What is hardware T&L and why does VRC use it?
Before an object can be painted on the screen, it must be lit and transformed from the 3D world into 2D screen coordinates. The renderer can either do this by using own algorithms (Software T&L), or use the 3D hardware for that (Hardware T&L, for OpenGL and DirectX 7 or above). On old systems, hardware T&L must be emulated and runs quite slow; on new generation 3D cards (GeForce and Radeon) however it is faster and gives better lighting effects than software T&L. Some renderers support both methods for always getting the maximum performance from the hardware. VRC uses hardware T&L because we want to use the latest technology to create the most realistic 3D racing environment. All the latest 3D games such as; Doom3, Half life2 etc. also use this technology. What graphics cards support Hardware T&L? Supported Cards (These cards support hardware T&L) -GeForce 4 MX -GeForce FX (all versions) -Radeon (original), Radeon 7200 and 7500 -ATI Diamond Radeon 9600 SE -SiS Xabre -nForce (integrated
