Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!um-math!hyc From: hyc@math.lsa.umich.edu (Howard Chu) Newsgroups: comp.sys.atari.st Subject: blitter beaters Message-ID: <10087@stag.math.lsa.umich.edu> Date: 28 Oct 89 07:40:43 GMT Sender: news@math.lsa.umich.edu Reply-To: hyc@math.lsa.umich.edu (Howard Chu) Organization: University of Michigan Math Dept., Ann Arbor Lines: 79 UUCP-Path: {mailrus,umix}!um-math!hyc Just for my own curiosity, I downloaded the QuickST 1.6 demo and checked its speed with QuickIndex 1.5 (geeze. Sorry Darek, I've used this QuickIndex a number of times and still haven't registered with you. A check is on its way tho, honest!). So, some numbers from my Mega 4 with TOS 1.4 in EPROMs, in case anyone else is curious... Abbreviations: A - no accelerators B - BLiTTER only T - Turbo ST 1.6 only TB - Turbo ST 1.6 + BLiTTER Q - QuickST 1.6 demo only QB - QuickST 1.6 demo + BLiTTER For monochrome resolution: A B T TB Q QB BIOS text 91 99 298 298 307 307 BIOS string 86 91 1210 1210 1081 1081 BIOS scroll 98 129 136 142 132 132 GEM draw 100 135 211 233 158 177 ____________________________________________________________ For medium resolution: A B T TB Q QB BIOS text 92 98 320 320 246 246 BIOS string 87 90 1364 1364 1373 1373 BIOS scroll 98 126 132 138 129 129 GEM draw 99 130 175 211 115 156 ____________________________________________________________ For low resolution: A B T TB Q QB BIOS text 94 106 415 416 221 221 BIOS string 89 97 851 856 443 443 BIOS scroll 98 125 133 133 128 128 GEM draw 99 149 182 235 101 151 Dunno why column A doesn't just say "100" all the way down the line. Oh well. Also interesting to note that when the blitter makes a difference with Turbo-ST, the difference depends on order of activation. If you turn on the blitter first, and then TurboST, you'll get about 6% more speed than vice versa. (Turn TurboST on first, then the blitter...) [This quirk isn't visible above, obviously.] Kind of interesting... Makes ya wonder how you could put up with text operations on an ST just out of the box. Things really do look real real slow, until you use one of these add-ons. Pretty hard to judge which one to use, though. I'm kinda bummed, myself. Neither of these two programs work with non-standard screen sizes, so my Overscan switch is idling in the normal position. Oh well. QuickST1.4 worked OK with Overscan. I wonder why the restriction now? Also TurboST doesn't seem to like PinHead. My system freezes when PinHead is in my AUTO folder, if TurboST is loaded. I s'pose I wanna comment on the numbers themselves, since I've gone to all the trouble of typing them in. Interesting to note that the BIOS text operations (Bconout, Cconws) done by both programs completely ignore the blitter. Also interesting that TurboST gains a few percent in scrolling when the blitter is active, but QuickST ignores it there as well. (Interesting, but not a very significant difference, to be sure.) Also odd how the different resolutions alter the speedups. Like, in monochrome, the blitter accelerates GEM draws by 35% all by itself. But, it only speeds up both TurboST and QuickST by about 20%. Then, in medium, the blitter accounts for only 30% by itself, but speeds up both TurboST and QuickST by about 40%. Funky Stuff there... Hm. Does anyone else out there really care about this stuff? I'm pretty curious to see some numbers for the various hardware accelerators now... -- -=- PrayerMail: Send 100Mbits to holyghost@father.son[127.0.0.1] and You Too can have a Personal Electronic Relationship with God!