Engineers at Advanced Rotorcraft Technology Inc. in Mountain View, Calif., needed to cut the price of their FLIGHTLAB Pilot Workstations without sacrificing performance. So they selected Sunnyvale, Calif.-based Quantum3D`s Obsidian family of real-time 3-D graphics accelerators for the workstation visualization subsystems.
Quantum3D`s Obsidian family of scaleable, real-time 3-D graphics accelerators enable PCs to deliver 3D graphics with performance levels equivalent to those of high-end graphics workstations and image generators, company officials claim.
The graphics enable FLIGHTLAB to run detailed simulations in real time, concurrently with realistic terrain and visuals at 30 to 60 frames per second, says Ross Smith, vice president of sales and marketing at Quantum3D. While the numbers remain the same the improvement is in the cost, he adds.
FLIGHTLAB runs the simulation on Intel PCs coupled with Obsidian graphics boards and OpenGVS at an entry level price of $15,000 - which is less than one tenth the cost of competitive solutions based on workstations and proprietary image generators, officials say.
The FLIGHTLAB Pilot Workstation is the first real-time high-fidelity solution for helicopter design, analysis, and flight dynamic operational simulation and training that employs PCs rather than UNIX-based graphics workstations or image generators, according to a company statement. - J.M.
For more information on Quantum 3D`s obsidian graphics accelerators, contact Ross Smith by phone at 408-747-1020, by fax at 408-747-1510, by mail at 1200 Crossman Ave., Sunnyvale, Calif. 94089, or by e-mail at [email protected].
