Intel Linux Driver Finally Handles 8x MSAA

[phoronix]

Phoronix: Intel Linux Driver Finally Handles 8x MSAA

Intel's Linux graphics driver is finally onto supporting 8x multi-sample anti-aliasing (MSAA), assuming you're using the latest-generation Ivy Bridge graphics hardware...

http://www.phoronix.com/vr.php?view=MTE0MjY

[Redi44]

Will it be part of Mesa 8.1?

[1c3d0g]

May I ask how one changes AA/AF on Intel Sandy Bridge/Ivy Bridge GPU's? As far as I can tell, DRIconf does not expose these settings and asking around in other forums haven't given me a single answer.

[Kayden]

May I ask how one changes AA/AF on Intel Sandy Bridge/Ivy Bridge GPU's? As far as I can tell, DRIconf does not expose these settings and asking around in other forums haven't given me a single answer.

As far as I know, it's up to the application---you'd just go into your game's graphics setting screen and select what level of antialiasing you want. The OpenGL driver will simply do whatever it asks (assuming it's supported). I suppose we could add a driconf option to drop back to single sampling, but I'm not sure what the use of that would be.

Also, for what it's worth, we actually don't support 2x MSAA---the hardware just doesn't do it. Sandy Bridge offers 4x, and Ivy Bridge offers either 4x or 8x.

[Kayden]

Will it be part of Mesa 8.1?

Yes, it will.

[1c3d0g]

As far as I know, it's up to the application---you'd just go into your game's graphics setting screen and select what level of antialiasing you want. The OpenGL driver will simply do whatever it asks (assuming it's supported). I suppose we could add a driconf option to drop back to single sampling, but I'm not sure what the use of that would be.

Also, for what it's worth, we actually don't support 2x MSAA---the hardware just doesn't do it. Sandy Bridge offers 4x, and Ivy Bridge offers either 4x or 8x.

Oh, I see. The thing is: if for instance Chrome/Chromium displays a 3-D rendered object (WebGL etc.), I suppose Chrome/Chromium itself will need to have an option to toggle AA/AF on/off, right? Perhaps it should be put in the about:flags section until the setting is stable enough for mainstream use. Am I right?

Secondly, on Windows there's a very useful option to adjust the different color settings of the monitor directly through Intel's graphics control panel. This is useful for a notebook display, as it doesn't have the physical buttons to adjust RGB settings, so controlling it through the GPU is a good alternative. Is there a way to do something like this in Linux? If there's a way, I haven't found an easy solution yet.

[Kayden]

Oh, I see. The thing is: if for instance Chrome/Chromium displays a 3-D rendered object (WebGL etc.), I suppose Chrome/Chromium itself will need to have an option to toggle AA/AF on/off, right? Perhaps it should be put in the about:flags section until the setting is stable enough for mainstream use. Am I right?

Right. I just checked Firefox; it seems to have a webgl.msaa-level key in about:config. Not sure about Chromium. I imagine as WebGL matures and becomes more mainstream they'll offer more polished settings for this.

Secondly, on Windows there's a very useful option to adjust the different color settings of the monitor directly through Intel's graphics control panel. This is useful for a notebook display, as it doesn't have the physical buttons to adjust RGB settings, so controlling it through the GPU is a good alternative. Is there a way to do something like this in Linux? If there's a way, I haven't found an easy solution yet.

I'm not aware of a way to change RGB settings, sorry...though display really isn't my area of expertise. It does sound useful. As an aside: we've tried to stay away from vendor-specific control panels and instead develop APIs that all vendors can use to expose the necessary mechanism...then GNOME, KDE, and other groups can write GUIs that are consistent across vendors.

[Hamish Wilson]

I'm not aware of a way to change RGB settings, sorry...though display really isn't my area of expertise. It does sound useful. As an aside: we've tried to stay away from vendor-specific control panels and instead develop APIs that all vendors can use to expose the necessary mechanism...then GNOME, KDE, and other groups can write GUIs that are consistent across vendors.

And as a user of another companies hardware I appreciated that.

On a similar vein, although this sounds pretty hardware specific, what is the chances of getting MSAA on Radeon and Nouveau? How much of this is Mesa and how much of this is drive side?

[smitty3268]

Oh, I see. The thing is: if for instance Chrome/Chromium displays a 3-D rendered object (WebGL etc.), I suppose Chrome/Chromium itself will need to have an option to toggle AA/AF on/off, right? Perhaps it should be put in the about:flags section until the setting is stable enough for mainstream use. Am I right?

Chrome and Firefox both default to having it on for all WebGL right now. It looks like Firefox defaults to 2 on my machine, though, so I'm not sure what that does on Intel. Off, i suppose? Not sure about what level Chrome defaults to.

Edit: The WebGL spec specifies that it is supposed to default to AA = on, so i guess that makes sense. The javascript can change the setting when it creates the context.

[RussianNeuroMancer]

Secondly, on Windows there's a very useful option to adjust the different color settings of the monitor directly through Intel's graphics control panel. This is useful for a notebook display, as it doesn't have the physical buttons to adjust RGB settings, so controlling it through the GPU is a good alternative. Is there a way to do something like this in Linux? If there's a way, I haven't found an easy solution yet.

At least for KDE there is KGamma.