Hardware acceleration in WPF

I was trying to run my simple application that uses some WPF features as
BitmapEffects and Opacity Mask into animations.

I saw that the task is very cpu intensive. So after I've read documentation
(http://windowssdk.msdn.microsoft.com.../ms742196.aspx) I found that my
application use the rendering tier 0 instead of 2 (I should expect)

My hardware is:
Intel Xeon 3GHz
1G Ram
AtiFireGL 3100 with 128
winXP + .net 3.0 (winFX may 06 CTP)
It should be ok for vista/wpf.

How does wpf decide if using GPU than CPU to make rendering operation?

Another question? Is OpenGL supported to work under WPF ? I have some OGL
based components that I would like to place in my wpf-GUI. I guess that if
wpf uses the D3D it locks the hardware so OGL can't run simultaneously on
graphic hardware? Am I right?
Is WPF team thinking to a solution?

Thanks a lot
alex

Hi,

As to the HW acceleration problem it is because OpacityMask uses software
rendering, that means that the cpu draws it. Peter from U2U told me this last
week. I would also like to know wich other features of WPF aren't rendered
using HW acceleration.

Thanks
Bruno Silva

"alex" wrote:

> I was trying to run my simple application that uses some WPF features as
> BitmapEffects and Opacity Mask into animations.
>
> I saw that the task is very cpu intensive. So after I've read documentation
> (http://windowssdk.msdn.microsoft.com.../ms742196.aspx) I found that my
> application use the rendering tier 0 instead of 2 (I should expect)
>
> My hardware is:
> Intel Xeon 3GHz
> 1G Ram
> AtiFireGL 3100 with 128
> winXP + .net 3.0 (winFX may 06 CTP)
> It should be ok for vista/wpf.
>
> How does wpf decide if using GPU than CPU to make rendering operation?
>
> Another question? Is OpenGL supported to work under WPF ? I have some OGL
> based components that I would like to place in my wpf-GUI. I guess that if
> wpf uses the D3D it locks the hardware so OGL can't run simultaneously on
> graphic hardware? Am I right?
> Is WPF team thinking to a solution?
>
> Thanks a lot
> alex
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>

The following page will tell you what's hardware accelerated and what's not
on different hardware.

http://windowssdk.msdn.microsoft.com...96(VS.80).aspx


"Bruno Silva" wrote:

> Hi,
>
> As to the HW acceleration problem it is because OpacityMask uses software
> rendering, that means that the cpu draws it. Peter from U2U told me this last
> week. I would also like to know wich other features of WPF aren't rendered
> using HW acceleration.
>
> Thanks
> Bruno Silva
>
> "alex" wrote:
>
> > I was trying to run my simple application that uses some WPF features as
> > BitmapEffects and Opacity Mask into animations.
> >
> > I saw that the task is very cpu intensive. So after I've read documentation
> > (http://windowssdk.msdn.microsoft.com.../ms742196.aspx) I found that my
> > application use the rendering tier 0 instead of 2 (I should expect)
> >
> > My hardware is:
> > Intel Xeon 3GHz
> > 1G Ram
> > AtiFireGL 3100 with 128
> > winXP + .net 3.0 (winFX may 06 CTP)
> > It should be ok for vista/wpf.
> >
> > How does wpf decide if using GPU than CPU to make rendering operation?
> >
> > Another question? Is OpenGL supported to work under WPF ? I have some OGL
> > based components that I would like to place in my wpf-GUI. I guess that if
> > wpf uses the D3D it locks the hardware so OGL can't run simultaneously on
> > graphic hardware? Am I right?
> > Is WPF team thinking to a solution?
> >
> > Thanks a lot
> > alex
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >

Note that new with June CTP, OpacityMask is HW accelerated.

-Adam Smith [MS]

"Brandon Furtwangler" <BrandonFurtwangler@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote
in message news:35BED37C-733A-4A71-98E4-F915C7A366C6@microsoft.com...
> The following page will tell you what's hardware accelerated and what's
> not
> on different hardware.
>
> http://windowssdk.msdn.microsoft.com...96(VS.80).aspx
>
>
> "Bruno Silva" wrote:
>
>> Hi,
>>
>> As to the HW acceleration problem it is because OpacityMask uses
>> software
>> rendering, that means that the cpu draws it. Peter from U2U told me this
>> last
>> week. I would also like to know wich other features of WPF aren't
>> rendered
>> using HW acceleration.
>>
>> Thanks
>> Bruno Silva
>>
>> "alex" wrote:
>>
>> > I was trying to run my simple application that uses some WPF features
>> > as
>> > BitmapEffects and Opacity Mask into animations.
>> >
>> > I saw that the task is very cpu intensive. So after I've read
>> > documentation
>> > (http://windowssdk.msdn.microsoft.com.../ms742196.aspx) I found that
>> > my
>> > application use the rendering tier 0 instead of 2 (I should expect)
>> >
>> > My hardware is:
>> > Intel Xeon 3GHz
>> > 1G Ram
>> > AtiFireGL 3100 with 128
>> > winXP + .net 3.0 (winFX may 06 CTP)
>> > It should be ok for vista/wpf.
>> >
>> > How does wpf decide if using GPU than CPU to make rendering operation?
>> >
>> > Another question? Is OpenGL supported to work under WPF ? I have some
>> > OGL
>> > based components that I would like to place in my wpf-GUI. I guess that
>> > if
>> > wpf uses the D3D it locks the hardware so OGL can't run simultaneously
>> > on
>> > graphic hardware? Am I right?
>> > Is WPF team thinking to a solution?
>> >
>> > Thanks a lot
>> > alex
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> >

That's great news! I'm going to update some of my apps that used OpacityMask.
Thanks!

"Adam Smith [MS]" wrote:

> Note that new with June CTP, OpacityMask is HW accelerated.
>
> -Adam Smith [MS]
>
> "Brandon Furtwangler" <BrandonFurtwangler@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote
> in message news:35BED37C-733A-4A71-98E4-F915C7A366C6@microsoft.com...
> > The following page will tell you what's hardware accelerated and what's
> > not
> > on different hardware.
> >
> > http://windowssdk.msdn.microsoft.com...96(VS.80).aspx
> >
> >
> > "Bruno Silva" wrote:
> >
> >> Hi,
> >>
> >> As to the HW acceleration problem it is because OpacityMask uses
> >> software
> >> rendering, that means that the cpu draws it. Peter from U2U told me this
> >> last
> >> week. I would also like to know wich other features of WPF aren't
> >> rendered
> >> using HW acceleration.
> >>
> >> Thanks
> >> Bruno Silva
> >>
> >> "alex" wrote:
> >>
> >> > I was trying to run my simple application that uses some WPF features
> >> > as
> >> > BitmapEffects and Opacity Mask into animations.
> >> >
> >> > I saw that the task is very cpu intensive. So after I've read
> >> > documentation
> >> > (http://windowssdk.msdn.microsoft.com.../ms742196.aspx) I found that
> >> > my
> >> > application use the rendering tier 0 instead of 2 (I should expect)
> >> >
> >> > My hardware is:
> >> > Intel Xeon 3GHz
> >> > 1G Ram
> >> > AtiFireGL 3100 with 128
> >> > winXP + .net 3.0 (winFX may 06 CTP)
> >> > It should be ok for vista/wpf.
> >> >
> >> > How does wpf decide if using GPU than CPU to make rendering operation?
> >> >
> >> > Another question? Is OpenGL supported to work under WPF ? I have some
> >> > OGL
> >> > based components that I would like to place in my wpf-GUI. I guess that
> >> > if
> >> > wpf uses the D3D it locks the hardware so OGL can't run simultaneously
> >> > on
> >> > graphic hardware? Am I right?
> >> > Is WPF team thinking to a solution?
> >> >
> >> > Thanks a lot
> >> > alex
> >> >
> >> >
> >> >
> >> >
> >> >
> >> >
> >> >
> >> >
>
>
>

I will try to address Alex's other questions

"alex" wrote:

> How does wpf decide if using GPU than CPU to make rendering operation?

It would depend on the capabilities of the card, and how they related to the
graphical operation being performed, as well as whether the GPU has available
resources, when on XP (texture memory - more about later). Some operations
may require intermediate software surfaces on some cards (likely without
PixelShader 2).

> Another question? Is OpenGL supported to work under WPF ? I have some OGL
> based components that I would like to place in my wpf-GUI. I guess that if
> wpf uses the D3D it locks the hardware so OGL can't run simultaneously on
> graphic hardware? Am I right?

On Windows Vista, the Direct3D team did an excellent job in introducing a
new driver model that enables the processing and resources of the GPU to be
virtualized and thereby shared by multiple applications (including OGL).

On XP, applications that want to use the HW contend for the resources,
whether Direct3D or OGL, as there is no arbiter allocating them.

Through hwnd host you can have OGL or Direct3D rendering take place within a
WPF application. When on XP, you may run into HW resource contention (have
parts or the whole application fallback to software). There is no "locking
of the hardware" per your question.

WPF handles the fallback to software automatically for you, for the other
graphics library, you have to do that work yourself as part of your
application.

-Pablo