S3TC Is Still Problematic For Mesa Developers, Users

[-jK-]

How are ASTC or ETC1/2 replacements for S3TC?

• ETC is implemented in software for all desktop drivers atm (and it is very unlikely MESA impl. them in hw before the blob ones do)
• ASTC isn't exposed yet by any drivers as I know (nor is it known how many gpus are able to do it in hw)

So is the future of MESA really to uncompress all current & future texture formats and to not support a single hw accel. compressed texture format?

My view of the future:

• ASTC is too complicated, so there won't be many compression libs (see M$'s BC6/7). Neither will there be much driver/hw support. So it won't ever get popular.
• ETC could easily gain popularity (better quality than S3TC), if it would be supported by drivers, but I don't see that in the (near) future

So it still isn't the fault of the engine/content devs that S3TC is preferred.

[nightmarex]

it could have been argued, that since the only way for S3TC to be useful, it needs to be supported in hardware, and all the hardware out there supports it, so you've already paid the licensing fee...

But to actually argue that, you'll need few lawyers and few million dollars in change.

The real world solution is to paraphrase Linus: "Fuck You VIA" and "Fuck You US legal system"

Hey, the laws in the US are just fine, as long as you ignore them and never get caught! I have to agree with your point, we did pay for the hardware already. Oh wait we don't actually own things we buy anymore, I forgot.

I get the feeling that if s3tc support was just integrated into mesa and shipped with distros HTC/S3 wouldn't care, but we would(the foss community).

Have we seen any indication otherwise ?
Are they willing to change the license or forfeit it ? Is anyone petitioning them directly for this ?

Why no public statements or emails/QA from the horse's mouth ?

Here's another idea:
find out how much they'd sell the patent for, then make a kickstarter project with the intent on purchasing it and open sourcing it.

Well, some distros (ones not based in the US) already include S3TC others make it super easy to add. I feel this is sort of a non issue if all you have to do is click a warning box from you distro saying you care less about the idiotic patent laws.

[ChrisXY]

we did pay for the hardware already.

Why only hardware? With this hardware there comes a driver free of cost that includes s3tc support. Usually even on a CD.

[Kivada]

VIA is still making processors

When is the last time you say any of their products for sale let alone anyone say they own one? The last time they where even semi interesting was when Nvidia was showing netops at CES with the ION2 chipset being powered by the dual core version of the VIA Nano, a combo that never saw the light of day as an actual product.

Since then AMD and Intel's low end CPU and GPU systems blew them out of the water for the same money spent giving nobody a reason to buy VIA/S3.

[doom_Oo7]

When is the last time you say any of their products for sale let alone anyone say they own one? The last time they where even semi interesting was when Nvidia was showing netops at CES with the ION2 chipset being powered by the dual core version of the VIA Nano, a combo that never saw the light of day as an actual product.

Since then AMD and Intel's low end CPU and GPU systems blew them out of the water for the same money spent giving nobody a reason to buy VIA/S3.

Oh, it's been a long time we didn't see a Matrox graphic card, they must be dead too

[GreatEmerald]

How are ASTC or ETC1/2 replacements for S3TC?

• ETC is implemented in software for all desktop drivers atm (and it is very unlikely MESA impl. them in hw before the blob ones do)
• ASTC isn't exposed yet by any drivers as I know (nor is it known how many gpus are able to do it in hw)

So is the future of MESA really to uncompress all current & future texture formats and to not support a single hw accel. compressed texture format?

My view of the future:

• ASTC is too complicated, so there won't be many compression libs (see M$'s BC6/7). Neither will there be much driver/hw support. So it won't ever get popular.
• ETC could easily gain popularity (better quality than S3TC), if it would be supported by drivers, but I don't see that in the (near) future

So it still isn't the fault of the engine/content devs that S3TC is preferred.

Eh? So you're saying that you think it'll fail due to it being too new?.. IIRC ASTC is part of the OpenGL spec, so drivers will have to support it if they want to claim OpenGL compliance. Not necessarily in hardware, but if you're supporting it in software, might as well also have it accelerated. So yes, it's still not the fault of the developers that S3TC is preferred, but it will be in a few years. Or, you know, they will stop preferring it.

[Kivada]

Oh, it's been a long time we didn't see a Matrox graphic card, they must be dead too

Matrox at least sold stuff like the Triple Head To Go, though that is largely unnecessary due to GPUs having as many as 6 outs these days, doubt there where all that many people actually connecting them to laptops that only have a single video out.

If they are just sitting back and collecting licensing checks then they as a company shouldn't exist anymore. Produce or die.

[droste]

Matrox at least sold stuff like the Triple Head To Go, though that is largely unnecessary due to GPUs having as many as 6 outs these days, doubt there where all that many people actually connecting them to laptops that only have a single video out.

They are still on top with respect to "head count": http://www.matrox.com/graphics/en/pr.../m9188pciex16/ 8 heads!

[doom_Oo7]

If they are just sitting back and collecting licensing checks then they as a company shouldn't exist anymore. Produce or die.

So you are really not aware? They just stopped selling to the consumer market and only focus on professionnal, like medical imagery (some IRMs are made by Matrox for instance) market.

I guess it's the same for VIA.

[Kivada]

So you are really not aware? They just stopped selling to the consumer market and only focus on professionnal, like medical imagery (some IRMs are made by Matrox for instance) market.

I guess it's the same for VIA.

Actually no I was not. I take it this is strictly embedded?

A while back, when I was looking around for a new monitor in the same resolution bracket as ye olde IBM T221 none of the high end screens I could find like the Eizo FDH3601 mentioned anything about Matrox even though they claimed they where for the medical/engineering/etc. market.

Even so, you'd think that the bigger players would be pushing them out, it's not like AMD and Intel don't make embedded x86 systems. Hell, Intel is trying to shoehorn x86 into a cellphone power envelope these days.

They are still on top with respect to "head count": http://www.matrox.com/graphics/en/pr.../m9188pciex16/ 8 heads!

Uh, if you need to go THAT big why not go projection or get a few 100" screens? If you actually had to render something on screens of a decent resolution instead of just play back video or static images then even a GTX Titan wouldn't be anywhere near enough grunt to not end up a choppy mess.