Games depending on OpenGL and GLX - any way to test on XO with regular OLPC image?

[Bert Freudenberg]

On 08.06.2008, at 10:37, Kent Dahl wrote:

>  I'm trying to load quite a few games onto the XO's,
> especially various Linux games that I've introduced them to before  
> that
> they like. However, I see that quite a few of them have OpenGL and GLX
> dependancies, despite being 2D games (such as SuperTux), and others  
> that
> are 3D but aren't too heavy. (TuxRacer/ppracer work OK on the Asus
> EeePC, so I'm curious how it fares on the XO.)


The EeePC has a quite performant Intel "GMA 900" 3D accelerator, which  
provides a fillrate of 1.3 GPixels/sec and even basic pixel shader  
support (OpenGL 1.4). The XO-1 has an AMD "Geode" without any 3D  
acceleration (there is some 2D accel).

So hardware 3D is not an option. Software 3D is hampered by the  
enormous resolution of 1200x900 pixels. Pseudo-3D (like in the Doom  
engine) works quite okay, but full 3D at acceptable frame rates would  
require a lower resolution. AMD said it should be possible to  
configure the Geode's video scaler to provide a smaller frame buffer,  
but nobody has adapted the X driver to support that, yet.

A 400x300 mode scaled up by 3 to the panel resolution would be  
awesome, and should allow nice software rendering. If such a mode  
existed, maybe it would even make sense to ship Mesa (a software  
OpenGL implementation) and GLUT, which would allow some OpenGL  
programs to run unmodified.

Until then, programs requiring OpenGL will not work on the XO. And  
even then, most will run slowly, and suck power - but having the  
option would be nice :)

- Bert -