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Yeah, people seem to forget those mining GPUs that were released specifically to prevent their resale in the aftermaket gaming community that people still manag

Yeah, people seem to forget those mining GPUs that were released specifically to prevent their resale in the aftermaket gaming community that people still managed to get to output video _despite the cards lacking physical ports_. They did it with a modded driver.

brokenmachine 6y ago
Sounds interesting. Any link for info about this?
kaszanka 6y ago
Is it some Looking Glass [1] kind of thing, or did they add physical ports to some unused traces or something? [1]: https://looking-glass.io/ https://looking-glass.io/
- p1necone 6y ago
  They basically render frames on the video port-less GPU, and then pass them over to a second GPU for actual output. So probably quite similar to what Looking Glass is doing.
- Teknoman117 6y ago
  Sort of. It's the exact same thing as Nvidia optimus. Linux calls it DRI-PRIME or PRIME offload. Get it =P ? Big, display-less GPU renders frame, image is copied into VRAM of smaller GPU with a display. Smaller GPU draws image to screen. Most of the gamer laptops do this. There's no physical link between the display and the big GPU. I believe the mobile cards enable a second DMA engine that is usually soft locked on GeForce to handle the transfer.
  - rasz 6y ago
    Same as first PowerVR gaming chips. Midas3 (1996) https://vintage3d.org/midas3.php https://vintage3d.org/midas3.php PCX1 (1996) https://vintage3d.org/pcx1.php https://vintage3d.org/pcx1.php and PCX2 (1997) https://vintage3d.org/pcx2.php https://vintage3d.org/pcx2.php Tomb Raider running 1024x768 30FPS on a card half the cost of 3Dfx Voodoo1 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5GMesT4WKzI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5GMesT4WKzI It could even run up to 60FPS at 640x480, the best hardware platform running Tomb Raider, and only one allowing over 30FPS.
eins1234 6y ago
For those looking for details, I remember watching a Linus Tech Tips video on it a while ago. Just managed to dig it up: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TY4s35uULg4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TY4s35uULg4 Forum thread has more: https://linustechtips.com/topic/1021372-nvidia-said-we-couldnt-game-on-this/ https://linustechtips.com/topic/1021372-nvidia-said-we-could...
- merb 6y ago
  well somebody could sign the driver with an authenticode cert. just costs some bucks and need to rewrite the publisher.

brokenmachine 6y ago

Sounds interesting. Any link for info about this?

kaszanka 6y ago

Is it some Looking Glass [1] kind of thing, or did they add physical ports to some unused traces or something? [1]: https://looking-glass.io/ https://looking-glass.io/

p1necone 6y ago
They basically render frames on the video port-less GPU, and then pass them over to a second GPU for actual output. So probably quite similar to what Looking Glass is doing.
Teknoman117 6y ago
Sort of. It's the exact same thing as Nvidia optimus. Linux calls it DRI-PRIME or PRIME offload. Get it =P ? Big, display-less GPU renders frame, image is copied into VRAM of smaller GPU with a display. Smaller GPU draws image to screen. Most of the gamer laptops do this. There's no physical link between the display and the big GPU. I believe the mobile cards enable a second DMA engine that is usually soft locked on GeForce to handle the transfer.
- rasz 6y ago
  Same as first PowerVR gaming chips. Midas3 (1996) https://vintage3d.org/midas3.php https://vintage3d.org/midas3.php PCX1 (1996) https://vintage3d.org/pcx1.php https://vintage3d.org/pcx1.php and PCX2 (1997) https://vintage3d.org/pcx2.php https://vintage3d.org/pcx2.php Tomb Raider running 1024x768 30FPS on a card half the cost of 3Dfx Voodoo1 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5GMesT4WKzI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5GMesT4WKzI It could even run up to 60FPS at 640x480, the best hardware platform running Tomb Raider, and only one allowing over 30FPS.

eins1234 6y ago

For those looking for details, I remember watching a Linus Tech Tips video on it a while ago. Just managed to dig it up: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TY4s35uULg4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TY4s35uULg4 Forum thread has more: https://linustechtips.com/topic/1021372-nvidia-said-we-couldnt-game-on-this/ https://linustechtips.com/topic/1021372-nvidia-said-we-could...

merb 6y ago
well somebody could sign the driver with an authenticode cert. just costs some bucks and need to rewrite the publisher.