Posted By
George
on 2024-01-23
10:58:41
 |  Your thoughts: 3d accelerator card for the plus/4
Hi all,
for some time now i am thinking about hardware 3d-acceleration on 8 bits like nintendo did with their 3d games back then. The :Voodo +4" should provide an Api for making wireframe 3d games or demos like Elite or Starwars easy without re-inventing the wheel every time. Maybe even programable and expandable. Plugable like a cartrige. Whats your opinion in this thought-experiment?
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Posted By
gerliczer
on 2024-01-23
11:03:35
| Re: Your thoughts: 3d accelerator card for the plus/4
Cease and desist. 
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Posted By
Csabo
on 2024-01-23
11:40:42
| Re: Your thoughts: 3d accelerator card for the plus/4
I get where you're coming from, but I'm also not a huge fan of doing something like this. I might not be able to clearly articulate why, but it's something like... it's not a Plus/4 any more. If you wants to do fast 3D stuff, why artificially limit yourself with whatever this thing would do? You could just code for the Amiga or PC or some consoles.
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Posted By
George
on 2024-01-23
12:28:19
| Re: Your thoughts: 3d accelerator card for the plus/4
I understand your point and and i totally respect it. Icould say the same about adding a Sid chip to the plus/4. Also not a plus/4 anymore.
But i don't have any problem with both (Sid and 3dchip) because its an expression of creativity on the platform of choice. I would like to see fluent vector graphics on our platform. Even if it's a period correct acellerator.
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Posted By
MIK
on 2024-01-23
12:57:36
 | Re: Your thoughts: 3d accelerator card for the plus/4
Yep, Amiga is your best bet from a retro point of view. The Amiga version of Super Hang-on and Star Wars (Atari Arcade) are very cool, and you only need a basic A500.
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Posted By
gerliczer
on 2024-01-23
13:00:15
| Re: Your thoughts: 3d accelerator card for the plus/4
That you could achieve by post-processing the result of your work on the high end machine to match the aesthetics of a TED based computer without any out-of-place add-on. A general accelerator based on up to something like a real 65816 may be considered a not too alien expansion, but anything representing a computing paradigm not fitting the period during which these computers were made has nothing to do here. 3D acceleration is not period correct. Keyrah (https://icomp.de/shop-icomp/en/produkt-details/product/keyrah-v3.html) is an idea and product existing for long years now, if you want to deceive yourself that you are doing retro computing using modern hardware. Just my €0.02.
BTW, there are nice, high frame rate vector graphics on our machines, but not at the polygon counts you unreasonably want to achieve. Things beyond possibilities are beyond possibilities. 
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Posted By
George
on 2024-01-23
15:55:15
| Re: Your thoughts: 3d accelerator card for the plus/4
@geliczer Your opionion is well respected of course. But i can't agree that 3D acceleration (in general, maybe not in the homecomputer area) is not period correct. 3D acceleration was always a thing:
https://retrocomputing.stackexchange.com/questions/11103/when-and-what-was-the-first-3d-acceleration-device-ever-released
Even the Amigas were upgraded with FPU's to increase the "unreasonable" amount polycount and do things that exceeded their original capabilties. Every computer system at any time was upgraded with the latest tech they had. And Amigas are still upgraded with moderrn tech.
Today we use modern sd2iec drives, with from the 80's perspective insane amount of "diskspace". Out of place add-ons or reasonable modern expansions?
Its of course a philosophical standpoint. I personally like combine old with new tech.
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Posted By
MMS
on 2024-01-24
13:24:15
 | Re: Your thoughts: 3d accelerator card for the plus/4
I remember when the PC CPUs started to be really fast, and they tried software rendering.
It never reached the same level of details, shading, colors and speed as the basic Riva128 with HW acceleration (the very first card I bought after the useless S3Trio3D)
Why I say that? Because speeding up the CPU is a potential alternative on this computer. You use exactly the same commands, but it executes faster. On Plus/4 there is a chance doing this, if you use only SRAM andall the ROM content is in the SRAM too as a shadow ROM. The TED given FRQ can be 2xquadriplied with frq mulitiplier (~13,6MHz) and the 14Mhz capable WDC65C02S could be used instead of 8501, though you loose the irregular commands. Th 6502 is compatible with the fastloaders
On the screen area the computer would be the same speed as now due to TED, while on the border it will be close to 14MHz. RAM and ROM access could be changed to SRAM, reacts way faster (so all the BASIC routines and interpreter could be faster).
The only quastion is the are TED registers and the ICs, like 8511, how much you need to wait to able to switch a register before doing anything with the new mode...
This idea is much better than my original brainstorming on an external eZ80 at 25Mhz (equal to a 6502 runs on 40mHz)), that could work mainly as an external FPU, as not code compatible with 8501, though at that time I was thinking a little CP/M and a little SymbOS.
BTW did you know that the ATARI GEM/TOS and GEMDOS are definitely a version of CP/M?
But still, the approx 5x faster machine cannot make a miracle on 3D vectors, or the attribute gfx be as sharp and fast as a 320x200+121 color chunky display with 3D support 
At least Driller would be way faster than on ZX Spectrum
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Posted By
MIK
on 2024-01-24
17:38:12
| Re: Your thoughts: 3d accelerator card for the plus/4
Return of Rockman at twice the speed is fun with Yape.
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