Oh, it gets complicated. It depends on whether you're talking about "the 2d engine" or "the 2d API calls".
The 2d *engine* doesn't change from earlier chips to 5xx, and on the 6xx the 2d functions are pretty much the same although they're emulated in microcode.
The 2d APIs are a different story -- I believe XAA can be done on the 2d engine but EXA needs the 3d engine for most of the really useful API calls. I think you can sort-of do rotation on the 2d engine but the 3d engine handles it much better. Blending absolutely needs the 3d engine and blending (the core of XRender) seems to be what EXA is really all about.
There is also general agreement that EXA needs a TTM-style memory manager to really shine, but that's another story.
The 2d *engine* doesn't change from earlier chips to 5xx, and on the 6xx the 2d functions are pretty much the same although they're emulated in microcode.
The 2d APIs are a different story -- I believe XAA can be done on the 2d engine but EXA needs the 3d engine for most of the really useful API calls. I think you can sort-of do rotation on the 2d engine but the 3d engine handles it much better. Blending absolutely needs the 3d engine and blending (the core of XRender) seems to be what EXA is really all about.
There is also general agreement that EXA needs a TTM-style memory manager to really shine, but that's another story.
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