-= 3DFX Video Renderer V1.1 =- (c)1998 Tjalling Hattink ----------------------------------------------------------------------- 1) Introduction This program is an addon for active movie. It replaces the original video renderer. The video renderer is a part of the active movie system and is responsible of showing the frames of a movie on the screen in a window. When the 3DFX Video Renderer is enabled it will do the job instead. It shows the frames stretched fullscreen on the 3dfx card. The software doesn't have to stretch the frames anymore and the 3dfx uses the bilinear filtering to make the movie look better. If you have a tv output you can even show the video on the tv. Because this program only replaces the video part the rest will be processed by the default parts. You can still use the standard active movie player. This program is SHAREWARE. You will see a text coming up slowly when you play a movie. If you register this text will be removed. You are required to register after 14 days. At the end of this readme you can read how to register. 2) Requirements To use this program you need at least windows95 or windowsNT and a 3dfx or 3dfx2 card. Glide 2.3 or later should also be installed and ofcourse active movie. To use the other utils you also need mfc 4.2 or later but I assume it's always installed. 3) Installing Note: Before installing be sure to uninstall any previous version. Otherwise you could get a mix up of the renderers. To install this program just run setup.exe. It will prompt for a directory to install to and a menugroup for the links. Then it will install all the files and enable the 3dfx renderer. There should be 6 links in your start menu. You can also uninstall the program using the uninstaller in the control panel or using the uninstall link in the start menu directly. To use as much colors as possible during playback set your gamma settings on 1. Otherwise you have less colors and the movie will look blocky. 4) How to use There are 6 links in the start menu: - Disable 3DFX Renderer : This option disables (not uninstall) the renderer and the default window renderer will be used. - Enable 3DFX Renderer : This option enables the 3dfx renderer again. - Readme : Link to this readme - Register 3DFX Renderer : This runs a little program where you can enter the registration code for disabling the shareware text. - Uninstall 3DFX Video Renderer : This uninstalls the renderer and the normal window renderer will always be used again. - Properties 3DFX Renderer : Here you can enter various settings for the renderer. See below for more info. When you start a movie and the renderer is enabled the 3dfx will be turned on directly. If you play the movie on the monitor you can't see the player anymore. The following shortcuts (of the default active movie player) do work: CTRL+LEFT ARROW Rewind CTRL+P Pause CTRL+R Run CTRL+RIGHT ARROW Forward CTRL+S Stop CTRL+SHIFT+LEFT ARROW Previous CTRL+SHIFT+RIGHT ARROW Next ALT-F4 Quit The Properties: In the Color Modes section you can enable of disable various bit modes: 8 Bit: the renderer uses a palette of 256 colors and the quality is bad. But some videos can only play in this mode. 16 Bit 555: the render uses 5 bits for Red, Green and Blue. It's almost the same as 565 16 Bit 565: the render uses 5 bits for Red and Blue and 6 bits for Green. This mode gives the best quality for 16 bits and doesn't take too much cpu time. 24 Bit: the render uses 8 bits for Red, Green and Blue and is the best quality possible on the 3dfx card. Only this mode takes much more cpu time because I have to upload very small textures. Default are the 8 and 16 bit modes enabled and 24 bit mode disabled. Usually you don't have to change any settings, if you have a very fast computer you can try the 24 bits mode. I still have to optimize this one. Just try it once to see the quality difference. The renderer always tries to use the best bit mode available. That depends on what you enabled and what bit modes the movie supports. 5) Bugs and future plans This program is tested on pure3d, flash3d, monster3d, miro hischore3d, hercules stingray3d and other rush cards and the creative voodoo2 card. The rush card is still acting somewhat buggy so I'll try to get my hands on one soon and fix it all. The voodoo2 bug should be fixed by know. Please let me know if it doesn't work on your card or if you find another bug. You can mail me at tjalling@op3dfx.com. The player only uses 640x480 60Hz fullscreen. I'll support more modes in the future. Also 'keep aspect ratio' and 'zooming' are going to be implemented. The 24 bit mode needs to be optimized. Currently I use the standard player but maybe I'll develop my own player that is also visible on the 3dfx screen. 6) Registering This software is shareware. You may evaluate it for 14 days. After that you are required to register. The registration fee is $15 or 25 DFL. To register send cash (no checks!) to the following address: Tjalling Hattink Calslaan 44-306 7522 ME Enschede The Netherlands Include your e-mail address also so I can mail you the registration code. If I receive enough support I'll keep developing on this program. If you have any suggestions or bugs please mail me on tjalling@op3dfx.com. I need it to make this program better. It's allowed to spread this program only when there's no fee charged for it (except for media costs) and no files are changed in this package. 7) Updates I hope to update this program with extra functionality and ofcourse bugfixes. To obtain the latest version check out www.op3dfx.com or ftp.op3dfx.com where I'll always try to release the latest version. 8) Disclaimer The usage of this program is at your own risk! I assume no liability, whatsoever. Although this program has been extensively tested, you are adviced that random problems might occur. I'm in no way responsible for any damage caused by this program to the system or in any other way. 9) History V1.0 - First version. Only supported 640x480 60 Hz fullscreen with 8 and 16 bit colormodes. It was only tested on pure3d and flash3d. It doesn't work good on voodoo2 cards. V1.1 - Added 24 bits mode but is quite slow. Voodoo2 bug hopefully fixed. ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Thanks for using this program and have fun with it! Tjalling Hattink