Rendition, Inc., was a maker of
3D computer graphics
3D computer graphics, or “3D graphics,” sometimes called CGI, 3D-CGI or three-dimensional computer graphics are graphics that use a three-dimensional representation of geometric data (often Cartesian) that is stored in the computer for th ...
chipset
In a computer system, a chipset is a set of electronic components
An electronic component is any basic discrete device or physical entity in an electronic system used to affect electrons or their associated fields. Electronic components are ...
s in the mid to late 1990s. They were known for products such as the Vérité 1000 and Vérité 2x00 and for being one of the first 3D chipset makers to directly work with ''
Quake'' developer
John Carmack
John D. Carmack II (born August 20, 1970) is an American computer programmer and video game developer. He co-founded the video game company id Software and was the lead programmer of its 1990s games ''Commander Keen'', ''Wolfenstein 3D'', ''Doo ...
to make a hardware-accelerated version of the game (vQuake). Rendition's major competitor at the time was
3Dfx. Their proprietary rendering
API
An application programming interface (API) is a way for two or more computer programs to communicate with each other. It is a type of software interface, offering a service to other pieces of software. A document or standard that describes how ...
s were Speedy3D (for DOS) and RRedline (for Windows).
3D Chipsets
Vérité V1000
![Sierrascreamin3d](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/6f/Sierrascreamin3d.jpg)
Released in 1996, Rendition's V1000
chipset
In a computer system, a chipset is a set of electronic components
An electronic component is any basic discrete device or physical entity in an electronic system used to affect electrons or their associated fields. Electronic components are ...
was notable for its
RISC
In computer engineering, a reduced instruction set computer (RISC) is a computer designed to simplify the individual instructions given to the computer to accomplish tasks. Compared to the instructions given to a complex instruction set comput ...
-based architecture. The V1000 was the first PC graphics card to utilize a programmable core to
render 3D graphics. V1000 was both faster and more advanced (in terms of features) than competitors such as the
Matrox
Matrox Graphics, Inc. is a producer of video card components and equipment for personal computers and workstations. Based in Dorval, Quebec, Canada, it was founded in 1976 by Lorne Trottier and Branko Matić. The name is derived from "Ma" in Mat ...
Millennium,
ATI
Ati or ATI may refer to:
* Ati people, a Negrito ethnic group in the Philippines
**Ati language (Philippines), the language spoken by this people group
** Ati-Atihan festival, an annual celebration held in the Philippines
*Ati language (China), a ...
Rage/3D, and
S3 Virge3D. Only
3DFX's Voodoo Graphics was faster, but unlike the 3DFX Voodoo, the V1000 included 2D/VGA capability making it the only acceptably fast single-board solution for 3D games.
Vérité supported a local framebuffer of up to 4 MB
EDO DRAM
Dynamic random-access memory (dynamic RAM or DRAM) is a type of random-access semiconductor memory that stores each bit of data in a memory cell, usually consisting of a tiny capacitor and a transistor, both typically based on metal-oxide ...
, on a 64-bit bus (for a theoretical 400 MB/s bandwidth). Aside from 3D games, Vérité contained an IBM VGA compatible
display controller
A video display controller or VDC (also called a display engine or display interface) is an integrated circuit which is the main component in a video-signal generator, a device responsible for the production of a TV video signal in a computing ...
, and served as a traditional 2D/GUI accelerator for the Windows operating system.
Vérité's first claim to fame was being the only accelerator supported by ''Quake''.
Board partner
Number Nine Visual Technology
Number Nine Visual Technology Corporation was a manufacturer of video graphics chips and cards from 1982 to 1999. Number Nine developed the first 128-bit graphics processor (the Imagine 128), as well as the first 256-color (8-bit) and 16.8 m ...
later canceled their Vérité products. In the book Masters of Doom, Carmack cited bad experiences with programming the Vérité as the reason for id's shift away from proprietary APIs toward the industry-standard
OpenGL
OpenGL (Open Graphics Library) is a cross-language, cross-platform application programming interface (API) for rendering 2D and 3D vector graphics. The API is typically used to interact with a graphics processing unit (GPU), to achieve hardwa ...
.
The V1000 was fairly popular when it was launched. At least four companies sold Vérité boards: the
Creative Labs
Creative Technology Ltd. is a Singaporean multinational technology company headquartered with overseas offices in Shanghai, Tokyo, Dublin, and Silicon Valley (where in the US it is known as Creative Labs). The principal activities of the compa ...
3D Blaster PCI, the
Sierra Screamin' 3D, the
Canopus
Canopus is the brightest star in the southern constellation of Carina and the second-brightest star in the night sky. It is also designated α Carinae, which is Latinised to Alpha Carinae. With a visual apparent magnitude ...
Total 3D, and the
Intergraph
Intergraph Corporation was an American software development and services company, which now forms part of Hexagon AB. It provides enterprise engineering and geospatially powered software to businesses, governments, and organizations around the w ...
Reactor (later renamed Intense 3D 100).
A handful of software titles shipped with V1000 support. As the ATI Rage/3D, S3 Virge/3D, and Matrox Mystique delivered 3D/graphics of questionable benefit,
id Software
id Software LLC () is an American video game developer based in Richardson, Texas. It was founded on February 1, 1991, by four members of the computer company Softdisk: programmers John Carmack and John Romero, game designer Tom Hall, and ar ...
's
vQuake
''Quake'' is a first-person shooter game developed by id Software and published by GT Interactive. The first game in the ''Quake'' series, it was originally released for MS-DOS, Microsoft Windows and Linux in 1996, followed by Mac OS and Sega ...
and
Eidos
Eidos may refer to:
* Eidos (philosophy), a Greek term meaning "form" "essence", "type" or "species". See Plato's theory of forms and Aristotle's theory of universals
* Eidos plc, a British software company, which created video game publisher Eido ...
's
Tomb Raider
''Tomb Raider'', also known as ''Lara Croft: Tomb Raider'' from 2001 to 2008, is a media franchise that originated with an action-adventure video game series created by British gaming company Core Design. Formerly owned by Eidos Interactive, th ...
were influential in fueling consumer interest in 3D rendering hardware. The Vérité (and Voodoo) ports added 16-bit color rendering,
bilinear filtering
In mathematics, bilinear interpolation is a method for interpolating functions of two variables (e.g., ''x'' and ''y'') using repeated linear interpolation. It is usually applied to functions sampled on a 2D rectilinear grid, though it can be g ...
, per-polygon
MIP mapping, and edge
anti-aliasing Anti-aliasing may refer to any of a number of techniques to combat the problems of aliasing in a sampled signal such as a digital image or digital audio recording.
Specific topics in anti-aliasing include:
* Anti-aliasing filter, a filter used be ...
to the game's 3D visuals. Released in time for Christmas 1996, both vQuake and Tomb Raider demonstrated the V1000's 3D/hardware to be both faster and better-looking than software rendering on even the most powerful host CPU.
An interesting piece of V1000's technology was its use of bus master
DMA transfers for data transfer across the PCI bus. This allowed the board to transfer data much more efficiently than with the alternative
FIFO mode of the bus. Unfortunately, the immaturity of the PCI bus at the time, and the limited use of bus mastering in general in systems of the day, caused DMA bugs to surface with Vérité. If a motherboard chipset wasn't capable of DMA, Vérité was forced to operate in FIFO mode and performance dropped dramatically. Additionally, on some motherboards, DMA support was incomplete or improperly implemented and speed was quite poor. Both of these issues combined to cause frequent problems for owners of the V1000. Rendition had a DMA test utility to benchmark a motherboard's support of DMA transfers. Some DOS games with Speedy3D Vérité support, such as
IndyCar Racing II
''IndyCar Racing II'' is a racing game developed by Papyrus Design Group. It is the sequel to IndyCar Racing, and was released in 1995 for the DOS, Mac OS and Windows. A little over a year later, the game was re-released, with a few minor upgrades ...
, offered a mode using DMA and a mode using FIFO, in order to bypass these issues.
The Vérité performed
triangle setup
This is a glossary of terms relating to computer graphics
Computer graphics deals with generating images with the aid of computers. Today, computer graphics is a core technology in digital photography, film, video games, cell phone and comp ...
in hardware. Rendition frequently touted its setup engine as an advantage against 3Dfx's Voodoo Graphics, because hardware setup reduced the host CPU's processing requirements for drawing complex 3D scenes. Unfortunately, the Vérité's 3D/engine lacked the necessary fill rate to capitalize on this advantage; the V1000's pixel fill rate was, at best, roughly 25Mpixels/second (little more than half that of the Voodoo Graphics.) Design limitations prevented V1000 from sustaining that level in many games (e.g. when the software uses
z-buffering
A depth buffer, also known as a z-buffer, is a type of data buffer used in computer graphics to represent depth information of objects in 3D space from a particular perspective. Depth buffers are an aid to rendering a scene to ensure that the ...
). While the Voodoo did become the accelerator of choice for high-budget 3D/gamers, the V1000's triangle setup and integrated 2D/VGA core attracted many gamers looking to upgrade on a modest budget.
Outside of 3D games, V1000's (2D) performance was subpar in almost every way. On the extreme, in regular MCGA/
VGA
Video Graphics Array (VGA) is a video display controller and accompanying de facto graphics standard, first introduced with the IBM PS/2 line of computers in 1987, which became ubiquitous in the PC industry within three years. The term can no ...
resolution or "
Mode X Mode X is an alternative 256-color graphics display mode of the IBM VGA graphics hardware that was popularized by Michael Abrash. It was first published in July 1991 in '' Dr. Dobb's Journal'', and republished in chapters 47-49 of Abrash's ''Graph ...
", the V1000's performance was embarrassingly slow; older MS-DOS games (such as ''
Doom
Doom is another name for damnation.
Doom may also refer to:
People
* Doom (professional wrestling), the tag team of Ron Simmons and Butch Reed
* Daniel Doom (born 1934), Belgian cyclist
* Debbie Doom (born 1963), American softball pitcher
* ...
'') ran at near slideshow speeds, even on a top-of-the-line host CPU (
Pentium
Pentium is a brand used for a series of x86 architecture-compatible microprocessors produced by Intel. The original Pentium processor from which the brand took its name was first released on March 22, 1993. After that, the Pentium II and Pe ...
166 MHz). Rendition introduced "renutil", an MS-DOS utility, to address performance in MCGA graphics mode. The utility redirected MCGA (VGA-compatible) display mode setup to an equivalent VESA display mode, bypassing the Vérité's slow VGA core. The utility worked with all MCGA games, but was completely incompatible with games using "Mode X" VGA display mode, which could not be emulated using the VESA mode. Within
Windows 95
Windows 95 is a consumer-oriented operating system developed by Microsoft as part of its Windows 9x family of operating systems. The first operating system in the 9x family, it is the successor to Windows 3.1x, and was released to manufacturin ...
, the V1000 was passable, scoring neither top nor bottom in ZDnet's benchmark suite. In
VESA VBE 2.0 display mode, Vérité's speed was outstanding, comparable to other top-rated cards of the era (such as the Matrox and ARK Logic PCI VGA chipsets.)
While Rendition had tried to craft the V1000 to support many
application programming interface
An application programming interface (API) is a way for two or more computer programs to communicate with each other. It is a type of software interface, offering a service to other pieces of software. A document or standard that describes how t ...
s (APIs), these APIs were in their infancy at the time. For example, Microsoft's
Direct3D
Direct3D is a graphics application programming interface (API) for Microsoft Windows. Part of DirectX, Direct3D is used to render three-dimensional graphics in applications where performance is important, such as games. Direct3D uses hardware a ...
standard was in rapid development with major changes occurring. V1000 was not optimized for this new Direct3D standard. However, this was more the fault of the API because Direct3D, at the time, lacked support for DMA transfers. The design of V1000, with its RISC core, was one of programmability. Because the
GPU
A graphics processing unit (GPU) is a specialized electronic circuit designed to manipulate and alter memory to accelerate the creation of images in a frame buffer intended for output to a display device. GPUs are used in embedded systems, mobi ...
was not "hardwired" as ASICs are, the chip could potentially adapt to newer or differing standards than it was initially designed for. Performance limitations, however, inevitably dictated that the chip was not able to grow significantly. OpenGL support, for example, was very limited on V1000.
Vérité V2x00
![Renditionv2200ref](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7f/Renditionv2200ref.jpg)
Rendition's 2nd generation architecture consisted of the Vérité V2100 and V2200. The chips were refined versions of the V1000 technology, most notably offering a single-cycle
pixel
In digital imaging, a pixel (abbreviated px), pel, or picture element is the smallest addressable element in a raster image, or the smallest point in an all points addressable display device.
In most digital display devices, pixels are the smal ...
computation (the V1000 took more than a single clock cycle to calculate each pixel). This boosted the chips' fill rate nearly twofold, and combined with faster memory and a slightly faster core clock rate, offered performance modestly ahead of 3Dfx Voodoo Graphics (the benchmark of the time).
These two chips were identical in every way other than clock speed, with the V2100 being used as a "value"-oriented chip. V2100 was typically clocked at 40-45 MHz, while V2200 was typically seen at 55-60 MHz. The V2100 only saw implementation on one board, the
Diamond Multimedia
Diamond Multimedia is an American company that specializes in many forms of multimedia technology. They have produced graphics cards, motherboards, modems, sound cards and MP3 players, however the company began with the production of the TrackS ...
Stealth II S220 PCI with 4 MB SGRAM, which was offered at $100 initially but quickly dropped to $50 due to limited demand. The Stealth II even received a BIOS update later in its life to up the clock speed of the V2100 to the same level as a V2200, as an attempt to boost interest in the card. The V2200 was seen on several cards, most notably the
Hercules
Hercules (, ) is the Roman equivalent of the Greek divine hero Heracles, son of Jupiter and the mortal Alcmena. In classical mythology, Hercules is famous for his strength and for his numerous far-ranging adventures.
The Romans adapted the Gr ...
Thriller 3D offered in both
AGP and PCI formats, with 4 MB or 8 MB
SGRAM
Synchronous dynamic random-access memory (synchronous dynamic RAM or SDRAM) is any DRAM where the operation of its external pin interface is coordinated by an externally supplied clock signal.
DRAM integrated circuits (ICs) produced from the ea ...
. V2200 offered a 55 megapixel/second fillrate with all of the features expected of a 3D accelerator at the time. Additions to the 2D and video acceleration improved performance and allowed hardware acceleration of
DVD
The DVD (common abbreviation for Digital Video Disc or Digital Versatile Disc) is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 1995 and first released on November 1, 1996, in Japan. The medium can store any kind ...
playback. The new chips were designed for
Microsoft Windows 9x and
NT 4
Windows NT 4.0 is a major release of the Windows NT operating system developed by Microsoft and oriented towards businesses. It is the direct successor to Windows NT 3.51, which was released to manufacturing on July 31, 1996, and then to retail ...
.
Rendition and Hercules were at one point cooperating on a "Thriller Conspiracy" project which combined a
Fujitsu
is a Japanese multinational information and communications technology equipment and services corporation, established in 1935 and headquartered in Tokyo. Fujitsu is the world's sixth-largest IT services provider by annual revenue, and the la ...
FXG-1 "Pinolite" geometry processor with a V2200 core to create a graphics card with a full
transform and lighting
Transform, clipping, and lighting (T&L or TCL) is a term used in computer graphics.
Overview
Transformation is the task of producing a two-dimensional view of a three-dimensional scene. Clipping means only drawing the parts of the scene that w ...
(T&L) engine years before Nvidia's
GeForce 256
The GeForce 256 is the original release in Nvidia's " GeForce" product-line. Announced on August 31, 1999 and released on October 11, 1999, the GeForce 256 improves on its predecessor ( RIVA TNT2) by increasing the number of fixed pixel pipeli ...
or ATI's
Radeon 7000. This board, designed to further reduce the load placed upon the system's CPU, never made it to market. Rumors spread that it was to be launched during Summer 1998, with a 9 MB board (1 MB for the Pinolite) costing $149
USD
The United States dollar (symbol: $; code: USD; also abbreviated US$ or U.S. Dollar, to distinguish it from other dollar-denominated currencies; referred to as the dollar, U.S. dollar, American dollar, or colloquially buck) is the official ...
. Preliminary benchmarks showed very consistent performance regardless of the system's CPU speed. Unfortunately, by the time it would have launched, there were far more powerful accelerators available, such as NVIDIA's
RIVA TNT and 3Dfx's
Voodoo 2, that would have significantly overshadowed this board
photo
One of the most peculiar graphics boards ever made was part of the V2200 family. The Jazz Multimedia Outlaw 3D "Bonny & Clyde" combined both an AGP and a PCI connector on the same board. To use one or the other the user simply flipped the card and metal edge bracket over and plugged it in.
Vérité V3300 RRedline (unreleased)
The V3300 is Rendition's third generation 3D graphics chipset. It would have been manufactured on a 0.35
μm process at
IBM and would have replaced the V2200 as Rendition's high-end chipset in early 1999. This chipset was never released. After several delays, in 1998 Rendition was purchased by
Micron Technology
Micron Technology, Inc. is an American producer of computer memory and computer data storage including dynamic random-access memory, flash memory, and USB flash drives. It is headquartered in Boise, Idaho. Its consumer products, including ...
and the project was cancelled.
*Dual Pixel Engine
**dual-texturing for
bilinear and trilinear filtering
**
specular highlighting (per vertex),
Anti-aliasing Anti-aliasing may refer to any of a number of techniques to combat the problems of aliasing in a sampled signal such as a digital image or digital audio recording.
Specific topics in anti-aliasing include:
* Anti-aliasing filter, a filter used be ...
**3 million triangles/second triangle setup engine, 200 million pixels/s trilinear fillrate
*Dual independent 250 MHz
RAMDAC
A random-access memory digital-to-analog converter (RAMDAC) is a combination of three fast digital-to-analog converters (DACs) with a small static random-access memory (SRAM) used in computer graphics display controllers or video cards to store th ...
CRT controllers
*
iDCT transformations &
motion compensation
Motion compensation in computing, is an algorithmic technique used to predict a frame in a video, given the previous and/or future frames by accounting for motion of the camera and/or objects in the video. It is employed in the encoding of video d ...
support (DVD playback acceleration)
*Compatible with 166 MHz
SDRAM
Synchronous dynamic random-access memory (synchronous dynamic RAM or SDRAM) is any DRAM where the operation of its external pin interface is coordinated by an externally supplied clock signal.
DRAM integrated circuits (ICs) produced from the ...
/
SGRAM
Synchronous dynamic random-access memory (synchronous dynamic RAM or SDRAM) is any DRAM where the operation of its external pin interface is coordinated by an externally supplied clock signal.
DRAM integrated circuits (ICs) produced from the ea ...
*128-bit bus architecture
*
AGP 2X execute mode support
Vérité V4400E (unreleased)
With its acquisition by Micron in 1998, Rendition had hoped to take advantage of Micron's embedded DRAM technology. After the setbacks to the V3300 project, and its eventual cancellation due to delays, Rendition came back with promises for a V4400 chip in 2000. This new chip was purported to have 125 million transistors mostly used by 12 MB of
embedded memory, a stunning level of complexity for the day. Although this embedded memory design was later used in Micron's
AMD Athlon chipset codenamed "Mamba", the actual graphics chip never surfaced.
Previewed Micron "SuperChip2" motherboard chipset specifications:
* 180 nm process
*
DDR SDRAM
Double Data Rate Synchronous Dynamic Random-Access Memory (DDR SDRAM) is a double data rate (DDR) synchronous dynamic random-access memory (SDRAM) class of memory integrated circuits used in computers. DDR SDRAM, also retroactively called DDR1 ...
memory interface
* Rendition V4400 graphics core with 4 MB
embedded DRAM
Embedded DRAM (eDRAM) is dynamic random-access memory (DRAM) integrated on the same die or multi-chip module (MCM) of an application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC) or microprocessor. eDRAM's cost-per-bit is higher when compared to equival ...
. Can use system RAM as well.
*
PCI
PCI may refer to:
Business and economics
* Payment card industry, businesses associated with debit, credit, and other payment cards
** Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard, a set of security requirements for credit card processors
* Pro ...
interface,
USB
Universal Serial Bus (USB) is an industry standard that establishes specifications for cables, connectors and protocols for connection, communication and power supply (interfacing) between computers, peripherals and other computers. A broad ...
interface,
Ultra ATA
Parallel ATA (PATA), originally , also known as IDE, is a standard interface designed for IBM PC-compatible computers. It was first developed by Western Digital and Compaq in 1986 for compatible hard drives and CD or DVD drives. The connectio ...
66, AC'98 audio controller,
IEEE 1394
IEEE 1394 is an interface standard for a serial bus for high-speed communications and isochronous real-time data transfer. It was developed in the late 1980s and early 1990s by Apple in cooperation with a number of companies, primarily Sony an ...
interface
Games with Rendition support
Rendition built a thorough list of supported games by encouraging developers large and small to make use of their free
API
An application programming interface (API) is a way for two or more computer programs to communicate with each other. It is a type of software interface, offering a service to other pieces of software. A document or standard that describes how ...
s. Rendition originally provided developers with Speedy3D, a
DOS
DOS is shorthand for the MS-DOS and IBM PC DOS family of operating systems.
DOS may also refer to:
Computing
* Data over signalling (DoS), multiplexing data onto a signalling channel
* Denial-of-service attack (DoS), an attack on a communicat ...
-based API, as most game development in 1995-96 was still centered on DOS. Later, Rendition released their
Win32
The Windows API, informally WinAPI, is Microsoft's core set of application programming interfaces (APIs) available in the Microsoft Windows operating systems. The name Windows API collectively refers to several different platform implementations th ...
version of the API, branded RRedline. Like 3Dfx, Rendition was one of the first 3D chipset makers to see the value of homebrew programming by releasing a free programming API to the public. In much the same manner as 3Dfx, Rendition also hosted a programming competition called "Take it to the RRedline" to allow homebrew programmers to show off their abilities (as well as Rendition's product).
Notable game titles with native Rendition API support included;
Descent II
''Descent II'' is a 1996 first-person shooter game developed by Parallax Software and first published for DOS by Interplay Productions. For the PlayStation (console), PlayStation, it is known as ''Descent Maximum''. It is the second installme ...
,
Grand Prix Legends
''Grand Prix Legends'' is a computer racing simulator developed by Papyrus Design Group and published in 1998 by Sierra On-Line under the Sierra Sports banner. It simulates the 1967 Grand Prix season.
Gameplay
The game offers several modes in ...
,
IndyCar Racing II
''IndyCar Racing II'' is a racing game developed by Papyrus Design Group. It is the sequel to IndyCar Racing, and was released in 1995 for the DOS, Mac OS and Windows. A little over a year later, the game was re-released, with a few minor upgrades ...
, the
Myth games, Sierra's
NASCAR
The National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing, LLC (NASCAR) is an American auto racing sanctioning and operating company that is best known for stock car racing. The privately owned company was founded by Bill France Sr. in 1948, and hi ...
,
Quake,
Quake II
''Quake II'' is a 1997 first-person shooter video game developed by id Software and published by Activision. It is the second installment of the Quake (series), ''Quake'' series, but not a direct sequel to ''Quake (video game), Quake''. The game ...
,
EF2000 V2.0, and
Tomb Raider
''Tomb Raider'', also known as ''Lara Croft: Tomb Raider'' from 2001 to 2008, is a media franchise that originated with an action-adventure video game series created by British gaming company Core Design. Formerly owned by Eidos Interactive, th ...
.
Downfall
Rendition was one step behind other competitors coming to market at a pivotal time in the 3D PC graphics engines battle. The
NVIDIA RIVA 128 came to market in late 1997. The V2100 saw first silicon in early 1997, but was late to sample due to a digital cell library bug necessitating a respin.
Rendition used libraries developed by SiArch (licensed through Synopsys at that time) for their digital logic synthesis, which is done by means of sophisticated software auto generating and simulating the actual chip manufacturing process. This software avoids the expensive and labor intensive manufacturing of faulty hardware. Chips are quality tested in simulation before manufacture, or
"spiced", because faults are incredibly difficult to detect in microchips with modern trace widths, even with highly accurate instrumentation.
A critical section of circuitry happened to synthesize into a 3 input nor-gate driving a scanned flip-flop. The scan-flop had three passive transmission gate muxes driven by the three n-type transistors in the NOR3, all in series. The result of this was excessive resistance with a weak bus-hold cell, which ate into the allowable noise margin and violated the static discipline in good digital logic design. This combination of faults was not found in the software test environment by SiArch before manufacture.
These faults manifested as an intermittent bug that was seen in the lab on real silicon but not in high level functional or even
RTL or gate-level simulations. The root cause was only determined after months of investigation, simulations, and test case development in the lab, which narrowed the problem to a very confined space. At that point, the chip was run live under a scanning electron microscope using the oscilloscope probe mode to find the problem net between the NOR3 gate and the scan-flop. The combination was then spiced and confirmed to be the culprit.
Two full quarters were lost due to this bug. When it was released, V2x00 shipped with fully conformant OpenGL and D3D drivers, but it arrived late to the market.
The company was eventually purchased by Micron, who kept the development team intact as a source of embedded graphics solutions for their own line of
motherboard
A motherboard (also called mainboard, main circuit board, mb, mboard, backplane board, base board, system board, logic board (only in Apple computers) or mobo) is the main printed circuit board (PCB) in general-purpose computers and other expand ...
s. Rendition's engineers were initially excited by the prospect of utilizing Micron's embedded DRAM technology for a high-end graphics processor, but such a product never surfaced commercially.
Micron resurrected the Rendition brand name as a value line of RAM by
Micron Technology
Micron Technology, Inc. is an American producer of computer memory and computer data storage including dynamic random-access memory, flash memory, and USB flash drives. It is headquartered in Boise, Idaho. Its consumer products, including ...
's consumer memory division, Crucial Technology. Micron has since re-branded the Rendition line as SpecTek Select, aimed at OEMs and resellers
[{{cite web, title=SpecTek Select Memory, url=http://www.spectekselect.com/, url-status=dead, archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120920025619/http://www.spectekselect.com/, archive-date=2012-09-20]
Competing chipsets
V1000 era
*
3D Labs Permedia
*
3Dfx Voodoo Graphics
3dfx Interactive was an American technology company headquartered in San Jose, California, founded in 1994, that specialized in the manufacturing of 3D graphics processing units, and later, video cards. It was a pioneer in the field from the l ...
*
ATI
Ati or ATI may refer to:
* Ati people, a Negrito ethnic group in the Philippines
**Ati language (Philippines), the language spoken by this people group
** Ati-Atihan festival, an annual celebration held in the Philippines
*Ati language (China), a ...
3D Rage and Rage II
*
Matrox
Matrox Graphics, Inc. is a producer of video card components and equipment for personal computers and workstations. Based in Dorval, Quebec, Canada, it was founded in 1976 by Lorne Trottier and Branko Matić. The name is derived from "Ma" in Mat ...
Mystique
*
Number Nine Imagine 128 Series 2
*
NVIDIA
Nvidia CorporationOfficially written as NVIDIA and stylized in its logo as VIDIA with the lowercase "n" the same height as the uppercase "VIDIA"; formerly stylized as VIDIA with a large italicized lowercase "n" on products from the mid 1990s to ...
NV1
The Nvidia NV1, manufactured by SGS-Thomson Microelectronics under the model name STG2000, was a multimedia PCI card announced in May 1995 and released in November 1995. It was sold to retail by Diamond as the Diamond Edge 3D.
The NV1 feature ...
*
NEC
is a Japanese multinational information technology and electronics corporation, headquartered in Minato, Tokyo. The company was known as the Nippon Electric Company, Limited, before rebranding in 1983 as NEC. It provides IT and network soluti ...
-
VideoLogic
Imagination Technologies Limited is a British semiconductor and Computer software, software design company owned by Canyon Bridge Capital Partners, a private equity fund based in Beijing that is ultimately owned by the Chinese government. With ...
PowerVR
PowerVR is a division of Imagination Technologies (formerly VideoLogic) that develops hardware and software for 2D and 3D rendering, and for video encoding, decoding, associated image processing and DirectX, OpenGL ES, OpenVG, and OpenCL accelera ...
Series 1 (PCX1)
*NEC
PC-FXGA
*
S3 ViRGE
The S3 ViRGE (Video and Rendering Graphics Engine) graphics chipset was one of the first 2D/ 3D accelerators designed for the mass market.
Introduced in 1995 by then graphics powerhouse S3, Inc., the ViRGE was S3's first foray into 3D-graphics. ...
V2x00 era
*3D Labs Permedia 2
*3Dfx
Voodoo2
The Voodoo2 (or Voodoo2) is a set of three specialized 3D graphics chips on a single chipset setup, made by 3dfx. It was released in February 1998 as a replacement for the original Voodoo Graphics chipset. The card runs at a chipset clock rate o ...
and
Voodoo Rush
*ATI 3D Rage Pro
*Matrox Mystique 220; Matrox Millennium II and Matrox m3D
*Number Nine Ticket 2 Ride
*NVIDIA
RIVA 128
Released in August 1997 by Nvidia, the RIVA 128, or "NV3", was one of the first consumer graphics processing units to integrate 3D acceleration in addition to traditional 2D and video acceleration. Its name is an acronym for ''Real-time Interactiv ...
*
PowerVR Series 2 (PCX2)
*S3 ViRGE DX/GX/GX2 and
Trio3D
*
SiS 6326
References
External links
Full system specs of Rendition Vérité v22007 Years of Graphicsat Accelenation. Com, February 8, 2006.
Rendition engineer Stefan Podell discusses Vérité vQuake development
1998 mergers and acquisitions
American companies established in 1993
American companies disestablished in 1998
Computer companies established in 1993
Computer companies disestablished in 1998
Defunct computer companies of the United States
Defunct companies based in California
Graphics hardware companies