One of our eagle-eyed readers has pointed out that the official N96 specifications now list it as containing a "3D Graphics HW Accelerator" (look at the Processor section). This is puzzling, as it comes amidst direct denials from Nokia earlier this year that such hardware was present. Is the hardware there or not? Has it been added since the unveiling in the Spring? Was the hardware always present in a combined module but Nokia hadn't paid to use the graphics bit of the chip? Whatever the truth is, we should soon find it out once the N96 hits the shops...
Read on in the full article.
None of this matters right now of course as no N-Gage games currently support hardware graphics acceleration, but it may become important in the future as the next version of the N-Gage SDK will contain support for graphics hardware.
i hope it's not just a mess up in the specs and i've got the hopes up of ppl who want 3D hardware lol
but i'm sure u can get confirmaton soon
Well... back in February the product manager said that it didn't contain the 3D hardware of the N95. But, as you just mentioned, it doesn't actually make any difference right now - and by the time it does, we'll all be toting N99's! (^_^)
It would be the first time i see 3D Graphics Acceleration on an ARM 9 CPU! I guess the easiest way to verify if its there is by testing how a game that needs acceleration performs. For example "Gamelion Global Race" should give a clear result.
was The N96 officially released today b/c it has now been added as out now as a supported phone on the n-gage app page with the download
http://www.n-gage.com/ngi/ngage/web/g0/en/get_ngage/download.html
What is the game on N96's display in that page?
I believe that is a HWA'd demo of System Rush: Evolution (released 2006) running on a N95.
What is the game on N96's display in that page?
The news icon on the AAN front page is the hardware-accelerated System Rush demo.
The game on the picture of the N96 is Star Wars Force Unleashed for N-Gage (which doesn't use hardware acceleration).
For example "Gamelion Global Race" should give a clear result.
I thought it was hardware accelerated too, but it isn't.
Global Race is built into the E51 and looks just like it does on the N95, so it apparently doesn't use graphics hardware after all.
However, once the actual hardware is out in public I'm sure we'll be seeing tech sites reporting what is present.
Well... back in February the product manager said that it didn't contain the 3D hardware of the N95.
I didn't hear what they said exactly, but I was told that they denied the presence of any kind of 3D hardware.
But as I mentioned in the news story it's possible that they just meant the 3D hardware was present but switched off.
It's apparently fairly common to have multi-use modules in phones where the manufacturer has only paid for a limited number of functions, so only a limited number of functions are switched on. Perhaps Nokia paid a bit extra to get the graphics hardware switched on after all?
But, as you just mentioned, it doesn't actually make any difference right now - and by the time it does, we'll all be toting N99's!
On the other hand, by the time an N99 (or whatever) comes out, the N96 will be available at a much much lower price, so it could become rather attractive to a wider audience. It seems to have quite a good layout for gaming, with better buttons than the N95.
i hope it's not just a mess up in the specs and i've got the hopes up of ppl who want 3D hardware lol
but i'm sure u can get confirmaton soon
Still no confirmation, but if it's any interest, exactly the same graphics hardware spec has also been added to the N96-3 page (which is the Americas variant of the N96).
I think its most likely Forum Nokia is in error. However how exactly you define 3D acceleration might be a point here. i.e. the chip will likely have some graphics component in its architecture - there's defintely not a separate graphics co-processor though.
Note that the N96 does have video acceleration (hardware decoding on H.264 codec IIRC) so it could be a mistake leading from that.
Sorry, but I didn't mean those games. The one on n-gage site when you want to download the application for supported phones. There is a strange game no N96's screen.
That would be Worms World Party.
Tzer2 I have to disagree with you there, I have played Global Race on both my N95 8GB & E51 & while the game and UI is identical the graphics is not. I cannot really describe it but the fluidity of the game is breathtaking, it looks & plays like a PSP game, I also showed it off to some of my colleagues & they were dumbfounded...
Also if you look at the file sizes of the 2 copies of the games, the E90/N95 version & the E51 version, you will see a small file size difference & later date for the E51 version.
Which makes me to belief the 1st edition taken from the E90 firmware supports HW Acceleration and the later release version does not & is optimized for E51,E71 etc & hence,plays very well...
Also if you look at the file sizes of the 2 copies of the games,the E90/N95 version & the E51 version,you will see a small file size difference & later date for the E51 version.
Which makes me to belief the 1st edition taken from the E90 firmware supports HW Acceleration and there is a later release version that does not supports HW Acceleration & is optimized for E51,E71 etc & hence plays very well...
hargs i think you are mistaken there is always different game sized files for different phone variants,if you look at other games even java you'll see different file sizes for the variaous devices and besides no dev kit supports the use of the 3D HW until the next n-gage dev kit version
The fact that the HWA version of the Ngage SDK is not out yet, doesn�t mean that Global Race is not HWA. The 3D chip inside the N95 is compliant with the OpenGL ES 1.1 Standard. Regards
Tzer2 I have to disagree with you there, I have played Global Race on both my N95 8GB & E51 & while the game and UI is identical the graphics is not.
I've played it on an N95 and later an E51 and honestly couldn't notice any significant difference. I know this is a very subjective thing, and I didn't play them side by side, but there was nothing in the E51 version which felt cut down or jerky. To me it seemed like exactly the same game.
It is odd though, the E90's file definitely only worked on phones with a 3D chip, which is the main reason we all assumed it was accelerated. If it didn't use the chip why would it only work on chipped phones? It doesn't make much sense unless it did use the chip.
The fact that the HWA version of the Ngage SDK is not out yet, doesn�t mean that Global Race is not HWA.
You're right that there are definitely some S60 games which already use graphics hardware, but they're extremely rare at the moment.
well the only games i've come across what claim to use the 3D HW are games what was'nt even built for s60 phones but got ported over by fans etc
i aint come across no big name dev using it no matter what type of game s60 or n-gage branded
The original 2006 demo of System Rush Evolution uses the graphics chip in the N93, N95 and N82, so that's definitely at least one S60 game (or demo at least). It's very similar to the real game, but it has much more detailed objects around the playing area to show off the chip's abilities.
But yeah, I can't really think of any others, though there's nothing to stop developers using it right now as the details are all available in Forum Nokia.
Good to see you getting on board the hardware acceleration train Tzer2 😊 Choo Choo!
Sorry to go a little off-topic, but there is something I don't fully understand. The CPU inside the N95 is a Dual ARM11 running at 333 Mhz, with a 3D chip, the one inside the N96 (at least what I read in Nokia Device Details) is a Dual ARM9 running at 264 Mhz, with a 3D chip also. Now what I don't understand is that the N95 can play videos in H264 at a maximum of QVGA (320x240) resolution at 30 fps (H264 is a hardware accelerated codec), and the N96 can play videos in H264 at a maximum of VGA (640x480) resolution at 30 fps (Also hardware accelerated codec for the N96). So the N96 with a CPU running at a lower rate, and using an "older" model or architecture can play videos 4 times the size in resolution than the N95. It seems strange to me at least. Regards!
BIg NEWS
3D HWA as now been removed from specs , like a few suspected it was probably a error
ccraig wrote:BIg NEWS 3D HWA as now been removed from specs , like a few suspected it was probably a error
Now, that makes a lot more sense than it did previously, doesn't it? So it's official, the N96 does NOT have a 3D chip. Another good reason not to change my N95-3 for an N96, lol. Regards.-