4 ms·

Hardware rendered vs software rendered??? :/ It's all just software. The only thing that matters is how fast it is.

maximusprime 15y ago
Downmodders: Can you explain why? My point is, software is rendering the graphics. Either it's software running on one chip, or it's software on another chip. That's irrelevant. What matters, is how fast the graphics are rendered.
- angrycoder 15y ago
  There is a big difference between hardware and software rendering. Software rendering has you plotting each pixel individually and writing to the framebuffer. Hardware rendering uses specialized APIs and hardware to dramatically speed up drawing and transformation functions.
  - maximusprime 15y ago
    No, they both involve software, writing to a framebuffer. (By software, I mean code - software/firmware/etc). A crappy 'hardware' accelerated GPU can be slower than a 'software' framebuffer write. My point was that saying "It's hardware accelerated" is meaningless marketing speak.
    - atnan 15y ago
      Indeed, Apple's Mac OS X QuartzGL framework (GPU accelerated drawing/rasterisation) is slower than the equivalent CPU-based Quartz framework in may cases. You're being shafted by downvoters who don't really know what they're talking about.
- tikhonj 15y ago
  Maybe you, as a consumer, only care about how fast something is. This post is more geared towards people who actually care about how things work, or, more pertinently, to the people who have been spreading misinformation around. So it isn't a post about Android's being slow or fast as much as a post about its internals.
- gnaffle 15y ago
  I'm not downvoting you, but you're implying that the difference between hardware and software rendering is irrelevant which it certainly is not. What's interesting is not only how fast the graphics are rendered, but the graphics performance compared to power usage. If the software stack doesn't give you a big performance / watt advantage when using a GPU, that's the fault of the software stack and will make that stack perform worse compared to one that does make use of hardware acceleration.
- cbs 15y ago
  >Either it's software running on one chip, or it's software on another chip. That's irrelevant. No, its not irrelevant. The terms have meaning, regarding the separation. And while it may technically be a misnomer, feigning ignorance to the misnomer to try and point out the misnomer to people who already know about it is not only arguing semantics, but doing so in least constructive way possible. To address your other post that its all marketing speak, well no, not really. In discussions, what gets called hardware or software conveys meaningful information, but it is highly context sensitive to the bits being discussed at the time, because technically all computing is some combination of hardware and software.
  - Hari_Seldon 15y ago
    I'm not a dev, but doesn't Apple's Open CL come into play here? is there silicon in iDevices in addition to the GPU which can be used for HW acceleration, whereas Android can only make use of the GPU for this?
- Dylan16807 15y ago
  It's not very complicated. Software rendering means that it's handled detail by detail by software on a general-purpose computation device. Hardware rendering means that the software instead initiates complex actions on swaths of the screen at a time by triggering highly-specialized hardware. One method is orders of magnitude faster than the other, but limited in scope. It's a fool's errand to try to conflate them.

Downmodders: Can you explain why? My point is, software is rendering the graphics. Either it's software running on one chip, or it's software on another chip. That's irrelevant. What matters, is how fast the graphics are rendered.

angrycoder 15y ago
There is a big difference between hardware and software rendering. Software rendering has you plotting each pixel individually and writing to the framebuffer. Hardware rendering uses specialized APIs and hardware to dramatically speed up drawing and transformation functions.
- maximusprime 15y ago
  No, they both involve software, writing to a framebuffer. (By software, I mean code - software/firmware/etc). A crappy 'hardware' accelerated GPU can be slower than a 'software' framebuffer write. My point was that saying "It's hardware accelerated" is meaningless marketing speak.
  - atnan 15y ago
    Indeed, Apple's Mac OS X QuartzGL framework (GPU accelerated drawing/rasterisation) is slower than the equivalent CPU-based Quartz framework in may cases. You're being shafted by downvoters who don't really know what they're talking about.
tikhonj 15y ago
Maybe you, as a consumer, only care about how fast something is. This post is more geared towards people who actually care about how things work, or, more pertinently, to the people who have been spreading misinformation around. So it isn't a post about Android's being slow or fast as much as a post about its internals.
gnaffle 15y ago
I'm not downvoting you, but you're implying that the difference between hardware and software rendering is irrelevant which it certainly is not. What's interesting is not only how fast the graphics are rendered, but the graphics performance compared to power usage. If the software stack doesn't give you a big performance / watt advantage when using a GPU, that's the fault of the software stack and will make that stack perform worse compared to one that does make use of hardware acceleration.
cbs 15y ago
>Either it's software running on one chip, or it's software on another chip. That's irrelevant. No, its not irrelevant. The terms have meaning, regarding the separation. And while it may technically be a misnomer, feigning ignorance to the misnomer to try and point out the misnomer to people who already know about it is not only arguing semantics, but doing so in least constructive way possible. To address your other post that its all marketing speak, well no, not really. In discussions, what gets called hardware or software conveys meaningful information, but it is highly context sensitive to the bits being discussed at the time, because technically all computing is some combination of hardware and software.
- Hari_Seldon 15y ago
  I'm not a dev, but doesn't Apple's Open CL come into play here? is there silicon in iDevices in addition to the GPU which can be used for HW acceleration, whereas Android can only make use of the GPU for this?
Dylan16807 15y ago
It's not very complicated. Software rendering means that it's handled detail by detail by software on a general-purpose computation device. Hardware rendering means that the software instead initiates complex actions on swaths of the screen at a time by triggering highly-specialized hardware. One method is orders of magnitude faster than the other, but limited in scope. It's a fool's errand to try to conflate them.