SDL, DirectX, Clanlib or Allegro

SDL Development
1

Hi Neil,
Thanks for your informations.I was in the middle of
considering whether to use SDL, DirectX, Clanlib or Allegro for my latest
projects.

	I've seen the weren't  any of the game develop from Allegro

and neither did Clanlib.Most of the games , including from Loki ( now
defuncted ) was developed from SDL.

	Although SDL is multiplatform, but as  with most

multiplatform stuff, it did sacrifice some performances.On a typical Pentium
machine ( 166 ~ 200 to be precise), a 3D game could be running fine if it
was written using DirectX library.But if you’re using SDL, it can’t even
run.It need a higher machine spec to run the game.

	I knew for such a machine it was considered obsolete, but I

just wanted to create a 3D stuff run on a lower machine spec.----------------------------------------
Lai Kok Cheong
AIG Software International
G-1, Enterprise 1, Technology Park Malaysia
Bukit Jalil
57000, Kuala Lumpur
Malaysia
Tel: + 60 3 8996 0200
Fax: + 60 3 8996 0096
www.aigsi.com http://www.aigsi.com/

-----Original Message-----
From: Neil Bradley [SMTP:nb at synthcom.com]
Sent: Friday, December 13, 2002 9:49 AM
To: sdl at libsdl.org
Subject: RE: [SDL] key presses

Hi Micah,
May I know what was your experience on using Allegro ?

You can know mine if you’d like. :wink: Consider it a DOS graphics library
ported to other environments. Lots of things, such as the "key array"
example already shown, and the “stop every once in a while and push sound
out the port” approach to audio, are throwovers from DOS days. SDL is not
hindered by such atrocities. :wink:

SDL Does a much better job all the way around. I’m curious why any non-DOS
developers even bother with Allegro any longer.

–>Neil

Neil Bradley In the land of the blind, the one eyed man is not
Synthcom Systems, Inc. king - he’s a prisoner.
ICQ #29402898

SDL mailing list
SDL at libsdl.org
http://www.libsdl.org/mailman/listinfo/sdl

2

i wasnt aware of such overhead…does anyone have any other info about how
SDL benchmark’s against other things such as DX? Just kinda wondering how
it fares but of course, i like the portability of SDL so a small preformance
hit would be acceptable.> ----- Original Message -----

From: kokcheong.lai@aigsi.com (Lai Kok Cheong)
To:
Sent: Thursday, December 12, 2002 6:00 PM
Subject: [SDL] SDL, DirectX, Clanlib or Allegro

Hi Neil,
Thanks for your informations.I was in the middle of
considering whether to use SDL, DirectX, Clanlib or Allegro for my latest
projects.

I’ve seen the weren’t any of the game develop from Allegro
and neither did Clanlib.Most of the games , including from Loki ( now
defuncted ) was developed from SDL.

Although SDL is multiplatform, but as with most
multiplatform stuff, it did sacrifice some performances.On a typical
Pentium
machine ( 166 ~ 200 to be precise), a 3D game could be running fine if it
was written using DirectX library.But if you’re using SDL, it can’t even
run.It need a higher machine spec to run the game.

I knew for such a machine it was considered obsolete, but I
just wanted to create a 3D stuff run on a lower machine spec.

Lai Kok Cheong
AIG Software International
G-1, Enterprise 1, Technology Park Malaysia
Bukit Jalil
57000, Kuala Lumpur
Malaysia
Tel: + 60 3 8996 0200
Fax: + 60 3 8996 0096
www.aigsi.com http://www.aigsi.com/

-----Original Message-----
From: Neil Bradley [SMTP:nb at synthcom.com]
Sent: Friday, December 13, 2002 9:49 AM
To: sdl at libsdl.org
Subject: RE: [SDL] key presses

Hi Micah,
May I know what was your experience on using Allegro ?

You can know mine if you’d like. :wink: Consider it a DOS graphics library
ported to other environments. Lots of things, such as the "key array"
example already shown, and the "stop every once in a while and push
sound

out the port" approach to audio, are throwovers from DOS days. SDL is
not

hindered by such atrocities. :wink:

SDL Does a much better job all the way around. I’m curious why any
non-DOS

developers even bother with Allegro any longer.

–>Neil

Neil Bradley In the land of the blind, the one eyed man is
not

Synthcom Systems, Inc. king - he’s a prisoner.
ICQ #29402898

SDL mailing list
SDL at libsdl.org
http://www.libsdl.org/mailman/listinfo/sdl

SDL mailing list
SDL at libsdl.org
http://www.libsdl.org/mailman/listinfo/sdl

3

I wouldn’t say SDL has any performance problems. I don’t have numbers
but just from experience I don’t have any issues with SDL that I
wouldn’t have with the environment’s own API. Under X11 I wouldn’t be
able to do hardware surfaces on my machine anyway, so performance is
nice using double buffering techniques … the same way it’d be had I
gone insane and used xlib to do all my drawing.

I haven’t benchmarked OpenGL performance either, but I get extremely
nice frame rates on all the OGL projects I’ve done. I’m sure there is a
little overhead (there has to be, just from calling one function that
directly calls another) but I think all the cross platform benefits
greatly outweigh any slow down from the thin layer.

All in all, no, I haven’t noticed any difference between SDL and using
native drawing/sound systems.On Thu, 2002-12-12 at 21:46, Atrix Wolfe wrote:

i wasnt aware of such overhead…does anyone have any other info about how
SDL benchmark’s against other things such as DX? Just kinda wondering how
it fares but of course, i like the portability of SDL so a small preformance
hit would be acceptable.

----- Original Message -----
From: “Lai Kok Cheong” <kokcheong.lai at aigsi.com>
To:
Sent: Thursday, December 12, 2002 6:00 PM
Subject: [SDL] SDL, DirectX, Clanlib or Allegro

Hi Neil,
Thanks for your informations.I was in the middle of
considering whether to use SDL, DirectX, Clanlib or Allegro for my latest
projects.

I’ve seen the weren’t any of the game develop from Allegro
and neither did Clanlib.Most of the games , including from Loki ( now
defuncted ) was developed from SDL.

Although SDL is multiplatform, but as with most
multiplatform stuff, it did sacrifice some performances.On a typical
Pentium
machine ( 166 ~ 200 to be precise), a 3D game could be running fine if it
was written using DirectX library.But if you’re using SDL, it can’t even
run.It need a higher machine spec to run the game.

I knew for such a machine it was considered obsolete, but I
just wanted to create a 3D stuff run on a lower machine spec.

Lai Kok Cheong
AIG Software International
G-1, Enterprise 1, Technology Park Malaysia
Bukit Jalil
57000, Kuala Lumpur
Malaysia
Tel: + 60 3 8996 0200
Fax: + 60 3 8996 0096
www.aigsi.com http://www.aigsi.com/

-----Original Message-----
From: Neil Bradley [SMTP:nb at synthcom.com]
Sent: Friday, December 13, 2002 9:49 AM
To: sdl at libsdl.org
Subject: RE: [SDL] key presses

Hi Micah,
May I know what was your experience on using Allegro ?

You can know mine if you’d like. :wink: Consider it a DOS graphics library
ported to other environments. Lots of things, such as the "key array"
example already shown, and the "stop every once in a while and push
sound

out the port" approach to audio, are throwovers from DOS days. SDL is
not

hindered by such atrocities. :wink:

SDL Does a much better job all the way around. I’m curious why any
non-DOS

developers even bother with Allegro any longer.

–>Neil

Neil Bradley In the land of the blind, the one eyed man is
not

Synthcom Systems, Inc. king - he’s a prisoner.
ICQ #29402898

SDL mailing list
SDL at libsdl.org
http://www.libsdl.org/mailman/listinfo/sdl

SDL mailing list
SDL at libsdl.org
http://www.libsdl.org/mailman/listinfo/sdl

SDL mailing list
SDL at libsdl.org
http://www.libsdl.org/mailman/listinfo/sdl
–
Chris Thielen <@Christopher_Thielen>

4

But for those who run on a slower machine, these problem would be
exaggerate.Of course if the same code run on Pentium III 700 Mhz and above,
it show not much differences.----------------------------------------
Lai Kok Cheong
AIG Software International
G-1, Enterprise 1, Technology Park Malaysia
Bukit Jalil
57000, Kuala Lumpur
Malaysia
Tel: + 60 3 8996 0200
Fax: + 60 3 8996 0096
www.aigsi.com http://www.aigsi.com/

-----Original Message-----
From: Chris Thielen [SMTP:chris at luethy.net]
Sent: Friday, December 13, 2002 1:53 PM
To: sdl at libsdl.org
Subject: Re: [SDL] SDL, DirectX, Clanlib or Allegro

I wouldn’t say SDL has any performance problems. I don’t have numbers
but just from experience I don’t have any issues with SDL that I
wouldn’t have with the environment’s own API. Under X11 I wouldn’t be
able to do hardware surfaces on my machine anyway, so performance is
nice using double buffering techniques … the same way it’d be had I
gone insane and used xlib to do all my drawing.

I haven’t benchmarked OpenGL performance either, but I get extremely
nice frame rates on all the OGL projects I’ve done. I’m sure there is a
little overhead (there has to be, just from calling one function that
directly calls another) but I think all the cross platform benefits
greatly outweigh any slow down from the thin layer.

All in all, no, I haven’t noticed any difference between SDL and using
native drawing/sound systems.

On Thu, 2002-12-12 at 21:46, Atrix Wolfe wrote:

i wasnt aware of such overhead…does anyone have any other info about
how
SDL benchmark’s against other things such as DX? Just kinda wondering
how
it fares but of course, i like the portability of SDL so a small
preformance
hit would be acceptable.

----- Original Message -----
From: “Lai Kok Cheong” <@Lai_Kok_Cheong>
To:
Sent: Thursday, December 12, 2002 6:00 PM
Subject: [SDL] SDL, DirectX, Clanlib or Allegro

Hi Neil,
Thanks for your informations.I was in the middle of
considering whether to use SDL, DirectX, Clanlib or Allegro for my
latest

projects.

I’ve seen the weren’t any of the game develop from Allegro
and neither did Clanlib.Most of the games , including from Loki ( now
defuncted ) was developed from SDL.

Although SDL is multiplatform, but as with most
multiplatform stuff, it did sacrifice some performances.On a typical
Pentium
machine ( 166 ~ 200 to be precise), a 3D game could be running fine if
it

was written using DirectX library.But if you’re using SDL, it can’t
even

run.It need a higher machine spec to run the game.

I knew for such a machine it was considered obsolete, but I
just wanted to create a 3D stuff run on a lower machine spec.

Lai Kok Cheong
AIG Software International
G-1, Enterprise 1, Technology Park Malaysia
Bukit Jalil
57000, Kuala Lumpur
Malaysia
Tel: + 60 3 8996 0200
Fax: + 60 3 8996 0096
www.aigsi.com http://www.aigsi.com/

-----Original Message-----
From: Neil Bradley [SMTP:nb at synthcom.com]
Sent: Friday, December 13, 2002 9:49 AM
To: sdl at libsdl.org
Subject: RE: [SDL] key presses

Hi Micah,
May I know what was your experience on using Allegro ?

You can know mine if you’d like. :wink: Consider it a DOS graphics
library

ported to other environments. Lots of things, such as the “key
array”

example already shown, and the "stop every once in a while and push
sound

out the port" approach to audio, are throwovers from DOS days. SDL
is
not

hindered by such atrocities. :wink:

SDL Does a much better job all the way around. I’m curious why any
non-DOS

developers even bother with Allegro any longer.

–>Neil

Neil Bradley In the land of the blind, the one eyed man
is
not

Synthcom Systems, Inc. king - he’s a prisoner.
ICQ #29402898

SDL mailing list
SDL at libsdl.org
http://www.libsdl.org/mailman/listinfo/sdl

SDL mailing list
SDL at libsdl.org
http://www.libsdl.org/mailman/listinfo/sdl

SDL mailing list
SDL at libsdl.org
http://www.libsdl.org/mailman/listinfo/sdl
–
Chris Thielen

SDL mailing list
SDL at libsdl.org
http://www.libsdl.org/mailman/listinfo/sdl

5

Normally, SDL is only used to start OpenGL; it’s then called directly.
There’s no layering, so there’s no overhead.

(I think you can write to the “screen” on top of OpenGL using SDL, but
I’ve never done that.)On Thu, Dec 12, 2002 at 09:53:29PM -0800, Chris Thielen wrote:

I wouldn’t say SDL has any performance problems. I don’t have numbers
but just from experience I don’t have any issues with SDL that I
wouldn’t have with the environment’s own API. Under X11 I wouldn’t be
able to do hardware surfaces on my machine anyway, so performance is
nice using double buffering techniques … the same way it’d be had I
gone insane and used xlib to do all my drawing.

I haven’t benchmarked OpenGL performance either, but I get extremely
nice frame rates on all the OGL projects I’ve done. I’m sure there is a
little overhead (there has to be, just from calling one function that
directly calls another) but I think all the cross platform benefits
greatly outweigh any slow down from the thin layer.

–
Glenn Maynard

6

But for those who run on a slower machine, these problem would be
exaggerate.Of course if the same code run on Pentium III 700 Mhz and above,
it show not much differences.

I believe the reason DirectX is faster is because of hardware
acceleration. SDL does all it’s stuff using software techniques,
unless you have a select few video cards. The most SDL can usually do
is let you write to a hardware buffer instead of a software buffer
(correct?). Since most Video Cards are created with Windows in mind,
they support DirectX hardware acceleration. So really, DirectX isn’t
causing the speed boost. It’s the video card.

I’m willing to bet that if you wrote an OpenGL app using the WinAPI
(and I guess direct input and direct sound), and then rewrote using
SDL and OpenGL, you’d see very little difference in performance. All
hardware acceleration is hidden inside the OpenGL implementation, SDL
and Windows merely call it. So they’d both have hardware acceleration,
or they wouldn’t, depending on the card, and performance should be
nearly the same.

Just my $.02, I’m a newb, so don’t take my word for it. And where can
a dude go to find out what cards SDL supports acceleration for anyway?

Peace,
=Pete=> ----------------------------------------

Lai Kok Cheong
AIG Software International
G-1, Enterprise 1, Technology Park Malaysia
Bukit Jalil
57000, Kuala Lumpur
Malaysia
Tel: + 60 3 8996 0200
Fax: + 60 3 8996 0096
www.aigsi.com http://www.aigsi.com/

-----Original Message-----
From: Chris Thielen [SMTP:chris at luethy.net]
Sent: Friday, December 13, 2002 1:53 PM
To: sdl at libsdl.org
Subject: Re: [SDL] SDL, DirectX, Clanlib or Allegro

I wouldn’t say SDL has any performance problems. I don’t have numbers
but just from experience I don’t have any issues with SDL that I
wouldn’t have with the environment’s own API. Under X11 I wouldn’t be
able to do hardware surfaces on my machine anyway, so performance is
nice using double buffering techniques … the same way it’d be had I
gone insane and used xlib to do all my drawing.

I haven’t benchmarked OpenGL performance either, but I get extremely
nice frame rates on all the OGL projects I’ve done. I’m sure there is a
little overhead (there has to be, just from calling one function that
directly calls another) but I think all the cross platform benefits
greatly outweigh any slow down from the thin layer.

All in all, no, I haven’t noticed any difference between SDL and using
native drawing/sound systems.

On Thu, 2002-12-12 at 21:46, Atrix Wolfe wrote:

i wasnt aware of such overhead…does anyone have any other info about
how
SDL benchmark’s against other things such as DX? Just kinda wondering
how
it fares but of course, i like the portability of SDL so a small
preformance
hit would be acceptable.

----- Original Message -----
From: “Lai Kok Cheong” <kokcheong.lai at aigsi.com>
To:
Sent: Thursday, December 12, 2002 6:00 PM
Subject: [SDL] SDL, DirectX, Clanlib or Allegro

Hi Neil,
Thanks for your informations.I was in the middle of
considering whether to use SDL, DirectX, Clanlib or Allegro for my
latest

projects.

I’ve seen the weren’t any of the game develop from Allegro
and neither did Clanlib.Most of the games , including from Loki ( now
defuncted ) was developed from SDL.

Although SDL is multiplatform, but as with most
multiplatform stuff, it did sacrifice some performances.On a typical
Pentium
machine ( 166 ~ 200 to be precise), a 3D game could be running fine if
it

was written using DirectX library.But if you’re using SDL, it can’t
even

run.It need a higher machine spec to run the game.

I knew for such a machine it was considered obsolete, but I
just wanted to create a 3D stuff run on a lower machine spec.

Lai Kok Cheong
AIG Software International
G-1, Enterprise 1, Technology Park Malaysia
Bukit Jalil
57000, Kuala Lumpur
Malaysia
Tel: + 60 3 8996 0200
Fax: + 60 3 8996 0096
www.aigsi.com http://www.aigsi.com/

-----Original Message-----
From: Neil Bradley [SMTP:nb at synthcom.com]
Sent: Friday, December 13, 2002 9:49 AM
To: sdl at libsdl.org
Subject: RE: [SDL] key presses

Hi Micah,
May I know what was your experience on using Allegro ?

You can know mine if you’d like. :wink: Consider it a DOS graphics
library

ported to other environments. Lots of things, such as the “key
array”

example already shown, and the "stop every once in a while and push
sound

out the port" approach to audio, are throwovers from DOS days. SDL
is
not

hindered by such atrocities. :wink:

SDL Does a much better job all the way around. I’m curious why any
non-DOS

developers even bother with Allegro any longer.

–>Neil

Neil Bradley In the land of the blind, the one eyed man
is
not

Synthcom Systems, Inc. king - he’s a prisoner.
ICQ #29402898

SDL mailing list
SDL at libsdl.org
http://www.libsdl.org/mailman/listinfo/sdl

SDL mailing list
SDL at libsdl.org
http://www.libsdl.org/mailman/listinfo/sdl

SDL mailing list
SDL at libsdl.org
http://www.libsdl.org/mailman/listinfo/sdl
–
Chris Thielen

SDL mailing list
SDL at libsdl.org
http://www.libsdl.org/mailman/listinfo/sdl

SDL mailing list
SDL at libsdl.org
http://www.libsdl.org/mailman/listinfo/sdl