Thread: RIM Announces OpenGL ES Support for OS 5.0

RIM has announced support for OpenGL ES at the BlackBerry Developer Conference. Shown is a video of a Storm2 running "Need for Speed Shift". The framerate and detail look to be around the Nintendo DS level, not bad for a device with current games that look like leftovers from the NES era. Best news? This will be OS 5.0-wide, not limited to the Storm2. After all this time, and speculation that it could not be done, apparently RIM has managed to do it. I am sure this will make many BB developers very happy, as well as many Storm gamers wishing for more iPhone-like games. This coupled with the Storm/Storm2 accelerometer has many interesting possibilities. Now, if only we could run apps from the SD card.

Research In Motion Press Release

This is great news!!! Especially with the introduction of the new Droid devices. This is what RIM should have done when the IPhone was released instead of having to play catch up. I am so looking forward to this!!!

The BEST part of it (IMHO) is that it seems to be a part of the developer's API, and not something that needs to be added to the OS itself. So it would seem that we should see some apps to take advantage of it sooner rather than later. It also seems that they are quite impressed with the texturing capabilities of the GPU in the Storm/Storm2

Wow, i'd have thought this topic would be FLOODED with posts..... C'mon folks, NO ONE is interested in OpenGL ES anymore?

Dave I think people are excited but RIM may be a tad too late for many
Posted via mobile device

Sorry i'm a little slow ...........but what is OpenGL ES

RIM is finally opening all the 2d and 3d graphics capabilities on storm.

Originally Posted by eishas

Sorry i'm a little slow ...........but what is OpenGL ES

Posted via mobile device

Originally Posted by Dave12308

Wow, i'd have thought this topic would be FLOODED with posts..... C'mon folks, NO ONE is interested in OpenGL ES anymore?

Now you know how I feel when I try to talk about the 9700.

Originally Posted by eishas

Sorry i'm a little slow ...........but what is OpenGL ES

Here is a wikipedia article that explains it in-depth; basically it's hardware acceleration using the built-in GPU (Graphics Proccessing Unit).

OpenGL ES - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Well, yeah, it is VERY interesting good news, but we simply do not have enough info to get excited about - people don't want to get disappointed later if RIM fails to live up to expectations, and unfortunately this would not be the first time.

First of all, which version of OpenGL ES will be supported ?? 1.0 ? 1.1? 2.0? Some intermediary version? We don't know!

Which Blackberries will be able to received OpenGL ES?? Is it only the Storm series?

What about the Blackberry Bold series? Will the 9000, or the 9700, be entitled to receive the update?

Will the "top of the line" blackberry (as marketed by RIM) be getting some OS love and receive the update? Notice they only show the Storm in their presentation, even though the Bold 9700 is supposed to be "the most powerful Blackberry".

This is only causing customers to be confused and delay purchasing a Blackberry, as we have no clue which model will be eligible for this update.

How will the blackberry's miniature memory cope with all those 3D textures if RIM does not change their OS architecture to allow apps to run from SD card? Our flash memory will be completely full after installing only 3 or 4 games !

Will OpenGL ES support mean that there will be hardware acceleration for Flash, etc?

By the way, does the 9700 really support Flash out-of-the-box, as claimed on RIM's website?

Originally Posted by secgena

Well, yeah, it is VERY interesting good news, but we simply do not have enough info to get excited about - people don't want to get disappointed later if RIM fails to live up to expectations, and unfortunately this would not be the first time.

First of all, which version of OpenGL ES will be supported ?? 1.0 ? 1.1? 2.0? Some intermediary version? We don't know!

- Whatever the version, it is a HUGE improvement over what we have now. I am assuming 1.1; I am pretty sure that is what the MSM7600 chipset supports.

Which Blackberries will be able to received OpenGL ES?? Is it only the Storm series?

According to what i've heard (and I think it's mentioned in the video) Storm/Storm2 to start off with, but eventually any BB running OS 5.0 - it's a 5.0 thing and not a Storm thing.

What about the Blackberry Bold series? Will the 9000, or the 9700, be entitled to receive the update?

Again, any OS 5.0 device.

Will the "top of the line" blackberry (as marketed by RIM) be getting some OS love and receive the update? Notice they only show the Storm in their presentation, even though the Bold 9700 is supposed to be "the most powerful Blackberry".

Storm was the best platform to show off the type of game they are showing off (accelerometer controlled). I believe the S2 was used for the demo because the NFS on the S2 can be compared directly to the iPhone version.

This is only causing customers to be confused and delay purchasing a Blackberry, as we have no clue which model will be eligible for this update.

How will the blackberry's miniature memory cope with all those 3D textures if RIM does not change their OS architecture to allow apps to run from SD card? Our flash memory will be completely full after installing only 3 or 4 games !

The texture memory is an embedded part of the GPU hardware. Again, it is specifically mentioned in the video that the Storm's chipset is REALLY good at handling textures

Will OpenGL ES support mean that there will be hardware acceleration for Flash, etc?

All depends on how the devs use the API

By the way, does the 9700 really support Flash out-of-the-box, as claimed on RIM's website?

AFAIK, NO BlackBerry device supports flash right now, period. I believe what it was referring to is the capability of playing a Flash video (FLV) - which is different from actual Flash support.

My replies are in Bold text.

Many thanks for clearing up these points for me.

By the way, you mention the MSM7600 chipset - do you know which chipset is used in the 9700 and 9000?

Originally Posted by secgena

By the way, you mention the MSM7600 chipset - do you know which chipset is used in the 9700 and 9000?

BlackBerry Bold 9000 - Marvell PXA930 @ 624MHz

BlackBerry Bold 9700 - from what I can find, also a Marvell PXA930 @ 624MHz according to most sources, some people are speculating that it runs faster, though.

I believe that MOST current GSM BlackBerries are running the PXA930, and MOST of the CDMA models run a Qualcomm chipset of some sort (since they are CDMA) - I do know that the 9500/9530; 9520/9550; and 9630 all seem to be running the MSM7600 though.


EDIT: Here are the specs for the MSM7600's 3D capabilities:

Blazing fast 3D graphics rivaling the best dedicated handheld gaming devices
• Advanced 2D/3D graphics support with up to 4 million 3D triangles per second,
and 133 million 3D textured pixels per second fill rate
• Q3Dimension™ rendering engine with OpenGL® ES-compliant 3D graphics
• Supported by leading third-party game titles
• Dedicated hardware accelerating the entire 3D rendering process
• Up to Video Graphics Array (VGA) resolution



EDIT2: I would also like to point out that it doesn't appear that the OpenGL capabilities will require an OS update, rather, will be availible to devs as soon as they download the new SDK.

Well I'm happy. My wife just got an iPod touch and man I'm jealous of the games she has. I can't wait for some awesome games to start coming out.

I'm bored, I think i'm gonna download the SDK and see if there are any OpenGL demos included.

Seems the 9700, 9000, Storm1, etc. are left out in the cold since it is reported on other sites that only the Storm 2 and the 8350 support OpenGL.

Why am I not surprised? Way to go RIM, thanks for the disappointment and the misleading info!

Originally Posted by secgena

Seems the 9700, 9000, Storm1, etc. are left out in the cold since it is reported on other sites that only the Storm 2 and the 8350 support OpenGL.

Why am I not surprised? Way to go RIM, thanks for the disappointment and the misleading info!

Key term being that it only supports the Storm2/Curve2 "for now". It could be they are still working on memory optimization to make it work for lower memory devices like the Storm 1. Still, if this is what RIM means, their initial press release should have clearly stated "Storm2/Curve2 support for now, with support for other devices coming in the future"

It is RIM's wishy-washy-ness that has caused me to make the decision to move away from the BB platform. Come Friday, I am getting a Droid.

EDIT: It would seem to me that RIM really missed the boat when they decided to only equip the Storm1 with 128MB of OneNAND (App memory) - considering the Storm1 was the flagship CDMA device when it came out, there is really no excuse for not using the 256MB OneNAND configuration.

where is the Tour sitting on this? it has plenty of memory and it's only a few months old...errr i might need to complain about it and upgrade it to an S2 lol..

Originally Posted by Bert336

where is the Tour sitting on this? it has plenty of memory and it's only a few months old...errr i might need to complain about it and upgrade it to an S2 lol..

We don't know about the Tour until 5.0 releases for it officially. I'd lean towards yes, since it's hardware is similar to the 8530's.

And complaining about lack of OpenGL support is NOT going to be grounds to upgrade to a different device, OpenGL support was never a listed spec to begin with.