Read Me First - License - Release Notes - Read Me GL

*** Rendition V2x00 Reference Drivers - Release Notes ***

Version: 3.0 beta5, build 5176 - June 2, 1999

What's new in this release: Quick Summary: RELEASE NOTES:

The Win9x Beta5 driver is a worthwhile install for most Rendition users. Many issues that have been communicated to us have been resolved. While these drivers are still BETA drivers and do contain bugs, they are a major improvement when compared to any of the previous BETA releases. This BETA release contains the new Verite Control Panel. Use the new Control Panel with extreme caution. There are many new features that have yet to be fully tested and may cause undesirable behavior if used incorrectly.

The beta4 release added a new D3D rendering architecture that fixed many longstanding Direct3D bugs. But because the D3D core is new and is still undergoing development, there may be new bugs that have surfaced. We are eager to get feedback from end-users regarding any new problems that this driver exposes so that we can fix them before we take this driver out of 'beta' and label it 'gold'.

Basic features and uses for the control panel:
First and most important ---- USE AT YOUR OWN RISK!!!!

Settings that are chosen on the Verite Control Panel do NOT go into effect until APPLY or OK is clicked and even then you may get a Message Box prompting you for a confirmation of the selected operation or configuration. Also, some settings will not be saved after reboot. (We are working on it).

The one exception is the CRTC positioning controls. Those update real-time.

BEFORE SETTING REFRESH RATES, MAKE SURE A MONITOR IS INSTALLED
A monitor *.inf file must be installed for correct behavior.

Setting Refresh Rates: There is now more than one way to set the refresh rate. In the middle of the right hand side of the Verite Property sheet there is a Refresh Rate group of text boxes and radio buttons. The current refresh rate is displayed next to the label (Refresh Rate) of that group. You may choose Default, Optimal, from a list of Predefined refresh rates, or (drum roll, please) create your own using our newly implemented Custom Refresh Rate Control. (this has not been thoroughly tested but is known to basically work).

Custom Refresh Rate Control: When one chooses the Custom radio button and clicks APPLY, whether or not a custom refresh rate has been entered, the CRTC box on the left hand side of the Control Panel will now contain "live" buttons that will allow adjustments to the position, height and width of your current display. One must be cautious when using these controls. They are for advanced users and should be approached with care. Also, these are very new to this driver set and have yet to be thoroughly tested. Use these controls at your own risk and only if you are confident that you will not harm your system in so doing.

CRTC Position Controls: When you move the mouse cursor over the buttons in this control group, you should notice that where your cursor is pointing determines the function that can be executed and is displayed as a text string directly over the button when your cursor is pointing at it. When you have selected a button corresponding to the function you would like to exercise, hit the mouse button ONE CLICK at a time and watch the result before continuing. Make sure the setting is correct.
*** You may notice a blanking of the screen when using these. This is to be expected right now. Just wait until your display returns before continuing.

Enabling TV-Out: To enable TV-Out, check the TV check box, choose NTSC or PAL, Underscan or Overscan, FlickerFilter(if needed), then click on APPLY at the bottom of the Property Sheet. Not all combinations of the above settings will function. Try the settings that you would like. If it does not work, let us know. TV out support in this driver has been improved but still is in beta, and is less stable than the rest of the driver.

Bilinear Filtering and DirectDraw settings: Testing for these settings is in progress. Whether or not they function correctly has yet to be verified.

Known Issues:
  1. The BIOS is no longer the means by which the clock rate is determined or set. If your BIOS usually sets the clock rate to a rate higher than 55/111 then you should copy the provided VERITE.INI file to your Windows directory. If you are experiencing the "white dots," this should fix the problem.
  2. The Verite Control Panel does NOT save settings upon reboot or restarting Windows for most settings. The Color control does.
  3. The Control Panel will allow you to try enabling TV-Out in these supported modes:
    • Brooktree: 640x480x16bpp
    • Chrontel: 640x480 and 800x600 - all color depths.
  4. In TV-Out, depending on which BIOS you are using, going to a Fullscreen DosBox will not function correctly. The TV- out display will be garbled. However, you can Alt-Enter back to the Desktop.
  5. In TV-Out, OpenGL games may cause a 'flashing' effect.
  6. The CRTC positioning controls are currently being tested. They may allow you to choose settings that are undesirable.
  7. In D3D, some rendering artifacts may appear. We are currently in the process of refining the D3D driver architecture. Some anomalies are to be expected. Your feedback regarding these issues is appreciated.
  8. Problems with F22-ADF and European Air War have been fixed. If you still encounter problems, let us know.
  9. Depending on the video memory on board, fullscreen DVD playback will be limited accordingly. eg. on a 4MB board, you will not be able to play full screen DVD at 720x480 resolutions on a 1024x768x16 desktop.
  10. If the card is playing in TV-Out mode, then Win98 will display a Macrovision error if you attempt DVD playback. Therefore DVD playback is restricted to PC-Monitor mode only at this point.
  11. Issues related to refresh rates lower than 60Hz in PAL TV-Out mode are currently being looked at.
  12. Changing resolutions in TV Out mode may cause a hang.
  13. Version 222 of Unreal has known problems with this driver. We encourage you to use v220, which should work fine. We are working on this issue.
  14. Hangs caused when running alongside certain Adaptec SCSI controllers have been fixed.
Application Notes:
We have implemented a workaround for the Half Life menu bug. If you have trouble seeing the main menu in Half Life when running at 640x480 resolution, do the following: "set PageFlip=0" in the environment or via regedit: Rendition- >s.w.->opengl->(dword)PageFlip=0, however there's a performance penalty. A more general fix is still in the works.

Another Half Life tweak:
'gl_polyoffset 16' (in the half-life console) will alleviate the z-fighting problems for decals.

The following are known bugs with this driver and Quake 3:
  1. Color depth switching problem: Changing r_colorbits from 0 (default) may cause problems on win98.
  2. Wireframe's missing: r_showtris fails to show a majority of wireframes unless r_drawstrips is enabled.
  3. Powersave problems: Intermittent hangs when returning from powersave/suspend mode.

Please let us know what you think of this driver release and what your experiences with it are, both good and bad.
Post into the Rendition discussion forums, found at: http://www.rendition.com/forums.html or at news://news.rendition.com/.

Read Me First - License - Release Notes - Read Me GL