Fpu
 

Hi guys,

If you get a better FPU chip for your trapdoor expansion, does this at all upgrade the graphics capabilities to play 3D Amiga games? (Alien Breed 3D, Breathless etc).

I didn't think it did, I thought it was for like spreadsheet work where calculations etc are needed, but I have been a listing on e-bay say that it improves 3D gaming on the Amiga?

No it doesn't. :D

an FPU is a math co-processor. when the lister says it speeds up 3D, he probably means 3D applications like Lightwave and Real 3D as these require heavy math calculations.

further reading on the function of an FPU:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Floating-point_unit

3D games need lots of math, so it might seem logical that an FPU would help. However, since such expansions were not very common, most games (probably practically all) were designed to use integer-only maths, and thus having an FPU makes no difference.

Alien breed 3d and breathless do not use fpu
but
there are a few games that requires a fpu
example, quake, and duke nukem
sincerely I don't know any others
theoretically having a faster fpu must improve fps

an fpu on a ram card would be a waist of time for games that require an fpu theres just not anough umph in a 68881 or 68882 at any speed.

its only any good for rendering and raytracing,even then its mega slow.

Cheers guys. Think the guy might have been telling a porky, HOWEVER, on closer inspection, it is a PGA FPU chip, so wouldn't have fit on my board so could be for somewhere else or a might fancier expansion card :)

it still wouldent make any difference anyway mate,its the same part in a different package they where in plcc and pga format from about 16 to 50mhz


plcc upto 40mhz and pga upto 50mhz