What is the 32X VDP capable of?

[Da_Shocker]

Other than hardware based scaling & rotation and pumping out 50K pps (Hello SH-2) what was this graphics chip capable of doing? I'd like to compare it to say anyting lower than a Model 1 board, CPS2 and the good ole Neo-Geo hardware.

[tomaitheous]

The VDP isn't even capable of scaling and rotation. The Super VDP in the 32x is just a bitmap display system. It has a double buffer system to eliminate screen tearing, and can do pixel priority in overlaying of the Genesis video. The two SH-2's do *all* the work in software. That makes it pretty flexible overall, but that also hinders it in other specific areas. In other 32x threads, you've might have seen what the 32x is capable of being discussed, but it's good to keep in mind that since it is software - that you're really just limit by speed and not necessarily spec. I.e. you want more sprites or scrolling BGs or more polygons or even texture/gouraud shaded polygons, you get an associated drop in frame rate because of more time in software to do said graphics. And those discussions are usually based with 30-60fps in mind and probably no less than 20fps.

[TmEE]

32X offers nothing, all you do is in software... you can pretty much do anything you want, other question is, if its going to be real-time....

[Chilly Willy]

Actually, the Super VDP can do ONE thing: fill memory. That's used to clear the framebuffer, or write a segment of solid color (for a flat shaded polygon, for example). If SEGA had made it COPY memory as well as fill memory (like the Genesis VDP can do), it would have been MUCH more handy.