated on the majority of current cards. – Tom ---
**Author:** ![Ventura](https://community.khronos.org/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/v/ac91a4/32.png) [@Ventura](https://community.khronos.org/u/Ventura)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2003, 12:19am UTC](https://community.khronos.org/t/ati-does-not-support-1-4/34203/14 "2003-02-07T00:19:00Z")
I too have both a GeForce3 and a Radeon 8500 and to be honest, i prefer the Radeon for programming. yeah its raw fill-rate isnt as high, but 6 texture units, and proper dependent lookups are _far_ more usefull to me. One thing that is bugging my at the minute is that ext\_vertex\_shader on the radeon doesnt seem to have position invariance like the nv\_vertex\_program does?? does anyone know if there is any way of doing this on the Radeon? i presume there is support for it in the arb\_vertex\_program which the card should support too. M. ---
**Author:** ![ehart](https://community.khronos.org/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/e/e36b37/32.png) [@ehart](https://community.khronos.org/u/ehart)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2003, 2:31am UTC](https://community.khronos.org/t/ati-does-not-support-1-4/34203/15 "2003-02-07T02:31:00Z")
bakery2K: The 9000 cannot support shadow mapping as was mentioned in the thread. On another note the 9700 doesn’t presently export a 1.4 string yet either. This is largely just because of a desire to do more testing. Ventura: EXT\_vertex\_shader on ATI parts should always be position invariant if you multiply the vertex by the builtin modelviewprojection matrix, unless you are exceeding HW resources and falling back to SW. If you are transforming it differetly, then it won’t be invariant. -Evan ---
**Author:** ![Korval](https://community.khronos.org/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/k/ecc23a/32.png) [@Korval](https://community.khronos.org/u/Korval)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2003, 8:01am UTC](https://community.khronos.org/t/ati-does-not-support-1-4/34203/16 "2003-02-07T08:01:00Z")
> Not being able to accelerate all of it is no excuse for not supporting it. If it were, we’d all still be using OpenGL 1.0. Accumulation buffer, aux buffers, color index mode and more are not accelerated on the majority of current cards. ATi could waste a lot of time writing software support for these few extensions. Or, they could not advertise full 1.4 and spend more time writing better drivers with fewer bugs. I much prefer to have bug-free hardware accelerated card features than to have an implementation expose extensions that are just getting in the way of killing bugs. Besides, the 9000 will be gone in 6 months or so, when ATi creates a low-end (\<$100) DX9 capapble card. Why should ATi spend driver developer time on the 9000 when those people could, in theory, help with the unified R300/R350 drivers? ---
**Author:** ![Theodor](https://community.khronos.org/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/t/b5a626/32.png) [@Theodor](https://community.khronos.org/u/Theodor)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2003, 10:28am UTC](https://community.khronos.org/t/ati-does-not-support-1-4/34203/17 "2003-02-07T10:28:00Z")
> does anyone know if there is any way of doing this on the Radeon? i presume there is support for it in the arb\_vertex\_program which the card should support too. Latest ATI drivers does provide support for ARB\_vertex\_program for Radeon 8500. And it does work with position invariance option. However I got a problem with that extension on Radeon 8500 - my demo seems to just hang up on VertexAttribPointer (while just this same code works for GF2). Anybody here managed to use glVertexAttribPointer successfully on Radeon 8500? ---
**Author:** ![Humus](https://community.khronos.org/user_avatar/community.khronos.org/humus/32/47_2.png) [@Humus](https://community.khronos.org/u/Humus)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2003, 11:02am UTC](https://community.khronos.org/t/ati-does-not-support-1-4/34203/18 "2003-02-07T11:02:00Z")
Yes, glVertexAttribPointer worked fine for me on my old 8500 last time I used it. ---
**Author:** ![Ventura](https://community.khronos.org/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/v/ac91a4/32.png) [@Ventura](https://community.khronos.org/u/Ventura)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2003, 3:31pm UTC](https://community.khronos.org/t/ati-does-not-support-1-4/34203/19 "2003-02-07T15:31:00Z")
Thanks Evan, I have found out with a quick test that Radeon cards are invariant with the basic transorm. I guess the card runs the fixed T&L path with vertex programs anyway to guarantee the invariance. Its a bit out of date now, but it might have been woth while mentioning in the spec. M.