March 13, 2002: PowerVR Technologies a division of Imagination Technologies unveiled the PowerVR KYRO II SE 3D Graphics Accelerator today at CeBIT 2002. KYRO II SE is the third processor in the KYRO family of 2D/3D graphics and video accelerators.
The PowerVR KYRO II SE processor, rated at 200 MHz, delivers an outstanding combination of frame rate performance and image quality, thanks to an architecture that makes extremely efficient use of the available memory bandwidth and incorporates a host of sophisticated features that support user demand for ever-increasing scene complexity. PowerVR technology typically requires less than one third of the memory bandwidth required by conventional 3D accelerators, which allows content developers to focus on realistic environments rather than having to resort to programming tricks to reduce scene complexity and image quality, which are required to improve frame rate with traditional 3D accelerators.
PowerVR takes a different algorithmic approach to 3D, aiming to eliminate redundant processing and avoid memory bottlenecks. By doing only what is absolutely necessary, and by keeping as much 3D processing as possible on-chip, PowerVR allows maximum performance to be extracted from the available memory bandwidth, enabling KYRO II SE to not only deliver exhilarating performance today, but also to keep pace with users’ escalating demands for higher visual quality.
KYRO II SE Features
EnT&L™
To deliver optimal cost-performance KYRO II SE supports the new EnT&L driver technology which unites the advanced features of KYRO II SE with transform and lighting to provide superior performance to cost comparable solutions. EnT&L is optimized for KYRO II SE AGP 4X SBA operation and Implicit Guard Band Clipping.
Smarter Rendering Technology
As game complexity increases, so does overdraw, resulting in performance decreases on traditional graphics architectures. KYRO II SE’s PowerVR architecture utilizes a smarter rendering technology, which defers texturing to ensure that only graphics information that will be visible on screen is processed. This smarter graphics architecture allows KYRO II SE to outperform cost-comparative graphics solutions based on traditional graphics architectures. Smarter rendering technology also ensures that as game complexity increases KYRO II SE based cards will remain a more effective performance solution than graphics cards based on traditional architectures. KYRO II SE’s smarter rendering technology is fully transparent under DirectX and OGL ensuring that games designers can take advantage of its performance features without additional programming and KYRO II SE’s smarter rendering technology can improve performance on all DirectX and OGL compatible games titles.
Textur8™
With Textur8 KYRO II SE fully supports single pass 8-layer multitexturing the maximum allowed in DirectX 8.1 significantly improving on the texturing capabilities of traditional accelerators. With its support of multiple texture layers, KYRO II SE allows more detailed backgrounds, realistically lit models, and more plausible environments to be created. When compared with traditional accelerators, KYRO II SE’s 8-layer multitexturing results in significant performance and quality improvements. Single pass 8-layer multitexturing is currently only available on KYRO family products and traditional renderers have to perform multiple passes to achieve the same effects, which reduces performance and degrades image quality.
TrueRender™ OnChip FSAA
KYRO II SE provides pixel-perfect FSAA with zero memory footprint allowing class-leading FSAA performance and enhanced image quality without requiring the large amounts of additional memory for FSAA data storage needed by traditional renderers. This frees KYRO II SE board memory for other uses, like storage of larger and more complex textures. KYRO II SE makes use of TrueRender OnChip to implement both 2X and 4X high quality Full Scene Anti-Aliasing.
Bump Map Complete™
KYRO II SE’s Bump Map Complete bump-mapping engine provides the most complete support for DirectX 8.1 bump mapping features of any graphics card in its class with support for EMBM, Dot3 and Embossed
KYRO II SE’s Environment Bump Mapping uses per pixel operations to represent detail on any polygon. As KYRO II SE’s Environment Bump Mapping is fully DirectX 8.1 compliant, developers are able to use it to create a wide range of effects including making metal, plastic, rubber, or other objects look real. KYRO II SE also supports Dot3 bump mapping for additional shading detail within polygons and per-pixel lighting as well as embossed bump mapping for the maximum compatibility with the latest 3D titles.
Internal True Colour
All of KYRO II SE’s pixel operations are rendered on chip at full 32-bit Internal True Colour resolution, maintaining the best possible image quality irrespective of the number of image layers or frame buffer bit depth. When operating in 16bpp frame buffer, KYRO II SE avoids the colour banding or grainy effects seen on traditional hardware, and the consumer receives best game performance without sacrificing visual quality. Internal True Colour also saves memory bandwidth whatever the colour depth, thus enabling KYRO to provide class-leading performance in 32bpp modes.
PowerVR KYRO II SE also includes a fast 128-bit 2D engine, hardware video playback and DVD decode assistance, AGP 4x Bus Master Interface, a 128-bit SGRAM/SDRAM interface with up to 64 MB support, and integrated Palette DAC. A video input port allows connection to a wide range of video source and capture peripherals, while a digital video output port provides glueless connection to flat panel displays and TV encoders.
wie kommt man darauf 😆
