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Xi Graphics has added support for Intel's GMA Family of graphics products to the Summit Series. Since Intel does not manufacture many models of add-in graphics cards, most of the Intel graphics support is in the Summit Series for Laptops. Currently that is the LX Series, but shortly a new Series - the "PX Series" - or the Portable Series (L for Laptop and M for Multi-head were already used, so we settled on the Portable designation).
Intel has given the Graphics Media Accelerator (GMA) Family a considerable boost for OpenGL applications with the inclusion of hardware support for Transform, Clipping, and Lighting (TCL). With that addition and the usual speed increases associated with time, laptops that utilize the GMA graphics instead of the ATI or Nvidia chips seem to have a considerable edge on battery life for users who need to use OpenGL for scientific work. Apparently blinding 3D performance speed using ATI/Nvidia chips is less important than the ability to get extra hours of battery life between recharges. And with Accelerated-X OpenGL, the loss of speed is actually not all that much, due to the large performance edge Summit has over the Xorg SW that ATI/Nvidia units use.
The variations of the hardware details within the GMA family make is impossible to create one graphics driver for all the laptops that use the chips. This means that each laptop maker has the flexibility (provided by Intel) to tweak their units for various reasons, resulting in the need for Xi Graphics to have to have at least one mofel made by each manufacturer. As in the past, the first customer that loans us their laptop (that does not work with the posted demos) for testing will get a free license. Over time, we will have figured out most of the"tweaks" and have them covered in the demos. Just in time for Intel to introduce a new line ;-).
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